Writing a Business Plan for Your Home Business

Are you writing a business plan for you home business? Do you really need one?
Why writing a business plan for a home business? A home business like any other needs a road map to a new destination. If you do not use one, you will end up lost before you get to your destination.
Every business no matter how small it is, must a have a business plan. You may not need a "formal" business plan document but you definitely need a "business plan" for you home business.
A formal business plan is a very long detail document with about 80-100 pages. A home business may not need this kind of elaborate plan, but writing a business plan is not an option. It is critical for your business.
Writing a business plan for your home business plan is just your "strategic planning." You want to cover at least four major elements: 1) Your home business description and elements, 2) Your marketing plan, 3) Your financial plan, 4)) Your operations plan
1) Your Home Business Description and Elements: This element covers what kind of business you are doing. Regardless of your home business of choice, at the very minimum, you need to have the following:

• Why: What is your main purpose of having home business? If it is just money, you may want to reconsider. Any business has to be driven by some sort of desire besides the financial rewards. This desire will give you the self-motivation that you need to do it; otherwise, you are setting yourself up to fail.
• What: What is your home business? What is your product or service? What is your focus?
• When: When do you plan to do it? Do you plan to work every day for 2-3 hours or 10 hours a day? Did you notice I said every day?
• Where: The location is probably your home, but where in your home. Do you have a designated space for it? Can you have everything you need available in this space?
• How: how you are going to execute? Is your business a one-person show? Do you need an assistant or a particular tool? Who is involved in your business?

2) Your Home Business-Marketing Plan: When writing a business plan, marketing is crucial. At the beginning, you can do many things. In addition, there are many that you do not know and you are not familiar with, however, at the very least, plan what you know.

• Do you need a website or a blog?
• How do you plan to get clients? Do you need word of mouth referrals? Do you need friend's referrals or other local business referrals?
• What is your market? Who is your target audience? Age, gender, and location, are important elements.
• What are you customer needs? What problem are you trying to solve for them?
• Who is your competition? How can you be better than they can?

3) Your Financial Plan: Although there are many home businesses that do not need a lot of money to start, you do need some capital to start and some to maintain. Do you know how much that is? Can you afford to start a business? Are you banking in your business to produce and maintain itself right away? If the latter is the case, you may want to reconsider. It will be a shame to put many hours of work and count in income you are not sure is going to come.
4) Your Operations Plan: This is your initial description on you plan of action

• List your priorities
• List your short-term items and have a dateline
• List your long-term items and have a dateline
• List your daily actions
• Schedule your daily actions and your priorities

Although many home businesses have started with nothing in place, most have fail for not having something in place from the start. Writing a business plan does not guarantee success but it does guarantee you clarity in what you want to do and how to accomplish it.
This plan is necessary to utilize during your road trip. You adjust as you go. You correct and continue. It may be in just 5 pieces of paper, but if you did your homework, may be that is all you need to start and become successful.

By Monica Beltran

Read more articles at Personal Business Advisors
http://www.personalbusinessadvisors.com/business