

Ask HN: Do you have a business plan? - cellis

I know, i know, we're all supposed to be agile, iterative startuppers, building something quick, and then being flexible enough to recognize and capitalize on every opportunity that presents itself...<p>PG says<p><pre><code>  "don't worry about making money. Making something people like is much harder". 
</code></pre>
DHH says<p><pre><code>  "Ask yourself: how can i build something that i can charge money for?". 
</code></pre>
Neither suggests a formal business plan, as far as i can tell. I know everyone here has at least a vague idea of <i>how they might</i> be able to make money. But does anyone here, who hasn't launched yet, have a written business plan?
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gscott
The problem with a "business plan" is that some people would see such a thing
as the only roadmap and follow it into oblivion instead of making the subtle
(and sometimes not so subtle) course corrections as business conditions and
customer requirements change.

But the other extreme is to have no plan. So some sort of "Stage 1" plan is a
good idea, with an ideal "Stage 2" roadmap that is open to change based upon
what happens with user adoption of Stage 1. Getting to Stage 1 would need to
be a good accomplishment preferably with an alpha/beta version so you can find
out if you are on-track.

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tstegart
I write notes, which I generally consider my plan. It never ends up as a full
fledged, fully written plan though. But I feel like I need to cover the
basics, like who I would market to, how I would make money, some general
estimates on how much money the idea could make, what the costs will be, how
much capital it will require, that sort of thing.

I found too many times I got excited about an idea only to later realize it
was completely stupid and had no possible chance of making money. I have too
many ideas in my head, so writing notes is part of the vetting process. If I
can't figure out who would buy or, why and for how much, and if that will be
enough in comparison to how much I would need to spend, then its not worth
spending more of my time on.

I think business plans or notes need to be written, because you come up with
ideas and strategies and find problems you would never have thought of. I
think its even more important when you're selling an actual physical product
or service, because capital is so intensive.

I think PG's advice is really for experimental entrepreneurship, where its
labor intensive but not necessarily capital intensive, very much like many web
2.0 companies these days. If you're planning on building a widget that will
cost $100 to make and sell for $200, you'd better be damned sure you know who
might buy it, who would sell it, and when you'll start turning a profit. A
good plan can be a process to tell you how those things will happen.

