Planning For Your Virtual Assistant Business

Planning

The most important part of developing any business is the planning stage. More than 90 percent of all start-up enterprises fail before the first year is over because the owners didn’t spend enough time planning all the different aspects of the business. When you create a workable, actionable plan, you create a road map for the path that your business will follow. If your road map isn’t complete, you can easily get lost along the way. If you spend the time inserting every prevalent detail, you’ll have a clear road to follow, and you will experience a lot less stress along the way.

Business advice

If you’ve never attempted to start your own business before, planning is especially important because you don’t have any personal frame of reference for the experience you’re about to enter. You can read all the guides and business advice you want, but until you experience the trials (and the joys) of being a self-employed business owner they’re nothing but words on a page.

Process

Despite that, it IS important to read about the process as much as possible. You can’t play football unless you read the rules first, and starting a business goes the same way. You should be able to get a good understanding of the general path that you’ll need to follow, and from there you have to start developing your business model.


Business Model

A thorough business model is important for two reasons. First is the reason that was already mentioned: it acts as a guide while you push your way through the first stages of your business. Second, it serves as a brochure of sorts if you need to acquire a bank loan or convince a partner to work with you on the business. It should clearly state all the goals of the business and the methods which you plan to employ to reach those goals. Having a clear, well thought out business model gives the appearance that you plan to take your business seriously, not just treat it like a fly by night whim that you are liable to forget about after just a few months. It gives any potential investors security by showing that you mean business, in a very literal way.

So what should the business model include? It should have three distinct sections.

Executive summary

First, you should begin with what’s known as an executive summary. This summary will explain an overview of the entire business. It’s a condensation of all the later parts, and will be the first thing that will grab the attention of your potential investors. Many times, a decision is bade based solely on the executive summary so be sure to make it long enough to cover everything, but short enough to be easy to digest.

Description

Second, you need a description of the business itself, including the type of service that you will be providing and the types of people who will benefit from this.

Strategy on How to get Business

Finally, you need to include a marketing strategy, showing how you plan to get business and expand on who your business will be targeting.

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