Burn Resources, Get Money
While having a business plan on hand at all times may seem cliché, it is actually the mark of an efficient and well-thought-out business. Business owners who do not have a business plan can often be stumped when put in an impromptu networking situation. They also may cause their business to fail because they have no direction where they want to go or no plan for how to get where they are going. A business plan is essential to the success of your business because it determines how various resources should be allocated and enables strategy in interpersonal settings.
Spend Wisely and the Rewards are Mighty
Businesses always come with budgets and it is the responsibility of the business owner to determine how the budget should be spent to obtain various types of assets. These decisions can be difficult, but spending money wisely can result in positive growth for the business. However, unwise decisions can lead to heavy losses to the business and even can result in business failure. Having a business plan can help determine what are wise investments and what are wastes of money.
For example, having a business plan can help determine if the business needs to hire new people to help run the business[1]. Whether it’s a personal assistant or an accountant or another professional to lend their services to the business, it’s important to be able to attract people with talents and skills that the business owner or other employees don’t already have[2]. It diversifies your business and grows the business’s potential[3]. The business plan allows for easier determination if hiring help is cost-effective or is a waste of resources.
Another resource that needs to be invested in wisely is renting office space. Rent is a financial obligation that is often fixed and can be a financial drain if the space isn’t used[4]. It may be more financially prudent to buy instead of lease. The business plan helps determine how much your business has the potential to grow and if investing in space is worth the financial risk[5].
Networking Events are Strategic Social Interactions
The idea of networking may seem daunting to the new business owner. It may seem like a forced and manipulative way to talk to friends and family. Or it may be hard to remember the reasons someone should invest in the business on the fly. However, networking is essential to business growth. A business plan allows for ease in talking with friends, family, lenders, and investors about why they should care about the business.
The act of starting an independent business can be scary for friends and family. They will want to know exactly what the direction is, how the business is going to get there, and if there are contingencies for things going wrong. All these concerns can be assuaged easily if there is a business plan[6]. It provides an easy way to answer all these questions and can also calm personal anxieties about the business by being a reminder that there is a plan and it’s not all unknown[7].
Having a business plan on hand sets anxious feelings investors and lenders can have as well. Investors and money lenders are essential because they help get the business off the ground and help it grow to reach more clients. They need to know how risky investing in this business is and what are the advantages of investing in this business[8]. A business plan prepares for addressing these issues intelligently and honestly, which helps grow the business[9].
How to Be A Wise Spender and Strategically Social
These skills are hard to learn, but ultimately extremely rewarding in the end. As a freelance typesetter and book designer, I have a unique skill set that will help me have a successful business. There are not as many freelance typesetters as there are freelance copyeditors. My plan is to use purchased resources and networking to grow my business so it can sustain my lifestyle during grad school in the way a part-time job would.
There are quite a few purchasable resources that I will need to have to have a successful business. Firstly, I will continue my subscription to the Adobe Creative Cloud, which is approximately $32 a month. While this may seem expensive to some, it is an essential resource for typesetting and book design. Having a Creative Cloud subscription gives me access to InDesign and Adobe’s vast array of fonts and other free resources. It is also industry standard to use the Creative Cloud, so I need it to remain competitive with other freelancers. Secondly, I plan on selectively investing in fonts when I find ones that I like enough to reuse multiple times. This will be a rare purchase, due to the wide variety of Adobe fonts, but it may sometimes be necessary. I will need to be especially judicious when buying fonts. Lastly, I will probably invest in some kind of website subscription so I can display my design portfolio effectively. I will have to ruminate for a long time about this, since there are some free website building platforms that are good. I may want to save money, but I also may want to look more professional by spending money on my own domain name. All these decisions need to be taken into consideration with great care, especially since I currently don’t have a constant source of income.
Networking will also be essential to building my freelancing business. I know a few people heavily involved in the small publishing scene in Utah, so I will let them know I am open for business and will post on the Facebook groups for networking that I am on. I also have a couple contacts in the New York book publishing scene, so I will reach out to them and find out if they know of any online freelancing communities that I can join. Additionally, I will also probably become that annoying person on social media that posts all the time about my small business. I may need to create social media pages separate from my art accounts just so it doesn’t get too confusing for any of my followers. I am uncomfortable when I feel like I am manipulating my friends, but I am going to have to do these things to be a competitive freelancer.
The business plan allows for business growth by determining how resources should be allocated and aiding in interpersonal business practices. A business needs to have potential to grow to succeed in the market. If there is no potential for growth, the business is essentially dead in the water. There will be no investors, no clients, and no hope at explaining bankruptcy to friends and family. A business plan is essential for success.
Berry, Tim. “15 Reasons You Need a Business Plan.” Entrepreneur. March 13, 2006. https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/83818.
Now from Nationwide. “What is the Importance of a Business Plan?” September 19, 2019. https://blog.nationwide.com/importance-of-a-business-plan/.
Nunn, Les, and Brian McGuire, “The Importance Of A Good Business Plan.” Journal of Business & Economics Research, vol. 8 no. 2 (2010) 95-106.
[1] Tim Berry. “15 Reasons You Need a Business Plan,” Entrepreneur, March 13, 2006. https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/83818.
[2] “What is the Importance of a Business Plan?” Now from Nationwide, September 19, 2019. https://blog.nationwide.com/importance-of-a-business-plan/.
[3] Nationwide, “What is the Importance…”
[7] Les Nunn and Brian McGuire, “The Importance Of A Good Business Plan,” Journal of Business & Economics Research, vol. 8 no. 2 (2010) 95-106.
[8] Nunn, “The Importance…”
[9] Nunn, “The Importance…”
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