How to Write a Business Plan: Step-by-Step Guide + Examples

Determined female African-American entrepreneur scaling a mountain while wearing a large backpack. Represents the journey to starting and growing a business and needing to write a business plan to get there.

Noah Parsons

24 min. read

Updated February 2, 2024

Writing a business plan doesn’t have to be complicated. 

In this step-by-step guide, you’ll learn how to write a business plan that’s detailed enough to impress bankers and potential investors, while giving you the tools to start, run, and grow a successful business.

  • The basics of business planning

If you’re reading this guide, then you already know why you need a business plan . 

You understand that planning helps you: 

  • Raise money
  • Grow strategically
  • Keep your business on the right track 

As you start to write your plan, it’s useful to zoom out and remember what a business plan is .

At its core, a business plan is an overview of the products and services you sell, and the customers that you sell to. It explains your business strategy: how you’re going to build and grow your business, what your marketing strategy is, and who your competitors are.

Most business plans also include financial forecasts for the future. These set sales goals, budget for expenses, and predict profits and cash flow. 

A good business plan is much more than just a document that you write once and forget about. It’s also a guide that helps you outline and achieve your goals. 

After completing your plan, you can use it as a management tool to track your progress toward your goals. Updating and adjusting your forecasts and budgets as you go is one of the most important steps you can take to run a healthier, smarter business. 

We’ll dive into how to use your plan later in this article.

There are many different types of plans , but we’ll go over the most common type here, which includes everything you need for an investor-ready plan. However, if you’re just starting out and are looking for something simpler—I recommend starting with a one-page business plan . It’s faster and easier to create. 

It’s also the perfect place to start if you’re just figuring out your idea, or need a simple strategic plan to use inside your business.

Dig deeper : How to write a one-page business plan

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  • What to include in your business plan

Executive summary

The executive summary is an overview of your business and your plans. It comes first in your plan and is ideally just one to two pages. Most people write it last because it’s a summary of the complete business plan.

Ideally, the executive summary can act as a stand-alone document that covers the highlights of your detailed plan. 

In fact, it’s common for investors to ask only for the executive summary when evaluating your business. If they like what they see in the executive summary, they’ll often follow up with a request for a complete plan, a pitch presentation , or more in-depth financial forecasts .

Your executive summary should include:

  • A summary of the problem you are solving
  • A description of your product or service
  • An overview of your target market
  • A brief description of your team
  • A summary of your financials
  • Your funding requirements (if you are raising money)

Dig Deeper: How to write an effective executive summary

Products and services description

This is where you describe exactly what you’re selling, and how it solves a problem for your target market. The best way to organize this part of your plan is to start by describing the problem that exists for your customers. After that, you can describe how you plan to solve that problem with your product or service. 

This is usually called a problem and solution statement .

To truly showcase the value of your products and services, you need to craft a compelling narrative around your offerings. How will your product or service transform your customers’ lives or jobs? A strong narrative will draw in your readers.

This is also the part of the business plan to discuss any competitive advantages you may have, like specific intellectual property or patents that protect your product. If you have any initial sales, contracts, or other evidence that your product or service is likely to sell, include that information as well. It will show that your idea has traction , which can help convince readers that your plan has a high chance of success.

Market analysis

Your target market is a description of the type of people that you plan to sell to. You might even have multiple target markets, depending on your business. 

A market analysis is the part of your plan where you bring together all of the information you know about your target market. Basically, it’s a thorough description of who your customers are and why they need what you’re selling. You’ll also include information about the growth of your market and your industry .

Try to be as specific as possible when you describe your market. 

Include information such as age, income level, and location—these are what’s called “demographics.” If you can, also describe your market’s interests and habits as they relate to your business—these are “psychographics.” 

Related: Target market examples

Essentially, you want to include any knowledge you have about your customers that is relevant to how your product or service is right for them. With a solid target market, it will be easier to create a sales and marketing plan that will reach your customers. That’s because you know who they are, what they like to do, and the best ways to reach them.

Next, provide any additional information you have about your market. 

What is the size of your market ? Is the market growing or shrinking? Ideally, you’ll want to demonstrate that your market is growing over time, and also explain how your business is positioned to take advantage of any expected changes in your industry.

Dig Deeper: Learn how to write a market analysis

Competitive analysis

Part of defining your business opportunity is determining what your competitive advantage is. To do this effectively, you need to know as much about your competitors as your target customers. 

Every business has some form of competition. If you don’t think you have competitors, then explore what alternatives there are in the market for your product or service. 

For example: In the early years of cars, their main competition was horses. For social media, the early competition was reading books, watching TV, and talking on the phone.

A good competitive analysis fully lays out the competitive landscape and then explains how your business is different. Maybe your products are better made, or cheaper, or your customer service is superior. Maybe your competitive advantage is your location – a wide variety of factors can ultimately give you an advantage.

Dig Deeper: How to write a competitive analysis for your business plan

Marketing and sales plan

The marketing and sales plan covers how you will position your product or service in the market, the marketing channels and messaging you will use, and your sales tactics. 

The best place to start with a marketing plan is with a positioning statement . 

This explains how your business fits into the overall market, and how you will explain the advantages of your product or service to customers. You’ll use the information from your competitive analysis to help you with your positioning. 

For example: You might position your company as the premium, most expensive but the highest quality option in the market. Or your positioning might focus on being locally owned and that shoppers support the local economy by buying your products.

Once you understand your positioning, you’ll bring this together with the information about your target market to create your marketing strategy . 

This is how you plan to communicate your message to potential customers. Depending on who your customers are and how they purchase products like yours, you might use many different strategies, from social media advertising to creating a podcast. Your marketing plan is all about how your customers discover who you are and why they should consider your products and services. 

While your marketing plan is about reaching your customers—your sales plan will describe the actual sales process once a customer has decided that they’re interested in what you have to offer. 

If your business requires salespeople and a long sales process, describe that in this section. If your customers can “self-serve” and just make purchases quickly on your website, describe that process. 

A good sales plan picks up where your marketing plan leaves off. The marketing plan brings customers in the door and the sales plan is how you close the deal.

Together, these specific plans paint a picture of how you will connect with your target audience, and how you will turn them into paying customers.

Dig deeper: What to include in your sales and marketing plan

Business operations

The operations section describes the necessary requirements for your business to run smoothly. It’s where you talk about how your business works and what day-to-day operations look like. 

Depending on how your business is structured, your operations plan may include elements of the business like:

  • Supply chain management
  • Manufacturing processes
  • Equipment and technology
  • Distribution

Some businesses distribute their products and reach their customers through large retailers like Amazon.com, Walmart, Target, and grocery store chains. 

These businesses should review how this part of their business works. The plan should discuss the logistics and costs of getting products onto store shelves and any potential hurdles the business may have to overcome.

If your business is much simpler than this, that’s OK. This section of your business plan can be either extremely short or more detailed, depending on the type of business you are building.

For businesses selling services, such as physical therapy or online software, you can use this section to describe the technology you’ll leverage, what goes into your service, and who you will partner with to deliver your services.

Dig Deeper: Learn how to write the operations chapter of your plan

Key milestones and metrics

Although it’s not required to complete your business plan, mapping out key business milestones and the metrics can be incredibly useful for measuring your success.

Good milestones clearly lay out the parameters of the task and set expectations for their execution. You’ll want to include:

  • A description of each task
  • The proposed due date
  • Who is responsible for each task

If you have a budget, you can include projected costs to hit each milestone. You don’t need extensive project planning in this section—just list key milestones you want to hit and when you plan to hit them. This is your overall business roadmap. 

Possible milestones might be:

  • Website launch date
  • Store or office opening date
  • First significant sales
  • Break even date
  • Business licenses and approvals

You should also discuss the key numbers you will track to determine your success. Some common metrics worth tracking include:

  • Conversion rates
  • Customer acquisition costs
  • Profit per customer
  • Repeat purchases

It’s perfectly fine to start with just a few metrics and grow the number you are tracking over time. You also may find that some metrics simply aren’t relevant to your business and can narrow down what you’re tracking.

Dig Deeper: How to use milestones in your business plan

Organization and management team

Investors don’t just look for great ideas—they want to find great teams. Use this chapter to describe your current team and who you need to hire . You should also provide a quick overview of your location and history if you’re already up and running.

Briefly highlight the relevant experiences of each key team member in the company. It’s important to make the case for why yours is the right team to turn an idea into a reality. 

Do they have the right industry experience and background? Have members of the team had entrepreneurial successes before? 

If you still need to hire key team members, that’s OK. Just note those gaps in this section.

Your company overview should also include a summary of your company’s current business structure . The most common business structures include:

  • Sole proprietor
  • Partnership

Be sure to provide an overview of how the business is owned as well. Does each business partner own an equal portion of the business? How is ownership divided? 

Potential lenders and investors will want to know the structure of the business before they will consider a loan or investment.

Dig Deeper: How to write about your company structure and team

Financial plan

Last, but certainly not least, is your financial plan chapter. 

Entrepreneurs often find this section the most daunting. But, business financials for most startups are less complicated than you think, and a business degree is certainly not required to build a solid financial forecast. 

A typical financial forecast in a business plan includes the following:

  • Sales forecast : An estimate of the sales expected over a given period. You’ll break down your forecast into the key revenue streams that you expect to have.
  • Expense budget : Your planned spending such as personnel costs , marketing expenses, and taxes.
  • Profit & Loss : Brings together your sales and expenses and helps you calculate planned profits.
  • Cash Flow : Shows how cash moves into and out of your business. It can predict how much cash you’ll have on hand at any given point in the future.
  • Balance Sheet : A list of the assets, liabilities, and equity in your company. In short, it provides an overview of the financial health of your business. 

A strong business plan will include a description of assumptions about the future, and potential risks that could impact the financial plan. Including those will be especially important if you’re writing a business plan to pursue a loan or other investment.

Dig Deeper: How to create financial forecasts and budgets

This is the place for additional data, charts, or other information that supports your plan.

Including an appendix can significantly enhance the credibility of your plan by showing readers that you’ve thoroughly considered the details of your business idea, and are backing your ideas up with solid data.

Just remember that the information in the appendix is meant to be supplementary. Your business plan should stand on its own, even if the reader skips this section.

Dig Deeper : What to include in your business plan appendix

Optional: Business plan cover page

Adding a business plan cover page can make your plan, and by extension your business, seem more professional in the eyes of potential investors, lenders, and partners. It serves as the introduction to your document and provides necessary contact information for stakeholders to reference.

Your cover page should be simple and include:

  • Company logo
  • Business name
  • Value proposition (optional)
  • Business plan title
  • Completion and/or update date
  • Address and contact information
  • Confidentiality statement

Just remember, the cover page is optional. If you decide to include it, keep it very simple and only spend a short amount of time putting it together.

Dig Deeper: How to create a business plan cover page

How to use AI to help write your business plan

Generative AI tools such as ChatGPT can speed up the business plan writing process and help you think through concepts like market segmentation and competition. These tools are especially useful for taking ideas that you provide and converting them into polished text for your business plan.

The best way to use AI for your business plan is to leverage it as a collaborator , not a replacement for human creative thinking and ingenuity. 

AI can come up with lots of ideas and act as a brainstorming partner. It’s up to you to filter through those ideas and figure out which ones are realistic enough to resonate with your customers. 

There are pros and cons of using AI to help with your business plan . So, spend some time understanding how it can be most helpful before just outsourcing the job to AI.

Learn more: How to collaborate with AI on your business plan

  • Writing tips and strategies

To help streamline the business plan writing process, here are a few tips and key questions to answer to make sure you get the most out of your plan and avoid common mistakes .  

Determine why you are writing a business plan

Knowing why you are writing a business plan will determine your approach to your planning project. 

For example: If you are writing a business plan for yourself, or just to use inside your own business , you can probably skip the section about your team and organizational structure. 

If you’re raising money, you’ll want to spend more time explaining why you’re looking to raise the funds and exactly how you will use them.

Regardless of how you intend to use your business plan , think about why you are writing and what you’re trying to get out of the process before you begin.

Keep things concise

Probably the most important tip is to keep your business plan short and simple. There are no prizes for long business plans . The longer your plan is, the less likely people are to read it. 

So focus on trimming things down to the essentials your readers need to know. Skip the extended, wordy descriptions and instead focus on creating a plan that is easy to read —using bullets and short sentences whenever possible.

Have someone review your business plan

Writing a business plan in a vacuum is never a good idea. Sometimes it’s helpful to zoom out and check if your plan makes sense to someone else. You also want to make sure that it’s easy to read and understand.

Don’t wait until your plan is “done” to get a second look. Start sharing your plan early, and find out from readers what questions your plan leaves unanswered. This early review cycle will help you spot shortcomings in your plan and address them quickly, rather than finding out about them right before you present your plan to a lender or investor.

If you need a more detailed review, you may want to explore hiring a professional plan writer to thoroughly examine it.

Use a free business plan template and business plan examples to get started

Knowing what information you need to cover in a business plan sometimes isn’t quite enough. If you’re struggling to get started or need additional guidance, it may be worth using a business plan template. 

If you’re looking for a free downloadable business plan template to get you started, download the template used by more than 1 million businesses. 

Or, if you just want to see what a completed business plan looks like, check out our library of over 550 free business plan examples . 

We even have a growing list of industry business planning guides with tips for what to focus on depending on your business type.

Common pitfalls and how to avoid them

It’s easy to make mistakes when you’re writing your business plan. Some entrepreneurs get sucked into the writing and research process, and don’t focus enough on actually getting their business started. 

Here are a few common mistakes and how to avoid them:

Not talking to your customers : This is one of the most common mistakes. It’s easy to assume that your product or service is something that people want. Before you invest too much in your business and too much in the planning process, make sure you talk to your prospective customers and have a good understanding of their needs.

  • Overly optimistic sales and profit forecasts: By nature, entrepreneurs are optimistic about the future. But it’s good to temper that optimism a little when you’re planning, and make sure your forecasts are grounded in reality. 
  • Spending too much time planning: Yes, planning is crucial. But you also need to get out and talk to customers, build prototypes of your product and figure out if there’s a market for your idea. Make sure to balance planning with building.
  • Not revising the plan: Planning is useful, but nothing ever goes exactly as planned. As you learn more about what’s working and what’s not—revise your plan, your budgets, and your revenue forecast. Doing so will provide a more realistic picture of where your business is going, and what your financial needs will be moving forward.
  • Not using the plan to manage your business: A good business plan is a management tool. Don’t just write it and put it on the shelf to collect dust – use it to track your progress and help you reach your goals.
  • Presenting your business plan

The planning process forces you to think through every aspect of your business and answer questions that you may not have thought of. That’s the real benefit of writing a business plan – the knowledge you gain about your business that you may not have been able to discover otherwise.

With all of this knowledge, you’re well prepared to convert your business plan into a pitch presentation to present your ideas. 

A pitch presentation is a summary of your plan, just hitting the highlights and key points. It’s the best way to present your business plan to investors and team members.

Dig Deeper: Learn what key slides should be included in your pitch deck

Use your business plan to manage your business

One of the biggest benefits of planning is that it gives you a tool to manage your business better. With a revenue forecast, expense budget, and projected cash flow, you know your targets and where you are headed.

And yet, nothing ever goes exactly as planned – it’s the nature of business.

That’s where using your plan as a management tool comes in. The key to leveraging it for your business is to review it periodically and compare your forecasts and projections to your actual results.

Start by setting up a regular time to review the plan – a monthly review is a good starting point. During this review, answer questions like:

  • Did you meet your sales goals?
  • Is spending following your budget?
  • Has anything gone differently than what you expected?

Now that you see whether you’re meeting your goals or are off track, you can make adjustments and set new targets. 

Maybe you’re exceeding your sales goals and should set new, more aggressive goals. In that case, maybe you should also explore more spending or hiring more employees. 

Or maybe expenses are rising faster than you projected. If that’s the case, you would need to look at where you can cut costs.

A plan, and a method for comparing your plan to your actual results , is the tool you need to steer your business toward success.

Learn More: How to run a regular plan review

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How to write a business plan FAQ

What is a business plan?

A document that describes your business , the products and services you sell, and the customers that you sell to. It explains your business strategy, how you’re going to build and grow your business, what your marketing strategy is, and who your competitors are.

What are the benefits of a business plan?

A business plan helps you understand where you want to go with your business and what it will take to get there. It reduces your overall risk, helps you uncover your business’s potential, attracts investors, and identifies areas for growth.

Having a business plan ultimately makes you more confident as a business owner and more likely to succeed for a longer period of time.

What are the 7 steps of a business plan?

The seven steps to writing a business plan include:

  • Write a brief executive summary
  • Describe your products and services.
  • Conduct market research and compile data into a cohesive market analysis.
  • Describe your marketing and sales strategy.
  • Outline your organizational structure and management team.
  • Develop financial projections for sales, revenue, and cash flow.
  • Add any additional documents to your appendix.

What are the 5 most common business plan mistakes?

There are plenty of mistakes that can be made when writing a business plan. However, these are the 5 most common that you should do your best to avoid:

  • 1. Not taking the planning process seriously.
  • Having unrealistic financial projections or incomplete financial information.
  • Inconsistent information or simple mistakes.
  • Failing to establish a sound business model.
  • Not having a defined purpose for your business plan.

What questions should be answered in a business plan?

Writing a business plan is all about asking yourself questions about your business and being able to answer them through the planning process. You’ll likely be asking dozens and dozens of questions for each section of your plan.

However, these are the key questions you should ask and answer with your business plan:

  • How will your business make money?
  • Is there a need for your product or service?
  • Who are your customers?
  • How are you different from the competition?
  • How will you reach your customers?
  • How will you measure success?

How long should a business plan be?

The length of your business plan fully depends on what you intend to do with it. From the SBA and traditional lender point of view, a business plan needs to be whatever length necessary to fully explain your business. This means that you prove the viability of your business, show that you understand the market, and have a detailed strategy in place.

If you intend to use your business plan for internal management purposes, you don’t necessarily need a full 25-50 page business plan. Instead, you can start with a one-page plan to get all of the necessary information in place.

