Working with a business plan writer is a great alternative to writing your business plan on your own.
It can benefit busy entrepreneurs who don’t consider themselves natural writers. A good business plan writer may have written hundreds of business plans. Experienced plan writers know what works with lenders and investors and what doesn’t. They know how to do good market research and capture the ins and outs of putting together a solid financial forecast.
With a good business plan writer, you save time and gain access to expertise that you may not have yourself. With the time you save, you can spend more energy focusing on getting your business up and running.
But how do you know if you’re hiring a good business plan writer? Here are 10 key questions you should ask when interviewing a business plan writer or a business plan writing company.
1. Who is going to write your plan?
When shopping for someone to write your business plan, you’ll mostly talk to business plan writing companies, not individuals. If that’s the case, you’ll likely talk to a salesperson or project manager who will manage your business plan writing process. Not the person who will write your business plan.
So, it’s essential to ask about the expertise of the person writing your plan. Get as many details about the person or team who will write your business plan as possible. You should be able to get details on their experience, the types of plans they’ve written, the business plan templates they use, and their business background.
This information is essential when you trust your business plan to a professional writer. Say you’re starting a restaurant and seeking help writing your business plan. You wouldn’t want to hand your plan over to a writer who has only written business plans for tech startups because they might not have the expertise to know what’s essential for a plan in your industry.
2. Is your plan writer based in your region?
Sometimes, time zone differences and language barriers can lead to communication breakdowns when working with people remotely. As you search for plan writers, you’ll want to be sensitive to that and find someone whose schedule and communication style are compatible with your own.
That doesn’t necessarily mean they have to be in the same geographic region as you. But make sure that you’re able to communicate clearly and efficiently with plan writers as you evaluate plan writers. Otherwise, unnecessary delays can slow you down.
3. How will my writer and I share information?
During the plan writing process, you will certainly be sharing much information about your business with your plan writer. What is the plan for sharing that information? Will you be submitting forms, making phone calls, sending emails, etc? You’ll want to know how your plan writer expects to communicate with you so you can come to meetings prepared.
Understanding how information will be exchanged in advance will help keep the plan writing process moving forward since you’ll be submitting information to your writer in the format they’re expecting.
4. Will your plan include market research for your specific industry and location?
Market research is a vital part of any business plan. It supports a plan by revealing the size of the market opportunity, what customers expect from a business in that industry, what competitors are offering, and more.
Lenders and investors will look for this section of your business plan and expect to find solid data here. So, you should clarify with your plan writer that they will be incorporating legitimate, relevant market research in your plan. That means finding data that are as specific to your business’s actual market as possible.
5. How many rounds of revisions will your plan writer do for you?
The first pass of any document is rarely perfect. And business plans in particular are an iterative process, meant to be refined over time.
Find out if your plan writer will offer revisions, and what type of edits will be covered when they do. It’s not uncommon for a business plan to go through several rounds of edits between the plan writer and the business owner as they work to tailor it to the owner’s specific needs. So you’ll want to know how many revisions are provided, what the process is like, and if any additional charges will be incurred.
6. What format will your plan be delivered in?
When your plan is finished, what format will you receive it in? Will it be in an editable, formatted text document? A flattened PDF? Can it be easily shared with other business partners and lenders? Do you have a say in the format you get?
If your plan is delivered as a PDF that you can’t easily edit, you’ll want to know what the process will be like to request any changes from your business plan writer. Or if it’s possible to have access to multiple document formats.
7. Can you make your own edits to the plan after it is delivered to you?
Echoing the point above, having some versatility in your final product can be crucial. Think about getting your business plan, receiving a bank loan, and then realizing you need to pivot part of your business to capitalize on a new market opportunity. In this case, it would be extremely beneficial to have a business plan in a format that you can open up and make a few changes to, without having to go back and have the entire plan rewritten.
Things can change quickly as your business moves forward, so you’ll want to be certain that your plan is delivered in a format that can be adapted over time.
8. How much will future changes to your plan or financial model cost?
Say your business has changed enough since receiving your plan that you need to update several sections. Or, perhaps the bank you submitted your plan to approved you for a smaller loan amount than you asked for, resulting in a request for an updated copy of your plan. You would need to make some adjustments in that case to reflect your use of the new, lower amount of funds.
If you can’t make edits to your financial model yourself, you’ll want to know the cost of any changes, and if there will be a way for you to make your own changes going forward.
9. Is business planning software included?
Business plans are living, breathing documents, and should be able to help you start, run, and expand your business. Some plan writing services provide you with a finalized business plan document — but not the next steps or the tools to update it as your business changes and grows. Other plan writers will provide you with software or other tools to make it easy to update your own plan and track your progress as your business grows.
Discovering what extra features or services you might receive as part of your contract with a plan writer can help influence who you choose to work with.
10. Will you be provided with tools to track your progress against your plan?
Keeping your plan up to date and adjusting your goals is an important part of running a successful business. Are you staying on budget and meeting your sales goals?
Once you’re up and running, and are tracking your sales and expenses in your accounting software, you should regularly compare your actual results to what you said you would do in your business plan. Having access to the kinds of tools to do that upfront is invaluable. You’ll want to know if that’s included with your plan, or if you’ll need to purchase it yourself.
