Why Is A Business Plan Important For Your Online Home Business

A business plan is a prerequisite if you really want to succeed in your online home business. Without it, you cannot know where you are going. And if you can't know where you are going, it's difficult to know when you will get there. You shouldn't therefore ignore the importance of developing a plan for your online business no matter how small it is. The major importance of a business plan is therefore to guide the business by showing what the business intends to achieve and how to achieve it.

Although very many people start online businesses every day, few of them remain committed to their businesses for some time and benefit from them. One of the reasons why most of them pullout in the first few months of running their businesses is lack of a plan to guide them. Not having a plan a sure way of failure in any business. But having a business plan is a wise and proven approach to your small online home business for the following reasons:

1. It gives a sense for what you have to expect, before you enter on the long journey of doing business.

It enables you to start your business after having prepared yourself as much as you can. This makes it possible to know clearly what to do, when to do it and how to do it.

2. It guides you to run your business and to be more focused.

The process of developing a business plan enables you to think about setting business objectives and goals. The goals you set guide you to achieve something, encourage you to work and assist you to watch and check your performance and the entire business as well. You can never hit a target you can't see. When you have goals, you are able to focus your efforts and to have a sense of direction.

3. Having a business plan is a way of selling yourself and your home business to possible partners.

You are able to confidently speak out to your partners from a more informed point of view. People will always believe in you more than the one who doesn't have a plan.

4. It shows that you are organized and you know your business well. I have always said that the future belongs to those who are organized. If you are disorganized in whatever you do, it's very difficult to succeed in your home business. Having a business plan for your business makes you look organized and someone who knows what he/she is doing. And having good organizational skills is a key to success in your business.

5. It provides information about the business and the market you are to operate in.

The process of making a business plan enables you to focus in depth on the nature of your business and the products or services you intend to offer. It also enables you to focus on your target market, how to position yourself in the market, the competition, the anticipated demand, marketing methods, how to attract new customers and how to support your customers. This is very useful information, which provides you with a clear and broader picture of your business.

6. It increases your chances of obtaining financial assistance.

A well prepared business plan opens up the doors for you to access financial support. It becomes easier for you to access, say, a loan from the bank to set up your business or to grow your business.

In conclusion, if you have an online home business without a business plan, it's high time you made one for you to succeed in your business. Having a business plan makes it possible for you to see the upside and downside, to set clear goals, expectations and ways to accomplish them, to make good business decisions and to sell your business to your partners.

If the Business For Sale Doesn't Make Money, Buying It Is Bad Business

Selling your business can be a life changing event. There is a vast amount of work that goes into having a business for sale, work that must be done. Preparation, as in many projects we take on in life, is a key part of a successful selling of one's business. Consider these business ideas when planning to sell your business.

To begin with, it must be understood that having a small business for sale involves evaluating a few primary areas of your enterprise. These areas are the positive and negative aspects which will affect the value. Of course there are endless variations on different businesses, and even businesses within the same category and type will have variations. But for the purposes of preparation, here are the main ones to consider.

We begin with the assets. Assets can be broken down into categories such as cash, investments, equipment, accounts receivable, goodwill, and real estate. Assets are the valuable possessions of the business which can be used to produce revenue and earn profits. A business must have some sorts of assets to be a business, and it must be able to produce revenue. So our first consideration is: does the business make money?

Clearly, for a business to have value it must be able to make money. How could it be worth much otherwise? Making money is the reason businesses exist; they are not there just because they enrich people's lives or keep people occupied; that's what non-profits and government bureaucracies are for. Businesses exist to make money, bottom line.

Unfortunately, there are many small businesses for sale that do not make money, i.e. (they do not "cash flow") but are being marketed for sale, at high prices. If you ask the sellers how they can justify the price, you will get a variety of answers ranging from "Because we have put so much into the business" to "Because it is going to make a lot of money in the future".

The problem here can be understood best by doing a quick mental switch and putting yourself in the shoes of the buyer. Now you are buying the business for sale and you are getting ready to write a huge check to take over the operation and all its hassles and challenges and surprises. And you ask yourself this very rudimentary, basic question: Am I willing to pay for something with the mere hope that I can make it pay me back, even though it's NOT doing it now?