What are the different types of business plans?

While all business plans cover similar categories, the style and function fully depend on how you intend to use your plan. Here are a few common business plan types worth considering.

Traditional business plan: The tried-and-true traditional business plan is a formal document meant to be used when applying for funding or pitching to investors. This type of business plan follows the outline above and can be anywhere from 10-50 pages depending on the amount of detail included, the complexity of your business, and what you include in your appendix.

Business model canvas: The business model canvas is a one-page template designed to demystify the business planning process. It removes the need for a traditional, copy-heavy business plan, in favor of a single-page outline that can help you and outside parties better explore your business idea.

One-page business plan: This format is a simplified version of the traditional plan that focuses on the core aspects of your business. You’ll typically stick with bullet points and single sentences. It’s most useful for those exploring ideas, needing to validate their business model, or who need an internal plan to help them run and manage their business.

Lean Plan: The Lean Plan is less of a specific document type and more of a methodology. It takes the simplicity and styling of the one-page business plan and turns it into a process for you to continuously plan, test, review, refine, and take action based on performance. It’s faster, keeps your plan concise, and ensures that your plan is always up-to-date.

What’s the difference between a business plan and a strategic plan?

A business plan covers the “who” and “what” of your business. It explains what your business is doing right now and how it functions. The strategic plan explores long-term goals and explains “how” the business will get there. It encourages you to look more intently toward the future and how you will achieve your vision.

However, when approached correctly, your business plan can actually function as a strategic plan as well. If kept lean, you can define your business, outline strategic steps, and track ongoing operations all with a single plan.

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Content Author: Noah Parsons

Noah is the COO at Palo Alto Software, makers of the online business plan app LivePlan. He started his career at Yahoo! and then helped start the user review site Epinions.com. From there he started a software distribution business in the UK before coming to Palo Alto Software to run the marketing and product teams.

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Table of Contents

  • Use AI to help write your plan
  • Common planning mistakes
  • Manage with your business plan
  • Templates and examples

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What is a business plan?

1. write an executive summary, 2. describe your company, 3. state your business goals, 4. describe your products and services, 5. do your market research, 6. outline your marketing and sales plan, 7. perform a business financial analysis, 8. make financial projections, 9. summarize how your company operates, 10. add any additional information to an appendix, business plan tips and resources.

A business plan outlines your business’s financial goals and explains how you’ll achieve them over the next three to five years. Here’s a step-by-step guide to writing a business plan that will offer a strong, detailed road map for your business.

Bizee

A business plan is a document that explains what your business does, how it makes money and who its customers are. Internally, writing a business plan should help you clarify your vision and organize your operations. Externally, you can share it with potential lenders and investors to show them you’re on the right track.

Business plans are living documents; it’s OK for them to change over time. Startups may update their business plans often as they figure out who their customers are and what products and services fit them best. Mature companies might only revisit their business plan every few years. Regardless of your business’s age, brush up this document before you apply for a business loan .

» Need help writing? Learn about the best business plan software .

This is your elevator pitch. It should include a mission statement, a brief description of the products or services your business offers and a broad summary of your financial growth plans.

Though the executive summary is the first thing your investors will read, it can be easier to write it last. That way, you can highlight information you’ve identified while writing other sections that go into more detail.

» MORE: How to write an executive summary in 6 steps

Next up is your company description. This should contain basic information like:

Your business’s registered name.

Address of your business location .

Names of key people in the business. Make sure to highlight unique skills or technical expertise among members of your team.

Your company description should also define your business structure — such as a sole proprietorship, partnership or corporation — and include the percent ownership that each owner has and the extent of each owner’s involvement in the company.

Lastly, write a little about the history of your company and the nature of your business now. This prepares the reader to learn about your goals in the next section.

» MORE: How to write a company overview for a business plan

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The third part of a business plan is an objective statement. This section spells out what you’d like to accomplish, both in the near term and over the coming years.

If you’re looking for a business loan or outside investment, you can use this section to explain how the financing will help your business grow and how you plan to achieve those growth targets. The key is to provide a clear explanation of the opportunity your business presents to the lender.

For example, if your business is launching a second product line, you might explain how the loan will help your company launch that new product and how much you think sales will increase over the next three years as a result.

» MORE: How to write a successful business plan for a loan

In this section, go into detail about the products or services you offer or plan to offer.

You should include the following:

An explanation of how your product or service works.

The pricing model for your product or service.

The typical customers you serve.

Your supply chain and order fulfillment strategy.

You can also discuss current or pending trademarks and patents associated with your product or service.

Lenders and investors will want to know what sets your product apart from your competition. In your market analysis section , explain who your competitors are. Discuss what they do well, and point out what you can do better. If you’re serving a different or underserved market, explain that.

Here, you can address how you plan to persuade customers to buy your products or services, or how you will develop customer loyalty that will lead to repeat business.

Include details about your sales and distribution strategies, including the costs involved in selling each product .

» MORE: R e a d our complete guide to small business marketing

If you’re a startup, you may not have much information on your business financials yet. However, if you’re an existing business, you’ll want to include income or profit-and-loss statements, a balance sheet that lists your assets and debts, and a cash flow statement that shows how cash comes into and goes out of the company.

Accounting software may be able to generate these reports for you. It may also help you calculate metrics such as:

Net profit margin: the percentage of revenue you keep as net income.

Current ratio: the measurement of your liquidity and ability to repay debts.

Accounts receivable turnover ratio: a measurement of how frequently you collect on receivables per year.

This is a great place to include charts and graphs that make it easy for those reading your plan to understand the financial health of your business.

This is a critical part of your business plan if you’re seeking financing or investors. It outlines how your business will generate enough profit to repay the loan or how you will earn a decent return for investors.

Here, you’ll provide your business’s monthly or quarterly sales, expenses and profit estimates over at least a three-year period — with the future numbers assuming you’ve obtained a new loan.

Accuracy is key, so carefully analyze your past financial statements before giving projections. Your goals may be aggressive, but they should also be realistic.

NerdWallet’s picks for setting up your business finances:

The best business checking accounts .

The best business credit cards .

The best accounting software .

Before the end of your business plan, summarize how your business is structured and outline each team’s responsibilities. This will help your readers understand who performs each of the functions you’ve described above — making and selling your products or services — and how much each of those functions cost.

If any of your employees have exceptional skills, you may want to include their resumes to help explain the competitive advantage they give you.

Finally, attach any supporting information or additional materials that you couldn’t fit in elsewhere. That might include:

Licenses and permits.

Equipment leases.

Bank statements.

Details of your personal and business credit history, if you’re seeking financing.

If the appendix is long, you may want to consider adding a table of contents at the beginning of this section.

How much do you need?

with Fundera by NerdWallet

We’ll start with a brief questionnaire to better understand the unique needs of your business.

Once we uncover your personalized matches, our team will consult you on the process moving forward.

Here are some tips to write a detailed, convincing business plan:

Avoid over-optimism: If you’re applying for a business bank loan or professional investment, someone will be reading your business plan closely. Providing unreasonable sales estimates can hurt your chances of approval.

Proofread: Spelling, punctuation and grammatical errors can jump off the page and turn off lenders and prospective investors. If writing and editing aren't your strong suit, you may want to hire a professional business plan writer, copy editor or proofreader.

Use free resources: SCORE is a nonprofit association that offers a large network of volunteer business mentors and experts who can help you write or edit your business plan. The U.S. Small Business Administration’s Small Business Development Centers , which provide free business consulting and help with business plan development, can also be a resource.

On a similar note...

Find small-business financing

Compare multiple lenders that fit your business

One blue credit card on a flat surface with coins on both sides.

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Introduction & Guidance To Business Analysis Planning and Monitoring

business analysis planning and monitoring

More often than not, the outcome of the business analysis project is directly dependent on proper planning.

The business analysis planning and monitoring activity lays out the groundwork necessary for the successful completion of the whole project.

Opens in a new tab.

Monitoring also plays a key role in evaluating the business analysis work during the project. Detailed planning and close monitoring are essential for delivering the desired outcomes.

Table of Contents

Introduction – business planning and monitoring.

They determine how changes are requested and analysed and determine the right approach that will satisfy the need of the organisation. 

Also, they evaluate how business analysis performance has contributed to the implementation of the solution . As for the stakeholders , the BA’s job is to analyse their needs and characteristics to ensure proper planning and monitoring. 

Furthermore, at this stage, they need to conduct performance analysis so the planned activities will deliver a satisfying value to the business. 

All of this would not be possible without ensuring a complete understanding of the organisational context and developing the right analysis approach.

The BABOK guide includes five tasks that BAs should perform as a part of the business analysis planning and monitoring knowledge area. 

These tasks focus on organising and coordinating analysts and stakeholders, planning the approach to specific parts of a project, and defining the roles. They should produce outputs that can serve as a foundation for tasks in other knowledge areas.  We’ll take a closer look at all five of these tasks.

Plan Business Analysis Approach

The plan business analysis approach task defines and creates methods that will be used while performing business analysis activities.

The outputs produced here are a groundwork for the tasks form all of the other knowledge areas. It determines the timeline of the projects, what and when will be performed, and which deliverables are expected.

Also, planning the business analysis approach identifies suitable techniques and tools which will be used over the course of the project.

Some organisations already have established and formalised procedures and approaches and the analyst will have to work within these standards.  Of course, this doesn’t necessarily mean that some of these approaches won’t have to be adjusted as the project progresses.

In organisations without set procedures, the BA will work with stakeholders to devise the most suitable approach.

The main inputs of planning a business analysis approach are the needs of a specific organisation – problems or opportunities that the organisation is facing.

The business analyst must have a full understanding of the organisational needs as he starts the planning and be aware that those needs may change during the project. 

The expected output of this task is to define the business analysis activities and approach necessary for achieving the desired goals, determine work timeline and sequencing, decide on techniques to be used, and determine expected deliverables.

Plan Stakeholder Engagement

Planning the stakeholder engagemen t includes establishing and maintaining a fruitful collaboration with stakeholders, understanding their roles and relevance, and identifying their needs. To communicate in the best possible way, the business analyst must perform a thorough analysis of all of the crucial stakeholders and their characteristics.

The more stakeholders are involved, the more complex the task becomes, the inclusion of every new stakeholder may require the use of a different technique or the adjustment to the existing approach.

Similar to the previous task the main input of planning the stakeholder engagement is the organisational need. If the analyst has an understanding of the needs, proper identification of key stakeholders will be much easier. Another significant input is the overall business analysis approach as it ensures better stakeholder analysis and communication.

Planning stakeholder engagement should provide a stakeholder engagement approach as an output, containing information on the number of stakeholders, their characteristics, roles, and assignments.

The main elements of the task of planning stakeholder engagement are:

  • Performing stakeholders analysis – identifying roles, attitudes, decision-making authority, level of power or influence;
  • Defining stakeholder collaboration;
  • Stakeholder communication needs.

Guidelines and tools that a business analyst will lean on while planning stakeholder engagement are business analysis performance assessment, change strategy, and current state description.

The key stakeholders for this task are customers, domains subject matter expert, end-user, project manager, regulator, sponsor, and supplier.

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Plan Business Analysis Governance

To plan business analysis governance is to define business analysis components that will serve as a support of governing function in an organisation. It’s defining how decisions are made on all aspects of the business, including designs, requirements, reviews, changes, and prioritisation.

For the organisation to function properly, the process of governance should be clear and unambiguous. All of the decision-makers and their competencies must be clearly identified. Also, the information needed to make the decision should be precisely defined.

The primary inputs in planning business analysis governance are business analysis approach which ensures consistency in planning and stakeholder engagement approach which provides information on stakeholders, their characteristics, needs, and roles.

When performed in the right way the planning of business analysis governance should provide an output of governance approach which contains information on decision making stakeholders and their authority and responsibility.

The business analysis governance planning includes the following key elements:

  • Decision making;
  • Change control process;
  • Plan prioritisation approach;
  • Plan for approvals.

Guidelines and tools that will come useful for planning business analysis governance are business analysis performance assessment, business policies, the current state description, and legal/regulatory information.

Stakeholders of significance for business analysis governance planning are domain subject matter expert, project manager, regulator, and sponsor.

Plan Business Analysis Information Management

The role of business analysis information management planning is to define the way information gathered during the business analysis process will be captured, stored, accessed, and integrated with other available information. This includes all information elicited, created, and compiled over the course of the business analysis process.

The amount of information obtained this way can be enormous and proper handling is essential for its future use. All of the information should be optimised and easily accessible for whatever period it is needed.

Business analysis information management planning uses all of the outputs from previous tasks as its input. This includes the business analysis approach, stakeholder engagement approach, and governance approach. The main expected output is the information management approach which defines the state of information upon the completion of the change.

The key elements of planning the business analysis information management task are:

  • Organisation of business analysis information;
  • Level of abstraction;
  • Planning a traceability approach;
  • Planning for requirement reuse;
  • Storage and access;
  • Requirements attributes.

Guidelines and tools used during this task are business analysis performance assessment, business policies, information management tools, and legal/regulatory information.

The main stakeholders with the role to play at this stage are domain subject matter expert, regulator, and sponsor.

Identify Business Analysis Performance Improvements

Identifying business analysis performance improvement s include monitoring and management of business analysis performance in order to ensure the realisation of improvements and securing continuous opportunities.

It’s the assessment of the work that the business analyst has done and serves as a guideline for implementing improvements where needed. This task consists of establishing performance measures, conduction analysis based on those measures, reporting, and identifying potential necessary actions.

The primary inputs are business analysis approach and performance objectives which are the external goals set by an organisation. The output of this task is the business analysis performance assessment. It details puts actual performance against the planned one, identifies potential issues, and proposes solutions.

Identifying business analysis improvements includes a few key elements:

  • Performance analysis;
  • Assessment measures;
  • Analysing the results;
  • Recommending actions for improvement,

The main tool used here is the organisation performance standard including performance metrics or organisational expectations.

For this business analysis planning and monitoring task, the main stakeholders are domain subject matter expert, project manager, and sponsor.

Adaptive US ECBA self-paced learning

Business Analysis Approach Template

Having a set of business analysis planning and monitoring templates will help you provide the groundwork for the successful completion of your whole project.

Conclusion – Business Analysis Planning and Monitoring

In all business analysis projects whether waterfall or agile the business analyst will need to understand and review their business analysis planning and monitoring approach to suite the context of their project (and also when they arrived in the project).

This article has provided an introduction to the business analysis planning and monitoring activities necessary for the successful completion of the whole project.

Learn more about the other IIBA business analysis knowledge areas:

Jerry Nicholas

Jerry continues to maintain the site to help aspiring and junior business analysts and taps into the network of experienced professionals to accelerate the professional development of all business analysts. He is a Principal Business Analyst who has over twenty years experience gained in a range of client sizes and sectors including investment banking, retail banking, retail, telecoms and public sector. Jerry has mentored and coached business analyst throughout his career. He is a member of British Computer Society (MBCS), International Institute of Business Analysis (IIBA), Business Agility Institute, Project Management Institute (PMI), Disciplined Agile Consortium and Business Architecture Guild. He has contributed and is acknowledged in the book: Choose Your WoW - A Disciplined Agile Delivery Handbook for Optimising Your Way of Working (WoW).

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business-analysis

Business Analysis: How To Analyze Any Business

Business analysis is a research discipline that helps driving change within an organization by identifying the key elements and processes that drive value. Business analysis can also be used in Identifying new business opportunities or how to take advantage of existing business opportunities to grow your business in the marketplace.

Table of Contents

A quick intro to the Business Analysis Framework

On FourWeekMBA, I’ve looked at hundreds of business models of companies from high-tech industries ( Alphabet’s Google , Amazon , Facebook , Apple , and Microsoft ) to more traditional industries, like luxury empires ( LVMH , Kering Group , Tiffany , Brunello Cucinelli , Prada ) and more.

I’ve analyzed from listed public companies, for which data can be found in financial statements, to small businesses for which data is not publicly available.

As I received this question repeatedly, I thought to show a simple framework to analyze any business.

For the sake of this framework, we’ll leverage business analysis to reverse engineer a business to either help it grow or to gather insights that can help us grow our own company.

Keep in mind that business analysis requires a good amount of creativity.

While a single framework is a good starting point, you will need to use your experience, understanding of the industry, and what is available out there to draw a picture of what you’re looking at.

In short, I think a practical approach to business analysis is that of the artist rather than the scientist.

Thus, while we’ll be using a few data points to understand a business, we want to keep our minds able to connect the dots in several areas to draw a picture that unlocks strategic insights that we can test.

To provide a framework as a starting point to analyze any sort of business, you’ll need to answer a few simple questions, each addressing a key element of the business.

We’ll tackle it by looking at three main competitive advantages a business can create over time:

business analysis business plan

  • What’s the key asset? (core asset)

Market moat :

  • Who’s the key stakeholder? (stakeholder profiling)
  • What player is competing for the same customer? (context mapping)
  • What’s the key touchpoint between the brand and the customer? (core distribution )

Financial moat:

  • How does it make money? (revenue generation)
  • Where’s the real cash? (cash generation)
  • How does the company spend money? (cost structure)

Let’s analyze each of those elements to uncover and draw the picture of any business. We’ll start from the outer layer (the financial moat, to get to the core asset.

Financial moat

In the. financial moat stage we’ll answer:

The purpose of the financial moat is to follow the money to dig deeper into the business and move toward what gives it a real market advantage, and eventually, we’ll look for the business core asset.

How does it make money?

Revenue streams are important as a baseline to understand any business.

Following the money can be very powerful in business as it unlocks a set of questions that will help us drill down into the current picture but also to draw some possible conclusions about future operations and strategy .

For instance, if you look at Google revenue streams it’s interesting to notice a few things right away:

how-does-google-make-money

  • The company still primarily makes money from advertising
  • Google revenue streams are diversified (even though advertising is still the primary revenue stream)
  • A very small percentage of Google’s revenues come from other bets

From those simple statements, we can drill further down and look at each revenue stream:

  • Advertising revenues: Google makes money by two primary mechanisms: Google Ads and Google AdSense
  • Other revenues: that comprises things like in-app revenues, but also hardware devices which Google sells
  • Other bets: it comprises investments in other ventures

From this first look, we can depart from looking at other bets and other revenues. Not because those are not important for the future. Quite the opposite, one of the hidden gems of Google’s success in the next ten, twenty years might hide there.

