Business & Strategy
Business Plan Board for Beginners: Fill In 8 Chapters and Finish Your First Plan
Beginner | 2 whiteboard pages · Task board: 5 columns (4 parent tasks, 12 subtasks)
Beginner: No technical terms. Just answer the whiteboard's questions, following the examples, and it takes shape.
A beginner-friendly business plan template for first-time founders and side-hustlers who need to know how to write a business plan and what belongs in each of the 8 chapters. On the whiteboard, the left page holds a table of the 8 chapters in two columns, what to write and an example, a 3C analysis in three columns and a 4P analysis in four; the right page holds who the plan is for, the five steps of the writing order, three frames of common criticism, a memo of the sales and cost figures and two pre-submission checklists. The task board has five columns, Gathering, Drafting, Numbers, Review and Done, with 4 parent tasks and 3 subtasks each, 16 in all, none of them started. Because every chapter tells you what to put in it, you never face a blank page, even for the first plan you hand to a lender. Amounts are in dollars. If researching the market feels hard, fill the 3C columns first and they become the draft of chapter 4, and the 4P columns become the draft of chapters 3 and 5.
Once you have a free account, you can copy this template from the marketplace
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Business Plan Outline Board
How to use: (1) Decide who will read the plan → (2) Fill in the table of the 8 chapters → (3) Turn the 3C analysis into one winning line → (4) Set how you sell with the 4P analysis → (5) Work out the figures in the writing order → (6) Go through both checklists before you submit
1. The 8 chapters (what to write, with an example)
| What to write | Example | |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Business summary | What you sell, who to and how, in three lines. Write it last and put it first. | e.g. ready meals for dual-income households, on a monthly plan, picked up on weekday evenings at the shop by the station or delivered. |
| 2. Why you start | Why you, of all people. Give the experience, the training and the trigger as facts. | e.g. seven years in a deli, three as manager. Friends working two jobs kept asking what to eat at night. |
| 3. Product and service | Items, price, cost and what sets you apart. Add a draft menu if you have one. | e.g. $4.50 a meal (cost $1.80). Two sides included. A dietitian keeps the salt under 2 g. |
| 4. Market and rivals | Local population and households, the price and strength of three rivals, your winning angle. | e.g. 4,200 dual-income households within 2 km. Two supermarkets and one lunchbox shop. Nobody hands food over after 9 pm. |
| 5. Sales plan | How people hear of you, how they buy, and how they keep buying. | e.g. flyers outside nurseries and social posts. Half price the first month, then a plan of 8 meals a month. |
| 6. Team and staff | Who does what. Headcount, contract type and the wage bill. | e.g. the owner (cooking and buying) plus two part-timers, 7 to 10 pm. Wages $2,300 a month. |
| 7. Profit plan | Sales, cost, expenses and profit month by month. Twelve months for year one. | e.g. sales $9,000, cost $3,600, expenses $4,100, profit $1,300. Break-even is sales of $6,850. |
| 8. Funding and timing | How much you need, where it comes from and what happens when. | e.g. equipment $25,000 plus $8,000 working capital. Own funds $13,000 plus a $20,000 loan. Sign in March, open in May. |
2. 3C analysis (market) — turn customer, company and competitor into one winning line
Customer Buyers and market
- Who buys, in one line e.g. households with two jobs who cannot cook after 8 pm on a weekday
- Give the local count a source e.g. 4,200 dual-income households within 2 km (2025 census)
- Use the buyer's own words e.g. "no deli around here is open at nine"
Company Your own business
- Put strengths in a form chapter 4 can use e.g. seven years in delis, 10 meals prepped in 20 minutes
- How much you can supply today e.g. 80 meals a day (this ceiling caps the sales plan)
- Write one weakness too e.g. no delivery experience (year one is mostly collection)
Competitor Rivals
- Visit the three nearest e.g. two supermarkets and one lunchbox shop
- Time the closing hour and note the price e.g. $2.80 to $4.80 a meal, all shut at 9 pm
- Put the point you win on in one line e.g. nobody hands food over after 9 pm = the winning line for chapter 4
3. 4P analysis (marketing mix) — product and price draft chapter 3, place and promotion draft chapter 5
Product What you sell
- Narrow it to one thing e.g. a meal box of one main and two sides (salt under 2 g)
Price What you charge
- Put price and cost side by side e.g. $4.50 (cost $1.80, a 40 per cent cost ratio)
Place How it reaches them
- Where you hand it over e.g. collection at the shop by the station and delivery within 2 km
Promotion How they hear
- Two ways at most e.g. flyers outside nurseries and social posts
4. What a business plan is and who reads it (bank, investor, yourself)
- What a business plan is e.g. a document setting out what the business does and how much it needs and earns, in a form an outsider can judge. Five to ten A4 pages is usual.
- Who reads it (pick one) e.g. the small-business loan desk at your bank, reading it to decide on a $20,000 startup loan. Others: investors / sorting out your own thinking / a supplier
- The three things a reader wants Will it really sell / can you pay it back / can this person do it. A plan that leaves any of the three unanswered comes straight back.
