A business plan is a written document that describes your business. It covers objectives, strategies, sales, marketing and financial forecasts.

A business plan helps you to:

• clarify your business idea
• spot potential problems
• set out your goals
• measure your progress

But its no good unless you have business model that works as Doug Richards explains

Research by the national enterprise campaign showed that last year 484,224 businesses were started, compared to 440,600 in 2011.

• There were an estimated 4.8 million businesses in the UK which employed 23.9 million people, and had a combined turnover of £3,100 billion
• SMEs accounted for 99.9 per cent of of all private sector businesses in the UK, 59.1 per cent of private sector employment and 48.8 per cent of private sector turnover
• SMEs employed 14.1 million people and had a combined turnover of £1,500 billion
• Small businesses alone accounted for 47 per cent of private sector employment and 34.4 per cent of turnover
• Of all businesses, 62.7 per cent (three million) were sole proprietorships, 28 per cent (1.3 million) were companies and 9.3 per cent (448,000) partnerships
• There were 907,000 businesses operating in the construction sector – nearly a fifth of all businesses

micro: 0-9 employees, small: 10-49 employees, medium: 50-249 employees (updated October 2012)

The best bit of advice I have heard is this piece from Doug Richards ‘Take the Order’

Once you have a business model that works, then create a business plan, here is a link to some free plans to get you started http://www.bplans.co.uk/sample_business_plans.cfm

steve@bicknells.net