What makes an excellent business plan?

Business plan is a written document describing all relevant internal and externa
l elements, and strategies for starting a new venture. It addresses short-term a
nd long-term decision making.
It can be prepared on different perspective: entrepreneur, marketing and investo
r s.
Entrepreneur must be aware to whom the business plan is addressed, and must incl
ude their viewpoint.
It can be varied by death and detail. The business must include strengths of man
agement, personnel, product or service and available resources.
Presentation of the business plan is a part of the excellence and should be focu
sed on the point of why this is a good opportunity to buy this business plan. Feas
ible study should be conducted focusing on marketing, financing and production.
Well-defined goals and objectives and strategy decisions should be clearly prese
nted to the audience. (The CTL booklet on entrepreneurship, Chapter 7)
2. Benefits of the business plan?
It will be a guide for your business direction. It will state objectives and how
they can be achieved realistically. It will state the information about your ex
ternal and internal stakeholders, such as: customers, competitors and shareholde
rs. It will state the financial information on profits that he or she is plannin
g to achieve. It will list individual perspective on marketing strategies. It ca
n organize the thoughts, questions and concerns that the entrepreneur still shou
ld work on.
Well thought and clearly organized business plan makes a business one step close
r to a success.
After listing all the components of the business plan, entrepreneur should by an
alyzing it carefully, and decide whether he or she should go ahead with the idea
, or should it be still improved at some point.
It will provide the information on the start up costs or how much finance you ne
ed to invest or to seek more.
It will state the risks involved of setting a new business, as well as risks inv
olved with business progression.
If the entrepreneur will decide to go ahead with the business and implement the
business plan, it will bring a sense of direction to the employees as well; it w
ill help them to keep focused on clearly stated objectives.
It will help to measure your success as you go along.
3. Why to list major risks in the business plan?
Business environment is ever changing state. All the business will face changes
and have to react to the risks accordingly. By detailing the risks in the busine
ss plan, entrepreneur explores the possible difficulties that he or she may face
, and which strategy direction it must take to survive and to keep their objecti
ves straight. It may include possible risks from the external and internal envir
onment: policies change, new competitors, financial risks and possible risks wit
h the suppliers. The best is to foresee the risks and to react to them strategic
ally with the good timing and strategy. Without risks statement in the business
plan, all the stakeholders will be straggling to survive in the business environ
ment, and would not be able to react on time and will fail, because of the compe
titors who did foresee the risks, or because of the investors who were not prepa
red to take such a risk. It will be impossible to find an investor to the busine
ss, as he or she will see that the business plan is unrealistic and will fail qu
ickly, loosing a big amount of finance and time. To persuade the stakeholders to
go ahead with the business plan is not enough just stating the risk factors, it
must be stated how the business is planning to overcome those difficulties, and
why those strategies will work to succeed the stated objective. Business should
 analyze both long-term and short-term risks, but the advantages of the objectiv
e and financial return on it should overweight the risks. If it does not come to
this term, there is a strong possibility that the business plan and business it
self will fail.
4. Purpose of the business plan for the entrepreneur, investor and a key su
pplier.
Entrepreneur the purpose of the business plan is to state clearly what he or she
is trying to achieve, the risks that it will bring and strategies to overcome a
nd accomplish their goal. It helps to determine whether the business will work a
t the market. It serves an important tool for obtaining financial support.
Investors the business plan states all the entrepreneurial characteristics and r
eturns that it may bring. It gives information for a background check and analys
is of the arisen opportunity. Generally giving the information on: Is the risk w
orth the return?
Key supplier business plan will help to identify the best supplier available for
the business, products and prices available for the win-win situation.
Business plan should be varied according to the audience, because they all are i
nterested in different information, distinct viewpoint. So, depending on the aud
ience, entrepreneur should make a more emphasis on the information they are look
ing for, stating it clearly, strongly and achievable. Entrepreneur will be then
more professional, reliable and able to negotiate the terms. In my opinion, the
entrepreneur must have a business plan serving its objective for a certain audie
nce, where all the information is relevant and persuasive to the audience and th
ey in them turns can come to the best decision. It may be time consuming and exp
ensive, but the result of the outcome should be worth, rather than searching for
the investor or choosing not the best supplier possible for the business. Entre
preneur rather spend more time and finance at the beginning stage of planning, e
xploring and analyzing, than spending all this effort and money on business plan
and business that will turn to fail quickly. Entrepreneur must spend his or her
money, wisely that this finance will work according to the long term run and ob
jective.