business plan online creator

Create Your Business Plan in Minutes

Type your business idea below.

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How it Works

Questionnaire

Respond to a series of targeted questions about your business goals and objectives.

AI Business Plan Generator

The engine analyzes your responses and generates a business plan tailored to your vision.

SBA Approved Business Plan

Receive a detailed, tailored business plan that aligns with your requirements. Ready for funding.

WHO BENEFITS FROM Plannit?

Aspiring Entrepreneurs

Analyze your ventures through extensive business plans aligned with your vision and goals.

Business Owners

Back your business with a solid plan that aligns with your vision and goals. Perfect for startups and small businesses.

Educational Institutions

Develop your business understanding and vocabulary by analyzing your business idea and creating a plan.

Startups Accelerators

Work alongside your founders as they build their plan to ensure they have a solid roadmap for growth and scalability.

Try Plannit AI For Free

Funding ready business plan, executive summary, company overview.

Problem Statement

Business Description

Mission Statement

Business Model

Products and Services

Additional Features

Revenue Model

Market Analysis

Target Market

Market Size and Segments

Unique Value Proposition

Risks and Mitigations

Identified Risks

Mitigation Strategies

Financial Overview

Income Statement

Marketing and Sales Plan

Focus On Your Vision

Language support.

Key Features & Benefits

Ai editing companion.

Modify and regenerate sections of your business plan using premade or custom prompts. Our AI will help you refine your plan to perfection.

Multi-User Collaboration

Invite team members with easy sharing to collaborate on your business plan in real-time. Communicate and make changes together. Collaborate with your partners in real-time as you perfect your plan.

Education Center

Immerse yourself in a rich library of articles, tools, templates, webinars and resources for continuous business and professional growth. Learn all about the key aspects of starting, running and growing a business.

Powered by Chat GPT

Our algorithms are powered the latest in AI technology to ensure the most accurate and relevant output. We use OpenAI's GPT 4 and 3.5 engines for the perfect blend of accuracy and speed.

Business Resources

We recommend a variety of useful tools and resurces that help sustain your growth. We only recommend the best in the business. Filter your needs and equip yourself with the best tools.

Your plan in your language. We offer a choice of over 150 worldwide languages to ensure the best fit for your business plan.

Financial Projections

Take an additional questionnaire about your financial trajectory and get a detailed financial projection + 3 year income statement for your business.

Tools and Templates

Plannit's comprehensive suite that accompany business planning. From pitch decks to financial models, we have you covered.

Plan Export

Download your business plan in an editable .docx format. Fully edit & share your plan with investors, partners, and stakeholders.

Privacy & Security

Rest assured, your privacy is our top priority, and we're committed to keeping your information safe and confidential.

PLANNIT BUSINESS ECOSYSTEM

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

• Initiate with Your Business Concept: Lay the Groundwork: Start by introducing your business idea into Plannit AI's Business Plan Generator. This first step is crucial, as it sets the tone for a tailored, insightful business plan that truly resonates with your vision. Capture the Essence: Our platform is designed to grasp the nuances of your concept, ensuring that the generated plan accurately reflects the core and potential of your business.
• Navigate Through the AI-Guided Questionnaire: Tailored Interactive Experience: Plannit AI’s AI-guided questionnaire is your interactive guide through the planning process. It meticulously gathers information about your business's objectives, strategies, and market positioning, ensuring a comprehensive and reflective plan. Intelligent Feedback and Suggestions: As you progress through the questionnaire, benefit from smart prompts and suggestions, ensuring that your plan is not just detailed but also strategically sound and aligned with industry standards.
• Generate Your Plan with Advanced AI: Intuitive Plan Creation: With the questionnaire complete, Plannit AI's advanced algorithms intelligently analyze your responses. They then craft a detailed, customizable, and strategically aligned business plan, providing you with a structured, coherent, and actionable format. Benefit from AI-Powered Insights: Plannit AI offers AI-driven insights and suggestions, ensuring your plan is not just a document but a strategic tool equipped with tailored AI prompts and an in-app plan editor. Get inspired by browsing through our sample business plans, a collection of successful strategies across various industries.
• Finalize Your Plan with Confidence: Dynamic Adaptation and Refinement: Plannit AI recognizes that a business plan is a living document. Our platform allows for continuous adaptation and refinement, ensuring your strategy remains agile, relevant, and aligned with your evolving business goals. Professional Presentation and Sharing: Once your plan meets your standards, utilize Plannit AI's export features to present your plan professionally. Choose between various formats for exporting your business plan, ready to impress stakeholders, attract investors, or guide your team. Review and Adapt: Ensure your business plan is a living document, ready to evolve with your growing business. Plannit AI's dynamic platform allows you to adapt your strategy as new opportunities or challenges arise.
• Roadmap for Success: At its core, a business plan acts as a strategic guide, providing detailed steps on how your business will achieve its objectives. It helps you navigate the startup phase, manage growth effectively, and tackle unforeseen challenges with a well-thought-out strategy.
• Securing Funding: For startups and businesses looking to expand, a business plan is crucial for securing loans or attracting investors. It demonstrates to potential financial backers that your business has a clear vision, a solid strategy for profitability, and a plan for delivering returns on their investment.
• Informed Decision-Making: A well-prepared business plan offers valuable insights into your market, competition, and potential challenges. This information is vital for making informed decisions, from day-to-day operations to long-term strategic shifts.
• Market Analysis and Strategy: It allows you to conduct an in-depth analysis of your target market, understand customer needs, and position your product or service effectively. The marketing strategy outlined in your business plan helps in identifying the best channels and tactics to reach your audience and achieve market penetration.
• Financial Planning: One of the most critical components of a business plan is the financial forecast. It outlines your funding requirements, expected revenue, profit margins, and cash flow projections. This section is essential for budgeting, financial management, and ensuring the financial viability of your business.
• Goal Setting and Performance Measurement: A business plan sets clear, measurable goals and objectives. It provides a framework for monitoring performance, measuring success, and making necessary adjustments to stay on track.
• Aspiring Entrepreneurs: If you're at the idea stage, looking to transform your vision into a viable business, Plannit AI offers the tools and guidance to bring your concept to life. Our platform helps you articulate your business idea, define your target market, and develop a solid plan to turn your dream into reality.
• Students and Educators: For students delving into the intricacies of business planning and educators teaching the fundamentals of entrepreneurship, Plannit AI serves as an invaluable resource. It provides a practical, hands-on tool for learning and teaching how to create detailed business plans, analyze markets, and understand financials in a real-world context.
• Startup Founders: In the dynamic startup environment, Plannit AI is the ideal partner for founders looking to pivot quickly, secure funding, or understand their competitive landscape. With our AI-driven insights and market analysis tools, startups can make informed decisions and adapt their strategies to thrive in competitive markets.
• Small Business Owners: For small business owners seeking to optimize their operations, expand their customer base, or explore new markets, Plannit AI offers targeted solutions. Our platform simplifies the planning process, enabling owners to focus on growth while managing the day-to-day challenges of running their business.
• Consultants and Freelancers: Consultants and freelancers specializing in business development, strategic planning, or financial advising will find Plannit AI a powerful addition to their toolkit. It allows them to provide clients with comprehensive, data-driven business plans and strategies, enhancing the value of their services.
• Non-Profit Organizations: Leaders of non-profit organizations can leverage Plannit AI to plan initiatives, secure funding, and manage resources more efficiently. Our platform helps non-profits articulate their mission, set achievable goals, and measure their impact, ensuring they can make a difference in their communities.
• Innovators and Inventors: Individuals looking to commercialize innovative products or technologies can use Plannit AI to navigate the complexities of bringing new ideas to market. From patent strategies to go-to-market plans, our platform covers all bases, ensuring innovators can focus on what they do best.
• Small Business Development Centers (SBDCs) and Government Agencies: Government and SBA backed entities can greatly benefit from integrating Plannit AI into their services, enhancing their ability to support a larger number of clients more efficiently. By facilitating quicker, more in-depth business plan development, these organizations can spend more time assisting with plan execution and less time on creation, ultimately serving their communities more effectively.
• Anyone with a Business Idea: Ultimately, Plannit AI is for anyone with a business idea, regardless of industry, experience, or stage of business development. Our mission is to democratize business planning, making it accessible, understandable, and actionable for everyone.
• Interactive Questionnaire and ChatGPT Integration: Plannit AI transforms the business planning process into an engaging conversation. Through our advanced ChatGPT integration, we offer a questionnaire that dynamically adapts to your responses, ensuring your plan is personalized, comprehensive, and aligned with your business goals.
• Dynamic Planning Environment: Unlike static templates provided by many, Plannit AI introduces a living platform that grows with your business. It features real-time updates, strategic insights, and a feedback mechanism that keeps your business plan current and actionable.
• Extensive Educational Resources: Our Education Center is packed with articles, guides, and sample plans to bolster your planning process. It's designed to arm you with the knowledge to navigate the complexities of your industry confidently.
• Enhanced Collaboration and Customization: Recognizing the collaborative essence of business planning, Plannit AI supports team efforts with multi-user editing, annotations, and feedback features, ensuring a comprehensive approach to your strategy.
• Customer Success Stories: Our users' achievements are a testament to Plannit AI's effectiveness. These success stories illustrate how diverse businesses have utilized our platform for strategic planning and growth.
• Tailored Business Plan Creation: Our platform stands out with its tailored approach, featuring customizable templates that directly cater to your business type and industry, making plan creation straightforward and relevant.
• Content Generation:: ChatGPT helps draft various sections of a business plan, from executive summaries to marketing strategies, by providing structured and coherent text based on the prompts given.
• Strategic Insights: It can offer suggestions on business strategies by analyzing trends and providing examples from a wide range of industries.
• Financial Planning: While it can't replace professional financial advice, ChatGPT can guide the structure of financial projections and statements, helping you consider important financial aspects of your plan.

Take The First Step Towards Success

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Free Online Business Plan Maker

Create a compelling and convincing business plan online with Venngage. Templates available for your every need, whether it's business plans, financial plans, marketing plans, and more.

Not a designer? No problem. With our easy-to-edit templates and online business plan generator, anyone can create a professional business plan for free. Over 40,000 businesses already use and trust Venngage.

Design from one of our business plan templates

Choose from hundreds of business plan templates. see all business plan templates, launch a profitable business with a visually engaging business plan.

Your business is unique and impactful — so should your business plan. Make sure the plan you share with investors, lenders, and other stakeholders is not only packed with key data and information but visually engaging too.

Looking to make your business plan stand out from the pack? Venngage's unique business plan templates add serious style to your ideas. Venngage's Business Plan Builder is a fraction of the cost of hiring a writer — you can even try creating a business plan for free.

Whether you're looking for a traditional business plan format or something more creative, Venngage's easy-to-edit business plan templates let anyone design business plans. No experience required. Free business plan templates available.

Nothing's better to convince your stakeholders than some sweet data that speaks volume. Engage and persuade your investors by visualizing your business plan data with Venngage's unique charts, graphs and diagrams.

Create a winning business plan with Venngage in 5 steps:

Design an unforgettable and convincing business plan today:

Business Plan Templates

Save money and hours of design time with Venngage's easy-to-edit templates and free business plan generator. Free online business plan templates available.

Easy-to-Use Editor

Venngage's online business plan builder is intuitive to use. The drag-and-drop editor means faster and better designs even when you don't have design experience.

Download Business Plans

Download your document with one click as an image (PNG), PDF, Interactive PDF or PowerPoint file. Add it to your Google Docs or Slides, Word doc or existing PowerPoint slides (paid plans only).

Visualize Business Plan Data

Persuade your stakeholders and tell a story with your business plan data through charts, graphs, maps and diagrams. Copy and paste your data or upload it in a .csv file in one click.

Brand Your Business Plans

Use Venngage's My Brand Kit to automatically import your brand identity. Then, add your brand colors and fonts to any business plan designs with one click.

Collaborate In Real Time

Collaborate with your whole team with Venngage's real-time collaboration. Leave helpful feedback through comments and create impactful business plans.

Easy-to-edit professional business plan templates

• Our team of professional designers have created a collection of unique, online business plan templates that anyone can customize. Pick a simple template, add your text and data and you're done.
• Or choose a more creative template and play around with the fonts, photos, icons, colors, and more.
• Whatever the case, Venngage's drag-and-drop free business plan generator lets anyone create a beautiful, professional business plan without any design experience.
• Share a public link for free from our online business plan creator. Don't worry. You can go back and edit your design at any time.

One-click branding with My Brand Kit

Show off important metrics with professional data visualizations

Collaborate with your whole team throughout the design process.

