商业计划书写作--执行摘要（英文版）

Starting your business plan
In today's lesson I'll show you how to start your business plan.

Today I show you how to start - and it's not at the beginning.
If you have a look back at the template you downloaded, you'll see the very first section is the executive summary.
As it says, this is a summary - it's a summary of your plan - and you write it AFTER you have completed the rest of your plan.
But starting is difficult.
The best way is to think CUSTOMER and SERVICE/ PRODUCT in that order.

Your customers are king - they buy your products ...
... so it's critical you understand what they need and look after them when they purchase from you -- you never know who they are likely to discuss your business with (and hopefully it will be others on recommendations).
With any product or service you are aiming to sell, you are trying to solve a problem or desire that your potential customer has.
So, if it's a restaurant you want to run, then think about the TYPE of customer you wish to attract.
Are you looking for customers who want cheap food 'on the go' (like sandwiches and salads) or 'an evening out'
Once you know what your customer WANTS you'll be able to target your products to those customers.
This is the ONE area to get right.
If you don't understand what your customers want, you'll end up trying to sell the wrong items to them.

Your customer demographics
So now you know what your customers want it's time to work out what they look like.
You need to work out:
their age
gender
geographic location
income
if they have kids
if they live with someone
what type of house do they live in
Once you have built up a picture of your customers you'll be able to target your products and services at the right price to these customers.
You'll also be able to create the correct messages when communicating to these customers.
Planning helps you understand your business. It can be frustrating when there are no customers about and you don't know why.
Planning helps you look at your own business and the businesses of others to get the best of everything.