Create A Money Winning Business Plan Outline

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A business plan outline is the second most important starting point once you've pre-determined your audience. The business plan outline should be prepared before the actual research and writing of the business plan. Once your outline has been set; organize your research files around the layout of your plan.

Every business plan follows a generic outline but not every business plan is the same. Business plan outlines differ on 2 factors:

1. Type of Business: Details of critical success factors for businesses in your industry must be included in the plan. Technology companies will discuss R & D, intellectual property, and time to market. A retailer will feature pricing methods, inventory control, merchandising and location. Ensure that your plan is complete by addressing factors important to your industry.

2. Type of Audience: A banker business plan will be different from an investor plan. Bankers like to see risk assessment and planning, loan amounts, repayment terms and collateral. Investors want a return on investment, an exit strategy, and planned growth with the funds.

Business Plan Outline General

Executive Summary: overview of most important points of business plan and selling your business.

Company Description: mission statement, company overview, industry briefing, corporate history, legal structure.

Products & Services: description, R & D, pricing, delivery, production.

Marketing & Sales: market definition, customer profile, competitive & SWOT analysis, strategy, sales & promotion.

Operations: Legal & government issues, staffing, suppliers, alliances, policies, risk assessment, facilities, location, insurance, milestones.

Management: key job descriptions, responsibilities, management team, organizational chart, advisors.

Financials: Profit & loss, cash flow, balance sheet, financing, debt schedule, use of funds and assumptions, break-even analysis.

Business Plan Outline Extras

The extras are what takes a plan from 10 pages to 20 pages. More in-depth and detailed for higher levels of funding and a greater complexity of investors. No real need for extras if your plan does not require it. Here's a brief description of some of the extras that can be added to your business plan outline:

SWOT Analysis: As part of your competitor profile, adding a Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats analysis can show your investors you understand the competitive landscape and your business can operate within that environment.

Porter's Five Forces: Michael Porter's 5 forces framework is a standard business tool used by companies to evaluate an industry's key forces. This is an important extra to add to your business plan outline especially if you are a start-up or an existing business entering a new market.

Glossary: If your business plan audience is not well-versed in your industry jargon, a glossary adds value to your overall plan. If you are writing a biotech business plan on gene therapy agents, determine the level of knowledge your target audience has on the subject.

Publishing Value-Adds: These are simply publication elements to improve the readability and presentation of your plan. This can include: a cover page with logos, graphics, charts, and table of contents.

What goes into your business plan appendix for a complete outline?

The Appendix

Your business plan will require an appendix following the financials for all supporting documents. This acts as a great reference area to back up your assumptions and provide added credibility to the plan. The appendix is not part of the plan but an addition. Therefore, a 10 page business plan will be 10 pages plus the cover, table of contents, and appendix.

What to Put in Your Business Plan Appendix?

legal documents

market studies

resumes

customer testimonies

photographs & maps

distributor/supplier list

articles

owner's personal financial statements

tax statements

advertising materials & brochures

credit reports

character references

equipment list

glossary

reference section/bibliography

Once you have a good understanding of the business plan outline needed for your company then the research and writing can begin.

A business plan novel does not ensure success. Provide enough information for decision-makers to give you the opportunity to sell your company and yourself.

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A Story About An Entrepreneur and the Real Meaning of Success & Wealth

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Rarely has any movie left such a lasting impression on the American public as Frank Capra’s all-time masterpiece --- “It’s a Wonderful Life.” We all know the story and have seen it many times.

On the surface, the movie appears to be a sappy, sentimental film which puts a smile on our face and brings tears to our eyes, every time. In reality, this film serves as a universal story of the enduring human spirit -- filled with many powerful lessons about life, business and money.

It’s our story -- yours and mine. It’s a story about the George Bailey within us all. It reminds us of our own human condition and the deep issues we must confront. Especially at year’s end, the story’s core message nudges us to take inventory of our lives, evaluate our worth and question our place in a world that does not behave as we often expect it.

The REAL STORY Behind the Story … Does This Sound Like YOURS?

