Writing a Business Plan

How to write a business plan is among the very first decisions you, as a future business owner must make. Do you write it yourself, or give in to the temptation to take an easier path? By taking ownership of this first, most important step in building your business, you will gain far more than a crisp document to be read by others. You will develop a deep understanding of what it will take for your business to succeed. For this reason, it is essential that the business owner be the primary thought leader or sole author of the business plan. Outside help should be reserved for fine tuning, validation and in some cases to prepare financial projections. Let it be YOUR Business Plan As the founder and business owner you will be charting the course for the business. It will be important that the business plan be an extension of your personal vision for the company. For most entrepreneurs, the opportunity to call the shots and lead the way was an important part of why they wanted to get into business. Now is the time to start being a leader. Leaders develop their own plans and call the plays along the way. When it's not your plan, you relegate yourself to performing as an operator. You will find yourself going back to the business plan someone else wrote to occasionally re-read the directions, or ignoring it altogether. Either way, the value of having a plan has been greatly diminished. The Value is in the Process The act of writing a business plan is one of forced discipline, problem solving and reconciling the results. When approached and completed in this manner the end product and the process itself will increase your self-confidence and assuredness about where your business is headed. Starting with a simple business plan template, and there are lots of them available, force yourself to think through all the critical aspects of the business. This will be an iterative process that you repeat, fine tune and re-write. As you develop each section of your business plan, your thoughts about the other sections will evolve-even those that you've already written. You go back, edit and in the end, you make it all work together. That's the idea. You are developing an understanding of the relationships between every aspect of your business. To underscore the importance of writing your own business plan, take this little exercise. Read the paragraph below as quickly as you can. Then stop, take a breath and move on to the next one. Who will my customers be? What problem will I solve for them? How much are they willing to pay to have this problem solved? What are my costs associated with each sale? Why will customers choose to buy from my business? How will I find customers? Who will sell, produce, and deliver? Which markets will I go after first? Why? How much will it cost to operate the business each month? What will my break even point be? How fast can I get there? How much startup capital will I need? How will I succeed? moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k Okay, slow down now and consider this: The most important question isn't listed. The most important question is, "How are these factors interrelated?" Imagine that today someone handed you the answers to all of the questions from our fast-read drill above. It would certainly save you a lot of time. Better still, these wouldn't be just any answers, but they would be the right answers from a solid business plan for a business that had already been proven to be successful, a business just like the one you're planning to start. You could read and re-read the answers many times over, practically memorizing them. You would know that they were the right answers. Yet, doing so will not help you develop an understanding of how the answers are interconnected. If you change the way you plan to find customers, how will that impact your monthly operating costs? If customers are only willing to pay 80% of your planned price, what will that do to your break even point? How will the answers to these two questions impact how much capital you need to start the business? This example looks at just two questions. Realistically, the answer to each question is highly dependent on the answers to several of the other questions. In the end they must all work together and you must understand how they all work together. If you develop your own business plan, section by section, thinking through all of the answers to the critical questions, you will also develop an intuitive sense of how they work together. It will require a lot of thinking and rethinking of your ideas and it will take time. This is not meant to be a fast drill. In the end, it will be the difference between memorizing the lines and actually being the character. Small business ownership is not the place to be reciting someone else's lines. You are the character. Write your own lines. Be the leader. When to Bend the Guidelines There are some times to reach outside for help. For example, perhaps you would say, "I'm not a numbers person; I don't think I can do the financial projections." First, plan to become more of a numbers person because business ownership is about numbers. Sales, expenses and profits are the three that are most important. Even so, many business operators who have a good feel for the numbers need assistance with spreadsheets and financial statements. It is okay to get outside help preparing your financials, just be sure that you understand them when they are complete. If you are going to pay someone to prepare them, be sure that they also save time to go over them with you from top to bottom. Ultimately they are your numbers. Others might say, "I have great ideas, but I'm not a great writer." It's understood that there can be a lot riding on someone else reading the final product of your business plan-such as a loan or an investment decision. For that reason, if you are not a strong writer you should start by going through the process of organizing, writing and rewriting your own business plan as best you can. Force yourself to go through all of the steps of writing, rethinking and rewriting as your ideas evolve. Then, have someone else take your finished draft and craft the final polished document. What is important is that the final document must accurately reflect your concepts, ideas and thought process, not the editors.