Business Plan Maker FAQs

How much does venngage's business plan builder cost.

Anyone can make a business plan for free and share a link to their work. Our Premium ($19/month) and Business ($49/month) plans include premium, professional business plan templates and features, plus access to multiple download formats.

How can I write my own business plan?

Your business plan can include these sections: executive summary, company description, market analysis, organization management, service/product line, marketing & sales, funding requests, financial projections, etc. Add sections to your business plan as you see fit — depending on the kind of plan you're creating. No matter the type of business plans you're making, Venngage has a template for that.

Can I download my business plan?

Yes! You can download your business plan in PNG, PDF, Interactive PDF, or PowerPoint formats (paid plans only). It's free to share a public link. It's also free to create an account and test out our online business plan maker with a free business plan template.

Wow your clients and investors at first sight — Create a convincing and winning business plan with Venngage's online business plan generator

Popular business plan templates you can edit right away

Nonprofit organization business plan template, business operational plan template, real estate investment business plan template, business continuity and disaster recovery plan template.

Finish YOUR Business Plan in Minutes with PlanBuildr!

Takes Less Than 10 Minutes to Complete!

Created by the World's Leading Business Plan Expert!

Will Improve Your Business Strategy and Allow You to Raise Funding!

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Free Business Plan Generator

Do you still spend hours writing and creating a business plan? Not after today. Upmetrics’ free business plan generator simplifies writing a business plan and helps you create a comprehensive and compelling lean plan in seconds.

Sounds exciting? Let’s learn more about getting started with our free business plan generator and using it to draft your plan.

Using Upmetrics’ Free Business Plan Generator

Need help using the free business plan generator? Follow these step-by-step instructions to create a business plan using the free generator in no time.

Creating a business plan requires filling in 4 critical fields—company overview, marketing details, competitor information, and financial overview. Let’s start with the first.

1. Enter the Company Overview

Provide a company overview in approximately 3-4 sentences, including your business’s name, service offerings, USPs, mission, goals, and target market. Here’s an example for you:

2. Add Marketing Details

The next step—provide marketing details. Start by answering how your business plans to attract new customers and what you want to achieve with your business.

You may also include details about your marketing budget and preferred marketing channels. Here’s an example for your reference:

“i.e. We will attract customers through a strong online presence, social media marketing, and in-store promotions. Offering loyalty programs and hosting community biking events will help build a loyal customer base.”

3. Enter Competitor Information

After adding the marketing details, provide the name of your primary competitor(s) and explain how you are distinct from your competitors.

Describe whether your offerings have any competitive advantages or differentiators. Here’s how it can be done:

“i.e. Our primary competitor is ‘Wheels & Gears,’ but what sets us apart is our personalized customer service and expert bike repair services. We also differentiate ourselves by focusing on eco-friendly and sustainable products.”

4. Provide Financial Overview

Finally,—provide an overview of your business financials. Include what your startup costs are, what your financial strategy would be, and your first-year sales.

We are creating a lean business plan, so it may not require a detailed description of your business financials. Here’s an example for your understanding:

“i.e. Our expected business costs are $87,000 and that includes rent, inventory, equipment, and staff salaries. Our financial strategy is to minimize overhead costs and optimize inventory turnover. We project annual sales to reach $500,000 in the first year.”

5. Click on Generate a Business Plan

You’ve filled in all the necessary fields. It’s time to click “Generate a Business Plan” and see it yourself.

Your lean business plan is ready; you may make a few changes and go ahead with it or choose an AI business plan generator for comprehensive planning.

Make detailed business & financial plans in minutes with

Upmetrics’ AI Business Plan Generator

Plans starting from $7/month

Business Plan Example that will Inspire You

We created this sample CycleWave business plan using Upmetrics’ free generator. Remember, it’s your first draft—you can always go back and re-generate or edit it later.

CycleWave Business Plan

Introduction

Welcome to the business plan for CycleWave, a bicycle retail and repair shop dedicated to providing high-quality bikes and expert maintenance services. Our mission is to promote a healthier and more sustainable lifestyle through cycling while offering exceptional customer service.

Market Overview

The cycling industry is experiencing significant growth, driven by increasing interest in health, sustainability, and alternative transportation methods.

The target market includes cycling enthusiasts, commuters, and local community members.

Strong market potential due to growing awareness of the need for eco-friendly and sustainable products.

Competitive Analysis

Primary competitor: Wheels & Gears.

Differentiation factors

• Personalized customer service
• Expertise in bike repair services
• Focus on eco-friendly and sustainable products.

Highlight the advantages of our unique offerings to attract customers away from competitors.

Marketing Plan

Utilize a solid online presence through a professional website to showcase our products, services, and promotions. Implement social media marketing strategies to engage with customers and build brand awareness.

Host community biking events to foster a sense of belonging and attract potential customers. Offer loyalty programs to incentivize repeat business and build a loyal customer base.

Operational Plan

Secure a suitable retail location with ample space for displaying bicycles and providing repair services. Employ knowledgeable staff with expertise in bike repair and customer service.

Create efficient processes for inventory management and maintenance repairs to ensure fast turnaround times. Maintain an attractive and organized store layout to enhance the customer experience.

Financial Plan

Our expected business costs are $87,000, allocated as follows:

• Rent: $30,000
• Inventory: $40,000
• Equipment: $10,000
• Staff Salaries: $7,000

We project annual sales to reach $500,000 in the first year, allowing us to gradually cover expenses and increase profitability.

Conclusion and Call to Action

In conclusion, CycleWave aims to thrive in the bicycle retail and repair industry by offering high-quality bikes, expert maintenance services, personalized customer care, and eco-friendly products. Join us in promoting a healthier and more sustainable lifestyle through cycling.

If you want to support our mission and become part of our cycling community, please contact us or visit our store today!

Upgrade to Make Comprehensive Plans in Minutes

Upmetrics’ free business plan generator is undoubtedly a better way to business plan. However, you may need an upgrade to create a comprehensive, investment-ready plan.

AI business plan generator like Upmetrics make business plan creation a breeze with their modern AI-powered features.

AI writing assistant helps you write, rewrite, edit, or translate sections of your plan, while the forecasting assistant provides revenue and expense stream suggestions for accurate projections.

You also get to access the massive library of 400+ sample business plans . So, all you need to do is export a template into the editor and start preparing your plan with AI .

What are you waiting for? Business planning starts @ $7 per month.

Build your Business Plan Faster

with step-by-step Guidance & AI Assistance.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a free business plan generator.

The free business plan generator is a free-to-use version of Upmetrics’ business plan software. It uses AI-powered features to help users create a business plan. Since it can only create a lean business plan, you need Upmetrics’ advanced features for detailed planning.

Is it really free to use?

Yes, Upmetrics’ free business plan generator is 100% free to use, but the features that come with it are also limited. So, you may consider getting a premium subscription for advanced business planning features.

What information will I need to provide to use the tool?

You must fill in the necessary details to create a business plan using the free generator. The information required may include a company overview, marketing details, competitor information, and a financial overview.

What type of businesses should use your free business plan tool?

Startups and small businesses starting up or operating on tight budgets should consider getting a free business planning tool to create a lean business plan.

Is there a limit to how many plans I can create with your software?

No. As of now, there’s no limit to the number of business plans you can create using Upmetrics’ free business plan generator.

Is a sample plan as useful as creating my own custom version?

Using a sample business plan or template is one of the easiest ways to create your business plan. All you need to do is export a template into the editor and start preparing your plan with AI.

The Quickest Way to turn a Business Idea into a Business Plan

Fill-in-the-blanks and automatic financials make it easy.

Business Plan Template

Collaborate with your team, craft your business plan, and present your ideas visually with the Business Plan Template.

Trusted by 65M+ users and leading companies

About the Business Plan Template

A solid business plan is the key to the success of any project. That's why we have designed a comprehensive business plan template that makes organizing and outlining your business objectives a breeze. This template will help you streamline your process and visualize your goals, creating a roadmap for your business journey.

What's a business plan template?

A business plan template is a pre-structured framework that outlines the core aspects of a business plan. It helps organize and detail key components, providing a clear picture of what the business aims to achieve. Miro's business plan template includes:

Problem: Identify the core problem that the business plans to solve.

Solution: Outline the solution to address the problem.

Resources: Detail the resources required, including time, workforce, and materials.

Benefit: Define the benefits of implementing the proposed solution.

Risks: Analyze potential risks and how they will be mitigated.

Scope: Describe the extent and limitations of the project.

Stakeholders: List the parties involved and their interests.

Costs: Estimate the financial aspects of the project.

Metrics: Identify the key performance indicators to measure success.

How to use the business plan template in Miro

Using Miro's business plan template is an effortless and effective way to craft your business strategy. Here's a step-by-step guide to making the most of this template:

Choose the template: Select the business plan template from Miro's Template Library, tailored to fit any business type.

Define the problem: Identify the core problem your business intends to solve. Use Miro's tagging feature to add relevant tags for easy reference.

Outline the solution: Describe how your product or service addresses the problem. Use Miro's automated diagramming to create flow diagrams or charts illustrating the solution process.

List the resources: Detail all necessary resources, including time, workforce, and materials. Create categories and use color coding to organize them effectively.

Highlight the benefit: Define the benefits and why your solution is preferable. Incorporate visual aids like icons to emphasize key points.

Analyze the risks: List potential risks and their mitigation strategies. Use sticky notes to jot down thoughts and ideas collaboratively.

Describe the scope: Clarify the project's limitations and extent.

Identify stakeholders: List the parties involved using symbols or avatars to represent various stakeholders.

Estimate costs: Break down the financial aspects using tables or charts to present the information clearly.

Determine metrics: Set key performance indicators and use Miro's graphs to visualize the success measures.

Customize your plan: Add, remove, or change any fields to suit your specific project. You can expand the quadrants, adding data or other artifacts as needed.

Collaborate and share: Invite team members to collaborate in real time, adding comments and feedback. Miro's collaboration features support seamless teamwork.

To finish, prepare a presentation. With features like frames and the Presentation Mode , you can visually guide stakeholders through your strategy. And remember, ensure that all details are accurate and aligned with your goals.

With this quick guide and Miro's various sets of features, creating a business plan becomes a collaborative and creative process. The ability to visualize, tag, and present your plan ensures a rich and engaging experience for everyone involved. Whether you're a startup or an established business, Miro's business plan template offers the flexibility and robustness needed to succeed in today's competitive landscape.

Can I customize the business plan template in Miro?

Yes, add, remove, or change any fields to fit the specific needs of your project.

How can I share the business plan template with my team?

Miro's collaboration tools make it easy to share your template with team members, either through a direct link or by inviting them to your workspace.

Is the business plan template suitable for small businesses and startups?

Yes, the template is designed to be flexible and can be adapted to businesses of any size, including startups and small enterprises.

Get started with this template right now.

Technology Product Canvas Template

Works best for:.

Product Management, Meetings

Originally created by Prem Sundaram, the Technology Product Canvas allows product and engineering teams to achieve alignment about their shared roadmap. The canvas combines agile methodologies with UX principles to help validate product solutions. Each team states and visualizes both product and technology goals, then discusses each stage of the roadmap explicitly. This exercise ensures the teams are in sync and everyone leaves with clear expectations and direction. By going through the process of creating a Technology Product Canvas, you can start managing alignment between the teams -- in under an hour.

Balanced Scorecard Template

Operations, Strategic Planning, Project Planning

Balanced scorecards are useful tools for understanding business performance at a glance with regard to customers, employees, business processes, and financial progress. Learn more about BSCs and create your own using Miro’s Balanced Scorecard template.

Social Media Calendar Template

Project Planning, Marketing

Most businesses have a social media presence, but many of them aren’t using social media as a competitive differentiator. The Social Media Calendar template allows you to plan, schedule, and craft posts for LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest, so you can leverage social media as a strategic tool to promote your brand. Use the Social Media Calendar template to plan out your social content a week, month, or quarter in advance. Collaborate with the marketing team, prepare for product launches and major initiatives, and share draft social posts.

Scenario Planning Template

The Scenario Planning Template simplifies the complex process of strategizing and envisioning various future scenarios. The template’s clear structure helps teams and individuals effectively navigate the multifaceted steps of project planning and execution. A standout benefit of this template is its capability to foster structured thinking. With its distinct sections ranging from definition to action, it ensures that ideas are organized coherently, promoting logical progression and reducing the chances of oversight, making the planning process both efficient and comprehensive.