As uplifting and inspiring as the end of this film is, “It's a Wonderful Life" has a very dark side as well. George Bailey, played by James Stewart, is a man at the end of his rope. Throughout his life, he has sacrificed his own needs to make everyone else happy.

Young and ambitious, he dreams of traveling the world, and accomplishing great things. However, George must abandon his plans, when his father suddenly dies, and he must take over his dad’s building and loan business to carry on the tradition. It is a well-respected business that genuinely puts people ahead of profit, yet in George’s eyes, it is the chain that ties his life down.

That is just the beginning of George’s spiral downward. One Christmas Eve, $8000 is misplaced by George`s absent-minded uncle, driving poor George deeper into despair. The combination of his own dashed dreams and the prospect of abandoning the town to Potter -- an old, corrupt man who represents the most despicable image of capitalism – sends George into an emotional crisis so large that he contemplates suicide. Rescued by an angel determined to get his wings, George is then shown how much good he contributed to the world, and what life would have been like if he hadn`t been born.

The REAL Message: 3 Profound Lessons About Money, Success and the Purpose of Life

LESSON 1: Failure is in the eye of the beholder. It’s all relative to your goals, expectations and values.

"It's a Wonderful Life” is a movie about a small town guy who thinks he is a failure and wishes he had never been born, It is only by getting a glimpse of what life would be like without him, does George get a major epiphany. “He is not a failure afterall.” He learns that he contributed to the happiness of many people, and that he made a difference.

Good things happen and bad things happen to us all. A bank run happens and someone nearly drowns. Yet, by the end of the movie, George Bailey reminds us -- as business owners -- that no matter what goals and dreams we are pursuing, real success comes from our journey and the lives we touch along the way.

LESSON 2: Our true wealth is measured by the love and support of family and friends. There is no $$ amount that can replace it.

In the beginning of the movie, all goes well for Bailey - a beautiful wife, a few children and a lot of friends. George even pursues his dream of building a village with affordable houses in Bedford. Unfortunately for Bailey, life spirals downhill after the Depression and then bankruptcy. It is at the point when Bailey is unable to handle the burden of all the people's money he cannot repay, he contemplates suicide and ending his misery.

In that moment, all George could see was the “dark” side. He loses perspective of the many blessings still in his life. At the end of the movie, George opens up a book given to him by his guardian angel with a handwritten note: "Remember: No man is a failure who has friends."

We too often fail to truly appreciate and treasure our homes, our family, our friends, and even life itself. Wouldn't it be nice if each of us could learn the lesson, as George did, that life is already wonderful? That where we put our focus determines if it is so?

LESSON 3: We all have a purpose in life. Our purpose is not something we decide. Rather it is something we discover. Through the events of our life, our purpose finds us.

As with George, we all go through life, with a certain amount of struggle and adversity. Sometimes life is frustrating,. Sometimes we fail. Sometimes we might even reach the end of our rope and wonder “is this all there is? Why was I even born, anyway?”

George did not recognize his life purpose until he hit rock bottom and questioned his very existence. With the helping hand of his guardian angel, he got to see the truth. The roadblocks that forced him to sacrifice his dreams and instead serve the community where he grew up were, in reality, the stepping stones to living his life’s purpose.

If, like George Bailey, we could see what life would be like, had we not been born, we would realize how truly fortunate we are to simply be in this world. We would discover that every event in our life – no matter how mundane or how difficult -- somehow is leading us down the path of our life purpose.

No amount of personal or business failure, no amount of misfortune, no amount of struggle or turmoil can change the immeasurable value of our lives and the difference we are already making every step of the way. Our smallest contributions are often the most significant.

As we welcome a new year, may each and every one of you, take inventory of your life, through the eyes of George Bailey, and awaken to the real truth, "It’s a wonderful life."

Denise Corcoran - CEO, The Empowered Business (tm) - assists CEOs, executives and business owners in taking a quantum leap from the ordinary to extraordinary … from unrealized dreams to mastering their destiny … from slow growth to exponential results. Subscribe to her monthly ezine - The Empowered Business (tm) - and learn the legendary mindset, strategy and performance secrets of top business achievers. http://www.goldbar.net/go.php?id=7996&c=1738&ac=ezar

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Is Web 2.0 A Bubble?

