How do I write a good business plan?

Question

There are several benefits to writing a business plan, but as someone who never wrote one up, I would like to know, for a small, one man business:

How should I approach writing one?
What should it include?
What shouldn't it include?
What scope/size should it be?

I believe this is open to discussion. How should I approach writing one? - No definite answer! What should it include? - No definite answer! What shouldn't it include? - No definite answer! What scope/size should it be? - No definite answer! — bPratik, May 31 '13 at 14:04
By all means. Trying to figure out good questions for this beta is hard! — Oded, May 31 '13 at 14:05
@bPratik - which kinda brings one to the conclusion that the topic may not be a good SE topic :( — Oded, May 31 '13 at 14:07
I already expressed that sentiment here: http://meta.freelancing.stackexchange.com/questions/69/is-this-going-to-be-a-qanda-site-or-a-forum?cb=1 — bPratik, May 31 '13 at 14:08
I would like it to work, but have a feeling this is more Quora, than SE! — bPratik, May 31 '13 at 14:08
Hope not, I thought I had lots to contribute here, but not if it will not work out. — Oded, May 31 '13 at 14:10
I think that there are definitive answers to this question. If someone has experience of writing a business plan that has been effective for them, they can and should share those experiences. Having a number of answers like that should give someone good grounds for making decisions about how to go about writing one for themselves. Much of freelancing is subjective, but if answers are backed up by real experience they are valuable and shouldn't be discounted — levelnis, May 31 '13 at 14:58
@levelnis - The question is whether multiple answers is something that we are OK with as part of the site definition. — Oded, May 31 '13 at 15:03
Well, Area51 advocates that as a general approach - "In a healthy site, questions receive multiple answers and the best answer is voted to the top." — levelnis, May 31 '13 at 15:08
I think there are definite answers to this question. However, I would recommend splitting this into several questions. "How to write a good business plan" is something books can and have been written on. The question is overly broad. I will give a very general summary below but space is too limited to go into much detail. — Chris Travers, Jun 01 '13 at 03:29
@ChrisTravers - fair enough. How would you suggest I split this up, so each part stands up by itself and is not too long? — Oded, Jun 01 '13 at 08:58
Trying to avoid questions resolvable with simple links to sites like http://www.nfib.com/business-resources/business-resources-item?cmsid=49946, here are some suggestions (will put one per comment for space reasons) — Chris Travers, Jun 01 '13 at 10:15
1: I am trying to write a business plan but I have never done this before. How should I approach writing it, particularly when I am just getting started? — Chris Travers, Jun 01 '13 at 10:15
2: I am writing a business plan for myself (to clarify strategy, or insert other goal here). What should the scope of the plan be? Is there a target length I should shoot for? — Chris Travers, Jun 01 '13 at 10:18

score 3 · Answer 1 · answered Jun 01 '13 at 03:36

This topic is very broad and so nothing beyond a very broad overview is really possible to give a very basic overview, namely where to start or begin, in the hope that this gets the process going. More specific questions may also have significant answers.

Before you begin

Who are you writing the business plan for? What do you want out of it? Different people have different styles, and so there is some room for disagreement in overall structure if you are not writing it for investors but you need to get this question answered in your mind first.

Possible answers for "what do you want to get out of it" include:

Clarity of vision regarding the market and business options.
Motivation to get started, and
Focus for actions

Of course those are not mutually exclusive but it may be worth ranking them. I tend to stress clarity of vision. I know others who stress focus for actions.

General Guidelines

Length: As long as you need it to be. 20-30 pages is a good target but if you fall short because you have covered everything you need to, don't sweat it. Some of my early plans were nearly 100 pages.... If you are writing for investors, bankers, etc. 20-30 pages is a harder limit but that takes you outside feelancer territory.

Scope: For a new business, I like to include everything but some people prefer to cover just the first couple years. There is room for disagreement here. The reason to focus on everything is that it gives greater clarity of vision. The reason not to include long-term goals is that it can take away from initial focus on actions. This is your choice. Hopefully the rationales above help you make it.

What to Include

Business plans almost always include:

A description of the market
A description of the competition in comparison to what you are doing
A description of your own products and services
A marketing plan
Financial forecasts and targets.

What to exclude

I don't think this is the right question. In general you should exclude material that you find not to be helpful in your business plan. This decision should flow from what you want to get out of the business plan, the intended audience, and so forth.

So this flows from what the focus of the plan is. For example if clarity on the business is primary goal, immediate first steps in the business may not be so important, but if you are trying to focus actions, those may be more important and long-term opportunities less-so.

How do I write a good business plan?

1 Answers1