How my business plan has changed…

Week 4 of my Business Plan Development class, and based on what I have learned from the class and from reading about Mark Cuban and Marin Zwilling there are some things I had to reconsider when doing my business plan. The first thing I had to reconsider was the cost of my company’s services. Mark points out that investors need to see that you will be profitable within 90 days and at first this was not clear. By changing my prices but still offering the services at an affordable price, my projected income now reflects a profit. Along with changing the initial service price, I changed the price a little each year and increased the amount of services provided accordingly and this too helped to prove to investors that my company would give them a return on their investment.

A piece of advice Martin gives on not being negative in your business plan something that I thought about when doing the target market and competition sections of my business plan. Martin says not to talk about competitors or customers in areas the company can’t back up. Naturally when writing in these two sections I wanted to make the company stand out and show how many customers we would reach, but I had to remember Martin’s advice and take a step back.  First I had to really look and see who my target market was. Because my service could potentially be offered to any age group I had to think who would mostly likely be benefiting from my services. So with that in mind I took into consideration the fact that other companies or organizations would mostly use my service, and then think about their target market. After doing this I was able to come up with more clear and representative target market.  

Learning from the class, Mark, and Martin I think the target market, competition, and financial sections are most important in the business plan. To me these sections are most important if you are trying to gain investors. By making sure each of these sections are strong and truly show your company investors can see the full potential of your company. This shows what market is, who is already in the market, and the potential money you can make; which for an investor is most important. If there is no market, there is no competition, and there is no profit.

Resources:

·      http://bpexpertviews.blogspot.com/

·      http://articles.businessinsider.com/2009-02-10/tech/30004645_1_business-plan-funding-entrepreneurs

·      http://www.forbes.com/sites/martinzwilling/2011/02/04/ten-top-investor-turnoffs-around-business-plans/

Writing a successful business plan

If you are thinking of starting your own business then you know you must have a business plan and that business plan needs to be able to show investors why they should invest in you. So if you are like me and would like some sound advice on how to make sure you business plan is the best and gives you the best results, here is some advice from two experts on writing a business plan.  The first expert is Mark Cuban.

Mark Cuban is the owner of the Dallas Mavericks, successful businessman, and billionaire entrepreneur. Mark’s best area of business is in Internet business. One key piece of advice Mark gives about writing your business plan is to ask yourself, is there an actual need for the product or service. Asking this question is so important because if your service or product is not one that is needed, then investors will not see the need invest their money into a business that will not give them a good return on investment. Mark has recently started a new platform for entrepreneurs to seek funding from him for their own business. He gives the entrepreneurs 12 rules if they want to receive funding from him, and one that stands out to me is the rule that the business plan must show that it will be profitable within 90 days. This too shows the investor that the business will bring in income and they will receive money back on their investment. Mark has confirmed to receive money; you must show that you will bring in money.

Martin Zwilling is the second expert I researched. Martin Zwilling is the CEO and Founder of Startup Professional, Inc. He has been published in Forbes, Harvard Business Review, and Business Insider writing about business plans, so I would say he knows what he is talking about and the business world agrees. Zwilling gives me a different look with regards to my business plan has he explains what turns off investors. This is equally important because by knowing what not to do you know more on what to do. He gives 10 things that turn of investors in his Forbes article and one that stuck out to me was “don’t be negative”. Zwilling explains not to talk about your competitors or customers in areas you can’t back up. If you are making a statement about your competitors and customers it should be supported by third-party data. I found this to be key, because it is easy to think and speak about competitors and customers from our own point of view, which is probably in favor of our business. By having third party data it shows investors that we have proof, like having creditable sources in a research paper.

Both Mark Cuban and Martin Zwilling have great tips on how to have a successful business plan. I will be using what I learned from each of them in creating my business plan. If you are planning on starting your own business, I suggest taking a look at the articles each of them have done on business plans.

Resources: 

  http://bpexpertviews.blogspot.com/

  

http://articles.businessinsider.com/2009-02-10/tech/30004645_1_business-plan-funding entrepreneurs

http://www.forbes.com/sites/martinzwilling/2011/02/04/ten-top-investor-turnoffs-around-business-plans/