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How to tailor your business plan to the right audience

The starting point for any business plan should be the perspective of the audience. What is the purpose of the plan — is it to secure funding? Is it to communicate the future plans of the company? If youre seeking finance, for instance, will your plan be directed to the banks or venture capitalists? Once the decision has been made about the target audience, it is time to tailor the plan accordingly as each audience will have very specific requirements.

Below are some of the people you may want to show your business plan to and some ideas on how you should tweak the contents to meet their needs.

Bank managers are primarily concerned about having their loans repaid. Whilst they are interested in a companys long-term prospects because they want to establish long-term relationships, first and foremost they want to be assured of a companys ability to keep up a loan repayment schedule.

As such they don’t want to hear too much about meteoric growth prospects as that usually requires pumping in more cash before the business becomes profitable.

The emphasis in these plans should be on cash flow — past, present and future. Banks usually expect a business to start repaying both the loan and the interest on a monthly or quarterly basis immediately after the loan has been granted so keeping track of cash flow is vital to ensure these arrangements are met. For existing companies, the more convincing your past record of cash generation has been, the more likely bankers are to believe future projections. For start-ups, the key is to be realistic with the financial projections. Bankers will compare your projections to industry reports showing average performance for different kinds of businesses. If your projected margins are a lot larger than industry averages, you will need to explain why and how you are going to accomplish those returns.

Venture Capitalists

When sourcing funding from venture capitalists, interest will be focused on the financial forecast section of the business plan, the expected return on the investment and the capability of the management team.

Businesses that intend to secure funding from venture capitalists will need to consider the amount of equity they would be prepared to hand over. Venture capitalists normally combine an equity stake with a loan and would expect a return of between 10-20 times their investment within a maximum of five years. Within your business plan you should identify the amount of investment needed as well as an exit strategy.

The inherent risks involved in investing in new and young ventures are far greater than for investing in established companies and as such venture capitalists expect the chance of achieving large overall returns for their risky investment. As a result, venture capital fund managers are only looking for winners. To appeal to this audience, your plan needs to emphasise the prospects of fast growth, big returns and an excellent management team. They need to be sure that the people involved in the venture have the experience and capability to produce exceptional results.

Potential Employees/Partners

When you are showing your business plan to a potential employee or partner for your business, they will want to hear about a venture with limitless growth prospects, exciting opportunities and very little risk. If the employee you want to recruit is leaving a good job to join you, there is usually a reason and frequently they just want the opportunity for recognition or career progression. Whilst a bank manager may consider creating a management position as a superfluous expense for a fledgling business, you will need them if you are to grow. Your business plan is the ideal way to show that when the business achieves its goals there will be opportunities for promotion.

Partners share some of the characteristics of employees, but specifically they will want to

read about the prospect of owning a part of a meaningful venture along with the chance of building upon that stake as the firm expands.

Wisteria Business Plans have extensive experience in creating bespoke business plans tailored towards each of the different audiences detailed above. For more information on how Wisteria can provide the business plan that you require please call 020 8951 6342 or send an e-mail to businessplans@wisteria.co.uk .