Business Plans

• Most small businesses never write a business plan. Those that do usually only do so when a funding source requires it. A business plan will help you review existing revenue streams, costs and market penetration. It is a pliable plan that should be changed as you change the mission, target audience or product line of your company.
  Use a business plan to isolate areas of your company that you want to develop. This might be increasing employees or changing a product line. Reviewing how more employees increase productivity or how a new product needs to be marketed differently gives you the foundation of what research you need to do to ensure success.
  
  

Stick with Long-Term Plans

• Few businesses achieve overnight success. The reality is that the public rarely sees the work and effort put into building a business. Create realistic expectations for growth and use time frames of three to five years to review growth success on top of your annual revenues. For new companies, know that most businesses fail within the first two years. The reason is that they do not have the money to adequately develop a customer base. Either the company runs out of money before potential customers know who they are and what they do or the company scrapes by without any real marketing campaign. Even the viral marketing campaign that boosted the movie "The Blair Witch Project" used a marketing campaign and hired online experts to infiltrate social networks and execute the campaign.
  
  

What Information is Included

• When creating a long-term business plan, it is important to consider internal and external factors. Internally you need to examine sales numbers and marketing campaigns. Determine which marketing campaigns were most successful. Start to look at the customer base and examine how you can branch out to a bigger market. This might take you to external factors such as industry trends and competition.
  If your competition is snatching a bigger share of the market, look at what they are doing. Investigate new technology and product packaging to see whether your company can be an innovator or someone who is able to give a better product for less.
  Finally, look at the economic outlook for your industry and for the economy in general. Part of planning means you are planning for growth and for economically challenging periods. Retaining earnings and cutting back is a good strategy if the economy suggests consumers might not want you product or services for a period of hardship.