A winning executive summary must have great content. However, perhaps equally important is a unique and captivating appearance. However, most business plan writers fail abysmally on appearance. In general, the appearance is predictable, boring, and standard. At the same time, the writer can’t risk creating something that doesn’t have a strong business feel. For many striking this balance is a nightmare or more accurately not even a possibility. In the next few paragraphs we’ll cover a number of conceptual examples that in part or together will deliver:

CONCEPT #1

Borders on the executive summary section will set your executive summary apart from the competition. My favorites are the very narrow triple line border or the broad line with either one or two narrow lines around the document. Also a dark bold black, deep blue or teal solid border from 1/4 to 1/2 inch around each page of the summary.

CONCEPT #2

1 to 3 graphics, illustrations, or photos with color on each page of the executive summary give character. Vary the size and spread across the pages. The graphics, illustrations and photos should not be gratuitous. They have to contribute to the summary in a strong positive way.

CONCEPT #3

I have found the two column format very compelling. You can often compress two pages of material to a single impactful sheet with a sense of being an easy read and yet a impactful presentation.

CONCEPT #4

Use bold type to highlight key information items in the executive summary.

CONCEPT #5

Brevity is powerful. Restrict your summary to a single page. Deliver a brief summary that tells the investor what you need from him or her. Explain clearly how your project is differentiated and will succeed. Explain what the risks are. Explain how the risks are mitigated. Deliver a clear explanation of what the anticipated returns will be.

CONCEPT #6

Lines to separate sections of your summary. Using lines can be physically attractive, very business like, and add to the message.

The writer can use these ideas in any combination that suits their needs, their message and their creative objectives. When writing a business plan executive summary, the main issues are to remember your audience. Consider who they are likely to be, what their background is, and what their goals are. Next, remember your goals and try to align those with your audience’s interests. The more effectively you tie these together along with creating a strong positive impact the more successful your executive summary will be.

Developing a business proposal is one thing that you should do if you’re on a plan to create some business opportunities. Whatever it is, initial business development, franchise, licensing. Attracting form of this kind of proposal could be the key on pulling investor to put their fund on your idea. But often this thing is the thing that bother most people, they have many, many ideas of new business opportunities, but they don’t know how to put on the line, describing their ideas to money making opportunities in front of those investors. The important point of developing a great business proposal is how you could put your ideas into a profit generator for them. You have to describe it clearly to them, make it make sense for them. Don’t try to give them some sky high words, hiperbolic words about your idea. They just want a simple explaining how this idea of yours could be their money farms.

In fact, some investors just needs a summary wrote on a single page, defining how much it would cost, how much they’ll earn from it, and how you can make it happens. If you’re able to describe these clearly, and sounds make sense for them, then your proposal is good enough. But you couldn’t stop here, at good, you want to create a great business proposal. A perfect proposal usually consists of these :

1. Background of your ideas (Explaining, why you could come up with this idea, and why do you think it would be a great opportunity that if they’re not taking it immediately somebody else will)

2. Technical Analysis (On this chapter, you have to describe what these ideas needs to support on, technically of course. Technical means what kind of support do you need to make this idea operational. What equipment do you need, location for this business, vendors, etc. So they’ll see if they could put investment on your ideas or not).

3. Market Analysis (This part should be explaining about the market of your business ideas, which segment of the market you’re aiming, position that your brand will have on the market, etc. So they could start analyzing is your ideas makes sense or not).

4. Financial Analysis (Financial analysis would be their big concern, here you must interpretate your technical and marketing analysis to a financial statement. Make a financial simulation that they could read about it’s BEP, ROI, IRR, and other financial indicator. So they can decide whether to take or not your offer).

There you are, four simple factors you should considered when you’re developing a business proposal. Hmm, I’m thinking about writing proposals for people will be a great business idea.

Everything here is is to help you write your perfect busines plan.

Free small business plan information to help you get started…

If you plan on receiving third party financing for you home business then creating a small business plan is something that you absolutely must do. Most people starting small businesses do not write out a business plan and from a academic standpoint this is large mistake.

Your business plan is in essence the backbone of your business.

You are going to need to create one especially if you plan on receiving a small business start up loan or grant. No investor will take your request for money seriously unless you can show them a viable business plan. I know you don’t know where to start, but don’t worry… It should not be too tough of a task after reviewing the information found here.

You have two options when creating a small business plan: you can hire a professional to write one out for you or you can create a free small business plan by writing it yourself.

Your small business plan can be simple, all it must do is describe what your business is and where you want it go in the future.

