A Guide To Creating A Business Plan That Gets Funding

 Successful Business ventures and other social organizations do not happen by chance. They are products of someone’s vision, thinking, determination, courage, persistence, discipline and hard work. Very often, people’s dreams and aspirations do not see the light of the day not because they lack education, skills or intelligence. 

Rather, people remain unaccomplished because they lack vision and concrete plans to turn their dreams into reality. Successful people in private and public sectors have a metal picture of their desired future and they maintain high degree of discipline to implement their plans with minimum distractions.

Today’s world is characterized by expanding opportunities in the corporate world. Many ordinary people have turned their ideas, passion and dreams into multi million dollar industries. 

In many cases, these people lack financial or technical capacity to turn their business ideas into commercial products or public goods. They rely on external sources of finance such as banks, micro finance, good samaritans, venture capitalists, grants and government assisted programmes and others.

 In virtually all cases, entrepreneurs who pitch a well thought-out business plan can possibly win technical assistance or funding to start or grow their ventures as grants or loans, based on the quality of the business plan submitted by the prospective entrepreneurs. 

Also, Micro finance banks and other conventional banks nowadays decide on whether not to fund a particular venture partly on the basis of the quality of the feasibility study or business plan.

WHAT IS BUSINESS PLAN?

Creating  a business plan is an essential step for every prudent entrepreneur  regardless of the size of the business. It can be described as a written outline that evaluates all aspects of the economic viability of a business venture including the description and analysis of the business prospects. 

In simple terms, it represents a strategy and actions needed to make the business a success. It drafts overall objectives and details the steps and resources required to reach targeted goals of the business.

Business plan contain certain elements which include:

Business Profile: It defines and describes intended business and exactly how one plans to go about it. In many cases people may not comprehend your business idea unless if you clearly describe it.  It is therefore important to narrate the idea and show the necessary steps to actualize it.

Environmental  Assessment: all businesses operate within a given environment. The environment may present opportunities and at the same time may also pose some challenges. 

This assessment helps provide a complete appraisal of the economic viability of the business considering certain factors such as regulatory, competitive, demographic, social and other related factors.

Cash Flow Assessment: It determines cash flow that will incorporate capital requirements.

Damage Control Plan: All businesses experience some elements of distress. Survival depends on how well a business is prepared to cope with them. 

Potential threats are anticipated and plans to overcome them are provided. Stay tuned, Subscribe here or on tab above and have a nice day.