Project Proposal Template

Project Management, Documentation, Project Planning

For any type of project, the Project Proposal template can be a crucial step toward clarifying the context, goals, and scope of a project to get stakeholder buy-in. A project proposal outlines what you want to accomplish, your goals, and how you plan to achieve them. Generally, a project proposal gives the reader some context on the project, explains why it is important, and lists the actions that you will take to complete it. Project proposals have myriad uses. Often, businesses use project proposals to get external buy-in from a donor or outside stakeholder. But many companies draw up project proposals for internal buy-in too.

App Development Canvas Template

Market Research, Product Management, User Experience

Ever noticed that building a successful app requires lots of players and moving parts? If you’re a project manager, you definitely have. Lucky for you, an app development canvas will let you own and optimize the entire process. It features 18 boxes, each one focusing on a key aspect of app development, giving you a big-picture view. That way you can fine-tune processes and get ahead of potential problems along the way—resulting in a smoother path and a better, tighter product.

• Product overview
• All features
• App integrations

CAPABILITIES

• project icon Project management
• Project views
• Custom fields
• Status updates
• goal icon Goals and reporting
• Reporting dashboards
• workflow icon Workflows and automation
• portfolio icon Resource management
• Time tracking
• my-task icon Admin and security
• Admin console
• asana-intelligence icon Asana AI
• list icon Personal
• premium icon Starter
• briefcase icon Advanced
• Goal management
• Organizational planning
• Campaign management
• Creative production
• Content calendars
• Marketing strategic planning
• Resource planning
• Project intake
• Product launches
• Employee onboarding
• View all uses arrow-right icon
• Project plans
• Team goals & objectives
• Team continuity
• Meeting agenda
• View all templates arrow-right icon
• Work management resources Discover best practices, watch webinars, get insights
• What's new Learn about the latest and greatest from Asana
• Customer stories See how the world's best organizations drive work innovation with Asana
• Help Center Get lots of tips, tricks, and advice to get the most from Asana
• Asana Academy Sign up for interactive courses and webinars to learn Asana
• Developers Learn more about building apps on the Asana platform
• Community programs Connect with and learn from Asana customers around the world
• Events Find out about upcoming events near you
• Partners Learn more about our partner programs
• Support Need help? Contact the Asana support team
• Asana for nonprofits Get more information on our nonprofit discount program, and apply.

Featured Reads

• Strategic planning |
• Business plan

Business plan template

If you’re looking for a way to start your business off on the right foot, a business plan template can help you establish the foundation for your strategy. Get started in a few clicks with Asana’s free business plan template.

Sign up to use this template.

INTEGRATED FEATURES

Recommended apps.

You’re pumped—you just thought of the greatest business idea ever. You want to get started, but you don’t have a plan laid out. You need a loan to get your idea off the ground, and the bank wants to see an in-depth business plan. We’re here to help.

What is a business plan template?

A business plan template is a framework that helps you solidify your ideas in an organized format. Our free business plan template walks you through how to create a new business from scratch, or re-imagine your existing business in a new market.

What components are included in a business plan template?

Our business plan template covers what an organization wants to achieve within three to five years. By using our template, you’ll have a place to capture all of the major information you need in order to complete your business plan. That includes:

Company description : Information like your executive summary , your company’s mission statement and vision, and your founder’s bio. 

Product and services: A high-level overview of what your company provides, including core products or services. This may also include how your product is developed, any potential screenshots or prototypes of your product, and pricing plans.

Marketing plan: How you plan to bring your product into market at a high level. You can add information like a SWOT analysis , target market research, and brand positioning in this section.

Financial plan: Important financial information such as balance sheets, a break-even analysis, and your cash flow projections. 

Management and organization information: Information on your company’s founders, executive team, and the board of directors.

How to use our free business plan template

Using Asana’s free business plan template is simple. Start by creating a new project with our free template. From there, add relevant information for your specific business plan in the sections provided in our template. If there’s more information you want to include in your business plan, you’re free to add sections, custom fields, or additional tasks to make this template fit your needs.

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Reporting . Reporting in Asana translates project data into visual charts and digestible graphs. By reporting on work where work lives, you can reduce duplicative work and cut down on unnecessary app switching. And, because all of your team’s work is already in Asana, you can pull data from any project or team to get an accurate picture of what’s happening in one place.

Milestones . Milestones represent important project checkpoints. By setting milestones throughout your project, you can let your team members and project stakeholders know how you’re pacing towards your goal. Use milestones as a chance to celebrate the little wins on the path towards the big project goal. 

Project Overview . Project Overview is your one-stop-shop for all important project context. Give your team a bird’s-eye view of the what, why, and how of your project work. Add a project description to set the tone for how you’ll work together in Asana. Then, share any important resources and context—like meeting details, communication channels, and project briefs—in one place.

Microsoft Teams . With the Microsoft Teams + Asana integration, you can search for and share the information you need without leaving Teams. Easily connect your Teams conversations to actionable items in Asana. Plus, create, assign, and view tasks during a Teams Meeting without needing to switch to your browser.

Slack . Turn ideas, work requests, and action items from Slack into trackable tasks and comments in Asana. Go from quick questions and action items to tasks with assignees and due dates. Easily capture work so requests and to-dos don’t get lost in Slack. 

Google Workplace . Attach files directly to tasks in Asana with the Google Workplace file chooser, which is built into the Asana task pane. Easily attach any My Drive file with just a few clicks.

Gmail . With the Asana for Gmail integration, you can create Asana tasks directly from your Gmail inbox. Any tasks you create from Gmail will automatically include the context from your email, so you never miss a beat. Need to refer to an Asana task while composing an email? Instead of opening Asana, use the Asana for Gmail add-on to simply search for that task directly from your Gmail inbox. 

How do I create a business plan template? .css-i4fobf{-webkit-transition:-webkit-transform 200ms ease-in-out;transition:transform 200ms ease-in-out;-webkit-transform:rotateZ(0);-moz-transform:rotateZ(0);-ms-transform:rotateZ(0);transform:rotateZ(0);}

Instead of taking the time to create a business plan from scratch, start the process off with Asana’s free template.To further customize your template, add evergreen information about your specific business, such as your business model, company name, address, mission statement, value proposition, or target audience. Adding these details to your template lets you avoid documenting this information from scratch every time you create a new business plan.

What components should I include in a business plan template?

Business plan templates typically contain five main sections: a company description, products and services, a marketing plan, basic management and organization information, and your current financial plan.

How long should my business plan be?

Short answer—as long as you need it to be. The long answer is that your business plan should have the answers to specific questions on how your business is run, from the perspective of an investor. The goal of a business plan is to highlight your business strategy for the next three to five years. This means any important operational, financial, and strategic information should be included. 

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Create a program roadmap template and know the exact structure of each program, how they operate, and their future plans—company-wide.

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Learn how Asana’s operations team uses standardized processes to streamline strategic planning—no matter how many stakeholders are involved.

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When you’re launching a new product, team, or even a new business, strategic planning templates keep you laser-focused and on task.

Annual planning template

Set clear goals and streamline your planning process—so every level of your company is aligned on what’s important.

Competitive analysis template

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Small business, big goals

Coming up with your business strategy can be daunting, but Asana helps businesses of all sizes track and hit their goals. See how with a free trial.

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🤖 Free Business Plan Generator (AI-Powered)

Starting a business is an exciting journey, filled with aspirations and ambitions, yet crafting a solid business plan can sometimes feel like navigating through a dense fog. The AI-Powered Business Plan Generator shines a light on this path, offering a straightforward way to outline your vision, strategies, and financial forecasts. By providing customized, coherent business plans, this tool assists in laying down the foundation of your entrepreneurial dream, ensuring every aspect is addressed. It simplifies the planning process, enabling you to focus on bringing your business idea to life with confidence and clarity.

Writing a business plan can often feel like navigating through a dense forest without a map. You know your destination—securing investment, defining your business strategy, or setting clear objectives—but the path isn't always clear. Enter the AI-powered business plan generator, a tool designed to illuminate the way forward. This guide will walk you through the essentials of crafting a comprehensive business plan, touching upon the traditional elements that captivate stakeholders. In the final stretch, we'll introduce how an AI-powered business plan generator can streamline this process, making it more accessible and less time-consuming.

How to create a Business Plan

Now that you're familiar with the executive summary, let's tackle how you can create the rest of your business plan.

You can start manually by outlining your plan's structure and filling in the details step by step, or opt for a business plan generator to streamline the process.

Either method requires careful consideration of each section to ensure your plan is thorough and compelling.

Manual Methods for creating a Business Plan

You'll start with the Executive Summary, distilling your business idea into a compelling snapshot that captures attention.

Next, you'll outline your Company Overview, providing a clear picture of who you are and what you stand for.

Then, lay out your Business Objectives, Products and Services, and your Market Analysis Approach to build a solid foundation for your plan.

Executive Summary Essentials

Although it's often crafted last, the Executive Summary stands as the crucial opener of your business plan. It distills key aspects such as your mission, product highlights, and financial ambitions for quick investor insight. It encapsulates your company's essence for investors and maps out the business plan development milestones.

Ensure it crisply outlines your executive summary, underscoring the company's financial goals. This will help capture investors' attention right off the bat.

Company Overview

Begin your company overview by detailing your business's foundational elements, including its name, location, and the team driving its operations.

Here's what to include:

• A clear description of your business structure and ownership.
• The mission statement that defines your business's purpose.
• An outline of the products or services you offer.
• Background information that paints a picture of your company's history and objectives.

Business Objectives

To set your business on the path to success, start by defining clear and measurable objectives that reflect both your immediate and long-term aspirations.

Align your business objectives with strategic objectives to meet financial goals.

Conduct market research to fine-tune your target market strategies .

Ensure company goals are realistic and adaptable, setting a course for growth and market competitiveness.

Regular updates keep your plan relevant.

Products and Services

After setting clear business objectives, focus on articulating the core of your offering by detailing the products and services your business provides. Your description should also include:

• Unique features and benefits of each product or service.
• Specific products' competitive advantages.
• Your strategy for sales, distribution, and supply chain.
• Trademarks and market placement for your products and services.

Market Analysis Approach

A thorough market analysis is crucial for your business plan as it reveals the dynamics within your target market and guides your competitive strategy .

You'll identify potential customers, understand established market trends, and analyze how competitors differentiate themselves.

This knowledge shapes your sales plan and informs your marketing and sales efforts, highlighting opportunities in an otherwise crowded marketplace and showcasing your grasp of the competitive landscape.

Marketing and Sales Strategies

Crafting a marketing and sales strategy requires precise identification of your target customers to ensure your message resonates and spurs action. Here's how to proceed:

• Define your target market for the new product.
• Develop a pricing and sales channel approach.
• Design a marketing plan with promotional tactics.
• Analyze market trends to refine your strategy.

Stay focused on meeting customer needs and differentiating from competitors.

Financial Analysis and Projections

Diving into the financials, you'll need to gather historical data and conduct a thorough analysis of revenue streams , costs, and profit margins to inform your projections for the next three to five years.

Your financial plan hinges on these insights.

Operations Plan

To ensure your business runs like a well-oiled machine, start by mapping out your key operational processes and procedures. Your operations plan is a vital section of your business plan. Here's what to include:

• Outline technology's role in business operations.
• Develop a comprehensive staffing plan.
• Establish a robust inventory management system.
• Implement quality control measures to provide additional assurance of product or service excellence.

Funding Requirements

Having established the operational foundations of your business, let's now focus on determining the capital necessary to fuel your growth and operational needs.

Outline your funding requirements by presenting clear financial data, including projected income, balance sheets, and cash flows.

You'll need this to secure funding from venture capital firms or potential investors, ensuring they grasp how their capital will propel your business towards its targets.

Appendices and Exhibits

When crafting your business plan, don't overlook the appendices and exhibits; these sections provide the substantiating details that reinforce your proposal's integrity. Include:

Documents that outline key personnel qualifications and experience.

Details on intellectual property, such as patents.

Additional information for financial institutions, like credit histories.

Contracts, leases, or other legal documents relevant to your business.

Using a Business Plan Generator

You might wonder why you'd use a Business Plan Generator—these tools streamline the planning process, making it easier for you to focus on the core aspects of your strategy.

To get started, you'll follow a series of steps that help structure your executive summary, goals, and market analysis within a proven framework.

The benefits are clear: using a generator can save you time and provide you with a professional, investor-ready plan.

Steps to use the Business Plan Generator

To create a business plan using a generator, start by selecting a template that aligns with your industry and business type.

