Business Plan
A business plan is your guide to success. You need to prepare this plan in advance to know how to proceed. Business plan is also necessary to introduce you and your idea to the investor. It makes the investor have a clear view of you; Learn more about the details of your business and your mastery of things. The business plan forms the framework of your current startup and future company. It accurately describes your idea and outlines your organizational strategy over a period of time (usually 3 to 5 years).
In a business plan, you must first determine the purpose of the business and the reason for launching it. Introduce yourself (your team) and the product or service that comes from your business. You should define your workspace as well. You should also specify how much of your business process is online and how much is offline; how much your physical space is and how it is organized and how many service or production staff you need. You also need to define the trend line and the prospects for your business development so that you will not lag behind the market and competitors if demand increases. You need to explain your budget and expenses in detail. Investors in particular will ask you for a list of costs and budgets you need. The financial debate has other details that come with starting and growing your business such as insurance costs, warehousing, taxes, server costs, etc.
Another important point in writing a business plan is to identify the customer. Determine who gets the final product or service of your startup and who makes up your target market. The extent of this market must be determined and the possibility of its development must be considered. Large startups that are growing globally also care about how their product or service transcends culture, race, and borders from the beginning, or how they assimilate it to the host culture and taste so that they can have an international market for it.
Suppose you have a product made for children. As a rule, the product should be in a way that draws the attention and trust of their parents. The level of income of their parents should also be considered since the price of the product and service you offer and the level of revenue of customers also plays an important role in determining the boundaries of the target market.
You should also consider your competitors when preparing a business plan. The first question you must ask yourself after coming up with an idea is why the customer should come to you and not others. This will be the first question of your investor.
It is rarely the case that an idea is formed without any background from A to Z; so there are probably companies in the market that offer services or products similar to yours. Get to know these companies and look for strengths. These strengths can come from obvious factors such as price and quality, as well as small points such as better customer interaction, better support, or even a smoother, more customer-friendly user interface.
In order to be superior to your competitors, you must also have a marketing strategy and attract a customer by allocating the appropriate budget to it. Do not skimp on this strategy and do not spend too much; as your strategy may not work and your money may be wasted. Try to find the appropriate platform for your marketing by knowing your target audience. For instance, if your audience is the general public, television is a good medium for advertising. However, if your target audience is a specific group of society, you should look for the right media for them.
Revenue Models
Revenue model is the way you make money from your business. By creating an idea and turning it into a business, you add value to users’ lives. It means that something did not exist previously and now its existence is useful for society. The revenue model is the way you work to turn this value-added into revenue. This method must be sustainable and repeatable. If your business shifts to another area over time, your revenue model may be affected. The revenue model is also important for your investors. Once they are familiar with your idea and business plan, they will ask about your revenue model.
In the last two decades, since the Internet entered businesses, new ways of making money have emerged, and the debate over the revenue model has heated up and given way to business start-ups. At that time, companies like Google started offering free services, but their business was growing gradually. Their revenue model was advertising.
There are various models for online business. Another common model is the subscription model, in which the customer pays a subscription to receive a service. This model, which is popular among online businesses these days, allows the customer to use it in the desired time period at a low cost. For example, Netflix allows customers to use their entire archive for a monthly fee of $15.
Marketplace business model is another common method among online businesses. In this way, sellers of goods or services can sell their products in the market provided to them. This market is attractive to the seller and the customer since the eligibility and security of the purchase is guaranteed by the market owners. Market owners, in the meanwhile, receive a percentage of their revenue from the parties to the transaction.
Pivot
Over time, the economic and social conditions of the people change. As a result, people’s tastes change. When you put these changes alongside the latest technological advances, it is very likely that you will need fundamental changes in the development of your startup. The service you provide may no longer be customer-friendly and you may have to set it aside and keep your customer with new ideas.
Mentioning this may not be necessary for you who are just starting your startup; however, it is of great importance as it changes your mindset about the future. A successful startup is ready to change by measuring the market, customer feedback, as well as the social and economic changes of the society, and to put itself in a new direction without prejudice. This is the stage of changing and turning the startup to a new path and it is called pivoting. Receiving constant feedback from customers and measuring the market will alert us in a timely manner to changes in the tastes and needs of customers, and changing our path will be less doubtful. For example, now that Coronavirus pandemic has forced people into quarantine, many startups have turned to providing services with minimal contact and presence to keep their business afloat or they have entered the areas of earning money at home.