Choosing Christian Business

With regard to Christian business opportunities, I am sure you have come to a point in time where you have ask yourself the question, "How do I choose the opportunity that is the right one for me?" There are some on the internet that catch my eye, but how do I know if it is going to give me the information I need to start a successful Christian business? If you have been seeking information on the internet for legitimate work at home, Christian business opportunities for any amount of time, you most likely have come to the conclusion that there are a lot of opportunities to take advantage of but are they legitimate work at home opportunities or are they there to take advantage of me? It is extremely overwhelming trying to sort through all of the opportunities to find the opportunity that is right for you. After some time goes by, you start to have doubts and you come to the point where you ask yourself the question "How do I find the right one?" I just don't seem to be getting the information I am looking for to build a good and honest successful Christian business. The first thing to keep in mind when you're doing a search for a business opportunity is, stay away from the marketing sites that say you can get rich over night. Do not let yourself be misled by them. I am sure you have heard the saying, if it is to good to be true it is. I call this words of wisdom. To start a Christian business and be successful, it is going to take some time and patience and you have to be willing to work at it in order to make it a successful business. Success does not happen over night, its not the Christian way. So what is the Christian way for a Christian business? In Luke 2:49 Jesus said, "I must be about my father's business." Through this Scripture, would it be fair to say, put God first and let God guide you His Way. Saying that, when you start a Christian business, be sure to exalt His name and promote His kingdom. This in itself is a great enough cause to focus your energies and strong enough to keep you going when the odds are stacked against you. With regard to Christian business opportunities, you will discover that focus is going to be a challenge when it comes time for you choose the opportunity that is right for you. Don't start a Christian business just to make money, stay focused on the true purpose of a Christian business and what it represents. If your passion is truly in the Lord and you're promoting God's kingdom and putting God first, you will stay focused, for that is where your heart is. When you focus on God, He in turn will focus on you. moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k moviefree8k Now, ask yourself the question? Are the Christian marketing sites you come across promoting God's kingdom? Are they going about God's business, and putting God first? If they are not putting God first, how could they possibly call their business a Christian business, and how are they going to help you? When it comes to Christian business opportunities, the biggest business opportunity there is for a Christian is spreading God's Word. This is how you will find the opportunity that is right for you, by their works. Are the Christian sites you come across truly putting God first and are they there to help you? For that is what a Christian business is, promoting God's kingdom and helping others. If your plan was to start an online business for the purpose to spread God's Word and you don't have a lot of money to work with, you will discover that an online business does not require a large amount of money, all you need is a website, a domain name and good way to promote it. One thing to keep in mind, when you start an online business, you don't just start a business and expect it to grow by itself, you have to build the business. It is like the farmer that plants the seed, he keeps cultivating and nurturing it to its full growth. That goes the same with a business, you have to keep after it, building your business to its full growth. When it comes to cultivating and nurturing your business, the first thing you have do is get your business name out to the public so you can get it noticed. You have to promote an online business to get it to grow. One of the best ways to promote your business and get it notice, is through article marketing. What makes article marketing the best strategy to use to get noticed? Search engines know there is a live person reviewing your article, and the search engines favor them, knowing the article directories want to have good valuable information for their readers. The search engines work the same way as the article directories, they also want to deliver the best information for the search performed. Another thing you want to keep in mind is, your establishing yourself as an expert by writing articles on your field of expertise. Take the time to think about this and what it can do for your Christian business. Look at it like this, when you're looking for information on a subject you want to talk to someone that knows what they are talking about. When your doing a search for Christian business opportunities, take the time to pick the opportunity that is right for you. Then start learning all you can on the business to the point of becoming an expert, and start being that someone who knows what they are talking about. Remember what I said, do some research and see if the Christian marketing sites you come across are promoting God's kingdom before you make your final decision. It could save you a lot of money and time down the road.