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Hundreds of Internet companies have emerged since the dot-com crash, looking to capitalize on a resurgent online advertising market. Companies in this new wave -- known as Web 2.0 -- have focused on online collaboration and sharing among users. They hope to attract millions of users and become the next YouTube, which was acquired by Google Inc. earlier this year for $1.65 billion.

Venture capitalists, who fueled the previous Internet bubble, are pumping money into the new crop of Web startups. In the first nine months of 2006, VCs sunk $455 million into Web 2.0 companies, according to research firm VentureOne. (VentureOne is a unit of Dow Jones & Co., publisher of this Web site.) That's three times as much money as such startups received in the same period last year.

There were no blockbuster Internet IPOs and just one Web deal (Google's purchase of YouTube) valued at more than $1 billion in the past year. But the flood of money and flurry of activity prompts the question: Is Web 2.0 another bubble or are the startups getting funded today more sound than ones created in the run-up to the last bust?

The Wall Street Journal Online invited two technology venture capitalists, who were active in the dot-com days and have invested in the current crop of startups, to debate the topic. Todd Dagres spent nearly a decade at Battery Ventures before starting Spark Capital last year. David Hornik, a partner at August Capital and a former Silicon Valley attorney, writes the popular VentureBlog. Their conversation, carried out over email, is below.

Mr. Dagres begins: Web 2.0 is a bubble for 3 reasons: 1) There is far too much money chasing Web 2.0 deals. Too much money means too many companies getting funded at higher valuations. 2) There are virtually no barriers to entry in Web 2.0 and therefore the ability to develop a unique solution and sustain a competitive advantage is virtually nil. Therefore, it's difficult for Web 2.0 companies to build long term value. 3) There is very little liquidity in the market for Web 2.0 companies. The Dow was recently at a high and still no liquidity. Without liquidity, Web 2.0 companies must rely on acquisitions to achieve liquidity and this will put a lid on the potential exit options and ultimate valuations of these companies. In short, they will be playing a musical chairs game in which there are far too many players and too few chairs.

There are some similarities between the current "bubble" and the last one that burst in 2000: Lots of incomplete and under-experienced teams, business models based more on eyeballs than cash flow, and a rash of incremental and "me too" deals.

Mr. Hornik responds: I do not believe that the existence of too much venture capital money chasing too few interesting ideas constitutes a bubble. The Web 1.0 bubble inflated because the public markets were willing to bet on unproven ideas. Public markets are ill suited to evaluating such risks. On the other hand, the venture capital community exists precisely to take on that risk. While many Web 2.0 companies will fail, they will not likely fail in significantly greater proportions than has been the case with other venture investments historically. So it is hard to imagine how this so-called bubble will over-inflate. Venture capitalists will rationally stop investing in ideas that don't bear fruit. Those that do bear fruit will gain traction and either be acquired or go public. Those are the traits of a rational market in my mind.

Mr. Dagres: Not really. Private markets are far less efficient than public markets. Private companies don't publish results, trade on exchanges or comply with a number of SEC rules that protect the individual investor. They are inherently illiquid and risky. Of course, where there's more risk, there is often more reward. I see irrational pricing occurring right now in the venture market with private companies receiving venture money at valuations of over $200 million (Spot Runner, LinkedIn) and $500 million (Facebook). I have seen private Web 2.0 companies with negative cash flow and little revenue valued above public companies with stronger operating results. There's a reason why the average American doesn't have access to venture capital and it's not because it's more rational.

Mr. Hornik: I was not suggesting that private markets are necessarily more efficient or more rational than public markets. Merely that private market investors are trained to assess the risks involved with speculative and illiquid investments. While I am not on the boards of Spot Runner, LinkedIn or Facebook, my understanding is that each is cash flow positive and making real money. They are each excellent examples of real businesses that are being built in this Web 2.0 era. Whether $200 million or $500 million is the appropriate price tag for those investments isn't important. What is important is that each of those businesses appears to be on track to be strong, stand-alone entities that will likely get public or be acquired. Those sound like good investments to me.

