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I'm here to tell you to stop searching because in today's
video, I'll be showing you how to make the ultimate business plan.
Business plans are absolutely essential for any business.
Why?
Well, because a solid business plan will allow you to rigorously assess
idea feasibility research and find insights on target markets,
and assess your competition.
These are all things that you need to do in order
to make your business as successful as it can be.
And when the time comes, investors will rely heavily on your business
plan to evaluate the feasibility of your business before funding it.
If you haven't already, make sure you're subscribed to
the channel as we release new videos every week that will
help you build your business.
Oh, and stay tuned to the end of this video when I share a
little gift from me to you.
Let's get into it.
The first part of every business plan is the executive summary,
the executive summarys purpose is to distill everything in
the business plan into a single page, and give a high level
overview of your business.
This is like the Canadian tuxedo, almost like a
blazer over a flannel shirt.
Admittedly, that one page constraint can make it seem
like squeezing in a lot of information will be impossible,
but trust me, it's not.
What I like to do is break down each section of the business
plan into one or two sentences to ensure that everything is
succinct and easy to read.
Here's what your business plans executive summary should include:
your business concept, business goals and vision, product
differentiation and description,
your target market, your marketing plan, your current
financial state, projected financial, state, the ask.
So if you're asking for money, how much are you
asking for and your team.
For more ideas on how to identify your target market, be sure to
check out our last video on how to build a brand in the right
hand corner right up here.
Now let's move on to a biggie, your company overview.
This section of your business plan should include two
fundamental questions.
Who are you and what do you plan to do?
Answering these questions provides an introduction to why you're in
business, why you're different, what you have going for you, and
why you'd be a good investment.
To answer these questions, you'll want to include these
components in your overview: your business structure.
For example, is your business a sole proprietorship?
A general partnership?
A limited partnership, or is it an incorporated company?
This can often be visualized using an organizational chart.
You also want to share the nature of your business.
What are you selling?
Now specify the industry.
Are you in fashion?
Electronics?
What is your landscape currently look like and
where could it be heading?
You're going to also want to list your team, including key
personnel and their salaries.
If I was doing this right now, it would just be me.
But I would also want to include future plans for
scaling up my company.
So I can see here that you've got four years of working
experience as a good boy?
Can you start on Monday?
Or I could just leave it as me.
You can also use this section to highlight background information
on your business or its history.
Get creative and be authentic in this part.
This is where you can really draw people in and have them invest
in how it all started for you.
So I thought it might be good to provide an example here.
So Sit With Me, the dog rescue that I volunteer for and run the
store for, has been operating since 2012 and since then we've
gone on to help over 1200 dogs.
We do not discriminate based off of breed, medical history
or age, so every dog has a chance to find their forever
home through our rescue.
And that was very important from the get go.
And we also do not have anyone that's making a salary, so
it's entirely volunteer based.
Um, it's all by the good graces of our community and
everyone that's out there willing to put in money, time,
and effort to help these dogs.
A big component of your company overview will be outlining
your business's vision,
mission and values.
I'm going to do a deep dive into this one with you.
To define your values.
Start thinking about all the people that your company is
accountable to, including owners, employees, suppliers,
customers, and investors.
Now, I want you to consider how you'd like to conduct
business with each of them.
As you make a list, your core values should start to emerge.
For example, Ikea lists some of its values as humbleness and willpower.
Leadership by example, and daring to be different.
Now, the mission statement.
Your statement should explain in a convincing manner and
ideally a single sentence why your business exists.
For example, Shopify's mission statement is "make
commerce better for everyone".
It's the why behind everything we do and it's crystal clear and
needs no further explanation.
Next, craft your vision statement.
What impact do you envision your business having on the world
when you've achieved your vision?
Make sure you phrase that impact using assertive language.
For example, Nike's vision statement is bring inspiration
and innovation to every athlete in the world.
If you have a body, you are an athlete.
Finally, include your business objectives,
both short and longterm.
I like to keep my goals on track by ensuring that they are smart.
Meaning specific, measurable, attainable,
realistic, and time bound.
Now get ready to do some serious work as the next
part of this plan, we'll be diving into market research.
For the marketing analysis section, you want to be including an
overview of your potential market, an analysis of your business's
position within that market,
and an overview of the competitive landscape.
I'm not exaggerating when I say that your market can
make or break your business.
If you choose the right market with the right products, one with
plenty of customers who understand and need your product, you'll most
likely have a headstart on success.
When diving into potential markets, you will need to be looking into as
much relevant independent data as possible to validate your business.
This can be a huge task, but I find that breaking it down into
two starting points, it then becomes much more manageable.
First, I seek to identify my ideal customer profile.
A customer profile should be a detailed factual description
of your target audience.
For example, if you're targeting millennial customers in the
U S I would first start by looking at government data
about the size of that group.
Secondly, I researched relevant industry trends and trajectories.
I like to approach this section by going to Google Trends and
using keywords as a jumping off point and then diving
into more granular data.
For example, say that I wanted to start a Halloween mask
business and I wanted to know the trends of that industry.
I would go to Google Trends, type in Halloween masks, and then get
granular on the results page.
