How To Write A Business Plan To Start Your Own Business?

As a fresh business owner in Australia, an important part of the process that comes before implementation is your business plan. The business plan is set up to be your go-to blueprint to make the objectives and intentions of your business clear. It is a document of your research, and is supported by enough evidence.

From informing new and future employees/venture capitalists what your plans are for the company, to obtaining funding at any point through your journey in the small business owner game; this document will go a long way.

According to Forbes, a whopping new 17% of business owners fail due to weak or vague business plans. This is why it is important to make sure that what you’re writing is clear, concise and to the point.

In this article, we provide an outline on what you should be clear about when writing a business plan.

To make it easy, we’ve broken it down into 5 key parts :

1.The Business

In this section, the organisational structure of the company is explored. A clear description of the product and/or services is provided. This section should describe how you can be set apart from other businesses and highlights your USP (Unique Selling Point). You can also mention possible insurance plans that might suit the size of your outfit. This shows afterthought and depth in how far you have covered your tracks in the business.

2.The Market

Understanding your competitors is key. You can only set yourself apart from the other brands once you understand and research their products and services. Here, we explore the objectives of your business over your main competition. If you also have an idea on what kind of strategy you’d like to advertise your business with, it can be mentioned in this section. Doing a SWOT(Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities & Threats) analysis is recommended in this case. Doing so would allow you to identify the gaps in your market, and make it easier to identify what kind of audience you should be targeting.

3.The Future

In this part of the plan, your vision and mission must be clearly mentioned. Ideas for expansion, and potential for growth needs to be identified and supported with fact-based evidence. While it is important to have present vision, forethought will show initiative. It is highly proactive, and will allow your growth to be smoother. Planning the future of a business is like finding the next rung of a ladder, so you always know what your next step in the business is.

4.The Finances

The most important part of your business would be to understand how to assign your assets and invests any funds that come in. For any future investors to understand how they will benefit from your expenditure, this section has to be extremely detailed and efficient in describing how you should funnel the cash flow.

5.Summarise

Elevator pitches are a concept that exists for a reason. For the executive summary, condensing your plan into a few sentences will help put your information into an easily digestible nugget of information for people to absorb. Always summarise with efficiency and cover all important first impressions you think the reader/investor should have.