1. Business Simulation Seminar Business Plans

2. What is a Business Plan?  A structured document describing the goals, plans, and expected outcomes for the company.  Practically – think about what you would give someone to convince them to loan you money

3. Business Plan Outline 1. Executive Summary 2. Company Overview 1. Mission statement 2. Objectives 3. Market Analysis 1. Target markets 2. Market size and growth 4. Strategy 5. Products 1. Product plans by market segment 2. Product differentiators 6. Marketing 1. Marketing plans (marketing mix) 2. Sales forecasts by product 7. Production Plans 8. Finance 1. Current financials 2. Planned financing 3. Expected financials 9. Profiles of Key Executives

4. Executive Summary  Short summary of the rest of the plan  Write this after you have written everything else  Should state: What you will invest What you plan to do with the money What the outcome will be  This include specifics, including Market share Expected profits  Give numbers, not platitudes

5. Company Overview  Mission statement  Objectives What are the company’s objectives?  What markets?  What size market share?  What profitability?

6. Market Analysis  What are the target market segments?  How big is each segment?  How much is it growing each year?  Who are the competitors?

7. Product Plans For each target market segment:  What products will you have in that segment?  When will you introduce them?  What are the product characteristics? E.g. size, performance, MTBF  What will differentiate your products?

8. Marketing Plan For each target segment, address:  Product  Price  Promotion  Distribution  What is the sales forecast for each product in the segment?

9. Production Plan  How much do you plan to produce each year?  What is the targeted plant capacity?  Will you add or sell off capacity?  How much inventory do you plan to carry?

10. Finance  What are your current financials?  What do key ratios say?  What financing actions will you take? Sell bonds or equity? Retire bonds or buy-back stock?  What do you expect your financials to look like in the future?

11. Profiles of Key Executives  Include these if going outside of the company for financing E.g. a start-up going to a bank or Venture Capitalist  Do not include for internal plans

12. Business Plans – Practical Notes  Remember – the plans should cover three years.  Use tables to present data  Do not use “I”, use “we” or the name of the company  Do not use the words such as “a lot” or similar. Give data.  You are trying to convince someone else that what you are doing is worth investing in.