Hey, awesome! You’re thinking about writing your business plan. I’m sure you’re serious about your business which is why you’re educating yourself on writing a business plan. I think it’s safe to conclude that you want your business to succeed, and of course, you don’t want to waste your time or any other resource on this entrepreneurial journey. You’re so right, your time is valuable, which is why you want to protect it and any other investment you’ll make along the way. For these reasons and more, you should write your business plan.
Below are a few ways your business plan can benefit you.
You can use it to:
- Understand who else is doing what you want to do and how you can stand out.
- Understand how likely your business idea is to make you money, or lose you money
- Understand who your potential customers are, where you will find them, and how you will interact with them.
- Understand what you will do to share about your business with potential customers
- Identify different ways that you can make money, or make more money in your business
- Understand how much your potential customer is willing to pay for your idea
- Understand how much money you need to make the business do well, for how long, why, and where it will come from
- Understand how much money you need to keep yourself and everyone else involved in the business happy, for how long, and why
- Understand how you can ensure you make enough and keep enough money to ensure you and everyone else involved in the business is happy, for how long, and why
- Understand who you need to help you make the business do well, for how long, and why
- Understand how much of your time you will need to invest on/in your business and whether or not you will be happy with that.
- Identify some things that can cause you to go out of business before it happens and how you can protect yourself, and the people that work with/for you, and your customers. And when you do need help, who you can contact
- Understand what is really going on in the business world, where you feel most at ease, and how you will navigate this business world
- Identify your plans for the future and the steps you will take and need to take to get there
- Create more opportunities to receive funding
This is a short list of all the ways a business plan can benefit you. Most importantly your time is valuable, don’t waste it by NOT writing a business plan.
There is nothing wrong with making mistakes and learning from them, after all this is how we all learn and grow, however, there are some mistakes that are avoidable. Reflect on a time you’ve thought or said these words “If I had known, I would have…”. Were you more intentional with your decisions after having the experience(s) that led to you saying/thinking those words? If “yes” great job identifying the importance of being intentional. Your business plan provides you with that opportunity. Best of all, it’s free, and you can do more than one, anytime you choose, for as many businesses as you would like, and instead of years of heartache, misery, and financial distress, you create opportunities for you and everyone involved to prosper today and in the future.
Learn more with less pain and increase your chances of being successful in business by writing your business plan. Best wishes!
Need more guidance with starting your business? Read a step by step guide to starting a business in Canada.
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