1. Executive Summary – This explains about everything that is the rest of the business plan. It should be written to completely cover every aspect of the rest of the business plan. A good way to think about it is this may be the only part of the whole plan that gets read, so it should sell your business.

2. Table of Contents – Do not elaborate. Keep it short and to the point. You get to explain later.

3. Company Description – This must cover the basics of your business. What products/services and what industry your business provides. It should also cover what makes your business stand out from the competition and how you will be successful.

4. Market Analysis – This is where you prove that you have done your marketing research. You should explain about the industry, including target markets. Explain your competition and compare your business to them. Explain your marketing strategies and plans.

5. Technology – Explain the technology you will use and how new developments may affect your business.

6. Business Operations or Manufacturing – Explain how you will conduct business. What makes you better than the competition as far as operations.

7. Management and Ownership – Here you will need to name all the key personnel. Explain their education, skills, and what they bring to the company.

8. Organization and Personnel – This is where you tell your personnel needs. State how many employees are needed, how you will pay them and what you will pay them. Also explain the personnel organizational structure.

9. Capital and Usage – This must be very detailed and explained. Starting with how much is needed to start and then projection of needs.

10. Financial – Here is where you get to project future gains and losses. You should list them quarterly until the business breaks even then annual reports are fine.

12. Appendices – Any resumes, references, copies of studies done or anything else to back up information in the business plan should be included here.

These 12 steps should help you put together a solid business plan as you start a small business. Just keep in mind that you should stick to the facts and back everything up with evidence.

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Did it ever happen to you that you saw a recent kind of small business and suddenly it struck you that you once had a comparable idea? If you are anything like me you must have had several ideas over the past and would have felt the desire to start a small business, and out of those ideas you might even have pursued some, which you felt more confident about. Let me guess, first you tried to learn how to start a small business and then you started laying out a business plan and while contemplating, either your doubts about the idea started getting deeper and deeper because you realized that the product or service is not compelling enough to be the next “Google” or you thought that it’ll be too big of a responsibility and would require too much hard work, or maybe you even decided to proceed with the idea and started a business thinking that the hard work will pay off, but it never did!

It happens to almost every one of us and often times we skip or even fail on some great ideas mainly because of some popular misconceptions. There is no 10 step plan or method that can tell you how to start a new business and make it successful but there are some major misconceptions that usually become the reason why most small businesses fail. I am going to discuss two of the largely essential factors of a business failure.

1- You need to have a unique and compelling product/service.

When people talk about how to start a small business they usually seem to have a greater emphasis on the need of a compelling product. Even if it can be good to have a product or service that can sell itself, the reality is that not every market provides such advantage. If you want to start a small business and are waiting for that bright idea - the odds of just coming up with such an idea are probably one in a million. That's even worse than the odds of falling off a bicycle and breaking your neck.

2- The Business plan is just a formality.

Most people seem to think that a business plan is not needed for a small business or a formal plan is only needed when you are looking for an investor or applying for a loan. A business plan is the best way to learn how to start your own business, because every business opportunity is unique in itself. First of all I would like to emphasize that it's not just a formality. The business plan is perhaps one of the most important part of the process for a startup business because it shows all interested parties including yourself about how serious you are about your business. An all-inclusive business plan gives you the impression about your competition, market requirement, feasibility of a small business opportunity and many more contributing factors. You can’t assume your small business to be profitable if you don’t know your competition and if you have not done an extensive investigation about whether it is an opportunity worth pursuing or not. All the hard work in the world would make no difference if you are not familiar with these important aspects of your business.

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