Posted on October 04, 2009 by Vera Raposo

Many small business owners get overwhelmed when it comes to the necessity of writing their business plan.  It doesn’t have to be as hard as it may seem.

Unless you are looking for major financial funding from a bank or other loan institutions, a simple business plan that includes answers to the following questions will be perfect for your small business purposes.

1.  Where am I now with my business?

2.  Where do I want to be with my business?  If you see your deadlines in front of you as you work your business, you’ll be more likely to meet them.  Break this answer down into a timeline to make it easier, using 6 months, 1 year, 5 years, 10 years, or whatever times work for your particular business.

If you are looking for a way to get a bit more detailed with your plan or you forsee needing it to request funding later, you may want to devote more time and attention.  You can still easily do this by devoting no more than one page to each section of your business plan.

Page 1 – Overview

Include your vision (possibilities) for the company, the purpose (why you started your business) of creating the company and the mission (plans for achieving) of the company.

Page 2 – Business Information

Here is where you would include information about yourself including name, business name and entity, address and phone number.

You’ll also want to summarize your business objectives on this page.  List your goals and how you plan to reach them.  Including what you’ll do to create a profit and what tools and resources you plan to use to do so.

Page 3 – Market & Customers

Answer the following questions in this section of your plan.
- Target market – Who are they? Where are they? How many?  What do you need to know about them?  Why do they need your service?  Is the market growing?  Give specifics about growth and spending habits.  Do as much research on your market as you can and put it in this section, including any barriers or hard to overcome issues.

Page 4 – Competition

Who are your competitors?  What makes you different and the same as those competitors?  How are you competing with them? With price, quality, etc?  How will your market feel about you compared to your competitors.

Page 5 – Marketing

This is a bit like your competition section because you’ll want to discuss how you will market your business products or services.  What makes your business unique?

No matter which method you use to create your business plan, be sure you are answering each of the questions to make it efficient for it’s purpose.  Whether it’s for you or someone else, the ulitmate goal of a business plan is to keep you on track and focused and working toward growth.  As your business grows don’t forget to update your plan to grow with it as well.

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