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E-Myth – “Why most small businesses don’t work & what to do about it”

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Virtual Accountant | Components Of Helpful Business Plans


Business owners that do not have a business plan within their business might as well be planning to fail says virtual accountant. The reason for this is because businesses that have completed a business plan for their company are 50% more likely to increase their business than businesses who do not have a business plan at all. The famous Benjamin Franklin quote says ìif you fail to plan, you are planning to fail.î And just like that quote, businesses that donít have a business plan are not going to be able to do all of the things that they need in order to become successful. They may be doing some of the right things some of the time but they will be less likely to do all of the important things all of the time.

How easy it is for business owners to effect positive change in their business, all business owners should know the most important things to include in their business plan in order to create this great tool. The first businesses can include in their business plan is a concrete sales and marketing plan says virtual accountant. Entrepreneurs are full of amazing and wonderful marketing ideas, they have the fully organized their thoughts on paper. A business plan is the best place to pull their plans together. Business owners need to remember that they should be as specific as possible not only writing down what they want to do for marketing, but for each marketing initiatives they need to be extremely specific. Beingís extremely specific also means business owners need to include timelines. Something else the business owner should think about when they are putting their marketing plans on paper, is how they are going to evaluate if they are working.

The next section a business owner can include in their business plan is a market and risk analysis. Many business owners often already know the risks that are associated with the industry that they work, donít think to put them in a business plan. However says virtually accountant the reason they want to do this is by identifying the risks ahead of time, they can come up with plans for how to avoid or minimize those risks. By being prepared head of time, business owners can react quicker and lessen the effects that risk had on their business.

The third thing that a business owner should include in their business plan says is a month to month cash flow projection. Cash flow projections are so incredibly necessary says virtual accountant because cash flow is something that most business owners struggle with. By having the cash flow projections be month-to-month, business owners can more easily see whatís going on the business and make changes whenever necessary. Often yearly projections can be far out especially if circumstances in the business change. By planning month-to-month, business owners can be more prepared and more effectively avoid cash flow problems in their business.

Businesses without business plans are like a ship without a captain says virtual accountant. Business plans help businesses set a direction for their business and achieve their goals. Without a business plan a business owner is unable to consistently do the tasks needed to succeed. Statistics show that businesses that complete business plan are at least 50% more likely to grow the revenue in their business and succeed. On the flipside, businesses that are struggling despite working very hard and do not know why they are struggling can benefit greatly from the business plan.

One of the reasons why entrepreneurs donít have business plans is that they donít know how important it is to their business. If they knew how incredibly important business plans are to the success of their business, many business owners still may not write a business plan because they donít know how to get started. Getting started on the business plan can be simple says virtually accountant all they need is a few hours of time and knowing what information to put in the plan. The first thing that business owners should include in a business plan is a market and risk analysis. It is very common knowledge that all businesses that exist carry some inherent risks. Many business owners intuitively know those risks. However it is extremely important for business owner to write out those risks in their business plan no matter how well they know them. The reason for this says virtual accountant is so that they can create a written plan on how that entrepreneur is going to address those risks. By being proactive and creating a plan before those problems come up can help the business owner either avoid those problems altogether, or minimize the effect those risks have on their business.

Another thing that business owners need to write out in their business plan is a sales and marketing strategy. Even though business owners may have an extremely good idea of what they want to do in order to market their business, if they donít write down strategies and plan out exactly how they are going to get done, business owners will not be able to follow through consistently. Since the only effective marketing plan is one that is not implemented consistently, business owners run the risk of your marketing efforts not working whether marketing efforts taking two or three times more work to get to be effective because the business owner is not implementing them strategically. Simply by writing them down, creating timelines and creating measurableís, business owners can ensure they are far more successful than just by keeping it in their head.

Business owners are very intelligent people and they often know all of the things they need to do in order to be successful in their business says virtual accountant, but creating a business plan will help them create the tasks that they must do every day in order to work on their business consistently achieve those goals that will help them succeed.