But here we’re not trying to predict the future, which is impossible.

We want to reverse engineer the current business to gather some insights which will help us drive our own strategy now (for instance, if you’re building a business today by gaining organic traffic from Google understanding its logic helps a lot!).

Therefore, we’ll decide to drill down more

Why? We want to uncover where the real cash is.

Where’s the real cash?

When asking “where’s the real cash?” we’re not talking about cash flows, but rather about margins. In short, for companies like Netflix which run cash negative business models , it would be misleading to ask where’s the cash.

Instead, we want to look at the part of the business that has high-profit margins. For instance, if we look at Google’s advertising machine we can notice a few things:

google-advertising-business

To build a cash cow the company might do the following:

  • Give up part of the margins on a line of business to strengthen another more strategic and scalable part of the business ( think of how Google splits revenues with network members thus giving up a good chunk of margins, yet by making its search pages way more valuable for users, and advertisers)
  • Build a freemium part of the business which while doesn’t get monetized it helps amplify the brand and to build a valuable core asset monetized asymmetrically (we’ll see what that means)

How does the company spend money?

cost-structure-business-model

How the company spends its money informs about how it’s investing back into strengthening its core asset, thus building future growth .

what-is-google-tac

Market moat

At this stage, we’ll ask:

The objective here is to understand what creates a competitive market advantage and point us toward the core asset of the company, which makes the business sustainable in the long-term.

Who’s the key stakeholder?

If you look at a companies’ like Amazon the complexity of the business goes well beyond a regular company.

In short, at this stage, it’s important to highlight the difference between small businesses which are more linear in how they approach customers.

And platform business models that instead have a more complex value chain.

linear-vs-platform-business-models

We could make this process harder and harder by finding more business types, and classifying them into B2B, B2C, B2B2C, and more.

Or we can take a more straightforward approach.

Who’s the key user/customer, and what’s the value provided to her?

Amazon Value Proposition

In Amazon’s case, for instance, the company has multiple products and each of them has a different value proposition .

Therefore, focusing on them all would be a mistake, as we want to go back and reconsider.

Who’s the Amazon repeat customer?

The customer who goes back to the Amazon e-commerce platform to buy over and over again is the key customer and where the company has built its success.

When you do look at the customer from that perspective, you stop assuming that Amazon Prime is another revenue stream . Instead, you understand that besides that, that is a way for Amazon to lock-in loyal customers and make their repeat purchases convenient (Prime Customers won’t pay for delivery).

The same happens if you go back and ask a similar question for a company like Google.

Who’s the person that drives up the value of the most important company’s asset?

If you look at Google’s business model , it’s easy to get fooled:

google-business-model

You might assume that as Google makes money by selling advertising to businesses, it will be the advertiser who pays Google to be the most valuable customer.

Yet, in Google’s case, the most valuable customer is the one who doesn’t pay: its users

google-vision-statement-mission-statement

That is because Google runs an asymmetric model .

In short, the company won’t monetize directly its users, but it will monetize the core asset which is built on top of the free users’ attention.

asymmetric-business-models

Where free users provide valuable data to Google’s algorithms, the company matches its technology with the users’ data and sells part of that as paid adverting.

In short, in an asymmetric model user and customers are not the same.

In a more symmetric model instead, users and customers are the same stakeholders.

The customer wearing the hat of the user provides valuable data to the platform. The company refines that data through proprietary algorithms and as a result, it gives back a valuable service to its customers.

That is how the Netflix business model works.

In those cases when the user is what provides valuable data to the core asset of the company, it’s important to understand that the tech company will prioritize its strategy around the user over time.

What player is competing for the same customer?

Once found the key stakeholder, the person who helps the company build its most valuable asset, we can zoom out a bit and understand the context in which the company operates.

comparable-company-analysis

One way to find comparable companies to map out the context is to look for those organizations that match the business and financial profile.

We do that because there is no company operating in a vacuum.

And even when a company that is better suited to help customers get things done might dominate.

In many other circumstances, better distribution strategy , capital moats, and more effective business models can help companies dominate beyond the value provided by their core products.

That’s why context matters.

In Google’s case we’ll look at the other players which are also grabbing the attention of users around the globe:

advertising-industry

An attention-based model usually follows an asymmetric monetization strategy . Therefore, given Google’s key stakeholders (its users), and the fact that it’s an attention-based model, we can understand right away what products/platforms in the marketplace are comparable:

  • Google (Alphabet)
  • YouTube (Alphabet)
  • Instagram (Facebook)
  • Bing (Microsoft)
  • TikTok (ByteDance)

Therefore, in order for Google to keep its competitive advantage is important to keep an eye on these.

* Note : The reason why Amazon is on the list as its website is one of the most important product search engines, intercepting the commercial intents of billions of people in the western world.

What’s the key touchpoint between the brand and the customer?

While disruptive startups built their name and grabbed market shares quickly by breaking down the trade-off between value and cost (at the basis of a blue ocean strategy ) there is another component of the success of any organization which can’t be ignored: distribution .

Distribution is the key touchpoint that makes customers connect with a brand , that enables companies to monetize their core assets and that enables them to keep tight long-term control over their business.

The importance of a distribution strategy can’t be overstated. Distribution isn’t just about delivering a product in the hands of the key customer that is also about:

  • Enabling the company to be perceived inline with its pricing strategy and the brand ’s identity
  • Building up the habits that enable users/customers to become champion of the product (just like you can’t stop using Google)
  • Build competitive moats

Finally, at this stage, we can identify the core asset and put all together.

What’s the key asset?

google-search-results-page

The key asset is the main property that enables the company to make money in the long run.

For a tech business like Google, which is represented by its search results pages endowed by users’ data and algorithms, makes them extremely valuable to advertisers.

If we think of a smaller business or a non-tech company that can be represented by its premises or its brand .

For instance, a small Boutique hotel’s location is the key asset. For a luxury company, its brand is the most important asset.

The former is physical and easily identifiable.

The latter is instead non-physical and abstract, yet still extremely valuable as it enables companies like Prada, LVMH, Tiffany and other luxury brands to capture high margins.

Therefore depending on the company, the main asset might be the technology, data or brand . Or better yet a mixture of those things.

Putting it all together

As we identified the core asset, market, and financial moat, we can move backward to uncover the whole story.

In a case like Google, the company makes its money primarily by monetizing its search results pages (core asset).

It runs an asymmetric business model where the user and the customer are not the same (stakeholder profiling). Products and platforms like Amazon, Facebook and Twitter also draw the attention of users (context mapping), however, Google has a strong distribution network given for instance by the fact the company can cover the whole users’ journey (core distribution ), and most of its money is spent to maintain its core asset competitive (cost structure), while advertisers provide revenues and cash to the company which makes it financially sustainable (financial moat).

Where do you find the data?

A set of useful resources to find the data you need to analyze several businesses are:

  • EDGAR Filings

It’s important to remark that when it comes to data it’s not important how many data points you find. Often it requires a bit of creativity to ponder the right question.

In that case, a single data point can tell you a lot about a business that you can use to assess the company or to drive the strategy for your own business.

FourWeekMBA business analysis framework summarized

To analyze any business, you can ask a few simple questions:

Each of those questions will lead to an understanding of the several blocks that make up internal and external strategic forces that shape the business.

Case study: how to make an everyday free tool your go to BI alternative

While it’s tempting to complex things up when performing business analysis, in reality, there is a simple tool, that you have been using for years, which can help you to perform a good part of your analysis: Google.

As pointed out on the Google blog in 2012:

Search is a lot about discovery—the basic human need to learn and broaden your horizons. But searching still requires a lot of hard work by you, the user. So today I’m really excited to launch the Knowledge Graph, which will help you discover new information quickly and easily. …The Knowledge Graph enables you to search for things, people or places that Google knows about—landmarks, celebrities, cities, sports teams, buildings, geographical features, movies, celestial objects, works of art and more—and instantly get information that’s relevant to your query. This is a critical first step towards building the next generation of search, which taps into the collective intelligence of the web and understands the world a bit more like people do. …the Knowledge Graph can help you make some unexpected discoveries. You might learn a new fact or new connection that prompts a whole new line of inquiry. Do you know where Matt Groening, the creator of the Simpsons (one of my all-time favorite shows), got the idea for Homer, Marge and Lisa’s names? It’s a bit of a surprise:

In 2012, Google started to roll out officially its Knowledge Graph (though its attempt to make the search experience even smarter and more semantic started way back and it escalated when the company acquired MetaWeb).

With that, Google started do develop more and more features related to giving beyond the classic ten blue links we have seen for years.

Those features we see appearing more and more on search results are coming from the massive Google’s semantic database made of billions of data points called Knowledge Graph.

Within the Knowledge Graph, Google combined semantic knowledge, to billions of users’ preferences and data, refined by its powerful algorithms and refined by its human raters.

This massive knowledge base is there to be explored, for free, it only requires you to be aware of it.

Industry analysis and setup

association-retailers

When searching for “Amazon” on Google, at the bottom of the page (from desktop) you will find several suggestions from Google, based on the industries where Amazon operates.

In short, Google is suggesting that Amazon primarily operates as an online retailer, and as such it compares it with other retailers (online and offline). Yet Google’s Knowledge Graph also expands on that and tells you more.

Amazon is also an AI company competing against other AI companies which offers you an interesting insight into the products of the company.

At the same time, Google is suggesting that Amazon is also a key player in the cloud space, thus it offers you some perspectives of how the cloud industry looks like by pointing out some direct competitors (like Microsoft and Oracle) and other companies operating in the cloud space.

industry-analysis-amazon

Expand the research

From there, you can drill down into each of the carousels you see showing on Google to have a more detailed overview and expand the research. You can stretch it as far as you want, depending on the scope of the analysis.

related-search-retail-companies

Discover new data points

As an example, when you drill further down and search for “cloud companies” at the bottom of the search result page, you will find other categories of companies part of the cloud industry.

From PaaS to IaaS models, all were born as part of the cloud industry.

cloud-providers

Key takeaway

data-point-question

While it’s easy to look for the ultimate business intelligence tools when performing an analysis, in reality, it makes sense to stop for a second and think about what might be the single data points that can give you insights about a company.

From there, you can use explorative tools, like Google to find out and drill down to draft an analysis that can give you different insights and enable you to reverse engineer many large companies.

Key Highlights

  • The framework aims to analyze businesses for growth opportunities and strategic insights.
  • It involves three main competitive advantages: Core moat, Market moat, and Financial moat.
  • Identifying the key asset that gives the company a competitive advantage.
  • Understanding the main value proposition of the business.
  • Recognizing the key stakeholders and their value in the business.
  • Identifying competing players in the same customer segment.
  • Understanding the crucial touchpoints between the brand and customers.
  • Analyzing revenue generation methods of the business.
  • Identifying where the significant cash flows come from.
  • Understanding the cost structure and how the company spends money.
  • Distinguishing between users and customers in the business model.
  • Highlighting the importance of leveraging data and technology.
  • Using Google’s Knowledge Graph for insights and research.
  • Expanding analysis by exploring suggested entities and categories.
  • Discovering new data points to enhance the analysis.
  • Focusing on single data points that offer valuable insights.
  • Using explorative tools like Google to gather insights about a company.
  • Emphasizing the importance of creative analysis and critical questions.
  • The framework provides a structured approach to understanding various aspects of a business.
  • It aids in identifying growth opportunities, competitive advantages, and strategic insights.
  • The use of Google’s Knowledge Graph enhances research capabilities.

Connected Analysis Frameworks

Failure Mode And Effects Analysis

failure-mode-and-effects-analysis

Agile Business Analysis

agile-business-analysis

Business Valuation

valuation

Paired Comparison Analysis

paired-comparison-analysis

Monte Carlo Analysis

monte-carlo-analysis

Cost-Benefit Analysis

cost-benefit-analysis

CATWOE Analysis

catwoe-analysis

VTDF Framework

competitor-analysis

Pareto Analysis

pareto-principle-pareto-analysis

Comparable Analysis

SWOT Analysis

swot-analysis

PESTEL Analysis

pestel-analysis

Business Analysis

business-analysis

Financial Structure

financial-structure

Financial Modeling

financial-modeling

Value Investing

value-investing

Buffet Indicator

buffet-indicator

Financial Analysis

financial-accounting

Post-Mortem Analysis

post-mortem-analysis

Retrospective Analysis

retrospective-analysis

Root Cause Analysis

root-cause-analysis

Blindspot Analysis

blindspot-analysis

Break-even Analysis

break-even-analysis

Decision Analysis

decision-analysis

DESTEP Analysis

destep-analysis

STEEP Analysis

steep-analysis

STEEPLE Analysis

steeple-analysis

Activity-Based Management

activity-based-management-abm

PMESII-PT Analysis

pmesii-pt

SPACE Analysis

space-analysis

Lotus Diagram

lotus-diagram

Functional Decomposition

functional-decomposition

Multi-Criteria Analysis

multi-criteria-analysis

Stakeholder Analysis

stakeholder-analysis

Strategic Analysis

strategic-analysis

Related Strategy Concepts:  Go-To-Market Strategy ,  Marketing Strategy ,  Business Models ,  Tech Business Models ,  Jobs-To-Be Done ,  Design Thinking ,  Lean Startup Canvas ,  Value Chain ,  Value Proposition Canvas ,  Balanced Scorecard ,  Business Model Canvas ,  SWOT Analysis ,  Growth Hacking ,  Bundling ,  Unbundling ,  Bootstrapping ,  Venture Capital ,  Porter’s Five Forces ,  Porter’s Generic Strategies ,  Porter’s Five Forces ,  PESTEL Analysis ,  SWOT ,  Porter’s Diamond Model ,  Ansoff ,  Technology Adoption Curve ,  TOWS ,  SOAR ,  Balanced Scorecard ,  OKR ,  Agile Methodology ,  Value Proposition ,  VTDF Framework ,  BCG Matrix ,  GE McKinsey Matrix ,  Kotter’s 8-Step Change Model .

Main Guides:

  • Business Models
  • Business Strategy
  • Marketing Strategy
  • Business Model Innovation
  • Platform Business Models
  • Network Effects In A Nutshell
  • Digital Business Models

More Resources

profitability

About The Author

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Bridging the Gap

An Introduction to Business Analysis and the Business Analyst Process Framework

One of the most common challenges I see in the business analysis profession is a struggle to help stakeholders understand the value of the BA functions on any type of project, and, quite honestly, gaining credibility for the role.  

Let me just say that I know what it is like to feel that you constantly have to be paving a path to do business analysis.  

I also get the pressure you feel to just get “things” done without the proper time and analysis. I’ve succumbed to it many times in my career – and always to my ultimate regret.  

It’s incredibly difficult to always be the one pushing back, and it can be wicked hard to keep asking questions when it feels like everyone else has things figured out.   

(Spoiler alert: They don’t.)  

But you and I – we also know, deep in our souls, that we’re doing our projects, our teams, and our companies a disservice if we don’t do the right analysis and keep asking questions.  

When self-doubt creeps in, you need a structure to fall back on. A framework to guide you forward and re-affirm that you are on the right track.  

And that’s what the 8-step process framework that we teach at Bridging the Gap is all about.  

By the way,  I cover these 8 steps in more detail in our free Quick Start to Success Workshop .

business analysis business plan

Now let’s look at each of the 8 steps in more detail.

Step 1 – Get Oriented

Often as business analysts, we are expected to dive into a project and start contributing as quickly as possible to make a positive impact. Sometimes the project is already underway. Other times there are vague notions about what the project is or why it exists. We face a lot of ambiguity as business analysts and it’s our job to clarify the scope, requirements, and business objectives as quickly as possible.

But that doesn’t mean that it makes sense to get ourselves knee-deep into the detailed requirements right away. Doing so very likely means a quick start in the wrong direction.

Taking some time, whether that’s a few hours, few days, or at the very most a few weeks, to get oriented will ensure you are not only moving quickly but also able to be an effective and confident contributor on the project .

Your key responsibilities in this step include:

  • Clarifying your role as the business analyst so that you are sure to create deliverables that meet stakeholder needs. (To better understand the BA role, be sure to check out our free workshop – Quick Start to Success as a Business Analyst .)
  • Determining the primary stakeholders to engage in defining the project’s business objectives and scope, as well as any subject matter experts, to be consulted early in the project.
  • Understanding the project history so that you don’t inadvertently repeat work that’s already been done or rehash previously made decisions.
  • Understanding the existing systems and business processes so you have a reasonably clear picture of the current state that needs to change.

This is where you learn how to learn what you don’t know you don’t know, so to speak. This step gets you the information you need to be successful and effective in the context of this particular project.

Step 2 – Discover the Primary Business Objectives

It’s very common for business analysts and project managers to jump right in to defining the scope of the project. However, this can lead to unnecessary headaches.  Uncovering and getting agreement on the business needs early in a project and before scope is defined is the quickest path forward to a successful project.

  • Discovering expectations from your primary stakeholders – essentially discovering the “why” behind the project. (Our BA Essentials Master Class covers 7 different business analysis techniques that can be used as part of this discovery.)
  • Reconciling conflicting expectations so that the business community begins the project with a shared understanding of the business objectives and are not unique to one person’s perspective.
  • Ensuring the business objectives are clear and actionable to provide the project team with momentum and context while defining scope and, later on, the detailed requirements.

Discovering the primary business objectives sets the stage for defining scope, ensuring that you don’t end up with a solution that solves the wrong problem or, even worse, with a solution that no one can even determine is successful or not.

Step 3 – Define Scope

A clear and complete statement of scope provides your project team the go-forward concept to realize the business needs. Scope makes the business needs tangible in such a way that multiple project team participants can envision their contribution to the project and the implementation. 