Here are the steps to use a business plan generator:

• Identify Your Business Details : Start by providing the name of your business and the industry it operates in. This foundational step sets the stage for the tailored guidance the generator can offer.
• Describe Your Offerings : Clearly articulate what products or services your business sells or offers. This will help the generator understand the value proposition of your business.
• Define Your Target Audience : Specify who your ideal customers are, including demographic information. Understanding your target audience is crucial for creating a focused and effective business plan.
• Outline Your Marketing Plan : Detail your strategies for promoting your business. This includes how you plan to reach your target audience and differentiate yourself from competitors.
• Detail Your Operational Strategy : Explain how your business will operate on a day-to-day basis. Include information on your supply chain, logistics, and any other operational details.
• Provide Financial Information : Input how much money you need to start your business and project how much revenue it will generate. This financial planning is critical for assessing the feasibility of your business idea.
• Set Business Objectives : List what you aim to achieve with your business in the short term and the long term. These goals will guide the direction of your business strategy.
• Click on Generate : After entering all the necessary information, click the "generate" button to create your personalised business plan. This plan will be tailored to the specifics of your business, providing a roadmap for success.

Benefits of using a Business Plan Generator

Harnessing a business plan generator can significantly streamline the process, saving you both time and effort as you craft a detailed blueprint for your venture.

Here are the benefits:

• Provides a structured framework to write a business plan efficiently.
• Helps identify opportunities in new markets.
• Enhances financial literacy through budgeting and forecasting tools.
• Clarifies business objectives, aiding in communication with stakeholders.

Tips for Creating a Business Plan

When crafting your business plan these tips collectively form a comprehensive business plan, providing a roadmap for your business and presenting a compelling case to investors and lenders.

Here are the tips for creating a business plan:

• Articulate your mission and vision succinctly.
• Outline your offerings and financial ambitions.
• Provide a snapshot of your business's financial health and market potential.
• Clarify the business structure ( sole proprietorship , partnership, corporation).
• Highlight ownership details.
• Showcase key employees, emphasizing their expertise.
• Define short- and long-term goals for your business.
• Align goals with your strategic direction.
• Establish a direct link between financing needs and future growth.
• Describe your offerings and emphasize how they meet market needs.
• Support claims with market research.
• Demonstrate a thorough understanding of your competition.

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

Noah Parsons

24 min. read

Updated May 7, 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: 10 AI prompts you need to write a 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 to include in a business plan is sometimes not quite enough. If you’re struggling to get started or need additional guidance, it may be worth using a business plan template. 

There are plenty of great options available (we’ve rounded up our 8 favorites to streamline your search).

But, if you’re looking for a free downloadable business plan template , you can get one right now; 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

Free business plan templates and examples

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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.

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.

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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• 5 Best Business Plan Software and Tools in 2023 for Your Small Business

Data as of 3 /13/23 . Offers and availability may vary by location and are subject to change.

We are committed to sharing unbiased reviews. Some of the links on our site are from our partners who compensate us. Read our editorial guidelines and advertising disclosure .

A business plan can do a lot for your business. It can help you secure investors or other funding. It can give your company direction. It can keep your finances healthy. But, if we’re being honest, it can also be a pain to write.

Luckily, you don’t have to start from scratch or go it alone. Business plan software and services can help you craft a professional business plan, like our top choice LivePlan , which provides templates, guidance, and more.

You’ve got quite a few choices for business plan help, so we’re here to help you narrow things down. Let’s talk about the best business plan tools out there.

• LivePlan : Best overall
• BizPlanBuilder : Most user-friendly
• Wise Business Plans : Best professional service
• Business Sorter : Best for internal plans
• GoSmallBiz.com : Most extra features
• Honorable mentions

Business plan software 101

The takeaway, business plan software faq, compare the best business plan software.

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LivePlan: Best overall business plan software

Data as of 3 /13/23 . Offers and availability may vary by location and are subject to change. *With annual billing

LivePlan has been our favorite business plan software for a while now, despite the stiff competition.

There’s a lot to like about LivePlan. It has pretty much all the features you could want from your business plan software. LivePlan gives you step-by-step instructions for writing your plan, helps you create financial reports, lets you compare your business’s actual financials to your plan’s goals, and much more. And if you ever need inspiration, it includes hundreds of sample business plans that can guide your writing.

LivePlan software pricing

But the best part? You get all that (and more) at a very competitive price. (You can choose from annual, six-month, or monthly billing.) While LivePlan isn’t quite the cheapest business plan builder out there, it’s not too far off either. And if comes with a 60-day money back guarantee. So there’s no risk in trying LivePlan out for yourself.

With a great balance of features and cost, LivePlan offers the best business plan solution for most businesses.

BizPlanBuilder: Most user-friendly

Need something easy to use? BizPlanBuilder fits the bill.

BizPlanBuilder doesn’t have a flashy, modern user interface―but it does have a very clear, intuitive one. You’ll be able to see your plan’s overall structure at a glance, so you can quickly navigate from your title page to your market trend section to that paragraph on your core values. And as you write, you’ll use a text editor that looks a whole lot like the word processing programs you’re already familiar with.

BizPlanBuilder software pricing

Data effective 3/13/23. At publishing time, amounts, rates, and requirements are current but are subject to change. Offers may not be available in all areas.

BizPlanBuilder also offers lots of helpful guidance for actually writing your plan. It gives you pre-written text, in which you just have to fill in relevant details. It offers explanations for what information you need to include in each section of your plan and way. It even gives you helpful tips from experts, so you’ll have all the information you need to plan like a pro.

So if you want planning software with almost no learning curve, you’ll like BizPlanBuilder.

Wise Business Plans: Best professional service

• Custom quote

Unlike all the other companies on this list, Wise Business Plans doesn’t offer software. Instead, it offers professional business plan writing services―meaning someone does all the hard work for you.

Now, you might think that sounds expensive―and you’re probably right (you have to request a custom quote for your plan). But there’s a lot to be said for expertise, and Wise Business Plans has plenty of that. Your business plan will get written by an experienced writer (with an MBA, no less). They’ll get information from you, do their own research, and then write your plan. You get one free revision, and you can always pay for more.  

Wise Business Plans service pricing

Your end result will be a polished, entirely original business plan. (You can even get printed copies.) And best of all, you won’t have to spend your precious time working on the plan yourself. Wise Business Plans takes care of all the hard parts, and makes your business look good while doing it. Sounds like a service worth paying for, right?

Put simply, if you want the most professional business plan possible, we recommend using Wise Business Plans’s writing service.

Business Sorter: Best for internal plans

Many businesses need plans to show to people outside the company (to get financing, for example). But what if you just need a plan for internal use? In that case, we suggest Business Sorter.

Business Sorter uses a unique card-based method to help you craft the perfect business plan. (You can watch a demo video to see how it works.) You’ll plan some of the usual things, like finances and marketing. But Business Sorter also lets you make plans for specific teams and team members. It also emphasizes more internal matters, like operations, that might get overlooked in a business plan for outsiders.

Business Sorter software pricing

After you’ve made your business plan, Business Sorter also helps you stay accountable to it. You can create tasks, give them deadlines, and assign them to team members―giving you basic project management tools to make sure your business plans become business actions. (Oh, and did we mention that Business Sorter has the lowest starting prices of any software on this list?)

It all adds up to a business plan software that works great for internal planning.

GoSmallBiz: Most extra features

Want to get way more than just business planning software? Then you probably want GoSmallBiz.

See, GoSmallBiz offers business plan software as part of its service―but it’s just one part of a much bigger whole. You also get everything from discounts on legal services to a website builder to a CRM (customer relationship manager) to business document templates. And more. In other words, you get just about everything you need to get your startup off the ground.

GoSmallBiz software pricing

Don’t worry though―you still get all the business planning help you need. GoSmallBiz gives you business plan templates, step-by-step instructions, and the ability to create financial projections. And if you get stuck, GoSmallBiz will put you in touch with experts who can offer advice.

If you want business planning and much, much more, give GoSmallBiz a try.

• PlanGuru : Best financial forecasting
• EnLoop : Cheapest tool for startups

We recommend the software above for most business planning needs. Some businesses, though, might be interested in these more specialized planning software.

Honorable mention software pricing

Planguru: best financial forecasting features.

PlanGuru is pretty pricey compared to our other picks, but you might find its forecasting features worth paying for. It has more forecasting methods than other software (over 20) plus it lets you forecast up to 10 years.

EnLoop: Cheapest tool for startups

EnLoop doesn’t have our favorite features or interface, but it does have really, really low pricing plus a seven-day free trial. It's the most affordable software for startup business planning and still provides all the essential features like financial analysis, team collaboration, charting, and more.

Data as of 3 /13/23 . Offers and availability may vary by location and are subject to change. * With annual billing

Several of our previous favorite planning software, including BusinessPlanPro and StratPad, seem to have gone out of business.

A business plan is a written, living document that tells the story of your business and what you plan to do with it. It serves as the source of truth for you—the business owner—as well as potential partners, employees, and investors, but it also serves as a roadmap of what you want your business to be.

Why you need a business plan

While some small-business owners don’t see the point of creating a formal business plan, it can have some concrete benefits for your business. For example, one 2016 study found that business owners with written plans are more successful than those that don’t. 1

Still too vague? Then let’s get specific.

If you ever seek business funding (from, say, banks, angel investors , or venture capitalists ), you’ll have to prove that your business deserves the money you want. A formal business plan―complete with financial data and projections―gives you a professional document you can use to make your case. (In fact, most potential investors will expect you to have a business plan ready.)

Even if you’re not seeking funding right now, a business plan can help your business. A formal plan can guide your business’s direction and decision making. It can keep your business accountable (by, for example, seeing if your business meets the financial projections you included). And a formal plan offers a great way to make sure your team stays on the same page.

What to include in your business plan

Not all business plans are created equal. To make a really useful business plan, you’ll want to include a number of elements:

• Basic information about your business
• Your products/services
• Market and industry analysis
• What makes your business competitive
• Strategies and upcoming plans
• Your team (and your team’s background)
• Current financial status
• Financial and market projections
• Executive summary

Of course, you can include more or fewer elements―whatever makes sense for your business. Just make sure your business plan is comprehensive (but not overwhelming).

How business plan software can help

With so many elements to include, business plan creation can take a while. Business plan software tries to speed things up.

Most business plan software will include prompts for each section. In some cases, you can just fill in your business’s specific information, and the software will write the text for you. In other cases, the software will give you specific guidance and examples, helping you write the text yourself.

Plus, business plan software can help you stay organized. You’ll usually get intuitive menus that let you quickly flip through sections. So rather than endlessly scrolling through a long document in a word processor, you can quickly find your way around your plan. Some software even lets you drag and drop sections to reorganize your plan.

Sounds way easier than just staring at a blank page and trying to start from scratch, right?

Choosing business plan software

To find the right business plan builder for your business, you’ll want to compare features. For example, would you rather write your own text, getting prompts and advice from your software? Or would you rather go with a fill-in-the-blank method?

Likewise, think about the elements you need. If your plan will have a heavy focus on finances, you’ll want to choose business plan software with robust financial projection features. If you care more about market and competitor analysis, look for software that can help with that research.

You may also want to find business plan software that integrates with your business accounting software . Some plan builders will import data from Xero, QuickBooks, etc. to quickly generate your financial data and projections.

And of course, you’ll want to compare prices. After all, you always want to end up with software that fits your business budget.

The right business plan software can make your life easier. With LivePlan ’s wide breadth of features and online learning tools, you can’t go wrong. Plus, BizPlanBuilder 's one-time pricing makes it easy to invest while Business Sorter has a low starting cost. And if you're business is looking to grow, GoSmallBiz and Wise Business Plans will scale with you.

But of course, different companies have different needs. So shop around until you find the software that’s best for you and your business.

Now that you've got a business plan, take a look at our checklist for starting a small business.  It can help you make sure you have everything else you need to get your startup off to a good start!

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• Best Project Management Software and Tools in 2023
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Creating a business plan can take anywhere from a couple hours to several weeks. Your timeline will depend on things like the elements you choose to include, whether you use software or hire a writing service, and how much research goes into your plan.

That said, much of the business plan software out there brags that it can help you create a fairly detailed plan in a few hours. So if you’re going the software route, that can help you set your expectations.

If you want to get the most out of your business plan, you should update it on a regular basis―at least annually. That way, you can continually refer to it to inform your company’s strategies and direction.  

At the very least, you should update your business plan before you start looking for a new round of funding (whether that’s with investors or lenders).

Thanks to business plan software, you can easily write your own business plan rather than pay someone to do it for you. And in most cases, software will cost you less than a professional business plan service.

