A business plan falls on the desk of an investor. They pick up the document and begin to read. A few pages in it has become crystal clear that this is the same plan they read earlier in the week, sometime last month, or dozens of times over the past year. While it may be written on different paper by a different management team, the business plan is obviously a “me too” document.

What is a “Me Too” business plan? It is a document that outlines a business model or strategy that closely mimics that of competitors in the market without bringing anything new or original to the table. It outlines a path that is already heavily travelled by competitors. It does not clearly identify why you will do it better than your competitors, or why you are taking a different approach from those that have already tried and failed. It jumps upon the latest “it” business model without directly addressing the issue of how you will differ from the hundreds or thousands of others on that same bandwagon.

In the hyper competitive and crowded business environment in which we all operate, it is critical to create a plan for your company that clearly, concisely and compelling demonstrates how you will succeed by taking a road that is all your own.

• Is it the composition, quality, or pricing of your products and services?
• Is it your ability to provide better value and service to your customers?
• Is it your ability to address a segment of the market which is either not served or underserved by your competitors?
• Is it the depth and experience of your team (be realistic here)?

Why is it so important to avoid a “Me Too” business plan? Because most investors review hundreds of business plans each year and if they can not quickly recognize in your document what makes you better and different than other similar concepts, you are doomed for the NO pile.

Good Luck!

Business planning is one of the most critical steps to online or offline business success. It is so much easier to work from a blueprint, when running a business, than it is to work without direction. When you work without any guidance or sense of direction, you get blown with the wind. You get lost in a sea of problems.

When you have a good business plan you can follow it to achieve your life’s dreams. You can modify it as you work from it so that your plan remains relevant at all times. A business plan is the route map to your wildest financial aspirations. All the more reason why you should pay attention to its preparation.

A business plan is a strategic document that manifests the principle of thinking before acting. As a strategic document it details the long term plan to be followed, covering a period of 3-5 years. A business plan is also a tactical document in that it is best constructed at a detailed level that makes the forecasts reasonably accurate over the first year.

Many obstacles stand in the way of constructing a business plan, and this article discusses four of them… being unsure of how to implement a plan, failure to recognise the need for regular updates, ignorance of product planning, and ignorance of marketing planning. The article also proposes solutions to these and other business planning problems.

IMPLEMENTATION

What is implementation? Why must we implement a business plan? How do we implement it? Implementation is the process of acting on a plan. We follow it and apply its findings, while watching the business environment for any significant changes. When there are changes we take them into account by modifying the plan. If the changes are minor we make only tactical changes. If they are major we make strategic changes.

It is one thing to plan, but it is a completely different matter implementing the plan to achieve the desired results. To succeed we must be disciplined while remaining flexible. We must also be objective in our assessments so that we can accurately monitor progress, and we must be ruthless in correcting deviant behaviour. Sometimes this means sacking incompetent personnel and hiring better ones. We shall deal with other implementation issues later.

UPDATES

Why must we update a business plan? A plan must always be up-to-date if it is to remain relevant. You don’t want to follow an outdated plan or it will lead your business astray. An updated plan is one that responds to environmental changes by listening for such changes and using them to adjust its methods.

The necessity to keep a plan relevant means that we must conduct business planning every year. The plan must cover a 3-5 year period in order to incorporate strategic elements. But what are the details behind updating a business plan? We shall discuss this later.

PRODUCT PLAN

A business sells products to make money. As such it must engage in product development or acquisition. What is a product plan? Why do we need a product plan? How do we develop a product plan? How do we implement a product plan? We shall deal with these questions soon.

MARKETING PLAN

Marketing is about bringing customers to your business. Without customers your business can’t survive. You can’t get customers if they don’t like your products or services. Therefore product planning must be driven by marketing considerations.

First you determine what your potential customers want and then you give it to them in the form of products or services. But what is a marketing plan? Why do we need a marketing plan? And how do we develop a marketing plan? These questions will be addressed soon.

Now let us turn to the answers to this and other questions mentioned above… Unfortunately, we do not have enough space in this article to address the aforementioned questions. So we have prepared a special page with all the answers you need. Before directing you to that page let us first summarise what we have done here.