  • Defining a solution approach to determine the nature and extent of technology and business process changes to be made as part of implementing the solution to the primary business objectives.
  • Drafting a scope statement and reviewing it with your key business and technology stakeholders until they are prepared to sign-off or buy-in to the document.
  • Confirming the business case to ensure that it still makes sense for your organization to invest in the project.

Scope is not an implementation plan, but it is a touchstone guiding all of the subsequent steps of the business analysis process and tasks by other project participants.

Step 4 – Formulate Your Business Analysis Plan

Your business analysis plan will bring clarity to the business analysis process that will be used to successfully define the detailed requirements for this project. Your business analysis plan is going to answer many questions for you and your project team.

  • Choosing the most appropriate types of business analysis deliverables, given the project scope, project methodology, and other key aspects of the project context.
  • Defining the specific list of business analysis deliverables that will completely cover the scope of the project and identifying the stakeholders who will be part of the creation and validation of each deliverable.
  • Identifying the timelines for completing the business analysis deliverables.

In the absence of defining a credible and realistic plan, a set of expectations may be defined for you , and often those expectations are unrealistic as they do not fully appreciate everything that goes into defining detailed requirements.

Step 5 – Define the Detailed Requirements

Detailed requirements provide your implementation team with the information they need to implement the solution. They make scope implementable.

Without clear, concise, and actionable detailed requirements, implementation teams often flounder and fail to connect the dots in such a way that delivers on the original business case for the project.  

  • Eliciting the information necessary to understand what the business community wants from a specific feature or process change.
  • Analyzing the information you’ve discovered and using it to create a first draft of one or more business analysis deliverables containing the detailed requirements for the project.
  • Reviewing and validating each deliverable with appropriate business and technology stakeholders and asking questions to fill in any gaps.

Effective business analysts consciously sequence your deliverables to be as effective as possible in driving the momentum of the project forward. Paying attention to the project’s critical path, reducing ambiguity and complexity, and generating quick wins are all factors to consider when sequencing your deliverables.

Step 6 – Support the Technical Implementation

On a typical project employing a business analyst, a significant part of the solution involves a technical implementation team building, customizing, and/or deploying software.  During the technical implementation, t here are many worthwhile support tasks for you to engage in that will help drive the success of the project and ensure the business objectives are met.

  • Reviewing the solution design to ensure it fulfills all of the requirements and looking for opportunities to meet additional business needs without increasing the technical scope of the project.
  • Updating and/or repackaging requirements documentation to make it useful for the technology design and implementation process.
  • Engaging with quality assurance professionals to ensure they understand the business context for the technical requirements. This responsibility may include reviewing test plans and/or test cases to ensure they represent a clear understanding of the functional requirements.
  • Making yourself available to answer questions and help resolve any issues that surface during the technical design, technical implementation, or testing phases of the project.
  • Managing requirements changes to ensure that everyone is working from up-to-date documentation and that appropriate stakeholders are involved in all decisions about change.
  • When appropriate, leading user acceptance testing efforts completed by the business community to ensure that the software implementation meets the needs of business end users.

All of these efforts help the implementation team fulfill the intended benefits of the project and ensure the investment made realizes a positive return.

Step 7 – Help the Business Implement the Solution

Your technology team can deliver a beautiful shiny new solution that theoretically meets the business objectives, but if your business users don’t use it as intended and go back to business-as-usual, your project won’t have delivered on the original objectives . Business analysts are increasingly getting involved in this final phase of the project to support the business.

Your key responsibilities in this step may include:

  • Analyzing and developing interim and future state business process documentation that articulates exactly what changes need to be made to the business process.
  • Training end users to ensure they understand all process and procedural changes or collaborating with training staff so they can create appropriate training materials and deliver the training.
  • Collaborating with business users to update other organizational assets impacted by the business process and technology changes.

This step is all about ensuring all members of the business community are prepared to embrace the changes that have been specified as part of the project.

Step 8 – Assess Value Created by the Solution

A lot happens throughout the course of a project. Business outcomes are discussed. Details are worked through. Problems, big and small, are solved. Relationships are built. Change is managed. Technology is implemented. Business users are trained to change the way they work.

In this flurry of activity and a focus on delivery, it’s easy to lose track of the big picture. Why are we making all these changes and what value do they deliver for the organization? And even more importantly, are we still on track? Meaning, is the solution we’re delivering actually delivering the value we originally anticipated?

Nothing creates more positive momentum within an organization than a track record of successful projects. But if we don’t stop and assess the value created by the solution, how do we know if we are actually operating from a track record of success?

  • Evaluating the actual progress made against the business objectives for the project to show the extent to which the original objectives have been fulfilled.
  • Communicating the results to the project sponsor, and if appropriate, to the project team and all members of the organization.
  • Suggesting follow-up projects and initiatives to fully realize the intended business objectives of the project or to solve new problems that are discovered while evaluating the impact of this project.

How to Get Started with the Business Analysis Process Framework

As you leverage this process framework, you’ll gain increased recognition for the value of business analysis, and you’ll start to get pulled into more interesting projects, earlier in the process.  

I see BAs resist having a process because it seems like every project is different but without a process, you really feel like you have to make things up as you go along. While there are nuances of each project that are different, this is a framework you can fall back on to guide you.  

It’s both structured AND flexible.  

I invite you to start applying this process.  

If you want to learn more, join my Quick Start to Success workshop , where I teach you the ins and outs. We also do a deeper dive into each step of the process in the BA Essentials Master Class, which is one of the modules of The Business Analyst Blueprint® certification program.  

And, again, this is about you increasing your effectiveness, and finding the confidence to do what’s right for your project and your team, even when there can be pressures to “just get things done.”  

We build our profession one business analyst at a time, and success starts with you.  

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How to Write a Business Analysis Report [Examples and Templates]

business analysis business plan

Table of contents

Business analysis reports are a lot like preparing a delicious meal.

Sometimes, the recipe is simple enough that you only need to use the basic ingredients. Other times, you will have to follow specific instructions to ensure those tasty delicacies turn out just right.

Want to make sure your business report never turns out like a chewy piece of meat? You’ve come to the right place.

Stay tuned until the end of this blog post, and we promise you won’t be hungry… for business knowledge!

What Is a Business Analysis Report?

Why is analytical reporting important, what should be included in a business analysis report, how do you write a business analysis report, business data analysis report examples and templates.

  • Improve Business Reporting with Databox

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A business analysis report provides information about the current situation of your company. This report is usually created by the management to help in the decision-making process and is usually used by other departments within a company.

Business analysis reports can either focus your research on the effectiveness of an existing business process or a proposed new process. Besides, an effective business analysis report should also assess the results to determine if the process changes had a positive or negative effect on the company’s goals. In fact, according to Databox’s State of business reporting , an overwhelming majority of companies said that reporting improved their performance.

Analytical reports are the bridge that connects your company to an effective, data-driven business intelligence strategy . By leveraging analytical reports , you can make informed decisions about your organization’s most critical issues. You will no longer need to rely on gut instinct or anecdotal evidence when assessing risks, threats, and opportunities. Instead, you will have access to a wealth of reliable data to inform your decisions.

Here are some essential benefits of analytical reporting:

  • Improve communication and foster collaboration – The most obvious benefit of business analysis report writing is an improvement in communication between all stakeholders involved in the project. Also, analytical business reports can help you to generate more trust and foster better collaboration among your employees and colleagues. By using data analytics reporting tools , you will be able to monitor your employees’ performance on a day-to-day basis. This will allow you to hold them accountable for their actions and give them greater freedom within the business as they know that their superiors have faith in their decision-making capabilities.
  • Increase productivity – Without this level of shared insight, businesses struggle to stay on top of their most important tasks and can become less efficient. An effective analytical business report provides the information needed for more efficient internal processes and helps you find more time for strategic activities such as improving your business strategy or working on long-term goals .
  • Innovation – In today’s digital age, the pressure to innovate was never greater. When consumers basically have everything they want at their fingertips, stepping up to the plate with a new and improved product or service has never been more important. With an accessible dashboard in place, you will be able to create data-driven narratives for each of your business’ critical functions. For example, if you are a software company, you can use the insights gained from report analysis done with your dashboard software to tailor your product development efforts to the actual needs of your customers. By doing so, you will be able to develop products that are better tailored to specific customer groups. You can also use the same information for developing new marketing strategies and campaigns.
  • Continuous business evolution – When it comes to digital businesses, data is everything. No model lasts forever, so having access to a business dashboard software that allows you to constantly keep tabs on your business’ performance will help you refine it as time goes on. If there are any glitches in your business model, or if something isn’t panning out as expected, the insight offered by a business analysis report can help you improve upon what works while scrapping what doesn’t.

A business analysis report has several components that need to be included to give a thorough description of the topic at hand. The structure and length of business analysis reports can vary depending on the needs of the project or task.

They can be broken down into different sections that include an:

  • Executive summary
  • Study introduction
  • Methodology
  • Review of statistics

Reports of this nature may also include case studies or examples in their discussion section.

A report can be written in a formal or informal tone, depending on the audience and purpose of the document. While a formal tone is best for executives , an informal tone is more appropriate for technical audiences . It is also a good idea to use something like an executive summary template to report on the results repeatedly with ease.

A good business analysis report is detailed and provides recommendations in the form of actionable steps. Here we have listed some simple steps that you need to follow to write a good business analysis report. Report writing is a major part of the business analysis process. In this section, you will learn how to write a report for your company:

Preparation

Presentation.

Obtain an overview of what you want to analyze in the business report . For example, if you are writing a business analysis report on how to improve customer service at an insurance company, you will want to look through all the customer service processes to determine where the problems lie. The more prepared you are when starting a project, the easier it will be to get results. Here is what your preparation should look like:

Set your goals

The first step in writing this document is to set your goals . What do you hope to accomplish with this paper? Do you need to assess the company’s finances? Are you looking for ways to make improvements? Or do you have outside investors who want to know if they should buy into the company? Once you know what your goal is, then you can begin setting up your project.

PRO TIP: How Well Are Your Marketing KPIs Performing?

Like most marketers and marketing managers, you want to know how well your efforts are translating into results each month. How much traffic and new contact conversions do you get? How many new contacts do you get from organic sessions? How are your email campaigns performing? How well are your landing pages converting? You might have to scramble to put all of this together in a single report, but now you can have it all at your fingertips in a single Databox dashboard.

Our Marketing Overview Dashboard includes data from Google Analytics 4 and HubSpot Marketing with key performance metrics like:

  • Sessions . The number of sessions can tell you how many times people are returning to your website. Obviously, the higher the better.
  • New Contacts from Sessions . How well is your campaign driving new contacts and customers?
  • Marketing Performance KPIs . Tracking the number of MQLs, SQLs, New Contacts and similar will help you identify how your marketing efforts contribute to sales.
  • Email Performance . Measure the success of your email campaigns from HubSpot. Keep an eye on your most important email marketing metrics such as number of sent emails, number of opened emails, open rate, email click-through rate, and more.
  • Blog Posts and Landing Pages . How many people have viewed your blog recently? How well are your landing pages performing?

Now you can benefit from the experience of our Google Analytics and HubSpot Marketing experts, who have put together a plug-and-play Databox template that contains all the essential metrics for monitoring your leads. It’s simple to implement and start using as a standalone dashboard or in marketing reports, and best of all, it’s free!

marketing_overview_hubspot_ga_dashboard_preview

You can easily set it up in just a few clicks – no coding required.

To set up the dashboard, follow these 3 simple steps:

Step 1: Get the template 

Step 2: Connect your HubSpot and Google Analytics 4 accounts with Databox. 

Step 3: Watch your dashboard populate in seconds.

Assess the Company’s Mission

It’s almost impossible to write a business analysis report without access to the company’s mission statement. Even if you don’t plan on using the mission statement as part of your business analysis summary, it can help you understand the company’s culture and goals. Mission statements are typically short and easy to read, but they may not include every area of focus that you want to include in your report.

Thus, it is important to use other sources when possible. For example, if you are writing a business analysis report for a small start-up company that is just beginning to market its product or service, review the company website or talk directly with management to learn what they believe will be most crucial in growing the company from the ground up.

Stakeholder Analysis

Who is your audience? Create the reader’s persona and tailor all information to their perspective. Create a stakeholder map that identifies all the groups, departments, functions, and individuals involved in this project (and any other projects related to this one). Your stakeholder map should include a description of each group’s role.

Review Financial Performance

Review the financing of the business and determine whether there are any potential threats to the company’s ability to meet its future financial obligations. This includes reviewing debt payments and ownership equity compared with other types of financing such as accounts receivable, cash reserves, and working capital. Determine whether there have been any changes in the funding over time, such as an increase in long-term debt or a decrease in owners’ equity.

Apart from reviewing your debt payments and ownership equity with other types of financing, wouldn’t it be great if you could compare your financial performance to companies that are exactly like yours? With Databox, this can be done in less than 3 minutes.

For example, by  joining this benchmark group , you can better understand your gross profit margin performance and see how metrics like income, gross profit, net income, net operating increase, etc compare against businesses like yours.

One piece of data that you would be able to discover is the average gross profit a month for B2B, B2C, SaaS and eCommerce. Knowing that you perform better than the median may help you evaluate your current business strategy and identify the neccessary steps towards improving it.

Instantly and Anonymously Benchmark Your Company’s Performance Against Others Just Like You

If you ever asked yourself:

  • How does our marketing stack up against our competitors?
  • Are our salespeople as productive as reps from similar companies?
  • Are our profit margins as high as our peers?

Databox Benchmark Groups can finally help you answer these questions and discover how your company measures up against similar companies based on your KPIs.

When you join Benchmark Groups, you will:

  • Get instant, up-to-date data on how your company stacks up against similar companies based on the metrics most important to you. Explore benchmarks for dozens of metrics, built on anonymized data from thousands of companies and get a full 360° view of your company’s KPIs across sales, marketing, finance, and more.
  • Understand where your business excels and where you may be falling behind so you can shift to what will make the biggest impact. Leverage industry insights to set more effective, competitive business strategies. Explore where exactly you have room for growth within your business based on objective market data.
  • Keep your clients happy by using data to back up your expertise. Show your clients where you’re helping them overperform against similar companies. Use the data to show prospects where they really are… and the potential of where they could be.
  • Get a valuable asset for improving yearly and quarterly planning . Get valuable insights into areas that need more work. Gain more context for strategic planning.

The best part?

  • Benchmark Groups are free to access.
  • The data is 100% anonymized. No other company will be able to see your performance, and you won’t be able to see the performance of individual companies either.

When it comes to showing you how your performance compares to others, here is what it might look like for the metric Average Session Duration:

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And here is an example of an open group you could join:

business analysis business plan

And this is just a fraction of what you’ll get. With Databox Benchmarks, you will need only one spot to see how all of your teams stack up — marketing, sales, customer service, product development, finance, and more. 

  • Choose criteria so that the Benchmark is calculated using only companies like yours
  • Narrow the benchmark sample using criteria that describe your company
  • Display benchmarks right on your Databox dashboards

Sounds like something you want to try out? Join a Databox Benchmark Group today!

Examine the “Four P’s”

“Four P’s” — product , price , place, and promotion . Here’s how they work:

  • Product — What is the product? How does it compare with those of competitors? Is it in a position to gain market share?
  • Price — What is the price of the product? Is it what customers perceive as a good value?
  • Place — Where will the product be sold? Will existing distribution channels suffice or should new channels be considered?
  • Promotion — Are there marketing communications efforts already in place or needed to support the product launch or existing products?

Evaluate the Company Structure

A business analysis report examines the structure of a company, including its management, staff, departments, divisions, and supply chain. It also evaluates how well-managed the company is and how efficient its supply chain is. In order to develop a strong strategy, you need to be able to analyze your business structure.

When writing a business analysis report, it’s important to make sure you structure your work properly. You want to impress your readers with a clear and logical layout, so they will be able to see the strengths of your recommendations for improving certain areas of the business. A badly written report can completely ruin an impression, so follow these steps to ensure you get it right the first time.

A typical business analysis report is formatted as a cover page , an executive summary , information sections, and a summary .

  • A cover page contains the title and author of the report, the date, a contact person, and reference numbers.
  • The information section is backed up by data from the work you’ve done to support your findings, including charts and tables. Also, includes all the information that will help you make decisions about your project. Experience has shown that the use of reputable study materials, such as  StuDocu  and others, might serve you as a great assistant in your findings and project tasks.
  • A summary is a short overview of the main points that you’ve made in the report. It should be written so someone who hasn’t read your entire document can understand exactly what you’re saying. Use it to highlight your main recommendations for how to change your project or organization in order to achieve its goals.
  • The last section of a business analysis report is a short list of references that include any websites or documents that you used in your research. Be sure to note if you created or modified any of these documents — it’s important to give credit where credit is due.

The Process of Investigation

Explain the problem – Clearly identify the issue and determine who is affected by it. You should include a detailed description of the problem you are analyzing, as well as an in-depth analysis of its components and effects. If you’re analyzing a small issue on a local scale, make sure that your report reflects this scale. That way, if someone else reads your work who had no idea about its context or scope, they would still be able to understand it.

Explain research methods – There are two ways to do this. Firstly, you can list the methods you’ve used in the report to determine your actions’ success and failure. Secondly, you should add one or two new methods to try instead. Always tell readers how you came up with your answer or what data you used for your report. If you simply tell them that the company needs to improve customer service training then they won’t know what kind of data led you to that conclusion. Also, if there were several ways of addressing a problem, discuss each one and why it might not work or why it may not be appropriate for the company at this time.

Analyze data – Analyzing data is an integral part of any business decision, whether it’s related to the costs of manufacturing a product or predicting consumer behavior. Business analysis reports typically focus on one aspect of an organization and break down that aspect into several parts — all of which must be analyzed in order to come to a conclusion about the original topic.

The Outcome of Each Investigation Stage

The recommendations and actions will usually follow from the business objectives not being met. For example, if one of your goals was to decrease costs then your recommendations would include optimization strategies for cost reduction . If you have more than one suggestion you should make a list of the pros and cons of each one. You can make several recommendations in one report if they are related. In addition, make sure that every recommendation has supporting arguments to back them up.