There are some times you might want to go with a service though. If time is tight, you might find that it’s worth the cost of a service. Or if you’ve got big investor meetings on the horizon, you might want the expertise and polish that a professional service can offer.

Ultimately, you’ll have to decide for yourself whether business plan software or a business plan service will work better for your company.

Methodology

We ranked business plan software and tools based on features, pricing and plans, and connections to project management and other services. The value of each plan and service, along with what it offers, was a big consideration in our rankings, and we looked to see if what was offered was useful to small businesses or just extra. The final thing we looked at was the ease of use of the software to see if it's too complex for small businesses.

At Business.org, our research is meant to offer general product and service recommendations. We don't guarantee that our suggestions will work best for each individual or business, so consider your unique needs when choosing products and services.

Sources 1. Harvard Business Review, “ Research: Writing a Business Plan Makes Your Startup More Likely to Succeed .” Accessed March 13, 2023.

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Market Research

Business planning, website development, product or service selection, marketing and promotion, is it a good idea to start an online business, can i start an online business with $100, what are different types of online marketing strategies, the bottom line.

• Small Business
• How to Start a Business

How to Start an Online Business: A Step-by-Step Guide

Crafting a Winning Business Plan: Setting Goals and Strategies

Katie Miller is a consumer financial services expert. She worked for almost two decades as an executive, leading multi-billion dollar mortgage, credit card, and savings portfolios with operations worldwide and a unique focus on the consumer. Her mortgage expertise was honed post-2008 crisis as she implemented the significant changes resulting from Dodd-Frank required regulations.

• How to Start a Business: A Comprehensive Guide and Essential Steps
• How to Do Market Research, Types, and Example
• Marketing Strategy: What It Is, How It Works, How To Create One
• Marketing in Business: Strategies and Types Explained
• What Is a Marketing Plan? Types and How to Write One
• Business Development: Definition, Strategies, Steps & Skills
• Business Plan: What It Is, What's Included, and How to Write One
• Small Business Development Center (SBDC): Meaning, Types, Impact
• How to Write a Business Plan for a Loan
• Business Startup Costs: It’s in the Details
• Startup Capital Definition, Types, and Risks
• Bootstrapping Definition, Strategies, and Pros/Cons
• Crowdfunding: What It Is, How It Works, and Popular Websites
• Starting a Business with No Money: How to Begin
• A Comprehensive Guide to Establishing Business Credit
• Equity Financing: What It Is, How It Works, Pros and Cons
• Best Startup Business Loans
• Sole Proprietorship: What It Is, Pros & Cons, and Differences From an LLC
• Partnership: Definition, How It Works, Taxation, and Types
• What is an LLC? Limited Liability Company Structure and Benefits Defined
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• Starting a Small Business: Your Complete How-to Guide
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Oscar Wong / Getty Images

If you want to get into the online business game, it’s a good time to start. The COVID-19 pandemic reshaped online consumer spending, including how people shop online and how they research products.

Today, 76% of Americans buy products online. Furthermore, roughly a third of people purchase items online weekly. From setting up an ecommerce business to offering web design services, there are countless avenues to explore as an entrepreneur.

Below, we’ll walk through each step to building an online business.

Key Takeaways

• When starting an online business, comprehensive market research is critical for identifying your target audience and learning how to resonate with your customers and understand their needs.
• Creating a business plan is an important step for outlining your business goals. It also includes your product description, target market, and financial projections, among other core components.
• Building your website involves setting up a domain name, finding a hosting company, and designing a strong website with consistent branding that allows your customers to navigate it intuitively.
• Choosing the right product or service to sell is essential. It’s important to think about how you’re addressing an unmet need.
• Several digital marketing strategies can be utilized, from content marketing to paid advertising, to help your business grow.

Successful online entrepreneurs study hard in order to have a thorough understanding of their market. This is important for knowing exactly how to reach your target market , because these are the people who will buy your products and drive your business growth.

At its core, market research is about understanding your customers’ needs, pain points, and solutions. It is designed to help your business better meet these needs.

Steps to Conduct Market Research

Market research involves understanding key aspects of your current and future customers. To get a clear sense of your target market, outline the characteristics of your audience—for example, age, location, gender, income, job title, and key pain points.

Once you have identified your target audience, conduct research on the following topics, which will tell you about how they make decisions and how you can better position your business:

• What are the challenges that your target market faces?
• Where do they research a given product or service?
• What are their views on pricing for this product or service?
• What factors influence their decision to make a purchase?
• Who are your competitors?

To put this market research into action, there are a number of different avenues you can take:

• Focus groups
• Competitive analysis
• Brand awareness research
• Market segmentation research

Consider the following questions that may be asked in an interview or focus group to learn more about your audience:

• “How do you search for that product?”
• “How useful was it?”
• “What words do you use when you search on Google?”

When you have completed your market research, identify what you have learned as well as your next steps based on these insights.

Creating a business plan is a key first step for all business owners . It is important for companies looking to secure funding resources. It also serves as a blueprint to summarize your key business objectives and goals.

To write a business plan , incorporate these eight main sections, which are often found in traditional templates:

• Executive summary : This is typically a one-page section that explains your objectives and includes your mission statement, core team, and why your company is positioned for success.
• Company description : This describes what you offer, your competitive advantages, and your business goals.
• Market analysis : This is where you explain your target market, market size, market trends, and competitive landscape.
• Organization and management : Explain who is working on your team and their professional background and experience.
• Service or product line : Describe the product or service you are offering, including any copyright or plans for patenting.
• Marketing and sales : Discuss your marketing and sales strategy. Discuss your pricing, key metrics, and sales plan.
• Funding request : If you are a company looking for funding, here is where you outline the capital you are requesting and where it will be allocated.
• Financial projections : Include projections for your company’s revenue and expenses. Consider including an income statement, balance sheet, and cash flow statement in this section.

A business plan is important because it helps clarify your action points, who you are, and what you offer, all in a coherent template.

Getting your business online is the next key step. In an ever-changing environment, it is important to know the tools, trends, and strategies for building a strong online presence to allow your business to grow.

Registering Your Domain

The first step is registering your name, or your website address. This can be in the form of your business name “.com.” To purchase your domain name, you can go to sites like GoDaddy or Namecheap . If you decide to build your website using WordPress, you will need to use a site such as these to host your website.

Web Hosting Companies

Alternatively, you can buy your domain name at a hosting company. These are companies like Shopify , Wix , or Amazon Web Services , that may also offer tools to build your website and release content on them. 

Website Design

A well-designed website is important for many reasons. Using a website builder, such as Mailchimp or Squarespace , can allow you to choose a theme, customize your pages, create relevant content, and set up a payment page.

Other key aspects of your website design include its functionality, simplicity, and ease of use. Allowing your potential customers to navigate the site intuitively will be key to their experience. Brand consistency—in your logo, colors, and typeface, for example—is also key to creating a unified brand.

Another essential part of website design is its mobile application. You’ll want to ensure that your website runs smoothly on mobile, that images load properly, that the text is legible, and that buttons are intuitive to click.

This step focuses on how to choose the right product or service to sell. At the heart of this choice is the goal of solving a customer’s problem. But there are a number of strategies you can use to identify your product idea.

For example, you might consider analyzing companies with high-profit margins, products that align with your passion, burgeoning trends, items trending on online marketplaces, and/or customer reviews.

With this in mind, analyze how this product will get to your customers. Additionally, you may consider products that are not available in stores in your local market but are offered in communities such as Europe or Japan, for example.

Marketing strategy and promotion is an essential driver of business growth. As the digital landscape evolves, it’s important to have an effective marketing plan that resonates with changing consumer preferences and needs.

Here are questions that companies can consider as they create their marketing strategy, navigating today’s environment:

• Impact, value, and growth : What are the goals and key performance indicators (KPIs) that will measure success for your business? How will you explain the value that the business provides to its customers and/or society? Create an “elevator speech”—a 30-second description of what you offer and why it’s special.
• Customer need and brand promise : How does the brand meet a customer’s need through its products and services?
• Customer experience : How will the business deliver the best experiences at each stage of the customer journey?
• Organizational model : How will the business operate to serve the customer with the most impact?

These will help you understand what types of strategies can have real impact.

Types of Marketing Strategies

Consider the following digital marketing strategies that can be used for your online business:

• Email marketing
• Social media marketing
• Paid advertising
• Search engine optimization (SEO)
• Content marketing
• Influencer marketing

Each of these presents a different way to reach your target audience, drive conversions, or build brand awareness, depending on your marketing goals.

You need to determine that for yourself. But before starting an online business, it’s important to assess the time, investment, and resources you’ll need to get it off the ground. While the barrier to entry can be quite low, it’s worth considering your goals and strategies for making it a reality.

However, compared with starting up a traditional brick-and-mortar business, the risks of launching an online business may be reduced due to lower upfront costs such as rent, staff, and materials, among others.

The short answer: yes. While it depends on the type of business you hope to pursue, there are many ways to set up an online business at very little cost. For example, you could offer your services doing freelance work, photography, bookkeeping, or personal training. The primary costs involved include setting up your business website, which can cost as little as $2 to $20 each year with companies such as GoDaddy.

There are a number of digital marketing strategies that online businesses can use, such as content marketing, email marketing, paid advertising, SEO, and influencer marketing. Each of these strategies can be useful, depending on your product and goals.

Starting an online business can be a powerful way to launch a new product or service while reaching a wider audience. With market research, a solid business plan, a strong website, and a digital marketing strategy, you can get started in growing your company effectively. As customers increasingly make decisions virtually, building an online business is vital to any business owner’s success.

Pew Research Center. “ For Shopping, Phones Are Common and Influencers Have Become a Factor—Especially for Young Adults .”

U.S. Small Business Administration. “ Market Research and Competitive Analysis .”

U.S. Small Business Administration. “ Write Your Business Plan .”

Ogilvy. “ Getting Future Ready with Marketing Transformation ,” Page 15.

GoDaddy. “ How Much Does a Domain Name Cost? Find Out! ”

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Create Your Course

10 steps to creating a wildly successful online course, share this article.

As you read this, you might have an online course idea already hanging out in your head.

If you’re passionate about a topic, you’re good at it, and it fulfills a need for someone – then you have all the makings of becoming a successful course creator. 

Creating an online course has never been easier thanks to a host of new tools and platforms that do most of the heavy lifting for you. All you need is your knowledge.

And if you’re building a business, learning how to create an online course is an ideal way to open up an additional revenue stream for your business while establishing you as an expert in your niche.

By creating online courses, you turn your tried and true industry expertise into a lead-generating, money-making, impact-creating online course that gets your valuable skills out into the world. 

To help you learn how to create online courses from scratch, we’ve broken the process into 10 easy stages – with plenty of tips from ultra-successful course creators who have the academies and the accounts to prove it. 

We’ve also included templates, guides and workbooks to support you every step of the way, so you can get your online course business up and running in no time. 

Here are our 10 steps to create an online course:

Pick the perfect online course topic

Check if there’s market demand for your course idea, create compelling learning outcomes, structure your online course, choose the most engaging and effective delivery method, produce your online course: filming, recording, and editing, choose your online course platform, establish your pricing structure, launch your online course and market for success.

• Build an online course community

How to create an online course from scratch

At the heart of learning how to create an online course is understanding what experience, expertise, and skills you have to offer the world.

We’ve tailored this guide to help you draw out your own unique perspective to solve your audience’s challenges, pain points, and problems. And build your personal brand in the process.

While it’s definitely not an exhaustive list of everything you’ll need to create and sell an online course – it’s a ‘birds-eye-view’’ of the major milestones on the journey to creating your first online course and tips to help you find your unique voice along the way from creators who have been exactly where you are.

Here’s our 10 steps to creating an online course that’s tailored to your audience – and feels authentically you. 

Choosing a topic for your online course is the first step to building a successful and buzzing course business.

Your ideal course topic should ideally be something you’re passionate about, you’re skilled at, have experience in, and have a target audience for.

In other words, here are the 4 things you need for your online course topic :

• Target audience

Let’s look at each of those in more detail…

Your passion

Your online course topic doesn’t have to be something you’re head over heels in love with – but it should be a topic you’re passionate about. That means something you don’t mind thinking about, talking about, and reading about for weeks, months, and even years on end.

If you’re passionate about your online course topic, then it will translate into your content. You’ll be better placed to inspire and engage your audience while making your course feel more authentic and relatable. And keep your customers coming back.

Warning: choose a topic you’re not passionate about and you risk getting tired of teaching it. (And your lack of passion will lead to a course that’s as enticing as a cardboard sandwich.)