Essential parts of a small business plan:

Title Page:

On this page you include the name of your business, your business’s address, phone number, email address, website URL, and of course your name as well as an other business owner

On the title page you should also include a one page statement explaining why you created your business plan (e.i. why you need money to start for your small business)

Table of contents:

Summary

A sentence or two about each section of your business plan to grab the attention of your potential investors.

Business Description

This section contains the who, what, when, where, why, and how of your small business. Give your companies physical location information, when your business was formed, what type of legal entity your business is formed under, and a brief description of your product or service.

Product or Service Rendered

Explain how your business operates and be as specific as possible.

Your Plan

How are you going to market your product or service? Who are you going to market your product to? Who is your existing competition? Answer these questions in this section of your small business plan.

Day to Day Operational Requirements

What will you do on a day to day basis in your business? What type of equipment will you need? Answer these questions in this section of your small business plan.

Personnel

Who will be the people directly involved in your business? What will they do? If you are going to run a home business you may be the only person directly involved in your business. Explain your role, your background, and what you will have to do to run your business successfully.

Financial Data

To your potential investors this is the MOST important part of your small business plan.

The information that you must include in this section is as follows…

* Projected start up cost: How much money are you going to need to get your business started and what are you going to be spending that money on.

* Projected income statement: How much revenue do you expect to produce in your business start up phase?

* Expected profit and loss: Self explanatory…

* Projected monthly cash flow: Your cash flow is how much money you earn minus how much you spend.

* Your personal financial statement: Self explanatory…

* Supporting Docs: In this section you will want to include any supporting information required for the success of your home business and anything else that directly adds as perspective to your start up plans.

I stumbled on a very interesting article that lead me to a very interesting competition. The article appeared in the New York Times on Friday 16 April with the following heading, “Can You Write a Business Plan With Fewer Than 140 Characters?” The article was written about a competition being run by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in conjunction with their MIT $100K annual business plan competition.

They call it the TWITCH (Twitter Pitch) contest. And this brings me to the topic for this article, “How long should your business plan be?” Here are some of the advice you may find on the Net:

It can vary from a 10 to a 100-page document; It should be short enough to not bore your reader; The shorter, the better; Shouldn’t take up more than 25 pages; Limit the plan length to 15 pages; 15 to 25 pages is the optimum length; Basic plans are under ten pages; Comprehensive plans are often 10-25 pages long; Length should be 20 to 30 pages max; Can be any length.

The general feeling is that shorter is better. A few factors should dictate the ideal length of your business plan.

The nature of your business – The simpler the shorter, the more complex or “new” the longer.

Purpose of the plan – To raise millions may have to explain a lot more.

We personally believe that the shorter the better as long as it achieves its objective. One expert said that “A business plan needs to be whatever length is required to excite the investor, prove that management truly understands the market, and detail the execution strategy.”

The “empathy” test, once the business plan has been done, is to put yourself in the shoes of the audience and to ask yourself if you would have done what you want them to do based on what you see and read.

If the plan does not pass your “empathy” test there may be several reasons for that and one of them may be incomplete information. This will require that you add more pages.

If one looks at the advertising industry the greatest challenge is to sell a product on the TV in a 30 seconds commercial. Can you sell your plan in 30 seconds? We therefore go for the “Short is good, long is bad.” approach. When we look at the various areas that should be covered in more detail we will endeavour to indicate how long each section should ideally be.

In the next article we’ll have a look at the concept of the “elevator speech” and how that can become a powerful tool in business planning.

Happy planning. Make it a challenging, exciting and creative experience.

I have a friend and business partner who is probably the world’s foremost expert on buying businesses.

Over the past 50 years he has bought somewhere around 200 (he’s lost count) businesses, and still going strong today.

And one of the jokes he likes to make goes something like this:

“There are three things people are afraid of in life: death, taxes and business plans.”

In fact, from his experience, he says the business plan is the most dreaded part of the whole business-buying process.

And yet, it doesn’t have to be.

Here’s why:

While it’s true you do need a business plan if you want to get money from a bank, an investor or any other financing source…writing a business plan really isn’t all that complicated.

In fact, a business plan basically just a sales document with three main components:

1.) How much money you need.

2.) What you need the money for.

3.) How you’re going to pay the money back.

And that’s it.

See?

That’s not so complicated, is it?

All you need to know besides the above is how to structure a business plan (there are books in your local library that can help you with this free), and you’re ready to go.

Bottom line?

Don’t put off buying a business just because you’re afraid to write a business plan or don’t think you can afford to hire someone to do it for you.

If you simply educate yourself on the topic (again, go to any library and learn it free), you will be up and running with your own business in no time.