It doesn't take an IQ above room temperature to realize you cannot simply hope to make money if you are going to spend money to get that opportunity. In other words, you cannot, you should not, pay for risk. The ancient equation of risk and return comes into play here. Knowingly taking on risk should come at really cheap prices, or no price at all. But to buy a business, a profitable business that has a current track record of making money, should come at a price, even a high price if it makes enough money.

The point of the discussion boils down to this: if a business is going to sell for money, it needs to be making money. Money is the reason we go to work each day. Some people say they work because they love the work, and it may be true, but still, we do business to make money, pure and simple. If a business we are involved in is not making money, it has lost its most primary quality, and therefore has limited to no value. Just as a real estate property has value because of its scarcity and usefulness, and a buyer pays for it with the intention of gaining appreciation and using the property, in a similar way a business has value because of its money making capabilities, and a buyer pays for it with the intention of doing just that... making money.

There are some exceptions to this rule, but very few. An example might be a situation where the buyer of the business is buying an "idea", or a concept. In this case, he or she might be buying a business for sale in a brand new market, where there exists little to no competition. With that comes the downside of little to no income, where perhaps there is a market but it has not been fully exploited. But these situations are the extreme exception, and should be approached with the utmost in caution.

In summary... when it comes time for the business owner to sell his or her business, is important to prepare for the sale and consider how buyers will view the business. And one of the best ways to understand the sales process is to view it from the buyer's perspective. "Would I buy it? Why or why not?" The business may have a lot of wonderful things about it: the market, the product, the people... but if it doesn't make money, for whatever reason, the buyer won't want to pay for it.

Reasons Why Your Small Home Business Needs Home Based Business Insurance

It's estimated that more than half of all small businesses in the U.S. are home based businesses. The Census Bureau estimates that there are over 27 million home based businesses as of 2007. This has certainly risen since the down turn in the economy when many people lost their jobs. This shift has given way to the small, home based business of today and tomorrow.

As an Independent Insurance Agent I run my business out of my home. The benefits are tremendous and technology allows more efficiency and productivity. I'm able to spend more quality time with my family instead of dead time on a commute to an office. I'm able to react to customer requests more quickly. And, I found out that I'm not alone. I meet so many people who manage their small businesses from their home, it's fantastic.

But, there is a problem. Most of these at-home small businesses don't have home based business insurance. I find there are three common reasons these entrepreneurs don't have business insurance. These are also the three reason's you need a home based business insurance policy.

My Home Insurance Policy will cover me. It's logical to think, since they own a home, somehow their home insurance company is going to cover any loss they may have. Unfortunately this is not the case. Most home insurance policies have a minimal amount of coverage for Business Property. So, if you have product, equipment, or supplies related to your business, at your home, there will be little or no coverage and, if the product, equipment, or supplies is away from your home then you'll have even less coverage. Generally, you can increase this coverage through a special endorsement but most insurance companies won't go higher than $10,000.

Besides limited Business Property coverage, there is minimal coverage for Business Liability under your home hazard insurance policy. Imagine a product you produce injures someone after purchase. Your home policy will not cover this type of liability claim. Or, say the UPS driver is delivering supplies and material and gets injured on your property due to a hazard. Will you have coverage for this loss? No. Are you a Realtor? You may have limited coverage if you're out showing homes and your buyer is injured or you cause property damage. We live in a risk filled world, with people who are more inclined to sue than not. It's in your best interest to protect yourself by having the right home based business insurance.

I've had my business at home for a long time and nothing has happened so I don't think I need it. This is a common excuse I hear from many home based business owners. They don't believe they face any risk. I once went to the home business of a seamstress. She had a room where she did alterations for her clients and she had cats. One of the cats was wearing a diaper because it was marking its territory in the house. What if the cats damaged a wedding dress or a stack of high end jeans waiting to be altered? Just because nothing has happened before doesn't mean something won't happen in the future. Give your clients assurance and confidence that you are a legitimate business by have the proper insurance.

Business insurance is expensive and I don't think I can afford it. This couldn't be further from the truth. Many home based businesses just need a basic home based business insurance policy. These can run as little as $159 annually depending on the type of business and the amount of coverage you may need. Also, you might be losing business because you don't have any business insurance. To bid on contracts you usually need to show a Certificate of Insurance proving a minimum level of coverage. Having the right business policy can put significant dollars in your pocket, many times more than the cost of the policy.