Related: How To Turn Your Passion Into A Business

Your skills

As well as being a topic you’re passionate about, you also need to have the specific skills that will help you teach others about your topic.

That means your topic should be something you’ve learnt how to do – and you’re confident you can teach other people how to do too. It might be something related to your profession or career or to a hobby or skill you have.

By teaching your chosen topic on a public stage, you can help people learn from you and solve the challenges they’re facing – while setting you up as a thought leader in your field. 

“We all have a gift that someone needs… Don’t let technology, imposter syndrome, or any other limiting beliefs scare you. Just put yourself out there and get started because you can always perfect yourself as you go.” – AMANDA SCHONBERG, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR AND MEMBERSHIP SITE OWNER

Related: How To Monetize Your Expertise

Your experience

We’re all the sum of our experiences. And your unique experiences are what will ultimately help you create a winning and wildly successful online course business.

Your experiences can include:

• Work experience
• Educational experience
• Hobbies and interests
• Volunteering
• Personal experiences e.g. relationships, family, spiritual, cultural experiences

If you can draw out the experiences that shaped you both professionally and personally, you can find a unique perspective for your online course that will help you stand out from the crowd.

“If you’re an expert in something – either from schooling or personal experience – I believe that you already have everything you need inside of you… The world is just waiting for you to share your knowledge, expertise, and lived experience in a way that’s digestible for others.” – KIAUNDRA JACKSON, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

Your target audience

To create online courses that people will actually want to buy, you need to make sure you have a target audience in mind from the very beginning. Who will your course help? 

Try answering these questions to find your target audience:

• What demographic groups are you most likely to help with your skills and experience? 
• How do your audience think? What are their values, interests, and attitudes?
• What needs, challenges, and frustrations do they have?
• What do they currently not know or need help with?
• How will your online course help them solve the challenges they’re facing?

People take online courses because they need help getting from where they are now to a place they want to be in their future – and your knowledge and expertise can help them get there quicker.

If you have a target audience in mind now, you can make sure that everything you do when you’re creating your online course is tailored to them – including your course content, delivery methods, marketing, and sales strategy.

Related: How To Define Your Target Audience (+Templates & Workbooks)

Activity: How to find an online course topic

To help you zero in on the perfect course topic, try this simple exercise:

Start by taking a sheet of paper and writing “Passions & Interests,” “Skills,” and “Experience & Achievements” across the top of the page. Draw a line between them so that each is in its own column.

Next, go column by column and write down as many things as possible that come to mind for each category. It doesn’t have to be perfect. Just write down what comes into your head.

Now review what you’ve written. Do you notice any similarities between the 3 columns? They could point you to your perfect course topic. If nothing comes up, keep brainstorming. Go step-by-step through your experiences, including your education, career, and how you like to spend time.

The truth is, you don’t need to have a degree or decades of experience in your chosen course topic to become a successful course creator. In fact, some of the best courses out there focus on things you might consider a hobby. 

Here’s a list of 10 online courses from some of our most successful course creators:

• Microsoft Excel  
• Content creation
• Mindfulness and meditation
• Photography
• Roller skating
• Dog training

There are so many online course ideas to choose from (the possibilities are literally endless…).

Remember: If you love your topic, you’re good at it, you have experience , and it fulfills a need for someone – then you have everything you need to create an online course.

Hands up, who wants to spend weeks of their life creating an online course only to have no one buy it? Nope. Didn’t think so.

Once you’ve picked your online course topic (or at least narrowed your choices down to 2 or 3 options), the next step is to do market research for your idea. The goal at this stage is to understand if there’s demand for your online course and who else is currently offering courses on that topic. 

If you’re just getting started, here are 4 questions to ask to help validate market demand for your online course:

• Are people asking questions about your topic? If yes, what questions are they asking?
• Who are your biggest competitors? Are there any topics, formats, or audiences they don’t cover or serve?
• Will someone pay money to solve the problem your course topic covers?

Let’s look at each question more closely and check out some tools that will help you complete your market research. 

What questions are people asking about your topic?

To understand what questions people are asking about your topic, you need to do some online research. Here are 4 places to look online:

• Try searching your topic on Reddit or Quora to see what questions come up and how often.
• Take a look at Answer The Public to see what people are asking, how, and how often.
• Scroll through any Facebook groups on your topic to gain some insight into the challenges your audience has.
• Follow relevant creators on LinkedIn to see what they’re saying about your topic and who is commenting on their posts.

If you know where your target audience spends most time online, start your research there. For example, if you’re targeting florists, consider doing your research on Instagram and Pinterest rather than LinkedIn.

After doing this research, you’ll probably have a few words, concepts and ideas that show up in posts, forums, and questions over and over. You can use these as keywords for your research in the next section. 

Are people searching for your topic and asking questions?

To understand whether or not there’s demand for your course topic, it helps to know how many people are searching for terms related to your idea online. 

Google Trends is the quickest way to check general search trends for your topic. These trends will give you a better idea of how popular a topic is and how it’s been performing over time. 

Use the keywords from your initial research to look up the popularity of your topic. For example, you can see below that “ Online Yoga Classes ” spiked in popularity at the start of the pandemic in March 2020. And it’s still popular today.

Search volume is also a great way to validate demand for an online course topic. Use a tool like Google keyword planner , Semrush, or Ahrefs to look at your topic’s search volume.  

Enter your keywords, and each tool will give you insights into how many people are searching for each keyword. 

The more people who are searching for each keyword – and the more competitive it is – the more sought- after your chosen topic is likely to be. As you can see, “Online yoga courses” is a popular keyword and has decent competition. 

Pro tip: Keep in mind that the search volume and competition you’ll see in keyword research tools only applies to the specific keywords you’re searching for. There can be hundreds of different keywords for any given topic. For example, running a search on “online yoga courses” will give you different results to searching for “online yoga courses for beginners” and  “yoga courses online”.

Related: 5 Steps To Test Your Online Course Ideas In The Real World

Who are your main competitors and what are they missing?

As well as researching what your audience is currently searching for, it’s a good idea to take a look at your competition too.

Do some research to figure out who your top competitors are and what their courses offer. While you’re unlikely to be the first person to think of your idea, there’s a good chance you can do it differently and offer your target audience something new and fresh.

Online course marketplaces are a good place to check what’s already out there. You can also do a simple Google search – such as “online courses on [ your topic or idea ]”.

Many creator educators make the mistake of thinking that lots of competition for their chosen topic means their online course idea won’t be successful. In fact, it shows there’s already a thriving market for your course idea and it’s well worth investigating further. If other people are making courses on that topic, there must be potential to generate revenue from it. 

The trick is to find a gap in the market. 

Finding a gap in the market means finding an opportunity to offer something new that your competitors aren’t currently catering to – such as:

• An audience: Is there a demographic or group of people who aren’t currently being served by your competitors? Who can you appeal to that your competitors can’t?
• An idea: Are there any key concepts, methods, or ideas that your competitors aren’t covering? What’s missing from their course content?
• A format: Is there a course style or format that your competitors aren’t currently offering? What could you do differently? How could you make your course more engaging?

The online courses already on the market have the upper hand. The creators behind those courses have been learning about your audience, developing their course, and tailoring their marketing for longer than you have. 

The best way to find success? Make sure you’re offering your audience something different to what’s already out there.

Here are a few examples of how creators managed to create new, different, and better online courses compared to their competitors.

Miss Excel – Making a (kinda) boring subject fun

Despite the stiff competition for Microsoft Excel courses, Miss Excel – real name Kat Norton – carved out a niche for herself in a crowded marketplace by using TikTok to create bite-sized Excel courses and infusing creativity, fun, and enthusiasm into her content. Making an otherwise boring topic super approachable.  

Miss Excel began by posting a new video on TikTok once a day. Then one of her videos went viral and hit 100,000 views in just four days. After that, the rest was history.

After her first video hit it big, Miss Excel was able to massively increase her online course sales, quit her job, and focus on growing her online course business full-time. She now boasts an impressive lineup of courses on Thinkific , helping over 17,000 students learn how to improve their Excel skills and bringing in a whopping 6-figure income in the process. 

The Budgetnista – Catering to an underserved audience 

Thinkific creator Tiffany Aliche from The Budgetnista found there was no shortage of creators offering financial advice. But she quickly realized that few online courses were catering to women – specifically black women – and this was a niche where she could use her skills and expertise to make a meaningful difference. 

By creating online courses tailored to her target audience, Tiffany carved out a hugely successful niche in a competitive industry – and built a 7-figure business in the process. To date, she’s helped over 2 million women learn how to manage their money, get out of debt, and save money smarter.

“I want to help women, especially black women, live richer lives. Because we have been left out of the financial conversation for so long.” -TIFFANY ALICHE, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR AND MEMBERSHIP SITE OWNER

Will someone pay to solve the problem your course topic covers?

Of course, to validate your online course idea, you also need to make sure that people will be willing to pay money for the products and services you’re offering.

There are a few ways to figure out who will pay for your course and how much they’ll pay. Here are 3 popular methods to validate your course idea:

• Talk to your audience : If you’re not engaging your audience during your market research, you’re missing out on valuable insights. Ask your audience about their challenges, needs, and whether or not they’d pay for a course to overcome them. Use surveys, quizzes, and 1:1 interviews to conduct your audience research and hear what your audience have to say.
• Create a free mini course: To check demand for your online course topic, create a free mini course for people to download via your website and/or social media channels. Depending on the interest in your free course, you can get a feel for whether or not a paid course would sell – and gather feedback from your audience on what could be improved and what they want to see more of.
• Pre-sell your course : To avoid creating a full-length course that no one buys, try pre-selling your online course before you create it. Pre-selling is one of the best approaches to launching an online course to make sure that you have an audience ready-and-waiting for your release date – and it can pre-fund your course production too. 

Related: 4 Steps To Validating And Selling Your Online Course

Once you’ve finalized your course topic – including who you’re tailoring your course to – it’s time to get clear on what exactly you’re offering your learners.

A critical step in learning how to create an online course is identifying your learning outcomes. Think of learning outcomes like your big picture goals for the course. Your learning outcomes summarize what your learners will gain from taking your course – and they’ll also play a key part in marketing your course to potential students.

To your learners, your learning outcomes explain clearly and succinctly what they’ll be able to do after taking your course. This means they know exactly what they’re getting from your online course before they start, helping to make sure that the people who hit “buy” are the right fit for your product.

The result? Higher completion rates, better satisfaction scores , glowing testimonials, and fewer refund requests.

How to write learning outcomes for your online course

To help you write your learning outcomes for your online course, focus on these 3 key things:

• What your learners will be able to DO by the end of your course
• What your learners will KNOW by the end of your course
• How your learners will FEEL by the end of your course

In other words, your learning outcomes should cover the skills your learners will gain, the knowledge they’ll acquire, and the attitudes and emotions they’ll feel after completing it.

Here is a formula from our creators for creating winning learning outcomes. Use this structure to create your own:

VERB + What they will do (with a measurement where possible) + how they will do it.

For example:

By the end of this program, you will be able to formulate your 3 profitable packages and offerings for your wider online course business using our profitable education business model.

Complete this statement using the formula to write your own learning outcomes: 

By the end of this program, you will be able to…

•     __________________________

Try to repeat this exercise for the skills, knowledge, and emotions your learners will have. When you’re done, you should have 9+ learning outcomes for your course.

It’s up to you whether you choose to display your learning outcomes in sentence form like this, as bullet points, or in some other format on your sales page and website. For example, Mimi Goodwin’s Sew It! Academy has a range of learning outcomes listed under each of their course pricing plans. 

As you can see, the learning outcomes are clearly listed below the cost of each membership plan. Take the ‘Kids Only’ plan for example – learners will get to understand sewing machine basics, how to cut, pin, and iron, how to sew in a straight line, and the basic stitches and terms. 

With these basic learning outcomes, the Sew It! Academy’s customers know exactly what to expect from their purchase and can easily decide if it’s the right choice for them.

“If you start at the beginning, you just go down a rabbit hole… Instead, look at the end result that you want to achieve, and focus on how you’re helping your students to transform.” – GEORGE PITTS, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

Related: How To Craft Magnetic & Compelling Learning Outcomes

Video embed: https://youtu.be/IauJLnNx8HI

Now you’re clear on the learning outcomes for your online course, you can begin to organize and structure your course content. 

If your course topic has a step-by-step linear progression – like learning a new yoga pose –  this stage should be easy.

If your course topic is more complex, you’ll need to break it down into smaller sub-topics. Try to group similar themes, tips, and ideas into different modules and structure the lessons within each module in the most progressive and logical manner. The idea here is to form a flowing sequence of lessons .

