Business Plan Formatting: When to Put Your Plan in Order

A business plan has a pre-defined format determined by years and years of standard practice. Before putting the content of your plan into this format there is a great deal of research and preparation to be done. However, using this format at the right time will put you on the right track by examining the document in the way that your intended audience (investors or lenders) will.

Preparation Before Formatting

After a business concept has been created, deeper research begins the business planning process. This research should be into the overall industry the business is in, the primary customer groups, and the primary competitors. It should also include research into marketing and operations methods which are standard (and non-standard) practice in the industry and the startup costs involved in the business. From this deeper research, the backbone of the plan is created which becomes the raw content you will use in your industry, customer, and competitive analysis sections. This research also presents an opportunity for you to choose to scrap the business idea if the hurdles appear too great.

The Right Time

The right time to put the content of your plan into business plan format is after this research is relatively complete. At this point you will be able to fill in most sections of the plan with a draft of the text. You will be able to read the plan from start to finish in the way you intend for funders to read it. By doing this you can better ask yourself whether the plan makes a logical progression through the ideas presented, whether certain information or definitions must appear earlier, and whether there is too much repetition or redundancy in the plan. Even if you have yet to make certain strategic decisions that will impact the marketing plan, operations plan, and hiring, using the business plan format will allow you to consider those sections in the greater context of what the funder is reading. This should help to guide you in making those decisions.