1. DEVELOPING A WINNING BUSINESS PLAN
Mayowa Odunnaike
January 2015
Creating a world of Limitless Opportunities 1.0
MKT3110: Lecture 1

2. Introduction
Most businesses fail because they run out of cash. Even highly profitable businesses can run into cash flow problems if they try to expand too fast for their level funding. Your business plan strategy has to match your level of ambition to the level of funding you can reasonably expect to invest. If you can’t acquire sufficient investment, you have to reduce your ambition. So, one of the most important outcomes of the business planning process is to decide on your ambition and work out the level of investment required and how you intend to fund it.

3. Market Analysis Products and Services Marketing Plan
Now, whatever your level of ambition, the market has to be large enough to satisfy it, especially when you take into account the extent of the competition you’ll encounter. So, the business plan has to show an analysis of the market opportunity and how you intend to exploit it with your products and services. It also needs to show how you plan to market your brand and attract customers. This leads us to define the next 3 sections of your business plan:
Market Analysis
Products and Services
Marketing Plan
You need to explain your market, what you intend to supply to that market and how you intend to market your products or services.

4. Now you need to explain the infrastructure you’ll need in order to deliver the products or services and how you arrived at your present position. If a potential lender or investor doesn’t think your business is equipped with the right capability and experience, they won’t be inclined to invest. This leads us to define the next 2 sections of your business plan as: Company Background & Milestone Operational Structure. The section on Operational Structure should include any resources, equipment or systems you have or will require in order to deliver your products or service. It is quite likely that you’ll be using some of the funding to create the Company Infrastructure.

5. There is one more essential section that any lender or investor will expect and that relates to risk. You need to show that you’ve considered areas of risks and how you might mitigate for them. I tend to refer to this section as Business Analysis. In this section you should include your S.W.O.T. Analysis (An assessment of Internal Strengths and Weaknesses and External Opportunities and Threats) and a Sensitivity Analysis (An assessment of how far certain parameters can move for the business to remain viable).
If they’re interested in evaluating the opportunity, they’ll need to take a closer look at the numbers. So, they’ll expect to be able to view your projections for Profit and Loss, Cash-flow, Balance Sheet and a Sources and Use of Funds Statement. This we’ll refer to as Business Financials.

6. Staying Relevant
Trend
Neglectors
Trend
Responders
Trend
Drivers

7. Developing and Selecting a Strategic Position
Resonate with the target market
Differentiate from competitors
Reflect the culture, strategy, and capabilities of the business

8. A strategic position specifies how the business is to be perceived relative to its competitors and market by customers, employees, and partners. It should differentiate the company from its competitors, and resonate with customers. It should also drive strategic initiatives and the culture and values of the organisation as well as communication programs.

9. “The secret of success is constancy of purpose.”
- Benjamin Disraeli

10. Dos and Don’ts
Do Keep It Short and Sweet The length of your plan won’t make it any more convincing. It is the quality of the argument within its pages which should make it clear that you have found a valuable opportunity, have the means and ideas to exploit it, and expect profits that will make investors happy.

11. Do Show the Experience of Your Management Team
Running a successful record label requires skills in a variety of functional areas (marketing, sales, legal, logistics, artist development) and it is highly unlikely that any one person, yourself included, will have skill in all of these areas. Therefore, you must show that the experience of the team members and planned team members, put together, covers all of these bases. Spend time showing this experience through biography and resume focused on the needs of the business. If any holes are left, don’t ignore them, but show you recognize the need to recruit more talent.

12. Do Make Sure Sources Are Relevant
Make sure that sources are clearly relevant to your venture and are from reputable sources. You should feel comfortable proudly display the source of the data in your plan, inviting readers to look into the original document if they choose. Data must be pretty recent to be relevant and must be from experts or organizations that have familiarity with the industry. Find data relevant to your geographic location and the demographic of customers you will have. When finding existing data on coffee consumption, consider that the average coffee drinking in California may be very different from that of Lagos or Maiduguri.

13. Don’t assume the product speaks for Itself
It simply doesn’t matter if investors will like the type of products you intend to sell with your new business plan. Investors and lenders simply have to understand that there is a clear market for the products and a demonstrated need for the product line you choose.
The products do not have to have mass market appeal, as long as you have a plan for how the target market will be reached and can convince readers that they will buy the products.

14. Don’t assume just building a website is Marketing
Launching a website for your business was once described as “placing a billboard along the express”. Those days are long gone, putting up a website now is only a means for customers to reach you, but only if they can find it. The marketing plan should focus more on how the website itself will be promoted (on posters, via lists, search engine optimization and search engine marketing) than on how the website itself will drive sales. Websites are now primarily means for users to engage more directly with the products and services they enjoy rather than means to convince them to buy the products / services.

15. The End
Thank You
Any Questions?