Report Summary

Every business analysis report should start with a summary. It’s the first thing people see and it needs to capture their attention and interest. The report summary can be created in two ways, depending on the nature of the report:

  • If the report is a brief one, that simply gives a summary of the findings, then it can be created as part of the executive summary.
  • But if it’s a long report, it could be too wordy to summarise. In this case, you can create a more detailed overview that covers all the main aspects of the project from both an internal and external point of view.

Everything comes down to this section. A presentation is designed to inform, persuade and influence decision-makers to take the next action steps.

Sometimes a slide or two can make them change their mind or open new horizons. These days, digital dashboards are becoming increasingly popular when it comes to presenting data in business reports. Dashboards combine different visualizations into one place, allowing users to get an overview of the information they need at a glance rather than searching through a bunch of documents or spreadsheets trying.

Databox offers dynamic and accessible digital dashboards that will help you to convert raw data into a meaningful story. And the best part is that you can do it with a ‘blink of an eye’ even if you don’t have any coding or designs skills. There is also an option of individual report customization so that you can tailor any dashboard to your own needs.

Pre-made dashboard templates can be extremely useful when creating your own business analysis report. While examples serve as inspiration, templates allow you to create reports quickly and easily without having to spend time (and money) developing the underlying data models.

Databox dashboard templates come with some of the most common pre-built metrics and KPIs different types of businesses track across different departments. In order to create powerful business insights within minutes, all you need to do is download any of our free templates and connect your data source — the metrics will populate automatically.

Business Report Examples and Templates

Databox business dashboard examples are simple and powerful tools for tracking your business KPIs and performance. These dashboards can be used by executive teams and managers as well as by senior management, marketing, sales, customer support, IT, accounting, and other departments. If you are new to this kind of reporting, you may not know how to set up a dashboard or what metrics should be displayed on it. This is where a premade template for business dashboards comes in handy.

For example, this Google Ads Report Template is designed to give you a simple way to keep track of your campaigns’ performance over time, and it’s a great resource for anyone who uses Google’s advertising platform, regardless of whether they’re an SMB, an SME or an enterprise.

Google ads dashboard

KPI Report Examples and Templates

KPIs are the foundation of any business analysis, and they can come in a multitude of forms. While we’ve defined KPIs as metrics or measurements that allow you to assess the effectiveness of a given process, department, or team, there are a number of ways to evaluate your KPIs. Through the use of color-coding, user-friendly graphs and charts, and an intuitive layout, your KPIs should be easy for anyone to understand. A good way to do this is by having a dedicated business analyst on your team who can take on the task of gathering data, analyzing it, and presenting it in a way that will drive actionable insights. However, if you don’t have a dedicated analyst or don’t want to spend money on one, you can still create KPI reporting dashboards using free KPI Databox templates and examples .

For example, this Sales Overview template is a great resource for managers who want to get an overview of their sales team’s performance and KPIs. It’s perfect for getting started with business analysis, as it is relatively easy to understand and put together.

sales overview dashboard

Performance Report Examples and Templates

All businesses, regardless of size or industry, need to know how well they are performing in order to make the best decisions for their company and improve overall ROI. A performance dashboard is a strategic tool used to track key metrics across different departments and provide insight into the health of a business. Databox has a collection of 50+ Performance Dashboard Examples and Templates which are available for free download.

For example, if your business is investing a lot into customer support, we recommend tracking your customer service performance with this Helpscout Mailbox Dashboard which will give you insights into conversations, your team’s productivity, customer happiness score, and more.

Helpscout dashboard example

Executive Report Examples and Templates

An executive dashboard is a visual representation of the current state of a business. The main purpose of an executive dashboard is to enable business leaders to quickly identify opportunities, identify areas for improvement, pinpoint issues, and make data-informed decisions for driving sales growth, new product launches, and overall business growth. When an executive dashboard is fully developed, as one of these 50+ Databox Free Executive Examples and Templates , it offers a single view of the most important metrics for a business at a glance.

For example, you probably have more than one set of financial data tracked using an executive dashboard software : invoices, revenue reports (for accounting), income statements, to mention a few. If you want to view all this data in one convenient place, or even create a custom report that gives you a better picture of your business’s financial health, this Stripe Dashboard Template is a perfect solution for you.

Stripe dashboard

Metrics Report Examples and Templates

Choosing the right metrics for your business dashboard can be crucial to helping you meet your business objectives, evaluate your performance, and get insights into how your business is operating. Metrics dashboards are used by senior management to measure the performance of their company on a day-to-day basis. They are also used by mid-level managers to determine how their teams are performing against individual goals and objectives. Databox provides 50+ Free Metrics Dashboard Examples and Templates that you can use to create your company’s own dashboards. Each is unique and will depend on your business needs.

For example, if you are looking for ways to track the performance of your DevOps team, and get the latest updates on projects quickly – from commits, and repository status, to top contributors to your software development projects, this GitHub Overview Dashboard is for you.

GitHub overview dashboard

Small Business Report Examples and Templates

A lot of small business owners don’t realize how important it is to have a proper dashboard in place until they actually use one. A dashboard can help you track and compare different metrics, benchmark your performance against industry averages, evaluate the effectiveness of your marketing and sales strategies, track financials, and much more. So if you’re looking for a tool to help you measure and manage your small business’ performance, try some of these 50+ Free Small Business Dashboard Examples and Templates .

For example, this Quickbooks Dashboard template can help you get a clear understanding of your business’s financial performance, ultimately allowing you to make better-informed decisions that will drive growth and profitability.

Quickbooks dashboard

Agency Report Examples and Templates

Agency dashboards are not a new concept. They have been around for years and are used by companies all over the world. Agency dashboards can be powerful tools for improving your marketing performance, increasing client loyalty, and landing new clients. There is no single correct way to create an agency dashboard. Everyone has their own goals and objectives, which will ultimately determine which data points you choose to include or track using a client dashboard software , but with these Databox 100+ Free Agency Dashboard Examples and Templates you have plenty of options to start with.

For example, you can use this Harvest Clients Time Report to easily see how much time your employees spend working on projects for a particular client, including billable hours and billable amount split by projects.

Harvest Clients Time Report dashboard

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Strategic Business Analysis Plan Template

Strategic Business Analysis Plan Template

What is a Strategic Business Analysis Plan?

A strategic business analysis plan outlines a systematic approach to thoroughly examine a business or organization's current state, assess the external environment to identify opportunities and threats, and set objectives to reach desired goals. The plan also outlines the strategies, tactics, and measurable targets that will help the business reach its goals.

What's included in this Strategic Business Analysis Plan template?

  • 3 focus areas
  • 6 objectives

Each focus area has its own objectives, projects, and KPIs to ensure that the strategy is comprehensive and effective.

Who is the Strategic Business Analysis Plan template for?

This strategic business analysis plan template is designed to help business analysts and teams outline a plan for conducting in-depth business analysis, gathering insights, and making informed strategic decisions. It can be used to ensure that all key stakeholders are on the same page and that all data-driven decisions are backed by data-driven insights.

1. Define clear examples of your focus areas

A focus area is a broad category or topic that is necessary to achieve the desired strategic goals. It is important to identify and define focus areas in order to set specific objectives and measurable targets that can help achieve the desired goals. Examples of strategic focus areas that could fall under a Strategic Business Analysis Plan could be: Comprehensive Data Collection and Analysis, Stakeholder Engagement and Collaboration, and Process Optimization and Efficiency.

2. Think about the objectives that could fall under that focus area

An objective is a goal that is specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART). Objectives should be created for each focus area in order to define a clear path forward and measure progress toward the desired outcomes. Examples of some objectives for the focus area of Comprehensive Data Collection and Analysis could be: Gather Relevant Data, and Perform Thorough Data Analysis.

3. Set measurable targets (KPIs) to tackle the objective

A key performance indicator (KPI) is a measurable target that defines the success of an objective. KPIs should be quantitative, measurable, and meaningful. The KPIs should be set to ensure that objectives are achieved and that progress is being made toward the desired outcomes. An example of a KPI for the focus area of Comprehensive Data Collection and Analysis could be: Achieve 95% Data Relevance in Analysis.

4. Implement related projects to achieve the KPIs

A project (action) is an approach or solution to achieve a KPI. Projects should be specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and timely (SMART). Projects should be identified for each KPI in order to ensure that progress is being made toward the desired outcomes. An example of a project related for Comprehensive Data Collection and Analysis could be: Utilize Advanced Analytical Tools.

5. Utilize Cascade Strategy Execution Platform to see faster results from your strategy

Cascade is the leading strategy execution platform for businesses of all sizes. Cascade helps teams align their goals and objectives, track progress, and measure success in order to achieve their desired outcomes faster. The platform provides an intuitive user experience and comprehensive analytics to help teams realize their vision and reach their goals.

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PESTLE Analysis

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What is Business Analysis and 8 Steps You Should Follow

Mar 18, 2015 by PESTLEanalysis Contributor

By definition, business analysis is the discipline of recognizing business needs and findings solutions to various business problems. In simpler words, it is a set of tasks and techniques which work as a connection between stakeholders. These help them understand organization’s structure, policies, and operations. They can also recommend solutions to help the business reach its goals.

When creating a small and large business, you need to understand how your organization functions to achieve its goals. This is called business analytics. Business analysis is about understanding how your organization functions to fulfill its purposes . It entails defining the abilities the firm needs to provide products to the external stakeholders. You will have to understand how the organizational goals connect to specific objectives. You will also have to make a detailed plan to help achieve the goals and objectives. If you need money to cover some expenses to help your business, find out how you could get that with a title loan. In your business analysis, you will define how the stakeholders and different organizational units interact.

You can conduct business analysis to get an overview of the current state of your company . You might use it to identify your business needs too. Most often, the analysis is performed to state and confirm solutions which meet business needs or goals.

It is the Business analysts’ task to analyze and synthesize information provided by the immense group of people who interact with the firm. Customers, executives, staff and IT professionals send this information. The analysts do not only focus on the expressed desires but elicit the actual needs of stakeholders. The analyst facilitates communication between organizational units sometimes.

Below are 8 steps business analysts generally follow .  Each of the steps is important for business analysis.

1. Get oriented

People expect business analysts to start contributing to projects as quickly as possible and make a positive impact. Sometimes, they get involved while the project is ongoing. It is essential to grant them some time to get oriented. They clarify the scope, requirements and business objectives. They spend some time to collect some basic information.

The following are the main responsibilities they have in this step:

  • Clarifying your role as the business analyst.
  • Determining who the primary stakeholders are.
  • Having a clear understanding of the project history.
  • Understanding the existing system and processes.

2. Identify the primary objectives of the business

Most business analysts start by defining the scope. This can cause problems. It is more effective to understand the business needs before defining the scope of the project.

Your responsibilities they have in this step are:

  • Discovering primary stakeholders’ expectations.
  • Merging conflicting expectations. Your business community begins the project a shared understanding of the objectives.
  • Making sure that the business objectives are clear and attainable.
  • Ensuring that the business objectives set the stage for defining a scope.

3. Define the Scope of your Business Analysis

Define a clear and complete statement as scope. It will serve as a go-forward concept and help the team realize what the business needs. Remember, scope is not an implementation plan. It merely guides all the steps of the business analysis process .

In this step, the business analysts’ main responsibilities are:

  • Defining a solution method to find the nature and extent of technology and process changes which should be made.
  • Drafting a clear scope statement. Reviewing it with the stakeholders.
  • Confirming the business case

4. Create your business analysis plan

The business analysis plan will provide clarity to the process of business analysis. The plan will answer several questions.

The vital responsibilities involved with creating a business analysis plan are:

  • Choosing the most appropriate types of business analysis deliverables.
  • Defining the specific list of deliverables for business analysis. It should cover the scope completely and identify the stakeholders.
  • Finding the timelines for finishing the business analysis deliverables.

5. Define the requirements in details

Clear and actionable detailed requirements are important. Detailed requirements provide the implementation team with the information they need to devise the solution. The most important responsibilities are:

  • Collecting the information needed
  • Analyzing the information and using it to make a first draft
  • Reviewing and validating the deliverables
  • Asking questions to fill the gaps.

6. Supporting the technical implementation

The technical implementation team builds, customizes and deploys software on a typical project. During this process, the key duties of the business analysts are:

  • Reviewing the final solution design.
  • Updating and repackaging requirements documentation.
  • Working with the quality assurance professionals and making sure that they understand the importance of technical requirements.
  • Being ready to answer questions and help solve certain problems.
  • Managing requirements changes.
  • Leading user acceptance testing efforts when possible.

7. Help the firm apply the solution

Sometimes a business cannot use the solutions aptly. As a result, it will be difficult to attain the original objectives. The business analyst should be involved in this final step to support the business. The aim of this step is to ensure that all members are prepared to accept the changes.

The business analysts’ main responsibilities for this step are:

  • Analyzing and developing interim business process documentation. These documents state exactly what changes to the business process should be made.
  • Training the end users. They must understand all the process and procedural changes. The analyst can also collaborate with training staff.
  • Working with the business users

8. Study the value created by solution

Throughout business analysis process, a lot of steps are involved. Business outcomes and details are discussed. Big and small problems are solved. Relationships are built, and changes are managed. Try not to lose track amid the steps. Stop and assess the value created by the solution.

The key responsibilities involved in this step are:

  • Evaluating the actual progress.
  • Conveying the results to the project sponsor. Communicating the results to the Project team and other members of the company is also essential in some cases.
  • Proposing follow-up projects.

Business Analysis Benefits

After a business analyst completes this final step, it is expected that the company will find more opportunities . It will help the business improve and lead to additional projects.

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Business Analysis Blog

How to do a Business Analysis Approach and Plan?

business analysis business plan

Very often Business Analysts are placed on a project without getting much input or say in how the Business Analysis aspects of the project will be implemented. This is often due to the fact that there isn’t much awareness within the organization around formal Business Analysis planning activities. It is mostly assumed that the Project Manager should be doing all planning including the Business Analysis aspects of the projects. Some Business Analysts are not really aware that it is also part of their core role as Business Analyst to contribute, initiate and plan the Business Analysis approach for a particular project or initiative. This includes agreeing the Business Analysis approach, plan out the specific tasks and specific deliverables, which will form the plan to achieve the agreed Business Analysis outcome. Many Business Analysts have not been taught how to do a Business Analysis Approach and Plan in their educational backgrounds and it is often up to learning these skills within the workplace.

business analysis business plan

This blog article aims to provide an outline around the topic of Business Analysis Approaches and Planning to assist Business Analysts with getting more confident in developing these aspects of Business Analysis.

Before we look at some practical aspects around how to put together a Business Analysis Approach and Plan, it is important to take note of the following key points:

  • Each Business Analysis Approach should be unique in the aspects, which mirrors the specific needs of the particular project. This means that although the Business Analyst can refer to a checklist of considerations or a toolset when preparing the Business Analysis Approach, it is imperative to realize there is no standard Business Analysis Approach to apply to every project in exactly the same way.
  • The most successful Business Analysis Approaches are the ones where the Business Analyst has a holistic view of the project dimensions before starting to formulate the Business Analysis approach. These dimensions include the project environment, people, culture, the timeframes, budgets and nature of the desired Business Analysis outcomes.
  • Agreeing the desired Business Analysis outcome for the project is probably the most important part of preparing for getting the Business Analysis Approach and Plan defined. This is based on the basic premise that you need to know what you are working towards, in order to know what you should do.

This brings us to the definition of what is a Business Analysis Approach and why it is important?

The Business Analysis Approach is simply the agreed plans for how the Business Analysis outcome will be achieved. If we consider a metaphor where you must prepare a lunch for a group of friends. The outcome in this scenario is to have lunch ready for a group of friends. The approach is all about how are you going to go about preparing this lunch? Will it be on a BBQ, in your own kitchen or perhaps in a restaurant? Who will be at the lunch? Do they have specific dietary requirements? When are they available for the lunch? Once you have determined which approach to take to get the lunch ready, you can start working out the tasks and steps you must take to make the lunch a success. With this example you should be able to clearly see that if you don’t know what your specific outcome should be you would find it hard to decide on a Business Analysis approach to take to achieve the outcome. This will make it even harder to work out what specifically to do, how to do it and when to do it! It is therefore essential to have a clear view of the outcome, consider the best approach using the information you have and collect about the project dimensions and then defined the plan in terms of tasks to perform.

business analysis business plan

STEP #1: Define and agree the expected outcome

The very first thing to determine is what is the expected Business Analysis outcome for your project? This will be different for every project because each project has it’s own unique objectives. What might be similar between projects is the type of Business Analysis artifact that you are delivering. The contents of the Business Analysis artifact will always be unique and should be developed optimally to meet the project’s objectives.

Once you have a clear view of what the project need in the form a Business Analysis outcome you are ready to start working out what approach to take to achieve that agreed Business Analysis outcome.

STEP #2: Take stock of the Project dimensions

Now that you know what the expected Business Analysis outcome is, you are ready to start delving into the different options for how you can approach the task to deliver that outcome. You now have to get an understanding of the project landscape. This involves various different aspects of which we will cover some of the most important factors here. The environment or organization to be more specific plays a key role in many aspects of your approach planning.

You need know the stakeholders you will have to work with. If you don’t know who your stakeholders will be yet, you should start by working out whom you would need to engage to achieve your Business Analysis outcome. Once you know who will be involved (and to what extent), you will have a lot to work with in terms of deciding how to approach the plans for execution.

For example, if you have stakeholders based in different offices around the city or country, you may need to think about having virtual requirements workshops rather than face-to-face sessions. This can be a cost saving for the project and this is when it is becomes important to also understand your timelines and budget for the requirements efforts. If you have a lot of time and money, you can perhaps afford to take a face-to-face requirements elicitation approach by having central workshops that people come to. If time and money is in fact limited you might need to take a different approach when eliciting requirements from those stakeholders.

