Don’t fly blind with your business. Learn how to create and implement a business plan. Learn how often you should be making a business plan to assist through the journey of your business.
Sunshine: Hey, are you flying blind? Or do you actually have a business plan you’re using?
Crystal: Welcome to the Love of Business. I’m Crystal.
Sunshine: And I’m Sunshine. Let’s get to it.
Business plans? Seems pretty essential.
Crystal: It’s definitely a game changer, that’s for sure. Let me ask you a question, Sunshine. Let’s say you were taking a flight to London today and you got on the plane, got in your seat, got comfortable, and the pilot got on the intercom to announce, “Hey, everyone. Welcome aboard. Get ready for our trip to London. I don’t have a flight plan today. So, I thought, you know, we’d just wing it?” What would you do?
Sunshine: I think I’d be grabbing my stuff and saying, “Open the door, I’m going to de-plane.”
Crystal: I think most people would. Now, same hold trues with your business, having a plan in place to get from point A and point B.
Sunshine: Great analogy, by the way.
Crystal: Thanks. Now, let’s talk about what a business plan is and how to actually create one. So, think of your business plan as your business visual roadmap. Where you are now, what you are going to do, and what you are going to accomplish. So, your business plan should consist of course financial projections. That’s both revenue and profit projections. It should have core areas, detailed, such as marketing, sales, delivery, admin, systems and team. And of course, there should be a spot on there for your personal goals. Because you are always going to be your number one client and you should always take care of yourself first before you can take care of anything or anyone else.
Now, once you have those main components in place, then you will start doing projects for each of those core areas. So, for example, a project in marketing might be networking or social media. So, you’ll put a goal of what you want to accomplish in that marketing goal and then put a deadline within that timeline.
Sunshine: That’s really great information, Crystal. So, now that you’ve given the basics of a business plan. How often are we supposed to be doing this?
Crystal: Great question. So, we recommend doing a business plan once every 90 days. And this is a very detailed plan for each 90-day, quarterly period. And that is because a lot can happen in six months and a lot can change within a year. And then you would be constantly be putting a lot of work if you are doing a six month or annual business plan.
Also, that said, it’s not saying that you don’t have longer term goals, but you put that in a separate document. Your one year goal, three year goal, five year goal, and your ten year goals.
Sunshine: Those are really helpful tips, Crystal. Thank you so much for sharing that with us and everyone who is viewing. What’s your number one takeaway from today’s lesson? Please leave us a comment and thanks for watching.
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