What exactly is a business plan? 

Lesson Details:

Video Transcription: So let's talk about what is a business plan some people just think it's a document it's they think it's really important to have a document a formal business plan before you start almost like a school homework right you have to have something to hand in but it's opposite of that a business plan is really the set of strategies it's only as good as the set of strategies that is in your document that's the quality of the business plan right it can help even be in your head right you can all be planned in your head and if that is good it's good right and if the strategies are bad doesn't matter if you have a document or not right so a lot of people they think they need a document but they don't know how to write the document and they tried to have somebody write for one for them but that's also like I'm mistake right because that person doesn't know what your business is all about either unless they're working closely with you so what you really really really have to do is think of your business plan as your plan of action your business plan is only as good as the quality of the strategies the quality of your plan of action is it going to be feasible if you're a first time entrepreneur you may not know that you may not have a good point of reference to judge that which is why I always recommend that well number one you educate yourself.

Which is what you're doing right now but also you always can get amazing benefits of working with a mentor a coach somebody who's done it before because a good coach can steer you in like in five or ten minutes if they can see the mistake and they can steer you away from it and you had gone down that path he would have like wasted months and a lot of money pursuing that only to later realize why that mistake was a mistake now some people think also they need a business plan to give to investors and investors like yeah they like to have a nice business plan as one of the things you give them but it's it's a big thing on their list a much bigger thing on their list is if your business is already in progress and growing and progressing and you know like you know you're actually making some progress more traffic more money more revenue something and consistently and there's vision for the long term for how this can become really big right and the investor will see all it can become really big and until already company so they don't like the plans they like execution now some people think that they're gonna create a business plan because they're gonna give it to a bank to get along that's another reason why people create business plans that's also a little bit faulty because most Bismol vans do not loan to companies which have not started they also prefer businesses which have they're in business and have profit and revenue because that makes that bond so much less risky right so that's also not the reason to have your business plan so let me tell you my very simple definition of a business plan that is easy - easy to use right it's the business plan is a definition of your company's business model or it's basically that the outline of all your strategies because what your business model is essentially is.

It's how every bit of your business sort of works with all the other parts of your business right how the ins and outs of the business function is it feasible that's what a business plan has to express now now I'm getting into like impulsively confusing terms like business plan was confusing now business model might be confusing so you might say Alex is becoming confusing but it's not because a business model can be confusing but let me make that easier - there there are three that are very important part of your business your product or service your marketing which is how you promote your product or service and the eventual finances meaning can this happen profitably does it happen happen profitably all that kind of you know or are you gonna lose money all the time right so those three things have to work well together creating a great product or service promoting it effectively and doing it all profitably you can manage that you have the inkling the start of a great business plan and not just a great business plan a great business so um who talking fast I like I gotta take a breath so um what's really the business plan right a lot of people they ask for a template just to fill in the blanks you know to make it easier I'm not big on templates although there are templates in this course and if you want that you will have that but again it's really the quality of the actual plan that's the important part right is the plan viable that's really really really the only thing so my advice don't buy sample business plans where people just you know use an existing work brother boilerplate business plan and just change the name of your business and change the few details better if you if you if after this course you're still not clear something still always you can message me here or you can look for a coach that will coach you on all the different aspects of your business plan different parts of your business plan and hopefully you and the coach together will come up with a great business strategy which you can then put on paper and then have that business plan.