Other factors you will need to consider is that general practice and culture of the organization. Do people expect to be included in the requirements detail or are you able to work at a higher level with most stakeholders. Do you need to engage a lot of people to ensure agreement and sign off of your Business Analysis artifacts or can you get away with only working with a small representative group? Are you able to obtain your approvals via email or do people expect formal structured walkthrough sessions. All these types of considerations will help you define what approach you should take to deliver the expected Business Analysis outcome in most successful way for that project in those particular circumstances.

There are many other factors that you should consider as part of formulating your Business Analysis approach and it is key to always do this in collaboration with the key project stakeholders. Once the key project stakeholders are in agreement with how you plan to approach the Business Analysis activities to achieve the expected Business Analysis outcome, you are ready to move to the next step of defining the Business Analysis activities for the project.

STEP #3: Create the Business Analysis Plan

At this point you know what approach you must take to deliver the Business Analysis outcome(s) for the project, however you must now take the time to create a specific Business Analysis Plan.

This is where you need to break down each key stage with their respective Business Analysis deliverables into specific tasks. Once you know what is required from a work breakdown perspective you are ready to estimate the effort required for the Business Analysis Plan. You will be able to present a specific Business Analysis Plan to the project stakeholders to demonstrate and outline the work involved and the number of Business Analysis resources you require (if you think you need more Business Analysts to help achieve the expected outcome within the timeframe and budget set).

In Conclusion

As an end result of doing your Business Analysis Approach and Plan you not only have a clear view of what the end goal will be but you know how you should go about it for that particular project. It demonstrates the value add of Business Analysis within the project environment in a very clear and pro-active way. As a Business Analyst you will most likely feel much more comfortable with working on a project with a clear Business Analysis outcome, an agreed Business Analysis Approach and all this supported with a specific and well suited Business Analysis Plan.

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What does a business analyst do?

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New innovations are being developed every day, and companies are placing big bets on whether their products will be the future. Apple’s Vision Pro or Elon Musk’s Neuralink are two examples of that today. 

But what’s in common behind virtually every major decision being made at businesses small and large—and across industries: the reliance on business analysts. 

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Business analytics involves the identification of data trends and their application to business decision-making. And with more companies relying on this data to power their biggest endeavors, business analysts are in high demand.

Based on Fortune analysis of online job board platforms LinkedIn and Indeed, there are thousands of business analyst jobs open at companies small and large and across all types of industry—from McDonald’s and Lego to Amtrak and Harvard University.

With the professional on average promising close to six-figure salaries, the field is an enticing one for individuals interested in the intersection of technical skills with business acumen. Plus, they’re increasingly quintessential to a successful enterprise.

“Every business needs business hours, I always think about business analysts as a Swiss army knife,” says Yao Morin, chief technology officer at JLL .  “And you have to be curious as to running all kinds of business problems across different industries, because you are needed everywhere.”

While a business analyst job can sound enticing, the field centers around one main idea: problem solving. 

On the daily, a business analyst may read dashboards, interpret data, and mold data into narratives that fit into a company’s objectives. Jan Ackerman, senior vice president of global recruiting at Oracle, adds that business analysts are effective communicators and data visualizers.

For example within the recruiting arm of an organization, like Ackerman oversees, business analysts may focus on how the company can make their recruiting services faster, smarter, and cheaper.

But it’s also important to keep in mind that in reality, a business analyst’s responsibilities may differ depending on the company and your seniority. 

A junior analyst, for example, may start out by focusing on simply identifying business needs that could be benefited from analytics, and over time, you may work more with the data itself.

“Believe it or not, the analysis is the shortest part of it. The biggest part is finding the business problem, finding the value that you can add, getting and sourcing the data and understanding if the data is correct and accurate for your need,” says Devanshu Mehrotra, curriculum developer and lead instructor at General Assembly, with a background in analytics.

Mehrotra adds that an individual’s interaction with data isn’t just “playing around with data until you find something cool,”—adding value to a company is of the utmost importance. 

Ackerman reiterates this by noting that above all, business analysts’ main objective is to solve business problems.

Where do business analysts work?

To keep it simple, business analysts work everywhere, especially at large companies. And even when there may not be a namesake business analyst, it is likely that someone is performing business analyst tasks anyway.

Even the International Institute of Business Analysis admits that the exact role of those in business analysis is difficult to pinpoint. Those conducting business analyst tasks could hold titles like business analyst, project manager, business systems analyst, product owner, or consultant. 

In its 2023 Global State of Business Analysis Report , over 1 in 4 business analysis professionals reported having a title that does not fit into one of those five buckets.

How much do business analysts make?

Business analysts earn an estimated $93,482 in total pay in 2024, according to Glassdoor . But again, salary may differ based on company, location, and experience level. 

Education experience may also play a factor, especially when it comes to raises and promotions. IIBA’s report notes that 39% of business analysis professionals hold a master’s degree. 

If obtaining an advanced degree in business analytics is something for you, Fortune has narrowed the choices for you in our ranking of the best online master’s in business analytics . If you are looking for something a little less intensive, checking out a business analytics course or certification program may be an easy way to learn the ropes or upskill with the most up-to-date skills.

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Sample Daycare Business Plan

Daycare Business Plan Template

Writing a business plan is a crucial step in starting a daycare. Not only does it provide structure and guidance for the future, but it also helps to create funding opportunities and attract potential investors. For aspiring daycare business owners, having access to a sample daycare business plan can be especially helpful in providing direction and gaining insight into how to draft their own daycare business plan.

Download our Ultimate Daycare Business Plan Template

Having a thorough business plan in place is critical for any successful daycare venture. It will serve as the foundation for your operations, setting out the goals and objectives that will help guide your decisions and actions. A well-written business plan can give you clarity on realistic financial projections and help you secure financing from lenders or investors. A daycare business plan example can be a great resource to draw upon when creating your own plan, making sure that all the key components are included in your document.

The daycare business plan sample below will give you an idea of what one should look like. It is not as comprehensive and successful in raising capital for your daycare as Growthink’s Ultimate Daycare Business Plan Template , but it can help you write a daycare business plan of your own.

Example – TinySteps Playhouse

Table of contents, executive summary, company overview, industry analysis, customer analysis, competitive analysis, marketing plan, operations plan, management team, financial plan.

At TinySteps Playhouse, we are committed to providing exceptional childcare services in the vibrant city of Denver, CO. Our daycare center is designed to offer a safe, educational, and nurturing environment for children ranging from infants to pre-kindergarteners. Our comprehensive curriculum is tailored to meet the developmental needs of each age group, fostering growth and learning through play. With a passionate and experienced team at the helm, TinySteps Playhouse is dedicated to supporting the families in our community by offering flexible care options that accommodate the diverse needs of modern families. Our location in Denver positions us perfectly to serve a growing demographic of parents seeking quality childcare solutions.

Our success at TinySteps Playhouse is anchored in our commitment to providing a nurturing environment that supports the holistic development of children. We have successfully established a reputation for quality care, thanks to our experienced and passionate team, comprehensive curriculum, and flexible childcare solutions. To date, we have achieved several milestones, including the successful launch of our center, consistent positive feedback from families, and a growing enrollment. Our dedication to fostering a supportive and engaging learning environment sets us apart and drives our continued success.

The childcare industry is witnessing significant growth, driven by increasing demand from working parents seeking reliable and quality daycare services. In Denver, CO, this trend is particularly pronounced, with a rising number of families requiring childcare solutions that offer both educational and emotional support. The industry’s expansion is further fueled by growing awareness of the importance of early childhood education, prompting parents to seek out establishments that provide more than just basic care. In response, daycare centers are evolving to offer comprehensive curriculums that encourage cognitive, social, and emotional development. This shift towards more holistic childcare services is reshaping the industry, making it an opportune time for TinySteps Playhouse to establish and expand its presence in Denver.

Our target customers at TinySteps Playhouse are working parents in Denver, CO, who value both the emotional and educational development of their children. These parents are looking for more than just a daycare; they seek a partner in nurturing their child’s growth. They are typically well-educated, middle to upper-middle-income earners who understand the importance of early childhood education and are willing to invest in quality childcare services. Our customer base values the flexible care options we provide, which cater to the diverse needs of modern families. By understanding and addressing the specific needs and preferences of this demographic, TinySteps Playhouse aims to become the go-to childcare solution in our community.

Top Competitors:

  • Happy Tots Daycare: Known for its large facility and wide range of extracurricular activities.
  • Little Scholars Childcare: Offers a strong educational program with certified teachers.
  • Sunshine Kids Academy: Praised for its outdoor play areas and emphasis on physical activity.

Our Competitive Advantages: TinySteps Playhouse stands out in the competitive landscape of Denver, CO, by offering a uniquely tailored curriculum that promotes holistic development. Our passionate and experienced team is dedicated to providing personalized attention to each child, ensuring their emotional, social, and educational needs are met. Furthermore, our flexible childcare solutions cater to the diverse needs of modern families, making us a preferred choice for parents in the area.

TinySteps Playhouse will implement a comprehensive promotional strategy to attract and retain customers in Denver, CO. Our approach includes a robust online marketing campaign leveraging social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to connect with potential clients by sharing engaging content, testimonials, and educational tips. We will also employ SEO techniques and Google Ads to enhance our visibility online. Additionally, email marketing will keep us in direct contact with interested parents, sharing updates, events, and special promotions. Beyond digital efforts, we will engage in community outreach by partnering with local businesses and schools, sponsor events, and offer special promotions to establish ourselves as a trusted community member. Open houses and free trial days will allow parents and children to experience our daycare firsthand, building trust and demonstrating our high level of care. Word-of-mouth, encouraged through referral discounts, will further amplify our reach. Together, these strategies are designed to establish TinySteps Playhouse as the premier choice for daycare services in Denver.

Our operations at TinySteps Playhouse are centered around key processes that ensure the provision of high-quality childcare services. These include rigorous staff training, implementation of our comprehensive curriculum, and maintaining a safe and nurturing environment for the children. We have outlined several milestones to guide our growth, such as expanding our facility to accommodate more children, achieving specific enrollment goals, and obtaining additional certifications that reflect our commitment to excellence. These operational milestones are integral to our strategy for providing exceptional childcare and education services in Denver, CO.

The leadership at TinySteps Playhouse is comprised of individuals with extensive experience in early childhood education and business management. Our team includes a Director with over a decade of experience in childcare management, an Educational Coordinator who specializes in curriculum development, and a Business Manager skilled in operations and finance. Together, our management team brings a wealth of knowledge and passion for childcare, driving TinySteps Playhouse towards achieving its mission of providing outstanding childcare services in Denver, CO.

Welcome to TinySteps Playhouse, a new Day Care/Daycare that has recently opened its doors to serve our fellow residents in Denver, CO. As a local daycare center, we are acutely aware of the lack of high-quality daycare options within our community. With this in mind, we have stepped forward to fill this crucial gap, providing a nurturing and educational environment for the children in our care.

At TinySteps Playhouse, we offer a comprehensive range of services designed to meet the needs of busy families and their children. Our offerings include childcare, early education programs, nutritious meals and snacks, and ample opportunities for outdoor play and physical activities. We understand the importance of a balanced approach to child development, and our programs are crafted to foster growth, learning, and fun in a safe and welcoming environment.

Located in the heart of Denver, CO, TinySteps Playhouse is perfectly positioned to serve the local community. We are committed to becoming a cornerstone of support for Denver families, providing peace of mind to parents and caregivers while their children are in our care.

Our ability to succeed in this competitive market is grounded in several key factors. Firstly, our founder brings a wealth of experience from previously running a successful daycare, ensuring that TinySteps Playhouse is built on a foundation of proven practices and passion for child care. Additionally, we pride ourselves on offering superior childcare services compared to our competitors, supported by a team of highly experienced staff. This unique combination of experience, passion, and quality positions us to become the preferred choice for daycare services in Denver, CO.

Since our founding on January 5, 2024, as a S Corporation, we have achieved several significant milestones. We have developed our brand identity, including designing our logo and finalizing our company name, which resonates with our mission and values. Furthermore, we have secured an ideal location for our daycare, ensuring that we are accessible and convenient for the families we serve. These accomplishments serve as the foundation for our future growth and success, as we continue to build our reputation and expand our offerings to meet the needs of our community.

The Day Care/Daycare industry in the United States is a significant and growing market. Currently, the industry generates over $56 billion in revenue annually, with an average growth rate of 3.9% over the past five years. This indicates a strong demand for daycare services across the country, making it a lucrative industry for new businesses to enter.

One of the key trends in the Day Care/Daycare industry is the increasing number of working parents in the United States. With more parents entering the workforce, the demand for reliable and high-quality daycare services is on the rise. This trend bodes well for TinySteps Playhouse, as it positions itself to cater to the needs of busy families in Denver, CO. By offering convenient and flexible daycare options, TinySteps Playhouse is well-positioned to capitalize on this growing market.

Another trend in the Day Care/Daycare industry is the focus on early childhood education and development. Parents are increasingly looking for daycare providers that offer more than just basic childcare services, but also enriching educational experiences for their children. TinySteps Playhouse can differentiate itself in the market by emphasizing its educational curriculum and dedicated staff, attracting parents who prioritize their child’s learning and development. With the industry expected to continue growing in the coming years, TinySteps Playhouse has a promising future ahead.

Below is a description of our target customers and their core needs.

Target Customers

TinySteps Playhouse will target local residents primarily, focusing on families with young children in need of daycare services. The community within Denver has a significant portion of dual-income households where both parents work full-time jobs. This demographic is in dire need of reliable and nurturing childcare solutions, making them a primary customer segment for TinySteps Playhouse.

The daycare will also cater to single-parent families seeking a supportive and engaging environment for their children during work hours. Denver’s diverse population includes a notable number of single parents who require affordable, high-quality daycare services. By offering flexible hours and a curriculum that promotes early childhood development, TinySteps Playhouse will meet the specific needs of this customer group.

Moreover, TinySteps Playhouse will tailor its services to attract parents who prioritize educational content in their childcare selection. With an emphasis on learning and development, the daycare plans to integrate educational programs into its daily schedule. This approach will appeal to parents interested in providing their children with a head start in education, further broadening the daycare’s customer base.

Customer Needs

TinySteps Playhouse steps in to meet the critical need for high-quality daycare services that Denver parents desperately seek. Parents expect a safe, nurturing environment where their children can learn, play, and grow under the supervision of caring and professional staff. This establishment ensures that every child receives personalized attention, fostering a sense of belonging and security.

Moreover, TinySteps Playhouse recognizes the importance of convenience for working parents. It offers flexible hours to accommodate the varying schedules of Denver’s diverse workforce. By doing so, parents can maintain their professional responsibilities without compromising their child’s care and well-being.

In addition to basic caregiving, TinySteps Playhouse provides an educational curriculum designed to stimulate young minds and prepare them for future academic success. Parents can rest assured that their children are not only cared for but also engaged in meaningful learning activities. This comprehensive approach to daycare fulfills a critical need for developmental support beyond mere supervision.

TinySteps Playhouse’s competitors include the following companies:

Kiddie Academy of Denver-Boulevard One offers a comprehensive child care program that focuses on early childhood education and development. Their services include infant care, toddler care, preschool, and pre-kindergarten programs. The academy emphasizes a Life Essentials® curriculum, which supports the physical, emotional, intellectual, and social development of children. Price points vary based on the program and age of the child, but they generally fall within the mid to high range of daycare services in the Denver area. Kiddie Academy of Denver-Boulevard One operates primarily in the Boulevard One neighborhood of Denver, catering to families residing in or near this area. They target middle to upper-middle-class families looking for a blend of education and care for their children. A key strength of Kiddie Academy is its national reputation and standardized curriculum. However, its location-specific weakness may be its higher price point, which could be a barrier for some families.

Crestmoor Learning Center provides early childhood education with a focus on creating a nurturing and safe environment for children to learn and grow. Services include infant care, preschool programs, and after-school care for older children. The center adopts a personalized approach to learning, tailoring activities to the developmental needs of each child. Pricing information is typically customized based on the specific needs and schedule of the family, aligning with industry standards in the Denver area. Serving the Crestmoor neighborhood and surrounding areas, Crestmoor Learning Center appeals to families seeking a more intimate and personalized daycare experience. The center’s strengths lie in its community-focused approach and flexible scheduling options. However, its smaller size and limited capacity could be viewed as a weakness, potentially limiting availability for new enrollments.

The Learning Experience – Westminster operates in the broader Denver metro area, with a specific focus on the Westminster location. This center offers educational childcare programs for children ages six weeks to six years, including toddler care, preschool, and kindergarten prep. Their proprietary L.E.A.P. (Learning Experience Academic Program) curriculum is designed to promote cognitive, social, and physical development. While The Learning Experience – Westminster has a competitive pricing structure that aims to be accessible to a wide range of families, they also offer premium features such as a mobile app for parents. This center serves a diverse customer base, including families from various socioeconomic backgrounds. Their key strength is the blend of affordability and technology-enhanced services. A potential weakness is the reliance on a franchise model, which may result in variability in service quality across locations.

Competitive Advantages

At TinySteps Playhouse, we pride ourselves on offering superior child care services that set us apart from our competitors. Our commitment to providing a nurturing and educational environment ensures that every child in our care receives the attention and support they need to grow and thrive. We understand the importance of early childhood development, and our programs are designed to stimulate learning and creativity in a safe and welcoming setting. Our approach is not just about watching over children; it’s about engaging them in activities that promote their social, emotional, and intellectual development.

Another significant competitive advantage we have is our team of highly experienced staff. Each member of our team brings a wealth of knowledge and expertise in child care, early childhood education, and child psychology. This experience allows us to create a supportive and enriching environment for the children we serve. Our staff’s dedication to continuous learning and improvement means that we are always at the forefront of best practices in child care. Parents can trust that their children are in capable and caring hands, receiving the best possible care and education. This level of service and expertise distinguishes us in the Denver area, making us a preferred choice for discerning parents.

Our marketing plan, included below, details our products/services, pricing and promotions plan.

Products and Services

TinySteps Playhouse offers a comprehensive suite of services designed to meet the needs of busy families while providing a nurturing and educational environment for children. At the core of its offerings is Childcare, a service that ensures children are cared for in a safe, engaging, and supportive setting. Parents can expect to pay an average of $250 per week for full-time childcare, which includes a range of activities aimed at promoting the physical, emotional, and cognitive development of children.

