“What’s your business plan?”

Written by Rolfe Larson
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    Person sketching a business plan on her note

    If you’re running a business, you get asked this question often. It could come from your banker, your accountant, your business-savvy aunt, or your teenager taking that first business class. They want to know: what’s your business plan? And they all want different things. Some just want a sentence or two about customers, competitors and business models. Others want detailed financials. Still others wonder if you’ve done a thorough market and competitor analysis.

    Welcome to the first edition of the Business Planning Blog of the Free Management Library. I’m Rolfe Larson, your guide in this quadrant of the blogosphere. Our goal is to help you figure out how to answer that persistent question. In a way that helps you succeed with your business.

    Here are some of the other questions we’ll be addressing here:

    • Do you really need a business plan?
    • How much business planning do you need to do?
    • Where to go to get business planning help?
    • When to hire someone to do market research
    • When to hire someone to write your plan
    • What about all those unknowns every business faces?
    • Will a business plan help you raise money?
    • When should you revise your plan?

    So I hope you can join us for the ride. Send in your reactions, comments, suggestions, and let’s make this fun. And we’ll help you answer that persistent question: what’s your business plan?

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    For more resources, see our Library topic Business Planning.

    Rolfe Larson