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all-insights,
BUSINESS & FINANCIAL MODELING

The Business Plan That Wins the Investor
Camille Beyrouthy

2022-11-29 17:05:07+00:00

1: Write Your Executive Summary

Start with a summary that provides a quick glance to the entire business plan, a snapshot to what you are simply talking about. Remember, some of the people reading it don't always have time to read the entire document, specially a busy investor analyst. So your executive summary should include important aspects of your plan. Spend enough time to perfect it. below is an executive summary from a business plan template :
Your executive summary should include:
  • Key objectives
  • Market research
  • Competition info
  • Products/services
  • Value proposition
  • Overview of your financial plan
  • Your go-to-market plan
Note: leave the executive summary as the last part to complete such that you can better summarize everything you’ve already created.

2: Put Together Your Company Description

Next, write a description of your business and the main offerings: it would include your mission statement and objectives, with a brief company history, and motivation for starting it. You may also briefly describe your business formation details from a legal perspective.

Mission Statement

Your mission statement is a simple “why” you started this business. What are you trying to achieve? Or what does your business solve? It can go from one single quote or a small concise paragraph, not longer than that. In fact, this should be a kind of value proposition, concisely put.

Objectives

Your goals? What are you planning to achieve in the first 6 month or one year with your entity? the long lasting impact it will leave on the market? Those points are good to include in this section so anyone reading it can get an idea of what you are aiming to achieve

History or Overview

What led you to put this document together and plan to start this business. If otherwise that's another iteration and/or another approach let potential investors know the history. Be very transparent and don't try to hide it if that is the case. Your goal then would be to explain what the business does or its future achievement

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3: Conduct Your Market Analysis

Your third step is to conduct a market analysis so you know how your business will fit into its target market. This page in your business plan is simply meant to summarize your findings. Most of your time should be spent actually doing the research. Your market analysis needs to look at things like:
  • Market size, and its dynamics (growing/stable)
  • Target Segment
  • Demographics of target segment
  • The expected demand of your products/services
  • Your competitive advantage
  • Estimate of average price of your products/services

4: Research Your Competition

Your next step is to conduct a competitive analysis. While you likely touched on this briefly during your market analysis, now is the time to do a deep dive so that you have a good grasp on what your competitors are doing and how they are generating customers. Start by creating a profile of all your existing competitors, or at the very least, your closest competitors – the ones who are offering very similar products or services to you, or are in a similar vicinity (if you’re opening a brick and mortar store). Focus on their strengths and what they’re doing really well so that you can emulate their best qualities in your own way. Then, look at their weaknesses and what your business can do better. Take note of their current marketing strategy, including the outlets you see a presence, whether it’s on social media, you hear a radio ad, you see a TV ad, etc. You won’t always find all of their marketing channels, but see what you can find online and on their website. After this, take a minute to identify potential competitors based on markets you might try out in the future, products or services you plan to add to your offerings, and more. Then put together a page or two in your business plan that highlights your competitive advantage and how you’ll be successful breaking into the market.

5: Outline Your Products or Services

Step five is to dedicate a page to the products or services that your business plans to offer. Put together a quick list and explanation of what each of the initial product or service offerings will be, but steer clear of industry jargon or buzzwords. This should be written in plain language so anyone reading has a full understanding of what your business will do. You can have a simple list like we see in the sample page above, or you can dive a little deeper. Depending on your type of business, it might be a good idea to provide additional information about what each product or service entails.

 

6: Summarize Your Financial Plan

Next is the hard and serious part: the financial data of your new business. What are the overhead costs? How will generate enough money to cover your expenses? What are your estimated expenses and profits over the first 12 months to a year? A lot will go into your financial plan, so make sure you will allocate enough time to prepare it. you will need an expert to help you, if you are not financially literate. most investors have a sharp eye, that can pon point any inconsistencies in your model, and they will grill you on it ! Investors will use your numbers to understand if proposal is viable, and if so , they have a team of seasoned analysts that will double check your numbers. Your financial plan would include the following sections:
Sample Income Statement
Sales Forecast: The first thing you want to include is a forecast or financial projection of how much you think your business can sell over the next year or so. Break this down into the different products, services or facets of your business.
Balance Sheet: This section is essentially a statement of your company’s financial position. It includes existing assets, liabilities and equity to demonstrate the company’s overall financial health.
Income Statement: Also known as a profit and loss statement (P&L), this covers your projected expenses and revenue, showcasing whether your business will be profitable or not.
Operating Budget: A detailed outline of your business’s income and expenses. This should showcase that your business is bringing in more than it’s spending.
Cash Flow Statement: This tracks how much cash your business has at any given point, regardless of whether customers or clients have paid their bills or have 30-60+ days to do so.
While these are the most common financial statements, you may discover that there are other sections that you want to include or that lenders may want to see from you.
You can automate the process of looking through your documents with an OCR API, which will collect the data from all your financial statements and invoices.

7: Determine Your Marketing Strategy

The next step is coming up with a successful marketing plan so that you can actually get the word out about your business. Throughout your business plan, you’ve already researched your competitors and your target market both of which are major components of a good marketing strategy. You need to know who you’re marketing to, and you want to do it better than your competition. On this page or throughout this section of your business plan, you need to focus on your chosen marketing channels and the types of marketing content you plan to create. Start by taking a look at the channels that your competitors are on and make sure you have a good understanding of the demographics of each channel as well. You don’t want to waste time on a marketing channel that your target audience doesn’t use. Then, create a list of each of your planned marketing avenues. It might look something like:
  • Social media (Facebook, Instagram)
  • Blogs
  • Email newsletter
  • Video
Depending on the type of business you’re starting, this list could change quite a bit — and that’s okay. There is no one-size-fits-all marketing strategy, and you need to find the one that brings in the highest

8: Showcase Your Organizational Chart

Your last section will be all about your leadership and management team members. Showcasing that you have a solid team right from the start can make potential investors feel better about funding your venture. You can easily put together an organizational chart like the one below, with the founder/CEO at the top and each of your team leaders underneath alongside the department they’re in charge of. Simply add an organizational chart like this as a page into your overall business plan and make sure it matches the rest of your design to create a cohesive document. click here for our Business Plan Templates / sorted by corporate size

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