

Ask HN: Business plan... what do you include in it? - huyng

I assume a good portion of the visitors to this site are entrepreneurs. I am not, ... not yet at least. Assuming that you use some type of document to sync up vision &#38; goals between your initial partners, what do you include in that document for these first critical discussions? What are the most important things to take into consideration?<p>Also, if you feel comfortable, it would be a great help to see some samples of ones you've written in the past.
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webwright
A document to synch up vision and goals between partners doesn't look very
much like the standard business plan (or what's been proposed so far here).

With partners you should have a mutual understanding of:

\- Risk tolerance. How much of their own money will they spend? How long will
they go without a paycheck? How cheaply can they live?

\- Contribution. How much time/money will each partner contribute?

\- Equity. Who owns what? I'm a huge proponent of getting equal partners. If
they don't deserve an equal share, punt 'em and find someone who does.

\- Vesting. How long will it take before everyone owns their share (should be
2-3 years - you don't want someone quitting early and leaving with 33% of your
companies stock)

\- Goals. Do you want to build a happy little income producing side project?
Or a monster business? Or do you want to change the world?

\- How to leave, gracefully. There should be a written agreement that has
rules for when a partner leaves voluntarily, or when two partners want to push
out a third. It's a lot easier to write this down NOW than when your company
is worth $10m.

\- What you're building, who you're building it for, and how flexible you are
on the idea. Ideas change, a lot. You should be passionate about the same
things.

\- Authority. Does anyone have it on design decisions? Code decisions?
fundraising decisions?

\- Horizon. How long are you committing to the project before you punt it or
pivot to a different idea?

In terms of business plans, it's a great exercise to discuss stuff like
development process, roles, sales/marketing, pricing, etc. But don't spend any
more time writing the document than you HAVE to to get a shared understanding.
99% of the value is the process-- they usually collect dust once they are
written.

~~~
huyng
Thanks, I've always kind of grouped the business plan and this process into
one thing. Makes sense to separate these two components.

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marketer
This is a good set of items to include:

<http://www.sequoiacap.com/ideas/>

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ankeshk
I include 7 things.

1\. The idea in a nutshell

\----

2\. Production - what you'll do to bring the idea to life

3\. Marketing - what you'll do to promote the venture

4\. Finance - how much money is needed. And what will be the breakeven point
and the cashflow positive point.

\----

5\. Your target audience profile

6\. Your competition

7\. Your own self - your USP, your resources, your team

~~~
huyng
Thanks for the response, can you clarify what USP means?

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oldgregg
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unique_selling_proposition>

haven't heard that term since advertising 201. what a bullshit class. i spent
hundreds of hours creating hundreds of bullshit "thumbnails" for bullshit
weight watchers campaigns.

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kunqiana
Paul Graham's business plan for viaweb <http://www.paulgraham.com/vwplan.html>

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uptown
7 Common Errors when Writing a Business Plan:
[http://entrepreneur.venturebeat.com/2009/07/09/seven-
common-...](http://entrepreneur.venturebeat.com/2009/07/09/seven-common-
errors-when-writing-a-business-plan/)

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cmos
A business plan is predicting the future. Play around with scenarios of
different success/failure points. If you have X amount of cash to work with
that will get you y months of time to prove it.

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ivyirwin
1\. Mission/What is It? 2\. Current Market (competition) 3\. Need left by
current market 4\. Why this is the solution to current need 5\. How it works
6\. Pro forma 7\. The team

