What Goes Into A Good Business Plan?

Writing a business plan can be a lot of hard work or itOBJECTIVES. This is what you want to achieve in the
can be great fun. An effective plan can help yourperiod your business plan covers. It is said that good
company to greatness. A poor one can lead you outobjectives are SMART. That is specific, measurable,
of business. No plan is like asking to fail before youachievable, realistic and targeted. Here's an example of
even start.a SMART objective for a hypothetical business.
Not every business needs a 200 page bound business"By the end of this year we will have increased sales
plan. However every business needs to have someof product X by 7.5% over the previous year."
idea of where they want to go and how they areYou can see how clear this objective is. It is much
going to get there. This article covers some keyeasier to achieve high performance with clear
insights into writing a business plan that get yourobjectives.
business to where you want to be.Now you need to outline your STRATEGY. How are
The first stage of any plan is ANALYSIS. You need toyou going to reach you objective(s)? This is where
take a very objective look at a number of factors thatyour marketing plan often comes in as it helps
may impact your business. There are many factors todescribe the programs you will run to achieve your
consider but the two major ones are competition anddesired objective(s). To continue the example above
your operating environment.our strategy may be to gain distribution for our product
Let's look first at competition. Every business hasin one new major retail chain.
competition, even if you think your product or service isTo make your strategy work you must then allocate
unique. How is this? Well it's quite simple really, peopleappropriate RESOURCES. Certain things will need to
have choices to make. The most fundamental choicebe provided to reach your goal. This could be dollars,
they make in most cases is whether to buy what youpeople, equipment, etc. Your plan must have included
offer or but something else. For example I could buy athe resources you are allocating and why you believe
game console or I could buy groceries instead.this is adequate to get the result.
Customers only have so much money available soEvery business plans also has some PROJECTIONS.
you first task is to ask yourself what is my competitionThis is your basic financials that you plan will deliver.
like and can I beat them? The more you understandAre you expecting a profit or loss? How much?
your competition the more you can develop yourLastly you need to allow for CONTINGENCIES. Things
business strategy of being different and outperformingchange all the time and your plan needs to consider
them.these possibilities in advance. A good way to do this is
Now let's look at operating environment. This isto ask What if?
understanding what factors around your area ofWhat if a new competitor enters our market?
operation are likely to affect your businessWhat if a distributor delists our product?
performance. For some companies this includes lookingWhat if interest rates rise?
around the World in other cases it's just your localYour analysis should give you some idea of likely
neighbourhood. You need to ask questions such as:contingencies. It saves a lot of stress if you have
How is the economy going?some documented ideas for dealing with them before
What is consumer confidence like?they become a big problem.
Where is technology heading in my industry?Writing a business plan is never perfect, the plan is on
After answering all the questions you need to decidepaper and you're operating in the real world. However
how these might negatively or positively influence youra good plan can really guide you in the right direction.
performance.Take time to put real thought into preparing your plan
Now you know more about your competition andan above all make sure you USE YOUR PLAN!
operating environment it's time to set some