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Writing a business plan from scratch seems like an uphill climb? We get that, but hold tight—you’re not alone. Even business plan writers often feel the same way while writing from scratch. That’s where a little content reference or inspiration can help—just like these business plan examples.
Reading such real-life sample business plans can be incredibly helpful while drafting your very first business plan with zero clue about business plan writing.
As you read and explore these industry-specific examples, you learn more about what you should and should not include in your business plan, ensuring sustainable and long-term growth.
So, let’s explore these 400+ business plan examples to help you quickly write a business plan—hassle-free.
Why you should refer a business plan example?
A Business plan example will provide you with the complete format and structure for your document, giving you a head start on developing your document so you’re not stuck seeing an empty page working to find out where to start.
Also, it gives you the overall layout of a professional business plan so you understand what goes where and you’re not leaving out anything.
Here are some of the key benefits of using sample business plans:
- Guidance on what to include in each section. If you’ve never attended business school, you might never have created a SWOT analysis or a balance sheet before. Business templates that give guidance — in plain language — about what to include and how to fill in each section and create a complete and effective plan.
- A business plan is vital to get an investment. If you’re seeking investment for your business, you’ll need to convince banks and investors why they should invest in your business. Lenders and investors will only risk their time and money if they’re certain that your business will be successful and profitable and they will get a great return on their investment.
- A business plan can help you prioritize. A complete, well-balanced business plan is one of the most valuable tools in assisting you to reach your long-term goals. It gives your business direction, defines your goals, outlines out strategies to reach your goals, and helps you to manage possible bumps in the way.
Creating a business plan will help you define the business goals you want to achieve, and define the strategies to achieve them. This means you can focus your resources and energy on what is important, rather than wasting time on unimportant things.
If you’re working with a team in your company then having a regular brainstorming session is the best way to keep your business on track and your business plan assures you’re all on the same page.
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Sample business plan format
Following is the standard business plan format you must consider while drafting a comprehensive business plan.
- Executive Summary: A high-level overview of your business plan.
- Company Overview: An in-depth and detailed description of your small business, its fundamental elements, and future goals.
- Market Analysis: A detailed description of your industry with the target market, competitors, and growth potential.
- Products and Services: Description of the products or services you intend to exchange for money.
- Sales and Marketing Strategies: Promotional strategies you will use to attract and retain customers.
- Operations Plan: Business processes and procedures that ensure seamless business operations.
- Management Team: Introduction to your founders, key management, and their compensation plan.
- Financial Plan: A breakdown of your financial projections and financing needs.
- Appendix: A supplementary final section that includes additional documents to support your plan.
This was about the outline. Now let’s break down and understand how to write each section, step by step, with real-life examples.
1. Executive Summary
Executive Summary is the first section of your business plan, providing a high-level overview of your entire plan and summarizing it for a quick understanding of your business.
Considering it as an introductory section of your plan, it must be clear, concise, and written to grab readers’ attention and persuade them to take action.
As business plans can be 10-20 to a hundred-page long, an executive summary remains your sole chance to gain a quick extra point.
Here are a few key components your Executive Summary must include:
- Business concept
- Company’s mission
- Company History
- Market Opportunity
- Management Team
- Financial Projections
Remember, you are bound to cover these topics in detail moving forward in your business plan, so make sure your executive summary is brief, covering only the key takeaways.
2. Company Overview
As the name suggests, the Company Overview section of your plan provides an overview of your small business, including your business concept, objectives, future goals, and what customers your business serves.
Since you will provide a brief company description in the executive summary, this section will expand on it—providing an in-depth understanding of your business.
Remember, this section is a platform for introducing and positioning your business as an ideal solution for your target market to your reader. So, make sure it’s short and succinct but impactful enough to help them understand what it does, who your potential customers are, and how you can make a difference.
Here are a few key components your business overview must include:
- Company Description
- Mission Statement
- Business Objectives
- Business History
- Future Goals
3. Market Analysis
Market Analysis is a study of your external business environment, providing a complete overview of your industry and its dynamics. This section provides valuable insights into the market, like what’s working.
When smartly researched, utilized, and written, this section can help you discover and identify untapped areas in the market and strategize to stand out from your competitors.
Remember, this section helps your readers and potential investors understand your target market, market size, and growth potential, so make sure you play your cards right.
Here are a few key components your market analysis section must include:
- Target Market
- Market Size and Growth Potential
- Competitive Analysis
- Market or Industry Trends
- Regulatory Environment
Unlike other sections of your business plan, Market Analysis requires deep research and analytical work. However, using an industry-specific example business plan can save hours of research work.
4. Products And Services
The products and services section is where you will mention and elaborate on your product or service range, description, pricing strategies, and more.
Since your business success solely depends on your products or services, your entire plan revolves around this particular section.