Need more help? Here are 4 tips from our creators:

Plan your online course with an instructional design storyboard

An instructional design storyboard will help save you a lot of time in the process of planning your online course content. It’s designed to keep your training focused and makes sure you hit all the most important points in the learning journey – before you sink time into fleshing out your online course.

Storyboards aren’t just a tool for planning videos. They can help you map high-level learning themes. For example, you could storyboard your student’s learning objectives using a Bloom’s Taxonomy storyboard , that covers all the levels of mastery your students need to master along the way.

Related: How to Plan an Online Course (Templates & Tips)

From here, you can start planning what courses you’ll need to create based on the themes you’ve come up with.

Related: 10 Instructional Design Models For Creating A Winning Online Course

Create a course outline

To give your course creation process more focus, create a course outline.

Think of your course outline as the roadmap for how your online course will bring your learners from point A to point B. A course outline will help you deliver content to your learners in a structured, ordered way, layering skill upon skill until they finish your course feeling like an expert.

To help you create yours, download a copy of our course outline template here.

“I’ll get a sense of how things [in the course] are flowing and then I work through it in order from the top down. I’m always adding in things, and sometimes I’ll take things out if they seem irrelevant or if I’ve covered it somewhere else.” – FIONA HUMBERSTONE, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

Plan your individual lessons

As well as thinking about your high level course outline, you’ll also need to plan your individual lessons.

When it comes to creating a lesson plan , it’s helpful to start with a few questions to determine the goal of your lesson.

• What do your students already know?
• What do they need to learn?
• What tasks and activities will help to lock that knowledge into place?

Here’s an example of a lesson plan, including learning objectives and the key topics covered.

Lesson #1: How To Source Ingredients For Baking

Learning Objective: Learn how to source ingredients for baking to save time and money

Topics Covered:

• How to find fresh locally sourced ingredients
• What ingredients to buy in bulk for multiple recipes
• How to evaluate ingredients by nutritional value

Create a lesson plan for every lesson in your online course to help you structure your content – and make your life easier when it comes to recording and creating the lessons.

Related: The Ultimate List of Free Online Course Lesson Plan Templates

Consider how you’ll structure your course academy

Most creator educators rarely create just one online course. Chances are, you’ll probably end up with a whole academy made up of many different courses.

If you can think about how you’ll structure your academy at this stage, you can understand more clearly how each course fits into the wider framework of your business.

Here’s the simplest way to think about structuring your online courses – you can follow this method to create an entire academy:

For example, let’s say the goal of your academy is to teach people about sewing. You might have a bundle of courses on sewing projects and patterns, including:

• A course on fabrics and garment sewing; a chapter about how to draft a garment; and a video lesson on using basic shapes to create a clothing item.
• A course on pattern making; with a chapter on how to read basic patterns; and a video lesson demonstrating how to sew a pattern.

Sound familiar? We gave you a glimpse of this earlier with Sew it! Academy’s pricing plan. This example was lifted straight from their course catalog. The Sew it! Academy is an ideal example of how you can bundle separate courses into cohesive units and create an overarching academy with a clear goal. 

Check out this structure map for another basic example:

By thinking about your online courses as part of a wider academy, you can build a cohesive brand throughout all your course content – making it easier to sell your courses as bundles and become known as a thought leader in your industry or field. 

“You need to do two things: make it easy for somebody to tell a friend about what you do, and make it easy for your brand to have a professional, recognizable look. That brand recognition helps give people the ability to connect the dots.” – AMANDA ROBINSON, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

You’re at the halfway point for how to create an online course that wows your audience.

To recap, you have:

• Picked the perfect course topic
• Validated demand for that topic
• Created clear and compelling learning outcomes
• Designed your course structure and plan

Now, it’s time to decide how you’ll deliver your content to create an engaging online course your learners will love.

When figuring out the best way to create an online course, you need to keep in mind your audience’s different learning needs and the ways you can deliver information to make your course as interesting as possible for your learners.

Here are a few questions to get the creative juices flowing:

• Will you have videos, reading content, activities, audio content?
• What type of visuals will you use?
• Will you have opportunities for social learning ?
• How will you make your course fun and engaging?
• How will you help students with different learning styles ?

To help you design effective learning content, follow these 3 tips.

Related: How To Design Your Online Course (Visually And Structurally)

Use a blend of different teaching techniques to make content more engaging

Traditional classroom experiences don’t always translate nicely into engaging online learning experiences. So it’s important to find ways to make your online course fun, easy, and interesting to complete. 

Here are 8 ways to make your online course more engaging :

• Bring storytelling into your teaching
• Create a learning community
• Use both synchronous and asynchronous learning
• Host live lessons or Q&As
• Use microlearning to break big topics into bite-sized chunks
• Include gamification to motivate your students
• Design your course to be accessible
• Make your courses interactive with quizzes

“I like to think of delivering your course like putting together a sitcom episode… Use lots of relevant and fun examples in your delivery and change slides and/or camera angles often. The former will keep the content interesting and the latter will re-engage the brain of your student.” – SAMANTHA KING, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

Engagement strategies like live Q&As and quizzes can be fun and add another dimension to your course content, helping to create the best possible learning experience for your audience.

When you’re creating an online course, make sure you’re also using universal design learning principles to ensure your course is accessible for anyone and everyone.

“Ask questions that make them think. Throw in a surprise slide every now and then to alert their senses and above all incorporate an opportunity to connect with you either on Facebook Live, Zoom or Instagram Live.” – YETUNDE SHORTERS, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

Related: 24 Expert Tips On How To Be A Better Teacher

Don’t make your online course too long

The ideal length of your online course is the shortest amount of time it takes to get your students from point A to point B. (The shorter, the better.)

There’s no one-size fits all approach to creating an online course. But in many cases, bite-sized learning can be just as impactful as a lengthy online course. 

A few factors may influence the length of your course – these include:

• The complexity of the topic: Your chosen course topic will determine how long your course content needs to be. For example, a course on rocket science will probably be longer than a course on how to change a tire.
• Requirements for continuing education credits: If you’re hoping to get your course certified for continuing education, your learners may need to complete a certain number of hours. These requirements will influence the length of your course and how complex your course may need to be.
• Your pricing structure: If you’re planning to create a range of online courses at different price points, this might influence how long your course is. For example, if you’re offering a deep-dive premium course offer , it may end up being longer and more in-depth than your lower ticket introductory course that just covers the basics.

Many first-time course creators fall into the trap of thinking they need to put everything they know into one course. But the secret to learning how to create an online course is knowing what to include – and what not to include.

In fact, you might be more successful if you break your course topic up into several smaller courses rather than one big course, giving your audience the chance to cherry pick the content they want to learn.

Add social elements like learning communities and cohort-based learning

We’re social animals. And one of the biggest challenges with self-paced online learning is finding ways to engage your learners and make the learning experience more social.

Consider building an online community to help facilitate meaningful connections between you and your customers. Learning communities complement online courses perfectly because they open up a space for social learning, peer-to-peer support, and learner-to-educator support. 

Online learning communities also help with accountability – learners can be paired up or placed in cohorts to collaborate on activities and hold each other accountable for hitting their learning goals.

“Online learning is definitely the thing that’s working… But along with that, I think a community or a way to touch base is important.” – EVELYN WOODS, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

Cohort-based learning is also a popular format for online courses. This model differs from self-paced learning as it’s a synchronous learning method where people gather to learn in real-time, putting the emphasis on collaboration and teamwork rather than individual learning. Cohort-based classes are a little more work to manage and coordinate – but learners tend to love them. 

And as a bonus, online communities will also help you in marketing your online course, turning your learners into powerful brand advocates – and opening up more opportunities to upsell and cross-sell to your existing customers in the future. More on that below.

Related: How To Create A Cohort-Based Course

When you’re confident in your online course structure, plan, and delivery methods, you’re ready to start creating your online course for real – including filming, recording, and editing your content. 

While this process will look different for every creator, depending on your course delivery plan, it’s likely you’ll need to shoot some video content. And you know what that means… it’s time to get in front of the camera and hit record.

Some of the most popular recording styles for online course content include:

• Talking heads – One of the top recording formats for creating online courses, talking head videos feature your face and upper body in the frame as you talk to camera. You might have a greenscreen, projector or whiteboard behind you for helpful materials like presentation slides, visuals, diagrams, animations, and much more. Consider shooting other angles too to make your content more visually interesting.
• Screen recording – Record your device’s screen to create your online course content. This style of video is used most often to walk viewers through a process, explain a concept, or create a how-to guide. You might choose to feature your face or an avatar on-screen as well. 
• Voiceovers – A voiceover is similar to a screen recording but you’re narrating what’s happening on screen. This style is often used for presentations and usually the speaker isn’t shown on screen. 

Related: How To Set Up A Video Recording Studio

Pro-Tip: Even though you’re learning how to create an online course, try looking at resources for how to build a YouTube channel too as many of the same video recording and editing principles apply. Check out content like ‘ How to Edit YouTube Videos ’ or editing software roundups to learn everything you need to know.

Don’t worry about your course content being perfect at this stage. The important thing is to get your course out there and in front of your target audience so you can start collecting feedback – then you can go back and refine and even reshoot your content based on what your customers are saying.

“I think things are shifting to becoming less perfect… you don’t have to have a huge production company to produce a course. Everybody can become a course creator with just an iPhone Pro.” – LOLA MELANI, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

If you need additional support or you want a professional touch to produce and edit your courses, consider outsourcing the work to skilled freelancers. Check out popular platforms like Upwork and Fiverr to find people ready and waiting to help you. 

Related: Best Equipment & Software for Creating Online Courses

Where you choose to host your online courses will shape the whole course experience – from creating your online course to onboarding learners to collecting feedback and issuing certificates.

When you’re building an online course business , it’s essential to choose a learning platform that fits all of your needs and can scale as you grow – including design, marketing, and community-building tools.

As you search for the perfect platform for your online courses, make sure you look at the marketing options on offer to help you promote your content. Here are some key questions to ask:

• What marketing integrations does this platform allow?
• Can I build a website and/or landing pages on this platform?
• What email marketing features do they offer?
• What metrics can I track?
• Can I create bundles and packages?

If in doubt, check out reviews, testimonials, and case studies from other creators who have used the platform to find out what it’s really like.

“Thinkific’s packages are simplistic and easy to follow. I love how user-friendly it is, and there is a ton of support. I like knowing that when I need something, I can get a response quickly.” – GEORGE PITTS, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

Related: These are The Best Platforms for Online Course Hosting

A key part of figuring out how to create an online course is knowing how your course will fit into your business overall and the pricing structure you’ll use to sell them. 

Online courses pricing can range from zero to multiple thousands of dollars. To come up with a price tag for your course content, here are a few things to consider:

• What’s your pricing structure? How you choose to package your course as a product will influence the overall course design, the value you build into it, and how you market it. Are you selling a stand-alone course, a bundle, a membership, or a combination of these? Figure out your structure first to know how to price your online course.
• What are your income goals? Let’s be real – many creator educators choose to create courses to earn additional income. Look at what you’re hoping to earn from your online courses and price them accordingly. Remember the lower the price point, the more courses you’ll need to sell to hit your income goals.
• Where does your online course fit into your overall business? If you already have an established business, your plans for how you’ll use your online course content will likely impact how you choose to price your course. If you’re planning to use your online course as a free lead magnet , a passive income stream , or your primary product, this will influence your pricing.

There are no rules for setting a pricing structure for your online course. It’s up to you to decide what you want to charge.

For a starting point, look at what your competitors are charging. Take a look at the notes you took during your competitor research and compare the depth and complexity of their content to the course you’ve created. 

If you’re confident your course is significantly better than what’s currently on the market, then price yours higher than the competition. If your main priority is keeping your course accessible and selling to as many people as possible, then you may want to price it lower – but beware of underpricing.

Here are three reasons why you shouldn’t underprice your online course:

It will hurt your bottom line

If your course is a lot cheaper than your competition, people will assume it has less value and will be less likely to buy it. That means you could be driving customers away and into your competitors’ arms. 

If your strategy is to sell your course cheap to get as many learners as possible in the door, you also risk reducing the quality of the learning experience for your customers. Why? Because you’ll have less time to support your learners, answer questions, engage your audience, and offer a personalized experience.

For example, here are 5 different ways to make $50,000 selling an online course:

It’s a lot easier to manage 25 learners and provide a high-quality, tailored experience to your learners than to try and cater to 500. And the revenue result is the same.

