Business plans are essential pieces of business literature that outline your overall business direction, goals, and practices. While a well-written business plan is not guaranteed to drop success in your lap, it can help set you up for it. A business plan that sticks with your stakeholders and lenders is one that generates revenue. Is your business meeting its goals? Is your business successful? Here are five things you can include that will help you write a business plan that you are proud of.
Executive Summary
When writing your executive summary and your description of your business, do you include only useful information? Does your descriptive summary portray effective business practices? If your business plan is written for specific stakeholders or specific lenders for a specific project or market segment, your business description should accentuate those aspects of your business with no underperforming business or market segments.
Market Analysis
Anyone can study business trends and document buyers within geographic areas or within market segments, but can you show interest in your products and services? Consistent sales receipts from the same customers within a market segment and receipts from new customers demonstrate that your business has grown.
Service or Products
The value of your products available in your inventory is an asset which can be figured into the net worth of your business. Products in inventory or products needed to perform services demonstrate that your business is ready to meet the needs of its customers. New products and the volume of products added to your inventory indicate prosperity.
Marketing and Sales
Your sales in response to your marketing efforts demonstrate your effectiveness. Employing new methods to expand into new markets such as a CRM program can help you increase and catalog your sales volume. CRM programs can generate extensive financial reports on your customers and those who show interest in your products. This type of information can be helpful to include in your business plan to showcase your customer base.
Financial Projections
The most influential financial projection in your portfolio is your monthly cash flow. Your accounts receivable demonstrate sound business practices if you efficiently convert your products and services into cash flow. Accounts receivable is a short-term asset, and you can get a line of credit or a short-term loan with it as collateral. Including these facts and projections in your business plan can help stakeholders develop a steady grasp of your business’s finances.