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Overview:
Step 1. Review the Report you purchased specific to the business of your choice
Step 2. Determine Your Finances, Start-up Costs, Running Cost
Step 3. Determine Your "Time to Dedicate"
Step 4. Determine Your Customers and Resources
Step 5. Determine Your Knowledge
Step 6. Determine Your Goals
Step 7. Open Your Business
Step 8. Feedback and Change
Planning:
Business Plan - "A business plan precisely defines your business, identifies your goals, and serves as your firm's resume." (This definition was taken directly from www.sba.gov).
This definition is probably the formal definition but I find it totally WRONG! We are not trying to sell our business! We are not writing a resume for our business, we want to sell products and services to our markets. Yes, reputation is important, as a standard Business Plan defines this, but take away the products and services and a reputation is nothing. Again, I like to get right down to the nuts and bolts of the subject, I just wanted to make you aware that many business plans are worthless, we are going to write a plan that we can use, not one that looks formal. If you want a formal pretty Business Plan you can goto www.masterplans.com and spend $1,200 and they will prepare one for you. What makes our business unique and successful is the owners and entreprenuers so how can some else posssibly write us a successful plan? If only it were that easy.
Ok, to write a good business plan is going to take us more than a day or two, probably about 15 days, some leg work, some insite from others, and a lot of thinking and rethinking. I say rethinking, because what looks great on paper does not always work in the real world so you will have to revisit and revamp your business plan as you begin your business.
I am to assume you have already determined what business you are going to begin. But after you complete your business plan you may change to a totally different business. This is very common, hence the word "plan" in business plan. A lot of business sound good till you really spend some research and plan time.
Click Here to view a sample of a Business Plan which you can use as a template.
Ok, if you reviewed the business plan above you can see that even if you made a wonderful business plan it doesn't put more money in your pocket. So let's do some planning of our own. Answer all the questions below, put some time into the answers, give it some thought, be creative and your business will be 10 times more successful than the standard business planning process, as this is what real entreprenuers ask themselves when they start a business.
1. How large is your business going to be?
2. Do you want employees? (Read my Money Tree Section of my site on this)
3. How much do you want to invest to start your business?
4. How quickly can you make your intitial investment back?
5. Who are your customers?
6. What are your products?
7. Will your products always be available?
8. Are there any legal issues with your products?
9. Who else sells these products?
10. How do you think the public going to react to your product?
11. Is there a lot of sales/marketing efforts required to market your product?
12. What type of promotions are you going to offer?
13. How are you going to advertise your product?
14. Who is going to run the bookkeeping?
15. Who is going to run the shipping/recieving?
16. How many hours a week do you estimate this business will take?
17. Does your business need to be a corporation?
18. How long do you think your business will be in demand? I.E. if it's a horseshoe business, your too late, if it's a cassette tape business, your too late.
19. Do you have any plans to partner with another business?
20. Will you need a building or is this a home-based business?
21. Will there be inventory? How will it be managed?
22. Will you need a telephone? Who will be there to answer the phone if it rings?
23. Is this business going to be your only source of income?
24. How will this business affect your family life?
25. How much do you know about the business?
26. What can you do to learn more about the business?
27. Have you talked with anyone doing this business?
28. I asked earlier who else sells your product, but how is the competition?
29. Where do you see this business in One year, 5 years...?
30. Are you just buying a job with this business? I.E. are you going to make more or less working for someone else? Is this business going to give you more time or less time than you have now?
31. Is it better to buy a business of this type that is already going or is it better to start from scratch?
32. Will you need a vehicle?
33. Will you need equipment?
34. What will the monthly expenses be to keep the doors open?
35. What do you need to do before you can market your business?
36. Ok, your business is up and running, what needs to be changed?
37. What's not working and why?
38. What should be done, and or more, and or differnetly? This question should be repeated daily.
These are just some questions to help you start planning, I put them in no particular order so that it helps the thinking process, kind of a brain storming session. Next I recommend putting some time into the answers, getting other peoples opinoions and doing some research before you begin your new business. Nearly any business can be successful if it's correctly managed. If you named any business right now I am sure you can grab your telephone book and find someone who is successful at it. With that said, let's plan for success!
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