Your marketing effort stays the same

The effort you need to put into marketing to get someone to buy your course at a lower price point is only marginally less than for a higher priced course – so don’t make the mistake of thinking you’ll instantly sell twice as many courses by low-balling.

This guide on how to price an online course gives you more details on why underpricing isn’t a good idea: 

(Assume each lead costs $5 and you have a 5% conversion rate.)

You can’t reinvest in growth if your margins are too low 

Putting a lower price point on your online course also results in a smaller marketing and advertising budget because you’ll have less money to reinvest. 

In the example below, the $50 course actually loses money compared to the $200 course: 

That $100 profit is money you can use to reinvest in filming equipment, a graphic designer, a better microphone, or even just a day off. 

Pricing your online course can be a tricky business – but don’t fall into the trap of undervaluing your expertise and pricing too low. It can end up damaging your reputation and losing you business in the long-run.

If you have no idea where to start with pricing your online course, try asking your audience. Set up a survey to find out how much they’d be willing to pay for your expertise. The results might surprise you.

“I saw what was included in other courses, how they were priced, the content, what I would change, and what I would add… that’s how I figured out the prices. It’s been five years and they haven’t changed.” – LOLA MELANI, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

Now you’ve chosen and validated your topic, crafted your learning outcomes, created your course content, set up your school, and finalized your pricing, it’s time to launch! 

Give yourself a pat on the back, but don’t go anywhere…

If you think the work is over now you’ve completed your online course – think again. It takes a little more work to market and sell your course than just uploading it to your course platform and waiting. In reality, after launching your course you’ll need an ongoing marketing strategy to keep selling courses and converting followers into customers. In fact, your marketing plan can make the difference between zero sales and a seven-figure course business. 

To get started with your course marketing plan, try answering the following questions:

• How will you use social media to market your online courses?
• What types of content marketing will you use?
• What promotions and discounts can you offer?
• Will you run ads to market your courses?
• Do you have an existing email list you can sell to?
• Can you partner up with influencers?
• Will you run an affiliate program?

Each of these questions represent a possible pillar in your overall marketing strategy. Combine several of these strategies and you’re on the right path.

“The most important thing is not just to use marketing for the sake of it, but to actually get the right word out. I tend to prioritize quality and creativity over numbers. This has helped me build the right type of client relationships and gain traction.” – FIONA HUMBERSTONE, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

Here’s a closer look at four of the most common marketing tools creator educators use to generate interest and drive sales for their online courses. 

Related: 58 Ways To Market Your Online Course & Increase Sales

Pre-sell your online course

Pre-selling your course means you start to sell it before you’ve even created it. 

This marketing method is one of the best ways to protect yourself from wasting time by creating a course that doesn’t sell – and drum up interest for your course.

To motivate customers to enroll early, consider an early bird special offer for anyone that buys your course during your pre-sell period. That might be a discount, bonus resources, or a sneak peek. 

Make sure your pre-sale is a limited time offer to create a sense of urgency and drive your audience to take action – you can include a countdown or stopwatch on your website, emails, and social media to drive home the message.

The main thing you’ll need to pre-sell your online course is a sales page – see more details on that below 👇

Create a sales page for your online course

Next, you’ll want to create a sales page for your course . A sales page (also known as a landing page) differs from other pages on your website. 

Your sales page only has one goal – to get people to enroll in your course. Everything on your course sales page should be tailored to converting casual visitors into customers. Here are a few key features of a high-converting online course sales page:

• A clear, compelling headline (to catch visitors’ attention)
• An opening story (to introduce the problem)
• Bullet points (to highlight the benefits of the solution, how it solves the problem, what you’re offering, and bonuses)
• Testimonials (for social proof )
• Credibility (instructor bio, your experience, and more relevant info)
• Pricing details (with a clear call-to-action)
• Risk Reversal (a satisfaction guarantee)

Make sure your content is clear and compelling with a concrete call-to-action (CTA) that directs your visitors on what to do next. 

The idea of a sales page is to make your offer irresistible, so you make your potential customers’ purchase decision as easy as possible – that means giving them all the information, social proof, and learning outcomes they need to know whether your course is right for them.

Related: Course Landing Pages: What You Need to Get Better Conversions

Use the webinar launch method

As well as creating a killer sales page for your online course, you can also use webinars as a strategy to sell your courses to potential customers. Webinars work because they create an environment where you can quickly earn your audience’s trust before you ask people to act.

“We need to be personable and connect with our target audience because they’ll probably never meet you in person.” – DIAMOND LEE, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

Webinars are a proven marketing tool that can help you generate leads, generate interest, and sell your course. If you offer your webinar attendees a discount or early bird offer on your online course, you can also boost conversions.

This is a strategy Miss Excel – aka Kat Norton – has successfully used to sell her online courses. She hosts free Excel training and offers webinar attendees half-price on her courses at the end of the session, after demonstrating her expertise and showing the concrete value her target audience can expect to gain from purchasing her course. 

“This launch method is awesome. I did two webinars in April, granting me my first six-figure month… 99% of the revenue was from core sales on Thinkific.” – KAT NORTON, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

Related: How to Promote a Webinar (Ultimate Guide)

Use lead magnets to grow your email list

As well as webinars, you can also use other lead magnets to grow your email list – and market and sell to your subscribers down the line. 

If you’re not already familiar with lead magnets , it might sound like a complex marketing term – but it’s actually exactly what it sounds like. Lead magnets act like a magnet to attract potential customers to your sales page, email campaign, or overall sales funnel. 

There are a huge range of lead magnets that can be ultra-effective for attracting and converting your ideal customers. You could offer a free mini-course, masterclass, or email course – and provide your audience with a shortened version of your paid course that delivers value, builds your authority, and encourages them to engage more with your content.

You can also create downloadable resources like guides, templates, workbooks, and ebooks to use as lead magnets.

Find out what your target audience are searching for, asking about, and eager to learn more about – then create lead magnets that are tailored to their needs.

“Don’t hold back what you know, be generous with the knowledge that you have. Once I said ‘screw it’ and just started teaching everything I knew without the intention to get paid, my audience found me.” – MILLIE ADRIAN, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

It’s easy to create high-quality lead magnets for your business using graphic design tools like Canva and Adobe Express .

Related: Top Online Business Tools Used By Entrepreneurs

Build an online community

Last but certainly not least, the final stage of creating an online course is building your online community .

Why are we so obsessed with communities? Your online community is what turns one-time customers into loyal, repeat customers who act as brand advocates, mentors, and a readymade, committed focus group for your business. 

Building an online community lets you foster direct relationships with previous and current learners, allowing you to engage with your target audience in ways that a regular sales page or website won’t let you. 

By creating an online community , you give your students the space to ask you questions, share their learning experience, and give you feedback (directly or indirectly) about what your course does well and what it might be missing. You can also watch your learners grow.

“My first round of BAM graduated two years ago and they’re able to network and respond to newer members’ questions in the Slack community, as well as share their experiences, insights and stories of their journey.” – KAT LEE, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

An online community can also function as an extension of your marketing strategy. When you ‘own’ a community, you have constant access to your target market that no algorithm can take away from you. You can use this access to build authority in your niche and generate more revenue. 

Just remember, as the community manager , it’s also your responsibility to keep the community machine oiled and the wheels turning. This might include:

• Sharing themed posts for each day of the week
• Asking questions to spark conversations
• Answering questions yourself or calling on others to share their tips
• Enforcing community rules and guidelines to ensure the safety of your members

And most importantly, it’s your responsibility to make sure you give more than you ask . Your students will quickly see through you if your community is nothing more than a marketing tool. So whatever you do, put people first . 

“For me, a membership is more effective than a one-off course because every single month I can check in with my students and watch them grow. Business has ups and downs and it’s never going to be perfect. I want to be there for all of it, and that’s what I love about the membership framework.” – AMANDA SCHONBERG, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR AND MEMBERSHIP SITE OWNER

Related: 13 Membership Site Examples That Will Inspire You

As well as improving the online course experience for your learners, an engaged, committed community can become the perfect space for generating new ideas, testing future products, and gathering valuable feedback to help you keep improving your offering and create the best possible experience for your customers.

Learn how to create an online course and start making money from your expertise today

The process of creating an online course can be hugely rewarding – especially if you’re able to create a resource that is genuinely helpful, valuable, and even life changing for your target audience.

If you have expertise and experience that you want to share with the world, now is the time to start. These 10 steps cover what to expect from the journey of creating, marketing, and selling online courses – all that’s left to do is for you to take the plunge. 

And if you need more inspiration, check out our Creator Stories from people who started where you are today.

“It’s never been easier to build your own course with all of the amazing tools that are offered nowadays to content creators… If I could do it in my living room on my laptop and make $1.3M in sales, you can do it too.” – LOLA MELANI, THINKIFIC COURSE CREATOR

Launch your online learning product for free 

Use Thinkific to create, market, and sell online courses, lead magnets, communities, and memberships — all from a single platform.

This blog was originally published in September 2021, it’s since been updated in May 2024 to include new information. 

Elizabeth Harris is a content marketer and copywriter with a passion for helping businesses get the most out of their content, helping to educate, inspire, and engage audiences.

• How to Plan an Online Course (Templates & Tips)
• How to Price Your Online Course (Complete Guide to Course Pricing)
• How To Create An Effective Course Outline (+Template)
• 7 Instructional Design Storyboard Templates For Online Course Creators
• 8 Steps to Building an Online Course Business (+ Business Plan Template)

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I'm an entrepreneur with 6 tips for building a website for your small business without breaking the bank

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• I built my first business website in 2000 — it was hard to get started, and even harder to make it look good.
• Now, there are low-cost options to make your small business website look professional.
• Many hosting plans give you a staging area where you can experiment with your site's design.

You can do many things to succeed as a small-business owner — steps like forming an LLC and getting a business credit card can help. One of the most important steps you can take is building a website for your business.

I got my first business website around 2000. In those days, you had to learn Dreamweaver or HTML to build your site from scratch, and it would still probably look terrible. I didn't know how to do it myself, so I hired a designer. I had to wait for her to be available for updates, which meant my site was often stale. I vowed never to have another business website I couldn't manage myself.

Now, many tools are available to help new business owners build and take control of their websites. I built my freelance writing website in WordPress, which is much fancier than I could have designed without those tools. I had help from a consultant to develop this version of my site, but you don't need that. Here's what you need to know.

1. Plan to spend some time on your website

When I was ready to build my first business website, a friend who had created a site for her business told me she could help me and we could do it in an evening. That was not overly optimistic. I spent about 10 hours getting my website up and another 15 hours updating it with a new theme a few years later.

2. Build it in WordPress

There's a reason WordPress is the most popular website-building platform. It is robust and full-featured, updates often, and is free. Because of its popularity, there are endless plugins, many free, that you can use to increase functionality. WordPress comes with a built-in page builder that's easy to use. Platforms like Wix or Weebly that promise simpler builds don't have the flexibility and, in my experience, aren't any easier to work with than WordPress.

One of the best things about WordPress is online help. I have never taken a class in WordPress; the online community is my help desk and instructor. I now help manage WordPress sites for my clients, not because I'm a techie but because it truly is easy.

3. Choose a low-cost hosting platform

WordPress is free, but you'll need to pay for hosting. I use Bluehost and pay about $400 annually, which gives me access to several security add-ons. Many services offer low-cost hosting for WordPress sites, and you can often manage your domain registration through the same company.

4. Use a page builder

WordPress's web builder keeps improving, but I recommend adding a drag-and-drop builder to give you more tools to add functionality and visual interest. There are many builders with free versions; two popular ones are Elementor and Beaver Builder. I use the Divi builder, which is not free, but I bought a lifetime license on sale for around $150.

5. Start with page templates

Templates are packs of pages with all the design elements in place. All you have to do is substitute your graphics and text. One way to choose a page builder is by looking at templates and using the builder for the template you like.

There are both free and paid templates. My builder subscription includes many free template packs; I chose one designed for freelancers. Using template pages gave my website a unified look, saving me a tremendous amount of time in design.

6. Do not fear failure

One of my favorite things about working on the web is that absolutely anything can be changed. I once accidentally changed the background color of my theme, which made all my pages look hideous, but I simply changed it back — no lasting harm done. Be experimental. Try new things.

One final pro tip: My hosting plan allows me to create a staging site where I can fiddle around to my heart's content while my current site remains live and unchanged. It is shockingly easy to set this up. When I first built my current website, I used a WordPress theme that wasn't very flexible. I created a staging site where I could take my time renovating the site with my new builder and templates. When I was ready, I switched to the updated pages with a click.

Watch: How two brothers are turning busted skateboards into bowls, furniture, and jewelry

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