FINAL REMARKS

This article has discussed a number of key problems that you will face when you try to construct a business plan. The problems include…

1. Your lack of skill in implementing a business plan.

2. Your failure to recognise the need for regular updates.

3. Your ignorance of product planning.

4. You ignorance of marketing planning.

The article also points at the solutions you must undertake to resolve these problems. The link to these solutions is provided below.

Are you at a point with your business where you just don’t know what to do next?
Do you have a business plan?
How about a growth business plan?

Have you looked at a lot of different ways to grow your business and nothing seems to work?

The right growth business plan could be your answer. If a growth business plan is done the right way it may open up some opportunities you have never thought about before. A growth business plan can be developed many different ways but I would like to discuss a growth business plan that you may have never thought about.

Here is the way I would encourage you to set up a growth business plan:

• Do some dreaming about what you would like your lifestyle to be
• By dreaming decide on an average income you would like to have over the next few years
• Decide how many years out you would like your plan to cover
• Decide how much profit you would like for your business to generate above the income you want for yourself.
• Set up a profit and loss statement of your existing business or your proposed business
• With the right business knowledge and a profit and loss statement you can actually use that data to see what your business would need to do for you to give you that income and profit
• Even better you can determine what size market you would need and even determine whether your market would support your business presently and in the future.

To me a small business is one of the best things you can have if you enjoy operating a business; however, it does require a lot more than just enjoying ownership and running a business. Especially if you are starting a small business and even if you have had a business for many years, you should know what you want for your future. Never guess about your business. You see, without a plan, you are just guessing. We business people work hard and we always continue to hope for the best but when we guess, we’re taking a lot of risks. You’ve probably heard the old saying from an unknown author that says, “If you fail to plan, then plan to fail.”

As a matter of fact, did you know that the Small Business Administration says that 50% of small business owners will fail sometime during their first 5 years? There are lots of reasons but one big one is that owners don’t have a plan. Another is they have picked a product or service that doesn’t have a big enough market to sustain their business and sometime during their future they will run out of customers.

Now as I said, there are many other reasons too.

After graduating from college, I started out in manufacturing as an engineer in a pretty large company and now, 45 years later, retiring as a of Director of Manufacturing, I have discovered an awful lot about business. Not only did I learn and teach a lot about business, I worked with small business owners as well. I’ve learned that it comes down to this. Too many owners work hard in their business but less on their business.

Do you work on your business as much as you work in your business? Do you ever dream about having a good lifestyle but just haven’t quite figured out what to do about it. Have you ever thought about seeing what your business would need to do to give you those dreams? Developing a growth business plan could be the answer.

So, why should you make a growth business plan? Well in simple terms you need to know where you’re going and how and when you’re going to get there.

Some of the questions a growth business plan might ask you are:

– Are you comfortable that the market wants and is willing to buy your product or service?
– Is your product or service priced so it is competitive in your market?
– What’s different about your product or service? Why would a customer purchase it over someone else’s?
– Is your market big enough to support your business? What about 15 years into the future?
– If you wanted a better lifestyle, what would your business need to do to give you that lifestyle?
– How much sales would your business need to generate to give you that income?
– How much sales would your business need to generate to give you the income you want 15 years into the future?
– What will be the cost of your labor and material?
– What will your expenses run?
– How much will it cost to overcome the capacity constraints that will occur as your business grows to meet your income requirements?
– Will your profit give you the income you want in the future and at the same time maintain a healthy business for you as well?

If you develop a good Profit & Loss Statement for your existing business for the current year or for the first year of your proposed business, you can use this data to actually project how much sales you would need to yield the income you want and the profit margin you want. You can plan ahead as far as you want. Sound impossible? It’s actually pretty simple and can be pretty accurate plan.

A plan like this would show you how much sales your business would need to do, what your fixed and variable expenses would be, what your material cost, labor cost and profit would need to be to provide the income and profit margin you want. You can see pretty quickly if it’s possible for you to get your business to that level. I don’t know of any better way than to have your business give you the income and profit you want. What’s neat is you can determine what you want your income to be and your profit to be over the next few years and develop a plan that can show you exactly what your business would need to do to give you that income and profit.

And with just a little more data you can actually determine how many customers you would need for each year you plan for and how many leads you would need. From that you can actually determine what size market you would need and whether your market is big enough to supply those leads that could be converted into customers.

Learn more about how to develop a growth business plan. Visit http://www.StrategicBusinessSolutionsLLC.com