Understanding the importance of early education, TinySteps Playhouse provides Early Education Programs tailored to different age groups. These programs are designed to lay a strong foundation for lifelong learning by incorporating elements of play, discovery, and structured learning. The cost of these programs is included in the weekly childcare fee, ensuring that every child has access to quality early education without additional financial burden on the families.

Nutrition plays a crucial role in the development and well-being of children, which is why TinySteps Playhouse offers Nutritious Meals and Snacks as part of its services. These meals and snacks are prepared with children’s dietary needs in mind, ensuring they receive balanced and healthy food throughout the day. This service is also included in the weekly fee, providing peace of mind to parents that their children are not only cared for but also receive proper nutrition.

Recognizing the importance of physical activity in children’s growth, TinySteps Playhouse incorporates Outdoor Play and Physical Activities into its daily schedule. This ensures that children have ample opportunity to engage in physical exercise, enjoy fresh air, and develop their motor skills. Like the other services, this is included in the overall childcare fee, offering a comprehensive approach to child development and care.

In summary, TinySteps Playhouse stands out by offering an all-inclusive package that covers childcare, early education, nutritious meals, and physical activities. With a focus on holistic development and a commitment to providing high-quality services, TinySteps Playhouse is positioned as a premier choice for families seeking the best care and education for their children in Denver, CO.

Promotions Plan

TinySteps Playhouse will utilize a comprehensive promotional strategy to attract customers in Denver, CO. At the heart of this strategy lies a robust online marketing campaign. The daycare will leverage social media platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, to connect with potential clients. Through these channels, TinySteps Playhouse will share engaging content, including day-to-day activities, testimonials from satisfied parents, and educational tips for children. This approach not only builds a community around the daycare but also showcases the quality and care provided. Furthermore, the daycare will implement search engine optimization (SEO) techniques to improve its visibility in search engine results. By targeting keywords related to daycare services in Denver, TinySteps Playhouse will attract parents actively searching for childcare options. Additionally, the daycare will use Google Ads to reach a wider audience, ensuring that parents searching for daycare services in the area encounter TinySteps Playhouse at the top of their search results. Email marketing will also play a crucial role in the promotional strategy. TinySteps Playhouse will collect email addresses from interested parents through its website and social media channels. The daycare will then send out regular newsletters featuring updates, events, and special promotions. This direct line of communication will keep TinySteps Playhouse top-of-mind for parents considering daycare options. Beyond online marketing, TinySteps Playhouse will engage in community outreach. The daycare will collaborate with local businesses and schools to sponsor events and offer special promotions. These partnerships will not only increase visibility but also establish TinySteps Playhouse as a trusted community member invested in the well-being of local families. To further attract customers, TinySteps Playhouse will host open houses and free trial days. These events will allow parents and children to experience the daycare firsthand, meet the staff, and see the facilities. Such experiences are invaluable in building trust and demonstrating the high level of care and education that TinySteps Playhouse provides. Word-of-mouth will also be a vital component of the promotional strategy. Satisfied parents are the best advocates for TinySteps Playhouse. The daycare will encourage referrals by offering discounts or special offers to families that bring new clients. This approach not only rewards current customers but also harnesses the power of personal recommendations. In conclusion, TinySteps Playhouse will deploy a multifaceted promotional strategy to attract customers. By combining online marketing, community outreach, and word-of-mouth, the daycare will establish a strong presence in Denver, CO. These efforts will ensure that TinySteps Playhouse becomes a preferred choice for parents seeking quality daycare services.

Our Operations Plan details:

  • The key day-to-day processes that our business performs to serve our customers
  • The key business milestones that our company expects to accomplish as we grow

Key Operational Processes

To ensure the success of TinySteps Playhouse, there are several key day-to-day operational processes that we will perform.

  • Opening Procedures: Staff arrive early to prepare the facility, ensuring that play areas are clean and safe, and that all necessary materials for the day’s activities are ready and accessible.
  • Health and Safety Checks: Conduct daily health checks of all children upon arrival to monitor for any signs of illness, and ensure that all play equipment and toys are sanitized and in good condition.
  • Attendance Tracking: Accurately record the arrival and departure times of children to maintain an up-to-date attendance log for safety and billing purposes.
  • Meal and Snack Preparation: Prepare and serve nutritious meals and snacks at scheduled times throughout the day, adhering to any dietary restrictions or allergies.
  • Educational Program Implementation: Execute planned educational activities and programs that stimulate cognitive, social, and physical development, adjusting as necessary to meet the needs of different age groups and individual children.
  • Continuous Supervision: Maintain constant supervision of children to ensure their safety and well-being, intervening as necessary to guide behavior and facilitate positive interactions among peers.
  • Communication with Parents: Provide regular updates to parents about their child’s day, including any notable achievements, behavior observations, and any incidents or accidents that occurred.
  • Cleaning and Maintenance: Perform regular cleaning of the facility throughout the day, with a deep clean at the end of the day, to maintain a hygienic environment. This includes laundering of any used fabrics and sanitizing toys and equipment.
  • Staff Coordination: Conduct briefings with staff at the start and end of each day to ensure everyone is informed about the day’s schedule, any special needs of children, and to discuss any issues that may have arisen.
  • Financial Management: Process payments from parents, manage billing inquiries, and ensure accurate financial records are kept for accounting purposes.
  • Professional Development: Encourage staff to engage in ongoing professional development and training opportunities to stay current with best practices in early childhood education and care.
  • Emergency Preparedness: Ensure that all staff are trained in emergency procedures and that emergency contacts for each child are readily accessible. Conduct regular drills for different types of emergencies.

TinySteps Playhouse expects to complete the following milestones in the coming months in order to ensure its success:

  • Securing a Suitable Location : Find and lease or purchase a facility in Denver, CO, that is safe, accessible, and compliant with state and local regulations for childcare services. This location should also offer potential for growth and expansion.
  • Obtaining Licenses and Permits : Complete all necessary state and local licensing requirements for operating a daycare. This includes passing health and safety inspections and obtaining a childcare license.
  • Building and Equipping the Facility : Renovate and equip the facility to meet the needs of children of various ages, including purchasing educational toys, furniture, outdoor play equipment, and safety features. Ensure that the environment is inviting, stimulating, and secure for children.
  • Hiring and Training Staff : Recruit, hire, and train qualified childcare providers who are passionate about child development. Staff training should focus on health and safety protocols, educational strategies, and emergency procedures to ensure a high-quality care environment.
  • Developing Curriculum and Activities : Design a comprehensive, age-appropriate curriculum that promotes physical, emotional, social, and cognitive development. Plan a variety of engaging activities and routines that cater to the interests and needs of children.
  • Launching Marketing and Enrollment Campaigns : Implement targeted marketing strategies to attract parents and guardians in Denver, CO. Develop an attractive website, engage in social media marketing, and host open house events to facilitate enrollment.
  • Launching Our Daycare : Officially open TinySteps Playhouse for business, welcoming children and their families. Ensure a smooth operation from the first day, with staff ready to provide high-quality care and education.
  • Monitoring and Improving Quality : Establish mechanisms for regular feedback from parents and staff to continuously monitor and improve the quality of care and education provided. Implement changes as necessary to meet the evolving needs of children and families.
  • Reaching $15,000/Month in Revenue : Through effective marketing, quality service, and word-of-mouth referrals, steadily increase enrollment to reach the milestone of $15,000 in monthly revenue. This financial stability is crucial for covering operating costs and planning for future growth.
  • Evaluating Expansion Opportunities : After establishing a successful operation in Denver, CO, assess the feasibility of expanding TinySteps Playhouse to additional locations or offering new services to meet the needs of the community and drive further growth.

TinySteps Playhouse management team, which includes the following members, has the experience and expertise to successfully execute on our business plan:

Mason Clark, President

Mason Clark, President, brings a wealth of experience and a proven track record of success to TinySteps Playhouse. With a strong background in early childhood education and management, Mason has previously steered a daycare center towards operational excellence and growth. His expertise lies in strategic planning, staff leadership, and implementing innovative programs that enhance the learning and development of young children. Mason’s ability to drive business success, coupled with his passion for creating nurturing and educational environments for children, positions him as a key asset in guiding TinySteps Playhouse towards achieving lasting success.

TinySteps Playhouse requires significant funding to reach our growth goals and fulfill our mission of providing top-tier childcare services in Denver, CO. Our financial plan outlines the need for investment in facility expansion, curriculum development, marketing efforts, and operational enhancements to support our increasing enrollment and ensure the highest level of care. By securing the necessary funding, we will be able to implement our strategic plan, achieve our operational milestones, and continue to serve the families in our community with excellence.

Financial Statements

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Daycare Business Plan Example PDF

Download our Daycare Business Plan PDF here. This is a free daycare business plan example to help you get started on your own daycare plan.  

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City bowling alley plan and Irish Times business awards

The best news, analysis and comment from the irish times business desk.

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Distinguished Leader in Business award winner Siobhán Talbot at The Irish Times Business Awards in the Mansion House, Dublin, on Thursday night. Photograph: Julien Behal

Conn Ó Midheach's face

Property developer Hines has been given permission to build a bowling alley to the rear of the Gaiety Theatre. The development will consist of an eight-lane bowling alley, a bar, and an arcade-style area with other games such as darts, shuffle board, and beer pong, according to planning documents. Barry J Whyte has the details.

Chief executive and founder of Cubic Telecom Barry Napier has been chosen as The Irish Times Business Person of the Year for 2023, an award run in association with Bank of Ireland. Siobhán Talbot , who stepped down last month as group managing director of Glanbia after 10 years at the helm, has been chosen as the recipient of the Distinguished Leader in Business award at the awards, which were held in the Mansion House in Dublin on Thursday night. Also on the night, Wexford-based Greenvalley Farms Ltd, otherwise known as Killowen Farm , won the Local Business category; Technology entrepreneur Terry Clune and his CluneTech group won Deal of the Year and Monaghan-based entrepreneur Sam Moffett (34) has won the Future Leader award.

“Barretstown is a very, very happy place, but behind it there’s a family here who’ve lost a child, and it’s so hard to sort of get your head around that,” says the charity’s chief executive Dee Ahearn in an interview with Dominic Coyle.

The public inquiry into the conduct of former PTSB chief executive David Guinane began this week, but tracker mortgage scandal is far from over, writes Joe Brennan in Agenda . All told, the banks set aside €1.5 billion of provisions in the past seven years to cover refunds, compensation, fines and administrative costs as they dealt with more than 41,000 borrowers so far deemed to have been affected by a sector-wide debacle that stretches back to 2008.

Cancel the proposal: No love for Eiffel Tower operators as strikes shut down symbol of Paris

Cancel the proposal: No love for Eiffel Tower operators as strikes shut down symbol of Paris

Siún Ní Raghallaigh deserved better than this treatment from Catherine Martin

Siún Ní Raghallaigh deserved better than this treatment from Catherine Martin

Former Glanbia chief Siobhán Talbot receives Distinguished Leader in Business award from The Irish Times

Former Glanbia chief Siobhán Talbot receives Distinguished Leader in Business award from The Irish Times

Barretstown chief Dee Ahearn: ‘It needed to be run like a business and it wasn’t run like a business’

Barretstown chief Dee Ahearn: ‘It needed to be run like a business and it wasn’t run like a business’

Germany does have a problem with a rigid constitutional rule that narrowly limits the permissible budget deficit. As we in Ireland know only too well, the Merkel government was bitterly opposed to borrowing, and they enshrined this provision in their constitution, writes John FitzGerald in his weekly column. But the answer to today’s conundrum, when Germany should be spending more to avoid a slump, is to alter their constitutional provision, not to play around with the books.

In the wild West they used to call them guns for hire. In business, they’re called interim managers and their role is to bolster the management capability of an organisation, particularly during periods of change, growth and expansion. Interim management really took off in the 1980s when the economic climate forced widespread corporate restructuring. writes Olive Keigh. A lot has changed in the world of work since then, but variations on the theme of interim help have stuck. With hard-pressed companies now needing to curb expenditure again, interim management is enjoying a renaissance and a rebrand. Exit the interim manager: enter the fractional executive.

Remember the national debt? During the financial crisis Ireland’s high debt levels, combined with a sudden hole in the annual budget, threw the State into crisis, eventually leading to the Troika bailout agreed in late 2010. Now, with the exchequer in surplus, the national debt has been largely forgotten. But at €223 billion, it is still lurking and the annual report on the national debt, published this week, points out that per head of population this is one of the highest national debts internationally. So does this matter, wonders Cliff Taylor .

Stay up to date with all our business news: sign up to our Business Today daily email news digest. If you’d like to read more about the issues that affect your finances try signing up to On the Money , the weekly newsletter from our personal finance team, which will be issued every Friday to Irish Times subscribers.

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Artificial Intelligence Computing Leadership from NVIDIA

Press Release Details

Nvidia announces financial results for fourth quarter and fiscal 2024.

  • Record quarterly revenue of $22.1 billion, up 22% from Q3, up 265% from year ago 
  • Record quarterly Data Center revenue of $18.4 billion, up 27% from Q3, up 409% from year ago
  • Record full-year revenue of $60.9 billion, up 126%

SANTA CLARA, Calif., Feb. 21, 2024 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) today reported revenue for the fourth quarter ended January 28, 2024, of $22.1 billion, up 22% from the previous quarter and up 265% from a year ago.

For the quarter, GAAP earnings per diluted share was $4.93, up 33% from the previous quarter and up 765% from a year ago. Non-GAAP earnings per diluted share was $5.16, up 28% from the previous quarter and up 486% from a year ago.

For fiscal 2024, revenue was up 126% to $60.9 billion. GAAP earnings per diluted share was $11.93, up 586% from a year ago. Non-GAAP earnings per diluted share was $12.96, up 288% from a year ago.

“Accelerated computing and generative AI have hit the tipping point. Demand is surging worldwide across companies, industries and nations,” said Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of NVIDIA.

“Our Data Center platform is powered by increasingly diverse drivers — demand for data processing, training and inference from large cloud-service providers and GPU-specialized ones, as well as from enterprise software and consumer internet companies. Vertical industries — led by auto, financial services and healthcare — are now at a multibillion-dollar level.

“NVIDIA RTX, introduced less than six years ago, is now a massive PC platform for generative AI, enjoyed by 100 million gamers and creators. The year ahead will bring major new product cycles with exceptional innovations to help propel our industry forward. Come join us at next month’s GTC, where we and our rich ecosystem will reveal the exciting future ahead,” he said.

NVIDIA will pay its next quarterly cash dividend of $0.04 per share on March 27, 2024, to all shareholders of record on March 6, 2024.

Q4 Fiscal 2024 Summary

Fiscal 2024 Summary

Outlook NVIDIA’s outlook for the first quarter of fiscal 2025 is as follows:

  • Revenue is expected to be $24.0 billion, plus or minus 2%.
  • GAAP and non-GAAP gross margins are expected to be 76.3% and 77.0%, respectively, plus or minus 50 basis points.
  • GAAP and non-GAAP operating expenses are expected to be approximately $3.5 billion and $2.5 billion, respectively.
  • GAAP and non-GAAP other income and expense are expected to be an income of approximately $250 million, excluding gains and losses from non-affiliated investments.
  • GAAP and non-GAAP tax rates are expected to be 17.0%, plus or minus 1%, excluding any discrete items.

NVIDIA achieved progress since its previous earnings announcement in these areas: 

Data Center

  • Fourth-quarter revenue was a record $18.4 billion, up 27% from the previous quarter and up 409% from a year ago. Full-year revenue rose 217% to a record $47.5 billion.
  • Launched, in collaboration with Google, optimizations across NVIDIA’s data center and PC AI platforms for Gemma , Google’s groundbreaking open language models.
  • Expanded its strategic collaboration with Amazon Web Services to host NVIDIA ® DGX™ Cloud on AWS.
  • Announced that Amgen will use the NVIDIA DGX SuperPOD ™ to power insights into drug discovery, diagnostics and precision medicine.
  • Announced  NVIDIA NeMo™ Retriever , a generative AI microservice that lets enterprises connect custom large language models with enterprise data to deliver highly accurate responses for AI applications. 
  • Introduced NVIDIA MONAI™ cloud APIs to help developers and platform providers integrate AI into their medical-imaging offerings. 
  • Announced that Singtel will bring generative AI services to Singapore through energy-efficient data centers that the telco is building with NVIDIA Hopper™ architecture GPUs.
  • Introduced plans with Cisco to help enterprises quickly and easily deploy and manage secure AI infrastructure.
  • Supported the National Artificial Intelligence Research Resource pilot program , a major step by the U.S. government toward a shared national research infrastructure.
  • Fourth-quarter revenue was $2.9 billion, flat from the previous quarter and up 56% from a year ago. Full-year revenue rose 15% to $10.4 billion.
  • Launched GeForce RTX™ 40 SUPER Series GPUs , starting at $599, which support the latest NVIDIA RTX™ technologies, including DLSS 3.5 Ray Reconstruction and NVIDIA Reflex.
  • Announced generative AI capabilities for its installed base of over 100 million RTX AI PCs, including Tensor-RT™ LLM to accelerate inference on large language models, and Chat with RTX, a tech demo that lets users personalize a chatbot with their own content.
  • Introduced microservices for the NVIDIA Avatar Cloud Engine , allowing game and application developers to integrate state-of-the-art generative AI models into non-playable characters.
  • Reached the milestone of 500 AI-powered RTX games and applications utilizing NVIDIA DLSS, ray tracing and other NVIDIA RTX technologies.

Professional Visualization

  • Fourth-quarter revenue was $463 million, up 11% from the previous quarter and up 105% from a year ago. Full-year revenue rose 1% to $1.6 billion.
  • Announced adoption of NVIDIA Omniverse ™ by the global automotive-configurator ecosystem.
  • Announced the NVIDIA RTX 2000 Ada Generation GPU , bringing the latest AI, graphics and compute technology to compact workstations.
  • Fourth-quarter revenue was $281 million, up 8% from the previous quarter and down 4% from a year ago. Full-year revenue rose 21% to $1.1 billion.
  • Announced further adoption of its NVIDIA DRIVE ® platform , with Great Wall Motors, ZEEKR and Xiaomi using DRIVE Orin™ to power intelligent automated-driving systems and Li Auto selecting DRIVE Thor™ as its centralized car computer.

