How to write a business plan

(Click here to download the business plan).

In this post, I would like to share with you an example of business plan. The business plan is based on one company idea I had when I wrote my last post about paperless. Because of this paperless trend, I indeed think there is an opportunity to create a company that would gather all your paper statements (bank and insurance statements, utility bills, etc…) in one single website.

Thanks to this website, not only you will be able to receive all your statements in one single place, but also you will be able to pay your bills online and archive them electronically. In addition, a company sending bills through this website, would have the possibility to increase its marketing impact by sending promotional messages and personalized communications directly to your attention, electronically.

One can argue that banks and other utility providers already send electronic bills, but think of the mess of usernames and passwords, which are different for every provider. Having all your bills in one place is a huge plus, and clearly makes your life easier!

Based on this idea, I have developed a business plan for a company called "Mygreenbill.com".The intent of this business plan is to present the project to Venture Capital (VC) companies that will assess the feasability of the project. Above all, the business plan is of course made to raise funds among VCs, and describes what would be required to create the company.

The business plan I did follows the agenda below, which was suggested by Sequoia Capital, which funded among other companies Apple, Cisco and Symantec:

Company Purpose

• Define the company/business in a single declarative sentence.

Problem

• Describe the pain of the customer (or the customer’s customer).
• Outline how the customer addresses the issue today.

Solution

• Demonstrate your company’s value proposition to make the customer’s life better.
• Show where your product physically sits.
• Provide use cases.

Why Now

• Set-up the historical evolution of your category.
• Define recent trends that make your solution possible.

Market Size

• Identify/profile the customer you cater to.

Competition

• List competitors
• List competitive advantages

Product

• Product line-up (form factor, functionality, features, architecture, intellectual property).
• Development roadmap.

Business Model

• Revenue model
• Pricing
• Average account size and/or lifetime value
• Sales and distribution model
• Customer/pipeline list

Team

• Founders and Management
• Board of Directors/Board of Advisors

Financials

• P&L
• Balance sheet
• Cash flow
• Cap table
• The deal

The business plan can be downloaded here.

There are several aspects in the business plan that need to be reworked. If you are interested in this idea and want to develop it further with me, feel free to contact me directly via my email address technologyofcommunication@gmail.com.