Business Writing

Lesson 8: Introducing your Business

Business Plans

Every new business needs a business plan if it hopes to be taken seriously by funding bodies. Existing businesses can also use business plans to introduce new projects or sidelines. Business plans should contain all the appropriate financial documents assessing present capacity, demonstrating any similar past achievements and predicting expected results for the new enterprise, and they also require a strong introduction for your business and for yourself. Although you may have been advised to fill several pages, it's better to do this by spacing out text and using attractive headers than by over-extending your descriptions. Everything which you write must be obviously important and must be stated with confidence. Active verbs and short sentences can help you to achieve this.

In a business plan, you should stress the things that make you different from others working in the same field. Determine your unique selling point. Explain why this difference makes you more competitive. Focus your writing on what you are doing and what you are going to do, to make yourself (and your business) seem dynamic and forward-looking.

Charts, tables and graphs can make a good impression in a business plan, demonstrating that you have made some analysis of available statistics and probabilities. Items of this sort should ideally be introduced on separate pages, with two or three sentences at the top of the page to explain what they are. They can then be given a code (eg: 'fig. 3.1') which will enable you to refer to them elsewhere in the document.

Charts which describe your intended market are particularly popular with potential investors. In any business plan or new product proposal, you should include at least one page focusing on your market. This should be described in plain language with reference to demographics (age, sex, income bracket etc.) and observed purchasing habits, but it should also include terminology which demonstrates that you are familiar with the way in which people in that market perceive businesses like yours. If, for instance, you are setting up a daycare center, you should use words like 'trustworthy' and 'fun'; if you are setting up an investment company you should use words like 'approachable' and 'dependable'.

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