It isn't surprising that we aren't seeing a whole lot of Web 2.0 companies going public yet. The public markets have appropriately adjusted to the irrationality of the Web 1.0 ascendancy and are looking for companies that have operating histories with quarters of profitability, large top-line revenue, and predictability going forward. That takes time. But I have no doubt in my mind that there are interesting businesses being built that will meet those criteria in the coming years.

Mr. Dagres: I agree that there will be interesting companies coming out of the Web 2.0 wave. Every wave has its winners and losers. The notion of a bubble, however, is that a particular market gets overdone, i.e. over-hyped, over-invested, and ultimately experiences a high mortality rate. I think the Web 2.0 space will have a higher mortality rate than other segments of the overall media and technology industries. There are far too many MySpace and YouTube genetically challenged clones. All but a few will fail. The winners are generally the ones that get in early and out before the bubble bursts. There are rare examples of bubble companies making it through the bust and going on to become successful and valuable companies. By the way, the combined cash flow of Spot Runner, LinkedIn and Facebook is less than that of one Costco store.

Mr. Hornik: I would reckon that the margins of Facebook, LinkedIn and Spot Runner are a whole lot better than that of a Costco store.

Even assuming that the vast majority of the Web 2.0 companies fail, the amount of capital that is going into all of them combined is a pittance compared to the Web 1.0 bubble. In fact, it is even a relatively small portion of the overall capital being invested by the VC community on an annualized basis. How many Web 2.0 companies do you think you can build for the same amount of capital it takes to build a single medical device company? And unlike a medical device company, the power of the Web 2.0 model is that investors get very quick feedback about how well the company is doing. So the likelihood that investors pour tens of millions of dollars into Web 2.0 companies that will never be self-sustaining is very low. VCs may lose their capital invested early in Web startups, but the amount of capital sunk into failed businesses will never snowball the way it did in the late 90s.

Mr. Dagres: I'll take cash flow over gross margin -- I can eat cash flow. I think there will be billions lost on Web 2.0 companies when all is said and done. The real money hasn't even gone in yet. The hedge fund, corporate and family offices are coming in as we speak. The good news is you can generally only lose 1.0 times your money. I agree that medical device and drug companies consume much more capital than a Web 2.0 company but they can build advantages based on patents and substantial R&D, which limits the competitive threat. R&D in a Web 2.0 company = rummage & duplicate.

That said, the life sciences venture environment has its own issues.

Mr. Hornik: I think that you aren't giving Web 2.0 entrepreneurs enough credit. Sure, there are some "me too" sites out there. There always are. But the amount of rapid innovation in online services has been staggering -- from Skype to Digg to Six Apart to YouTube to Flickr to Facebook... The list goes on. They aren't microprocessor companies with years of patent-protected intellectual property. On the other hand, they are innovating around things that matter to consumers today. And I believe they are being appropriately valued, not just by potential acquirers but by the consumers themselves.

You say that billions are going to be lost. I think that overstates the potential problem. Certainly billions haven't been invested to date. It takes a whole lot of companies to get to billions when investing a few million dollars at a time. On the other hand, if a few billion dollars are lost in the face of exits like Skype and YouTube, and others that I see making hundreds of millions in the future, then the market is doing well and investors and entrepreneurs alike will emerge decidedly net positive. That doesn't sound like a bubble to me. That sounds like a vibrant market for innovation.

Mr. Dagres: Aha! We agree on what may be the most important point -- great entrepreneurs are the key to building valuable companies. If you invest in great people, you have a good chance of making money. In the current market there are gifted entrepreneurs that will benefit and thrive. These people will start disruptive companies that look for what will be hot rather than what is hot. They won't be lumped into the Web 2.0 category; they will define their own categories. This is what will separate the few winners from the many losers. So in closing, I am leery of Web 2.0 but I am always going to invest in great people pursuing big ideas.

Mr. Hornik concludes: I was recently asked by an entrepreneur what I thought would be the next great technology in the coming year. I told him I thought it would be the Internet. We have just started scratching the surface of the enabling power of the Internet. Whether it is called "Web 2.0" or "New Media" or "Enterprise 2.0," Internet services are going to drive the world's economies for the foreseeable future. To me that doesn't spell bubble, that spells opportunity.

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