Create A Money Winning Business Plan Outline

How To Make Money Telling People How Much Money Their House Is Worth | NicheGeek.com
Good Improvements

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.

Read more on About.com.
My Choose Of Nutrition
The Microcredit Boom

Rich Today, Poor Tomorrow

How To Make A Profit With Cat Poop Inventions
FREE package of Dove beauty products.

As promised, I'll explain why deflation will severely punish the upper middle class. These are the people who think they're rich because their houses and stocks have gone up in value -- that is, because of inflation.

What Goes Up...

People concerned about inflation today tend to buy big houses and nice cars. They believe that the purchasing power of the dollar is going down. But what happens if cash becomes king?

This cash squeeze is already affecting many people who thought they were rich. My wife, Kim, has a friend who's a successful architect. Her husband was a manager of a good sized advertising agency. They have three children, the oldest in high school, and earn about $350,000 a year in combined income.

Because they were flush with cash, this couple purchased two high-end vacation homes, one in the mountains and one at the beach. They live most of the year in a McMansion in Phoenix.

Things were going along fine until the husband lost his biggest client. Then he lost his job, and in less than three months their savings was depleted. They then tried to sell their vacation homes, but the values had dropped below the mortgage amount. Today, they continue to pay the mortgages on their houses and hope the price of real estate will go back up. They sold one of their BMWs at a loss.

In 2005, they were net-worth millionaires. In 2007, they're facing bankruptcy.

Follow the Arrows

People like this couple aren't concerned enough about is the credit bubble bursting, which could lead to deflation. Today, nationwide savings are low and debt per household is up. Most of us know the following equation from Economics 101:

cash + credit = the economy

Ever since 2000, there's been an oversupply of credit. When the Y2K threat loomed, the Federal Reserve flooded the market with credit. After the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the stock market downturn in 2002, the market was again flooded with easy credit. Excessive credit and lower interest rates kept the economy afloat.

It was a smart move at the time. In the first five years of his presidency, President Bush borrowed nearly a trillion dollars, more money than all of our previous 43 presidents combined, and the resulting credit bubble helped keep the stock market from collapsing entirely and led to a boom in real estate.

The problem is that this debt must be repaid. So the trillion-dollar question is, can the government, businesses, and consumers keep the credit bubble inflated? Here's that equation:

^ cash +

^ credit

^ = the economy (inflationary)

If credit is cut off or the debt can't be repaid, the equation changes to this:

cash + v

credit v

= the economy (deflationary) v

Fresh-Squeezed Stocks

If the credit bubble bursts, it could trigger a short squeeze.

"Short squeeze," a trader term, is when a stock's price is high and many traders short the stock. Shorting a stock means borrowing shares from an investment house, selling them, and hoping the price of the stock drops. When the price drops, a trader buys the stock back and returns it to the investment house he borrowed it from.

For example, say XYZ stock is selling for $100 a share. A trader borrows 10 shares from the investment house and sells them for $1,000. The stock drops to $60. Now the trader buys back 10 shares from the market for $600 and returns the 10 shares to the investment house. He now has a gross profit of $400 before paying interest and fees to the investment house.

A short squeeze occurs when the market goes the other way. In this example, instead of XYZ stock dropping to $60 a share, it rises from $100 to $150. The investment house issues a margin call, which means the trader needs to return the 10 shares he borrowed.

Suddenly, all the other traders who shorted the stock need to buy shares of XYZ in order to return them. As more short traders begin buying XYZ, the price of the stock goes up and up -- from $150 to $160 to $170, for instance. This is a short squeeze in stocks. The traders who thought the price of the stock would go down are squeezed into becoming the ones who drive the price up.

Putting the Squeeze on the Economy

A short squeeze could happen with the U.S. dollar if lenders suddenly forced debtors to pay in cash.

The couple I mentioned above is technically caught in a short squeeze, since they're short of cash and long on debt. They had to sell their luxury car at a huge loss because they were desperate. As time goes on and their savings dwindles, they may become desperate enough to sell their vacation homes at huge losses.

If the credit markets bust, there could be millions of couples just like this who seemed rich but are suddenly poor. This could send the lending rate of the dollar higher, making the value of the dollar higher as well -- essentially causing a deflation.

I don't want the U.S. economy to go into a short squeeze, and I hope the credit bubble doesn't burst. Deflation isn't good, and inflation is easier to cure than deflation.

Invest in Money Smarts

My concern about deflation is best represented by the following equation:

cash + v

credit v

= the economy (recession) v

If the credit bubble bursts, not only will credit disappear, but people will stop spending and start hoarding cash, and savings will increase. Money is fuel for the economy, so when credit is gone and money is in hiding, the economy slows and a recession -- or worse, a depression -- can occur. In this case, prices go down, not up, and cash becomes king.

I certainly don't want this to happen. Nonetheless, given the lack of a clear direction in markets today, a good investment for 2007 may be to pay off some high-interest debt, put a little extra cash aside, and wait for bargains. If there's a short squeeze on cash, I believe it will be short lived. Once the Fed pumps more money into the system, the dollar will continue its fall.

In conclusion, your best investment today may be in time, not money. That is, invest your time in studying, reading books, and going to seminars. I recommend you study the asset class that's high-priced today, and could be low-priced tomorrow. For example, if you want to acquire real estate, study real estate while prices are high.

And if and when the market crashes, be ready to buy.

