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Starting up:
Presenting your plan

Once you have developed your plan for the business, you might find it helpful to put it all down in writing and prepare a formal business plan. Such a document would help you to formulate your ideas and would help you to spot any areas that needed further thought or resources. It is often an essential document if you want to obtain finance.

Tips on presenting your plan to a potential funder include:

Start with an executive summary (say only two pages long) highlighting the key features of each section of your plan.

Write the plan in a language that the funder will understand, for example try to avoid technical jargon and long rambling sentences.

Make sure you answer the questions that a potential funder is likely to ask, such as what you intend to do with the money, and how you intend to pay the money back.

The plan should look good, be typed, be broken down into sections consisting of short, numbered, paragraphs and generally have a professional feel to it.

A good presentation should make the potential funder read your plan, but they then need to be convinced that the plan will work. Two areas that they will focus on are:

Whether the financial forecasts are realistic and consistent with the other information in the report.

Whether the management team is strong enough to implement the plan.

If you are trying to raise finance you may only get one chance to put your case across, and so it is worthwhile making sure that your business plan is suitable for the purpose. We recommend that your plan is reviewed by your accountant or business adviser. They will be able to comment on the effectiveness of the presentation of the plan and identify any problems with the financial forecasts, or prepare forecasts for you.

Even if you are not raising finance, it will still be helpful to prepare a business plan. The act of setting down your ideas on paper and working through the implications can help you decide whether the business is viable and how to best make it work. It will also give you a benchmark against which you can compare your actual results.