August 31, 2005
Using Census Data in Your Business Plan
One of the biggest hurdles many business plan writers face is finding data to use in their plans. Using actual data adds credibility to your business plan and increases the chance that someone will give you the funding that you need. If you are looking for information on your target market, the Census Bureau Fact Finder website is a great resource. Visit this website at factfinder.census.gov.
Using the data on the census website, you can find the size of your target market, the age distribution, facts about the community, and more. The best part is that all of this data is FREE!
To get a feel for the type of information that you can look up, enter your zip code on the first page of the website. You can see the population, the age distribution, the gender of the region, race, average household size, education, employment, etc. Much of this data will be very useful for your business plan.
Posted by Jon at 10:10 AM | Comments (1)
August 26, 2005
Writing an Executive Summary
One of the most important sections of your business plan is the executive summary.
Columbia University has created a great site to assist with writing the executive summary. You can find this information at this page.
Here are a few tips from the article:
1. Scan your business plan to determine what the content, structure and length of the report would be.
2. Highlight key points.
3. Review your business plan and determine what the key ideas or concepts are.
4. Group ideas in a logical fashion and prepare a point form outline of the summary.
5. Edit the outline to eliminate secondary or minor points; use your judgement to keeping the summary concise.
6. Determine whether subtitles, bullets, selective bolding or some other type of organizational structure will add to the clarity of your summary.
7. Write the summary in your own words, using a professional style.
8. Read it aloud or even tape record yourself reading your summary.
Posted by Jon at 3:02 PM | Comments (0)
August 22, 2005
Common small business legal mistakes
Legal issues are some of the hardest issues for small business owners to understand. We recommend consulting with an attorney before starting your business. The attorney will be able to help you make correct decisions regarding the business type, employment questions, etc. When you are writing your business plan these issues are also very important.
Here are a few legal issues that small business owners often overlook.
1. Forgetting to "put it in writing"
2. Poorly written employment agreements
3. No attorney for your company
4. Poor knowledge of the law
5. Improperly kept records
6. Incomplete or unclear partnership agreements
7. Working with the wrong buiness type
This information is summarized from an article at Allbusiness.com. Please visit this website for the complete text.
Posted by Jon at 10:08 AM | Comments (0)
PTEN Announces VERGE Finalists
The Piedmont Triad Entrepreneurial Network has announced the finalists for its VERGE business plan competition. The final awards will be announced on January 27. The VERGE business plan competition is for biotechnology, entertainment, retail, and the transportation industries.
The six business plan competition finalists are AstaPharma Inc., Best One Card, The BioMarker Group, Clear Defense, Medication Management Partners, Parking Revolution, and Transportation Systems Solution. $36,000 in prize money will be awarded to the six finalists.
Posted by Jon at 10:00 AM | Comments (0)
August 18, 2005
Describing Intellectual Property In Your Business Plan
This article is by Dave Lavinsky and was printed on WebPro News. You can view the complete article at this link.
When a company is a complete start-up, and no milestones have been accomplished, the plan should focus on past accomplishments of the management team as an indicator of the company's ability to execute successfully.
Most companies that are worthy of raising venture capital have proprietary Intellectual Property (IP). In fact, the quality of the IP and the management team are often the two most important aspects of a venture capitalist's investment decision.
The challenge that many ventures face, however, is that most investors will not sign non-disclosure agreements (NDAs), and NDAs are critical to maintaining the proprietary nature of the IP. This article details the appropriate strategy for addressing proprietary IP in your business plan in order to attract investor attention while retaining the confidentiality of your inventions.
Focus on the Benefits of and Applications of the IP: The business plan should not discuss the confidential aspects of the IP. Rather, the plan should discuss the benefits of the IP. Remember that even the most amazing of technologies will not excite investors unless it has tangible benefits to customers.
The business plan first needs to discuss the products and services into which the IP will be integrated. It then must detail the benefits that these products and services have to customers and differentiate them from competitive products. When applicable, it is helpful to include non-confidential drawings and backup materials of the products and services in the Appendix.
Focus on Customer Needs and the Relevant Market Size: The business plan must also discuss how the benefits of the IP fulfill a large customer need. To accomplish this, the plan needs to detail customer wants and needs and prove that the company's offerings specifically meet these needs.
Secondly, the plan needs to discuss the marketplace in which the IP is offered and the size of this marketplace. Critical to this analysis is determining the relevant market size. The relevant market size equals a company's sales if it were to capture 100% of its specific niche of the market. For example, a medical device's market size would not be the trillion dollar healthcare market, but rather the sales of all competing medical devices.
Focus on Competition and Competitive Differentiation: Your business plan must also prove that your IP is better than competitive inventions. In identifying competitors, note that listing no or few competitors has a negative connotation. It implies that there may not be a large enough customer need to support the company's products and/or services. On the other hand, should there be too many competitors, then the market may be too saturated to support the profitability of a new entrant. The answer -- any company that also serves the customer needs that you serve should be considered a competitor.
The business plan should detail both the positive and negative aspects of competitors' IP and products/services and validate that your offerings are either superior in general, or are superior in serving a specific customer niche.
Prove that you can Execute on the Opportunity: As importantly as proving the quality of the IP and that a vast market exists for its applications, the business plan most prove that the company can successfully execute on the opportunity.
The plan should detail the company's past accomplishments, including descriptions and dates when prior funding rounds were received, products and services were launched, revenue milestones were reached, key partnerships were executed, etc.
When a company is a complete start-up, and no milestones have been accomplished, the plan should focus on past accomplishments of the management team as an indicator of the company's ability to execute successfully.
Results: Getting Investors to Sign the NDA: If you are able to convince the prospective investor that the IP is integrated into a product/service which yields real customer benefits in a large market, then the investor will take the quality of the invention for granted when reviewing the plan. Later, during the due diligence process, the investor will review the actual technology. At this point, a discussion regarding signing an NDA would be appropriate.
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About the Author:
As President of Growthink, Dave Lavinsky has helped the company become one of the premier business plan development firms. Since its inception, Growthink has developed over 200 business plans. Growthink clients have collectively raised over $750 million in financing, launched numerous new product and service lines and gained competitive advantage and market share. Growthink has become the firm of choice for venture capital firms, angel investors, corporations and entrepreneurs in the know. For more information please visit http://www.growthink.com.
Posted by Jon at 1:30 PM | Comments (0)
The Small Business Administration
One of the greatest resources for any small business owner is the Small Business Administration, or the SBA.
The SBA was formed to help small business succeed. On its website you will find information on topics such as business law and regulations, training, business grants, news, forms, and even a library with helpful information.
One great resource on the SBA website is the Free Online Entrepreneurship Course. You can take this course by visiting this website.
Posted by Jon at 1:25 PM | Comments (0)
August 15, 2005
Welcome to the Business Plan Blog
This weblog has been created to bring Business Plan resources on the internet together. We hope to find interesting websites, news articles, and software that will assist small business owners with their quest for independance.
If you have comments or suggestions for the Business Plan Blog, please add a comment to this post.
Thanks!
Posted by Jon at 11:07 AM | Comments (0)