Robert Kiyosaki [Via Yahoo! Finance]

To Do To Lose Weight
Young Entrepreneurs Face Higher Hurdles

Rich Today, Poor Tomorrow

How To Own A Multimillion Dollar Mansion For A Fraction Of The Cost.

As promised, I'll explain why deflation will severely punish the upper middle class. These are the people who think they're rich because their houses and stocks have gone up in value -- that is, because of inflation.

What Goes Up...

People concerned about inflation today tend to buy big houses and nice cars. They believe that the purchasing power of the dollar is going down. But what happens if cash becomes king?

This cash squeeze is already affecting many people who thought they were rich. My wife, Kim, has a friend who's a successful architect. Her husband was a manager of a good sized advertising agency. They have three children, the oldest in high school, and earn about $350,000 a year in combined income.

Because they were flush with cash, this couple purchased two high-end vacation homes, one in the mountains and one at the beach. They live most of the year in a McMansion in Phoenix.

Things were going along fine until the husband lost his biggest client. Then he lost his job, and in less than three months their savings was depleted. They then tried to sell their vacation homes, but the values had dropped below the mortgage amount. Today, they continue to pay the mortgages on their houses and hope the price of real estate will go back up. They sold one of their BMWs at a loss.

In 2005, they were net-worth millionaires. In 2007, they're facing bankruptcy.

Follow the Arrows

People like this couple aren't concerned enough about is the credit bubble bursting, which could lead to deflation. Today, nationwide savings are low and debt per household is up. Most of us know the following equation from Economics 101:

cash + credit = the economy

Ever since 2000, there's been an oversupply of credit. When the Y2K threat loomed, the Federal Reserve flooded the market with credit. After the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the stock market downturn in 2002, the market was again flooded with easy credit. Excessive credit and lower interest rates kept the economy afloat.

It was a smart move at the time. In the first five years of his presidency, President Bush borrowed nearly a trillion dollars, more money than all of our previous 43 presidents combined, and the resulting credit bubble helped keep the stock market from collapsing entirely and led to a boom in real estate.

The problem is that this debt must be repaid. So the trillion-dollar question is, can the government, businesses, and consumers keep the credit bubble inflated? Here's that equation:

^ cash +

^ credit

^ = the economy (inflationary)

If credit is cut off or the debt can't be repaid, the equation changes to this:

cash + v

credit v

= the economy (deflationary) v

Fresh-Squeezed Stocks

If the credit bubble bursts, it could trigger a short squeeze.

"Short squeeze," a trader term, is when a stock's price is high and many traders short the stock. Shorting a stock means borrowing shares from an investment house, selling them, and hoping the price of the stock drops. When the price drops, a trader buys the stock back and returns it to the investment house he borrowed it from.

For example, say XYZ stock is selling for $100 a share. A trader borrows 10 shares from the investment house and sells them for $1,000. The stock drops to $60. Now the trader buys back 10 shares from the market for $600 and returns the 10 shares to the investment house. He now has a gross profit of $400 before paying interest and fees to the investment house.

A short squeeze occurs when the market goes the other way. In this example, instead of XYZ stock dropping to $60 a share, it rises from $100 to $150. The investment house issues a margin call, which means the trader needs to return the 10 shares he borrowed.

Suddenly, all the other traders who shorted the stock need to buy shares of XYZ in order to return them. As more short traders begin buying XYZ, the price of the stock goes up and up -- from $150 to $160 to $170, for instance. This is a short squeeze in stocks. The traders who thought the price of the stock would go down are squeezed into becoming the ones who drive the price up.

Putting the Squeeze on the Economy

A short squeeze could happen with the U.S. dollar if lenders suddenly forced debtors to pay in cash.

The couple I mentioned above is technically caught in a short squeeze, since they're short of cash and long on debt. They had to sell their luxury car at a huge loss because they were desperate. As time goes on and their savings dwindles, they may become desperate enough to sell their vacation homes at huge losses.

If the credit markets bust, there could be millions of couples just like this who seemed rich but are suddenly poor. This could send the lending rate of the dollar higher, making the value of the dollar higher as well -- essentially causing a deflation.

I don't want the U.S. economy to go into a short squeeze, and I hope the credit bubble doesn't burst. Deflation isn't good, and inflation is easier to cure than deflation.

Invest in Money Smarts

My concern about deflation is best represented by the following equation:

cash + v

credit v

= the economy (recession) v

If the credit bubble bursts, not only will credit disappear, but people will stop spending and start hoarding cash, and savings will increase. Money is fuel for the economy, so when credit is gone and money is in hiding, the economy slows and a recession -- or worse, a depression -- can occur. In this case, prices go down, not up, and cash becomes king.

I certainly don't want this to happen. Nonetheless, given the lack of a clear direction in markets today, a good investment for 2007 may be to pay off some high-interest debt, put a little extra cash aside, and wait for bargains. If there's a short squeeze on cash, I believe it will be short lived. Once the Fed pumps more money into the system, the dollar will continue its fall.

In conclusion, your best investment today may be in time, not money. That is, invest your time in studying, reading books, and going to seminars. I recommend you study the asset class that's high-priced today, and could be low-priced tomorrow. For example, if you want to acquire real estate, study real estate while prices are high.

And if and when the market crashes, be ready to buy.

Robert Kiyosaki [Via Yahoo! Finance]

Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in IraqHow to Evolve Your Business Around Your Adsense Business
Eri Comedy and Warsai performance in Sweden