This section can be a crucial component of your plan while searching for an investor or partner, as a well-articulated products and services section can help you persuade them.
Here are a few key elements your products and services section must include:
- Product Description
- Product Comparison
- Pricing Strategy
- Order Management
- Quality Measures
5. Sales And Marketing Strategies
A business’s sales and marketing strategies determine how your product is displayed and reaches your target audience.
A well-designed sales and marketing plan can help you streamline your marketing efforts and create impactful and effective marketing campaigns while keeping track of the marketing budget and maximizing return on investment.
In short, this section will discuss how you’ll acquire new customers using your sales and marketing strategy. You might consider including the following information in your sales and marketing plan:
- Your target audience and brand positioning
- Your business’ UVP
- Marketing channels and distribution tactics you plan to use
- Sales goals and performance measurement
- Your customer retention strategies
- Your sales and marketing goals
6. Operations Plan
The operations plan section outlines the daily business processes and activities centered on achieving business goals and objectives described in the previous sections of your plan.
A detail-oriented logistics and operations plan helps you and your team define your responsibilities, daily tasks, and short-term goals you need to achieve, keeping track of your long-term objective.
Remember, your logistics and operations plan won’t be static but a living document. You may adjust and update it as time goes on.
Here are a few key elements your operations plan section must include:
- Staffing and training
- Tools and equipment
- Inventory management
- Supply chain management
- Operational process
7. Management Team
Your management team plays a crucial role in the ultimate success of your business. And this section introduces your owners and management team, along with their qualifications, industry experience, roles and responsibilities, and compensation plan.
A strong management team section can be critical to weigh authority and help investors be confident about your business idea and vision.
Make sure to include the educational background, accomplishments, work experience, and area of expertise for each individual, part of your management.
You might consider including the following information in the management team section:
- Business owner/founders
- Key management
- Organization structure
- Compensation plan
- Advisors/consultants
8. Financial Plan
It’s no secret that the financial plan is the most crucial yet nerve-wracking aspect of business planning. In fact, it’s one of the deciding factors when it comes to convincing potential investors and banks to invest or lend money.
This section of your plan details your business’s financial information and how it will reach its financial goals. The information may include balance sheet, income, and cash flow statements.
Here are a few key components and financial statements you must include or provide while creating a financial plan:
- Profit and loss statements
- Operating costs
- Income statement
- Cash flow statement
- Balance sheet
- Break-even point
- Financing needs
9. Appendix
While an Appendix isn’t a required element of your business plan, it can be pretty helpful in adding legal notes, charts, tables, or any other critical information to support your business document.
It generally includes financial statements, information, and documents that didn’t naturally fit into your plan but can be considered critical enough to add.
In addition, it helps readers navigate through the entire business plan and easily find specific information or documents.
Pro-tip
Need a way out from manual editing and business plan writing work?
Get Upmetrics’ business plan template, import data directly into the editor, and start editing using Upmetrics AI Assistant.
Since we are finished discussing the sections of a business, let’s learn more about how you can put an example business plan to use while writing your own.
How to use an Example of a Business Plan to write your own?
Having real-life and industry-specific business plan examples by your side can be incredibly resourceful to help you write a business plan from scratch.
A well-planned structure helps you outline your plan, while content inspiration helps you set the tone for your business document.
Let’s dive deep and understand how to use these examples effectively to write your business plan.
1. Understanding the Structure
Traditional business plans generally follow a similar structure.
It starts with an executive summary followed by a company description, market analysis, product and services, sales and marketing strategies, operational plan, management team, financial plan, and appendix.
Using an example business plan is the best way to understand the structure and outline your plan.
2. Gaining Inspiration
Reading industry-specific business plan examples can help you gain inspiration for your plan. You can gain insights on presenting your business idea, vision, mission, and values and persuade investors to invest in your idea.
3. Learning Industry-Specific Language
There’s no universal template for business planning that fits all. An industry-specific template can help you learn and understand the business language for your industry and the best way to communicate your message to your investors.
4. Identifying Key Elements
Reading business plan examples of similar businesses can help you identify the key elements and information to include in your plan. You can keep note of these and ensure everything necessary for investors to consider is present in your final draft.
5. Crafting Financial Projections
A financial plan is a critical component of your business plan, and a good business plan example can help you better understand how they project their financials which can be incredibly helpful while forecasting yours.
6. Refining Your Executive Summary
As mentioned earlier, your executive summary is a key factor influencing potential investors and lenders to invest or lend you money. Analyzing free business plan templates can help you optimize your executive summary to make it more brief, persuasive, and attention-grabbing.
7. Realizing what works and what doesn’t
Analyzing industry-specific and real-life examples can help you determine what works best and what doesn’t within your industry. Understanding these factors can help you avoid many significant pitfalls.