What a "Business For Sale" Really Means

Having a business for sale can mean a lot of things - more than people might think. How does one business value compare to another, and how to arrive at that value? Because there are many types of businesses that exist for many different industries, it stands to reason there are numerous ways of approaching the process to find the value.

There are the three main approaches to value, which are the income approach, the market approach, and the asset approach. There are variations of these approaches, and combinations of them, and things which must be looked at because each and every business will have variations of what gives the business worth, and some of these differences are substantial.

First we must identify the type of sale: stock sale or asset sale. A stock sale is the sale of the company stock; the buyer is buying the company based upon the value of its stock, which represents everything in the business: earning power, equipment, goodwill, liabilities, etc. In an asset sale, the buyer is buying the company assets and capital which enable the company to make profits, but is not necessarily assuming any liabilities with the purchase. Most small businesses for sale are sold as an "asset sale".

Our question, when selling a business or buying a business, is this: what are the assets considered to arrive at an accurate value? Here we will look at some of the most common.

1. FF and E: This abbreviation stands for furniture, fixtures, and equipment. These are the tangible assets used by the business to operate and make money. All businesses (with a few exceptions) will have some amount of FF&E. The value of these can vary greatly, but in most cases the value is included in the value as determined by the income.

2. Leaseholds: the leasehold is the lease agreement between the owner of the property and the business that rents the property. The agreed upon leased space typically goes with the sale of the business. This can be a significant value, especially if there is an under market rate currently charged and the lessor is obligated to continue with the current terms.

3. Contract rights: many businesses do business based on ongoing contracts, agreements with other entities to do certain things for certain periods of time. There can be immense value in these agreements, and when someone buys a business he or she is buying the rights to these agreements.

4. Licenses: in certain business sales, licenses do not apply; in others, there can be no business without them. Building contracting is one of them. So is accounting. For a buyer to buy a business, his purchase includes either buying the license to the company or the license to the individual. Often times, the buyer will require the access or availability of the license as a contingent element of the sale.

5. Goodwill: Goodwill is the earnings of a business above and beyond the fair market return of its net tangible assets. In other words, whatever the business makes in excess of its identifiable assets is considered "goodwill" income, where there exists a synergy of all of the assets together. This one can be tricky. Most business owners assume they have goodwill in their business, but goodwill is not always positive; there is such things as "negative" goodwill. If the business makes less than the sum total of its identifiable assets, there exists negative goodwill.

6. Trade secrets: some businesses are all about secrets. The reason the business is in operation may be because of a trade secret, some aspect of a product or service that sets it apart and gives it a market. In a business purchase, these secrets have value and go with the sale.

7. Trade names, telephone numbers, websites, and domain names: some businesses generate business simply because of its name and identifiable aspects. If those were to change, so would the profits. So in buying a business, the buyer will have need of those names and numbers to continue on in business. Of course, in some cases these things would not matter at all, and that is why each one must be approached individually.

8. Works in progress: a construction company may have a multi-million dollar job going on at the time of the sale, which can take months to complete. In case such as this, the buyer would have need of continuing on in the particular job the company was engaged in; for money and for reputation. This is considered a work in progress and has value and therefore is considered an asset and made part of the sale.

9. Business records: the history of a business detailed in documents and spreadsheets must necessarily become part of the business sale. The new owner can make use of records in identifying progress, tracking increased or decreased sales, adjusting expenditures and depreciation rates, etc. When someone purchases a business, they are buying the current operation and all the details that led to it.

10. Real estate: the seller-owned property on which the business does its business is inherent to the operation and therefore the value. There are times when the new buyer needs to move the business to purchase it, but more often the real estate is viewed as a major aspect of the business value, especially if there is equipment attached to the property and buildings suited specifically to the business.

When a business for sale is valued by a professional appraiser, a business broker, or a business owner, more than just the income is considered. Assets, economic values used by the business to produce revenue and profits, are weighed heavily to determine the worth of the business. And they must be considered to understand what a "business for sale" really means to a buyer.