5. The writing order (content, then numbers, then summary)
- 1. Gather the material Get the local data, the rivals' prices and your own record to hand first. e.g. take the population from the census and buy something at all three rivals. It cuts the time spent staring at a blank page. Stick what you gather on the three 3C columns (board 2).
- 2. Write chapters 3 to 6 Fill them in order, product, then market, then selling, then people. This is the body of the plan. Write what you can state as fact and move on, leaving the doubtful parts blank. Fill the 4P analysis (board 3) before you write chapter 5.
- 3. Work out chapters 7 and 8 Calculate in order, sales, cost, fixed costs, profit, then the money you need. Copy each figure onto the memo (board 9) so the source stays with it.
- 4. Write chapters 1 and 2 Only once content and numbers are settled do you write the summary and the reason. Written last, the summary fits in three lines. Written first, it always gets rewritten. e.g. ready meals for dual-income households, picked up on weekday evenings at the shop by the station or delivered.
- 5. Have it read Ask one person, family, someone in the trade or a support office. Add wherever they stumbled to boards 6 and 7, then fix it by adding one line of evidence.
6. Common criticism (numbers)
- e.g. the sales figure rests on nothing but we will work hard
- e.g. cost and wages left out, so the profit looks too big
- e.g. the loan repayment is missing from the cash plan (the principal is not an expense, so cash still leaves in a profitable month)
- Explain every figure as unit price times quantity
7. Common criticism (content)
- e.g. writing that you have no competitors
- e.g. the buyer ends up being everyone
- e.g. your own experience has nothing to do with the business
- Make the chapters that answer will it really sell the thickest
8. How to fix a comment
- Do not delete the comment, add one line of evidence and fix it
- Park a figure you cannot get yet and write the source beside it
- e.g. 4,200 households within 2 km (2025 census)
- Keep the date of each fix and never overwrite the old version
9. Where the figures come from (sales, cost, fixed costs)
- Where the sales figure comes from e.g. $4.50 x 80 meals x 25 days = $9,000 a month. The 80 comes from timing the rivals and from how much you can prep.
- Cost and variable spend e.g. $1.80 of ingredients a meal (40 per cent of the $4.50 price). At 2,000 meals a month that is $3,600. Boxes and packing sit inside the $4,100 of expenses in chapter 7. Keep the quotes from both suppliers.
- Fixed costs and repayment e.g. rent $1,200, wages $2,300, utilities $350, packing and sundries $250, giving $4,100 of expenses. On top of that $350 of loan repayment leaves in cash (the principal is not an expense).
10. Before you submit (form)
- All 8 chapters are there
- No figure contradicts another from chapter to chapter
- One currency throughout, with no mixing of units
- Read it once through for typos and name spellings
11. Before you submit (content)
- Chapters 4 and 5 answer will it really sell
- Chapters 7 and 8 answer can you pay it back
- Chapters 2 to 6 answer can this person do it
- A stranger who reads it can explain the business in three minutes
Task board contents
Gathering 16 items
Learn the 8 chapters
Before you write a word, settle the whole shape and the reader. Once those are fixed, what goes in each chapter decides itself.
Pick your reader
Choose one use, a lender, an investor or your own thinking. The reader decides how deep you have to go.
List the 8 chapters
Copy the 8 chapters from the table onto paper or the board, and mark which ones you can already write.
Read a sample plan
Read one real plan, such as a lender's worked example, to get a feel for length and detail. Read it to copy the shape.
Write the content
The body of the plan, chapters 3 to 6. Start with what you can state as fact and leave the gaps empty rather than stalling.
Describe the offer
Write the items, the price, the cost and what makes you different from the shop next door. Add photos or a draft menu if you have them.
Research the market
Fill the 3C analysis on board 2 with local population and households, the price and closing time of three rivals and your own record, then put your winning angle in one line.
Plan how you sell
Fill the 4P analysis on board 3, product, price, place and promotion, then copy it into chapters 3 and 5. Keep to two ways of getting customers.
Build the numbers
Chapters 7 and 8, the profit plan and the funding. Give every figure a unit price times quantity or a source, and leave it on the memo board.
Forecast the sales
Work out the monthly sales as price times customers times days. Base the customer count on timing rivals or on what you can produce.
List the costs
Split variable spend such as ingredients and stock from fixed costs such as rent, wages and repayment, and list both as monthly amounts.
Write the funding
Add equipment and working capital together, then write the split between your own money and the loan, down to the monthly repayment.
Finish and submit
Only once the content and the numbers are settled do you write the summary and the reason you are starting. Page one comes last.
Write the summary
Put what you sell, who to and how into three lines and place it in chapter 1. Written last, it comes out short.
Get a second read
Ask one person, family, someone in the trade or a support office, to read it, and add wherever they stumbled to the criticism frames.
Final check
Read the whole plan for missing chapters, figures that disagree, mixed units and typos before you hand it in.