While business plan examples can be incredibly helpful in writing a plan from scratch, ensure your plan is customized for your business and sends out a unique message. Your business plan must reflect its unique idea, vision, and target market.
Download a free sample business plan template
Ready to kick-start your business plan writing process? Not sure where to start? Here you go, download our free sample business plan, import data directly into the editor, and start planning.
This intuitive, modern, and investment-ready template is designed specifically for startups and small businesses. In fact, this format has helped 110K+ entrepreneurs create business plans to secure funding, business grants, and loans. It includes a business planning course and step-by-step instructions to write each section.
Business plan types: choose the suitable template
Well, there are a few types of business plans. Though they cover similar categories, they all have different formats intended for different purposes or industries.
Here are a few common business plan types to help you choose the most suitable one for your business:
1. One-page business plan
One page business plan can be considered a one-page version of a standard business plan. It’s mainly used to present a quick overview of small businesses to your vendors, employees, investors, or stakeholders.
Considering its shorter length, creating a one page business plan can be a lot easier and less time-consuming compared to a standard business plan using a business plan software like Upmetrics.
2. Lean business plan
A lean business plan is a summarized version of a standard business plan that is longer than a one-page one. It’s mainly used to track finances and emphasize achieving short-term milestones.
This business plan type is best suitable if you are unsure about the business planning process. Moreover, drafting a lean business plan is also a lot easier and faster than a standard one.
3. Traditional business plan
A traditional business plan is the standard plan entrepreneurs have been using for years to outline marketing strategies, project financials, and draw investors. A traditional business plan can be a few dozen to a hundred-page long, depending on its purpose and your business specifications.
A traditional plan is a must-have business document for business owners aiming to achieve long-term business success.
4. Internal business plan
As the name suggests, an internal business plan is a document designed for internal management and team members to ensure everyone’s on the same page. The primary focus of these plans is to set primary goals and outline processes aiming to achieve them—ultimately streamlining business operations.
Start writing your business plan
There’s no denying—creating a business plan that draws investors in needs some serious work; it’s no stroll in the park. But you must take the first step to stay ahead in the cut-throat competition; there is no way around it.
So, what are you waiting for? Understand your business and the value it offers to its customers, find a suitable template from our library, and start planning.
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Frequently Asked Questions
How can I write my own business plan?
Follow this step-by-step process to write your business plan on your own.
- Choose a format that best suits your business requirements
- Create a business plan outline
- Create a company description section
- Conduct market research
- Conduct a competitive analysis
- Describe your product and services
- Outline sales and marketing strategies
- Create a logistics and operations plan
- Introduce management team
- Project financials
- Summarize your plan with an executive summary
- Complete your plan with an appendix
Where can I find business plan examples?
Upmetrics is an incredible business planning solution providing 400+ business plan samples and examples. You can easily create a good business plan using these industry-specific templates.
What is a business plan template?
A business plan template is a pre-formatted business plan, usually written for a fictional company. These industry-specific templates can help entrepreneurs understand a business plan’s structure and other key components. These templates are used mainly by entrepreneurs planning to launch a new startup or expand an existing business.
Should I hire someone to write my business plan for me?
Concept, contents, and cashflow are the 3Cs of a business plan that can be defined as follows:
- Concept: Your concept should explain the purpose of your business, summarizing what you plan to accomplish with this very business.
- Contents: Your content should reflect your concept, product and services, target market, and competition.
- Cashflow: Your cash flow section must detail your cash in-and-out flows, including capital investment, operations costs, and revenue projections.
Why Is It Beneficial to Use a Sample Business Plan as a Guide?
Let’s face it—writing a 40-50 page business plan from scratch can be too intimidating; you may soon give up and won’t even finish it.
Instead, using a sample business plan as a guide can help you understand its structure, gain inspiration and ideas for content, plan marketing strategies, and project financials. In short, using business template examples is the best way to write a business plan.
When should you not follow a business plan example?
We’ve always been saying this, using an example of a business plan is the best way to write one. However, it’s also critical to understand when not to follow a template. Here’s when:
- The format does not align with your business model or industry.
- Include outdated templates and information.
- Offer poorly written content.
- Include misleading and poorly done financials.
- There’s a lack of expertise.
These are a few red flags in a template you must consider looking at while choosing one.
Instead, using a sample business plan as a guide can help you understand its structure, gain inspiration and ideas for content, plan marketing strategies, and project financials. In short, using business template examples is the best way to write a business plan.
Are these examples suited for business plan beginners?
Absolutely. In fact, these examples are specially designed, keeping common issues faced by beginners while drafting a plan in mind to serve them best. So, if you are a new or an established business with no planning experience, you have to check out these templates.
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