CFO Commentary Commentary on the quarter by Colette Kress, NVIDIA’s executive vice president and chief financial officer, is available at https://investor.nvidia.com .

Conference Call and Webcast Information NVIDIA will conduct a conference call with analysts and investors to discuss its fourth quarter and fiscal 2024 financial results and current financial prospects today at 2 p.m. Pacific time (5 p.m. Eastern time). A live webcast (listen-only mode) of the conference call will be accessible at NVIDIA’s investor relations website, https://investor.nvidia.com . The webcast will be recorded and available for replay until NVIDIA’s conference call to discuss its financial results for its first quarter of fiscal 2025.

Non-GAAP Measures To supplement NVIDIA’s condensed consolidated financial statements presented in accordance with GAAP, the company uses non-GAAP measures of certain components of financial performance. These non-GAAP measures include non-GAAP gross profit, non-GAAP gross margin, non-GAAP operating expenses, non-GAAP income from operations, non-GAAP other income (expense), net, non-GAAP net income, non-GAAP net income, or earnings, per diluted share, and free cash flow. For NVIDIA’s investors to be better able to compare its current results with those of previous periods, the company has shown a reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP financial measures. These reconciliations adjust the related GAAP financial measures to exclude acquisition termination costs, stock-based compensation expense, acquisition-related and other costs, IP-related costs, other, gains and losses from non-affiliated investments, interest expense related to amortization of debt discount, and the associated tax impact of these items where applicable. Free cash flow is calculated as GAAP net cash provided by operating activities less both purchases related to property and equipment and intangible assets and principal payments on property and equipment and intangible assets. NVIDIA believes the presentation of its non-GAAP financial measures enhances the user’s overall understanding of the company’s historical financial performance. The presentation of the company’s non-GAAP financial measures is not meant to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for the company’s financial results prepared in accordance with GAAP, and the company’s non-GAAP measures may be different from non-GAAP measures used by other companies.

About NVIDIA Since its founding in 1993, NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) has been a pioneer in accelerated computing. The company’s invention of the GPU in 1999 sparked the growth of the PC gaming market, redefined computer graphics, ignited the era of modern AI and is fueling industrial digitalization across markets. NVIDIA is now a full-stack computing infrastructure company with data-center-scale offerings that are reshaping industry. More information at https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/ .

Certain statements in this press release including, but not limited to, statements as to: demand for accelerated computing and generative AI surging worldwide across companies, industries and nations; our Data Center platform being powered by increasingly diverse drivers, including demand for data processing, training and inference from large cloud-service providers and GPU-specialized ones, as well as from enterprise software and consumer internet companies; vertical industries led by auto, financial, services and healthcare now at a multibillion-dollar level; NVIDIA RTX becoming a massive PC platform for generative AI enjoyed by 100 million gamers and creators; the year ahead bringing major new product cycles with exceptional innovations to help propel our industry forward; our upcoming conference at GTC, where we and our rich ecosystem will reveal the exciting future ahead; NVIDIA’s next quarterly cash dividend; NVIDIA’s financial outlook and expected tax rates for the first quarter of fiscal 2025; the benefits, impact, performance, features and availability of NVIDIA’s products and technologies, including NVIDIA AI platforms, NVIDIA DGX Cloud, NVIDIA DGX SuperPOD, NVIDIA NeMo Retriever, NVIDIA MONAI cloud APIs, NVIDIA Hopper architecture GPUs, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 40 SUPER Series GPUs, NVIDIA DLSS 3.5 Ray Reconstruction, NVIDIA Reflex, NVIDIA TensorRT-LLM, Chat with RTX, microservices for the NVIDIA Avatar Cloud Engine, NVIDIA DLSS, ray tracing and other NVIDIA RTX technologies, NVIDIA Omniverse, NVIDIA RTX 2000 Ada Generation GPU, NVIDIA DRIVE platform, NVIDIA DRIVE Orin and NVIDIA DRIVE Thor; and our collaborations with third parties are forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause results to be materially different than expectations. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially include: global economic conditions; our reliance on third parties to manufacture, assemble, package and test our products; the impact of technological development and competition; development of new products and technologies or enhancements to our existing product and technologies; market acceptance of our products or our partners’ products; design, manufacturing or software defects; changes in consumer preferences or demands; changes in industry standards and interfaces; and unexpected loss of performance of our products or technologies when integrated into systems, as well as other factors detailed from time to time in the most recent reports NVIDIA files with the Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, including, but not limited to, its annual report on Form 10-K and quarterly reports on Form 10-Q. Copies of reports filed with the SEC are posted on the company’s website and are available from NVIDIA without charge. These forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and speak only as of the date hereof, and, except as required by law, NVIDIA disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements to reflect future events or circumstances.

© 2024 NVIDIA Corporation. All rights reserved. NVIDIA, the NVIDIA logo, GeForce, GeForce RTX, NVIDIA DGX, NVIDIA DGX SuperPOD, NVIDIA DRIVE, NVIDIA DRIVE Orin, NVIDIA DRIVE Thor, NVIDIA Hopper, NVIDIA MONAI, NVIDIA NeMo, NVIDIA Omniverse, NVIDIA RTX and TensorRT are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of NVIDIA Corporation in the U.S. and/or other countries. Other company and product names may be trademarks of the respective companies with which they are associated. Features, pricing, availability and specifications are subject to change without notice.

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/38343cb8-8bc8-42b0-aa76-e3d280ae5507

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The Trump fraud trial verdict goes well beyond ordering the ex-president to pay $355 million. Here's what the ruling means.

  • Trump, his eldest sons, and the Trump Organization must repay $364 million from a decade of fraud.
  • Friday's verdict also bars Trump from running a New York business for three years.
  • Judge Arthur Engoron wrote that Trump's frauds "leap off the page and shock the conscience."

Insider Today

In a scathing verdict that punishes a decade of deceit, the judge in Donald Trump's New York civil-fraud case on Friday slammed the GOP frontrunner, his two eldest sons, and his company with a nearly $364 million cash penalty.

"The frauds found here leap off the page and shock the conscience," the verdict by the New York Supreme Court Judge Arthur Engoron , who has presided over the case for more than three years, said.

While Trump is personally on the hook for almost $355 million of that penalty, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump must pay $4 million each, and the former Trump CFO Allen Weisselberg must pay $1 million.

But the verdict hits way beyond just Trump's wallet. It targets his real-estate and golf-resort empire, the Trump Organization, in two ways that Trump has pushed against for years.

First, the verdict wrests control of the company further from the former president and his two eldest sons, leaving major company decisions to a yet-named "independent director of compliance" who'll operate under Trump's court-appointed monitor's continuing watch .

Second, it sets a three-year ban on Trump running the Trump Organization or any other business in the city and state where he made his name — and where he first seized a national spotlight as a brash real-estate mogul. For Trump, it's the commercial equivalent of being run out of town on a rail.

Significantly — and this is a big silver lining for Trump — the verdict reverses the most unfriendly elements of the judge's pre-trial " corporate death penalty " judgment from September.

He no longer has to surrender all of the Trump Organization's New York operating licenses, and the verdict does not mention the forced sale of any Trump properties.

The verdict caps a five-year effort by the office of New York State Attorney General Letitia James .

On Friday afternoon, James issued a statement celebrating the verdict.

She said that Trump has engaged in fraud for years to enrich his own family and company.

Now, he and his codefendants will have to pay more than $450 million, including interest.

"While he may have authored the 'Art of the Deal,' our case revealed that his business was based on the art of the steal," she said.

Trump is expected to immediately appeal, likely putting these and other punishments from the 92-page verdict on ice well past the November election.

But in the coming weeks, Trump will still have to spend millions on a surety bond — a bond guaranteeing performance of a contract or obligation — to guarantee he can pay whatever dollar figure, plus interest, an appellate court ultimately upholds.

Interest also applies to the penalties, potentially adding millions more to his ultimate verdict price tag.

"When confronted at trial with the statements, defendants' fact and expert witnesses simply denied reality, and defendants failed to accept responsibility or to impose internal controls to prevent future recurrences," Engoron wrote Friday.

The verdict holds Trump civilly liable, based on Engoron's three-month Manhattan bench trial, for leading a conspiracy to commit business and insurance fraud with help from his two eldest sons and a pair of long-standing Trump Organization executives.

"Their complete lack of contrition and remorse borders on pathological," Engoron wrote.

"They are accused only of inflating asset values to make more money," the verdict said.

"The documents prove this over and over again. This is a venial sin, not a mortal sin," he added. "Defendants did not commit murder or arson. They did not rob a bank at gunpoint. Donald Trump is not Bernard Madoff. Yet, defendants are incapable of admitting the error of their ways."

In a statement, a Trump Organization spokesperson decried the verdict as a "gross miscarriage of justice."

"Every member of the New York business community, no matter the industry, should be gravely concerned with this gross overreach and brazen attempt by the Attorney General to exert limitless power where no private or public harm has been established," the spokesperson said in the statement. "If allowed to stand, this ruling will only further expedite the continuing exodus of companies from New York."

Read Friday's verdict here .

"Today, justice has been served. This is a tremendous victory for this state, this nation, and for everyone who believes that we all must play by the same rules — even former presidents," James said in her statement Friday. 

" When powerful people cheat to get better loans, it comes at the expense of honest and hardworking people," James continued. "Everyday Americans cannot lie to a bank to get a mortgage to buy a home, and if they did, our government would throw the book at them. There simply cannot be different rules for different people .

Some lesser penalties

The verdict also bans Trump and the Trump Organization from borrowing from New York banks or purchasing real estate in the state for three years. James had asked for a five-year ban on such buying and borrowing in her lawsuit.

Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump are banned from running a New York business for two years. James had asked for five-year bans for the brothers.

And it bans the two former executives, the ex-CFO Weisselberg and the former Trump Organization controller Jeff McConney, from controlling another New York company's finances.

business analysis business plan

Watch: Trump fights back as fraud trial begins

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  1. Business Analysis Plan Template

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  2. How to Create a Business Plan (7+ Business Plan Templates)

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  3. Writing your Business Plan: How To Analyse Your Business

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  4. What is Business Analysis? Process & Techniques

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  1. Introduction to Business Analysis

  2. Type of business plan discussion🔥| How to Start New business in 2024@RupaOdiaKahani

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COMMENTS

  1. A Checklist for Business Analysis Planning

    Use the Universal Business Analysis Planning Checklist as You Plan Your Business Analysis Approach. Every project is a unique, temporary endeavor. The business process management, regulatory compliance and digital transformation projects that business analysts may play a role in all come with different goals, scopes, teams, timelines, budgets dependencies and risks. Though many projects follow

  2. Write your business plan

    Executive summary. Briefly tell your reader what your company is and why it will be successful. Include your mission statement, your product or service, and basic information about your company's leadership team, employees, and location. You should also include financial information and high-level growth plans if you plan to ask for financing.

  3. How to Write a Market Analysis for a Business Plan

    Step 4: Calculate market value. You can use either top-down analysis or bottom-up analysis to calculate an estimate of your market value. A top-down analysis tends to be the easier option of the ...

  4. How To Write A Business Plan (2024 Guide)

    Describe Your Services or Products. The business plan should have a section that explains the services or products that you're offering. This is the part where you can also describe how they fit ...

  5. How to Write a Business Plan: Guide + Examples

    Download a free one-page plan template to write a useful business plan in as little as 30-minutes. Explore over 500 real-world business plan examples from a wide variety of industries. Try the business planning and growth tool trusted by over 1-million business owners.

  6. How to Create and Sustain a Business Analysis Plan

    1 Know your stakeholders. The first step to creating a business analysis plan is to identify and understand your stakeholders. These are the people who have an interest or influence in the project ...

  7. How To Do a Business Plan Analysis

    Here are some tips on how to perform an accurate business plan analysis: 1. Look for a good business plan structure. The first thing to look for in a good business plan is the structure of the business plan. As an investor or owner, you'll want the business plan to include the following: Executive summary.

  8. How to do a market analysis for your business plan

    The industry analysis is the section of your business plan where you demonstrate your knowledge about the general characteristics of the type of business you're in. You should be able to present statistics about the size of the industry, such as total U.S. sales in the last year and industry growth rate over the last few years.

  9. Business Plan

    A business plan should be structured in a way that it contains all the important information that investors are looking for. Here are the main sections of a business plan: 1. Title Page. The title page captures the legal information of the business, which includes the registered business name, physical address, phone number, email address, date ...

  10. Business Plan: What it Is, How to Write One

    Learn about the best business plan software. 1. Write an executive summary. This is your elevator pitch. It should include a mission statement, a brief description of the products or services your ...

  11. Introduction & Guidance To Business Analysis Planning and Monitoring

    The plan business analysis approach task defines and creates methods that will be used while performing business analysis activities. The outputs produced here are a groundwork for the tasks form all of the other knowledge areas. It determines the timeline of the projects, what and when will be performed, and which deliverables are expected. ...

  12. Business Analysis: How To Analyze Any Business

    Business Analysis Framework Overview: The framework aims to analyze businesses for growth opportunities and strategic insights. It involves three main competitive advantages: Core moat, Market moat, and Financial moat. Core Moat: Identifying the key asset that gives the company a competitive advantage.

  13. Business Analysis: Definition, Process, Techniques and Tips

    Business analysis is the process of examining and evaluating business demands and identifying solutions to potential challenges. Essentially, companies use this process to help them better understand how to meet their short-term and long-term business goals. This may include connecting company operations to measurable results that demonstrate ...

  14. PDF Business Analysis Planning Guide

    This guide provides analysts with instructions and considerations for planning the business analysis approach of a singular solution. The business analysis approach should include information about how and when tasks will be performed, the techniques that will be used, and the deliverables that should be produced.

  15. Business Plan: What It Is + How to Write One

    A business plan is a written document that defines your business goals and the tactics to achieve those goals. A business plan typically explores the competitive landscape of an industry, analyzes a market and different customer segments within it, describes the products and services, lists business strategies for success, and outlines ...

  16. An Introduction to Business Analysis and the Business Analyst Process

    Step 4 - Formulate Your Business Analysis Plan. Your business analysis plan will bring clarity to the business analysis process that will be used to successfully define the detailed requirements for this project. Your business analysis plan is going to answer many questions for you and your project team. Your key responsibilities in this step ...

  17. How to Compile Your Business Analysis Work Plan

    Here are steps to take to compile your plan: Create the task list. You can organize the task list by techniques, deliverables, stakeholder groups, or time sequence based on how you compiled tasks as you thought through the people, project characteristics, and process. Credit: Illustration by Wiley, Composition Services Graphics.

  18. How to Write a Business Analysis Report [Examples and Templates]

    A business analysis report examines the structure of a company, including its management, staff, departments, divisions, and supply chain. It also evaluates how well-managed the company is and how efficient its supply chain is. In order to develop a strong strategy, you need to be able to analyze your business structure.

  19. How to Plan and Scope Your Business Analysis Deliverables

    1 Understand the business problem and context. Before you start planning and scoping your business analysis deliverables, you need to understand the business problem and context that you are ...

  20. Strategic Business Analysis Plan Template

    This strategic business analysis plan template is designed to help business analysts and teams outline a plan for conducting in-depth business analysis, gathering insights, and making informed strategic decisions. It can be used to ensure that all key stakeholders are on the same page and that all data-driven decisions are backed by data-driven ...

  21. What is Business Analysis and 8 Steps You Should Follow

    4. Create your business analysis plan. The business analysis plan will provide clarity to the process of business analysis. The plan will answer several questions. The vital responsibilities involved with creating a business analysis plan are: Choosing the most appropriate types of business analysis deliverables. Defining the specific list of ...

  22. 3.1 Plan Business Analysis Approach

    Introduction 10.1 Acceptance and Evaluation Criteria 10.2 Backlog Management 10.3 Balanced Scorecard 10.4 Benchmarking and Market Analysis 10.5 Brainstorming 10.6 Business Capability Analysis 10.7 Business Cases 10.8 Business Model Canvas 10.9 Business Rules Analysis 10.10 Collaborative Games 10.11 Concept Modelling 10.12 Data Dictionary 10.13 ...

  23. How to do a Business Analysis Approach and Plan?

    STEP #2: Take stock of the Project dimensions. Now that you know what the expected Business Analysis outcome is, you are ready to start delving into the different options for how you can approach the task to deliver that outcome. You now have to get an understanding of the project landscape.

  24. What does a business analyst do?

    In its 2023 Global State of Business Analysis Report, over 1 in 4 business analysis professionals reported having a title that does not fit into one of those five buckets.

  25. Sample Daycare Business Plan

    A well-written business plan can give you clarity on realistic financial projections and help you secure financing from lenders or investors. A daycare business plan example can be a great resource to draw upon when creating your own plan, making sure that all the key components are included in your document. The daycare business plan sample ...

  26. City bowling alley plan and Irish Times business awards

    The best news, analysis and comment from The Irish Times business desk Expand Distinguished Leader in Business award winner Siobhán Talbot at The Irish Times Business Awards in the Mansion House ...

  27. NVIDIA Announces Financial Results for Fourth Quarter and Fiscal 2024

    Record quarterly revenue of $22.1 billion, up 22% from Q3, up 265% from year ago Record quarterly Data Center revenue of $18.4 billion, up 27% from Q3, up 409% from year ago Record full-year revenue of $60.9 billion, up 126% SANTA CLARA, Calif., Feb. 21, 2024 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) - NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) today reported revenue for the fourth quarter ended January 28, 2024, of $22.1 billion, up 22% ...

  28. Some lesser penalties

    In a scathing verdict that punishes a decade of deceit, the judge in Donald Trump's New York civil-fraud case on Friday slammed the GOP frontrunner, his two eldest sons, and his company with a ...