Looking at things like where this industry has peaked
outside of seasonal time.
I would then dive into what made it peak and have a look
at some of the search terms and show shifts and changes in
the popularity of the industry.
From here, I would then dive into sources such as government
statistics offices, industry associations, academic research
and respected news outlets covering the industry to get a robust view
and understanding of landscape.
Now, when assessing my business's position in the
market, I like to use a SWOT analysis to break things down.
Using a grid format.
You want to start listing out the strengths,
weaknesses, opportunities, and threats to your business.
I like using SWOT because you can clearly see the positive
and negative internal and external factors that may
impact your business visually.
Now, the competitor analysis.
For this analysis,
I like to include a list of a few companies that I would
consider direct competitors, and then I state how I plan
to differentiate my product and business from theirs.
Okay.
Now we're into the products and services section.
You want to provide more detailed information here on
your products and state why
your product stands out in the market.
Like before, we want things to be succinct and visual.
Patents, copyrights, and trademarks that you own or
have applied for should also be listed in this section.
In the customer segmentation section, you want to
give a holistic overview of your ideal customer.
A lot of this information should be clear to you after
you've done preliminary research on your target market.
When talking about your customers in this section,
you want to include a number of general and specific
demographic characteristics:
such as where they live, their age range, their level of
education, how much they earn, their values, beliefs or opinions.
Ideally, you should be specific enough that it's very clear
who you're trying to reach with your business, and even more
importantly, why you've made the choices you have based on who your
customers are and what they value.
Now we should be ready to move on to highlighting
your marketing plan.
Your plan here should outline your current and future
strategies for marketing your product to your ideal customers.
For example, say that I have a phone case company and I know
that a lot of my audience is on TikTok, I will show that I plan
to leverage that knowledge into creating a paid campaign on that
platform using content specifically created for my key customers.
I will then also include how I plan to measure the
success of that campaign.
Now, although sometimes marketing is seen as purely promotional,
your plan should include information on the following,
four key subjects: price, so how much does your product cost?
Product, what are you selling, and how do you plan to differentiate
yourself in the market?
Place.
Where will you sell your products?
And finally promotion.
How will you get your products in front of your ideal customer.
By including these, you're showing investors and yourself that you
have thought about every facet of how your marketing strategy
will be effective in driving customers to your business.
Now onto our logistics and operations plan.
You really want to cover all parts of your business
operation in this section.
Including where you get the raw materials you need
for production or where your products are produced.
Highlighting if you'll make, manufacturer, wholesale,
or dropship your product.
Then stating how long it takes to produce your
products and get them shipped.
You'll also want to touch on how you might handle a busy
season or an unexpected spike in demand discussing facilities.
For example.
Where will you and your team members work?
Do you have plans to have a physical retail space?
If so, where?
Outlining the tools and technology that you require
in order to be up and running.
This includes everything from computers to light bulbs
to everything in between.
Finally, discuss the specifics on how you're handling inventory.
For example, how much will you keep on hand and
where will it be stored?
How will you ship it to partners if required, and
how will you keep track of incoming and outgoing inventory?
This section should demonstrate that you've got a solid
understanding of your supply chain and a strong contingency plan in
case of any potential uncertainty.
Finally, we're going to end with the financial plan.
Now I know what you're thinking, boring, but I assure
you this will be an important step in your business plan.
The level of detail required in your financial plan will really
depend on your audience and goals.
However, typically you want to include three major
views of your financials.
An income statement, a balance sheet and a cashflow statement.
Your income statement is designed to give your readers a look into
your revenue sources and expenses over a given period of time.
Your balance sheet should offer a look at how much equity
you have in your business.
On one side, you'll list all of your businesses assets, so
what you own and on the other side, all of your liabilities.
So what you owe.
This will provide a snapshot of your business's shareholder
equity, which is calculated as.
Assets minus liabilities equals equity.
Now, your cashflow statement is similar to your income statement
with one important difference.
It takes into account when revenues are collected and
when expenses are paid.
It can be especially helpful to forecast your cashflow statement to
identify gaps or negative cashflow and adjust operations as required.
If you're worried right now about how to best format this
out, because numbers and math are not really your thing.
Don't be put off by this section.
Shopify has created a set of formatted sheets specifically
for helping you formulate this section of your business plan.
By taking the time to develop your business plan, you're
actually achieving a number of extremely beneficial
things for your business.
A business plan will allow you to evaluate your business idea.
For your business to be successful, it needs to be tangible.
This plan will help solidify that.
It will also help you plan for the next phase of your
business and help you think about scaling and scope.
It will then empower you to start thinking about
hiring additional staff or even building partnerships.
Additionally, it will clarify strategies, goals, and tactics
and make them actionable.
Finally, it will help you if you're looking to secure funds
for your business, whether it be from a bank or an investor.
As promised, I did say that I would have a little gift for you and that
is my ultimate business template.
You're welcome and Hey, if you did use our template to create your
own business plan, let us know what learnings you had from doing that.
Did you find a new customer base or a cool new market to tap into?
Let us know.
Oh, okay.
Lettuce, lettuce know.
If had a piece of lettuce.
That'd be fantastic.