Before You Write Your Business Plan
Before you start writing a business plan, it’s important to understand that the plan itself is not where your business begins. A business plan is simply a document that brings your ideas, research, and decisions together. The real work happens before you write a single word.
Most businesses start with an idea. You might have spotted a problem that needs solving, discovered a gap in the market, or have a skill that other people are willing to pay for. The challenge is working out whether that idea can become a profitable business and how you will turn it into one.
Before creating a business plan, take the time to think about what you’re selling, who you’re selling it to, and why someone would choose your business over the alternatives. You’ll also need to consider how customers will find you, how much it will cost to get started, and whether there is enough demand to make your idea worthwhile.
Answering these questions now will save you time, money, and frustration later. More importantly, it will give you the information you need to create a business plan that is based on real research and clear goals rather than assumptions.
In this guide, we’ll walk through the key things every new business owner should consider before writing a business plan, helping you build a stronger foundation for long-term growth and success.
1. Decide What You’re Selling
Before you can plan a business, you need to be clear on what you’re offering.
This sounds obvious, but many new business owners start with a broad idea rather than a specific product or service. They know the industry they want to enter, but they haven’t yet defined exactly what they’ll sell or who they’ll sell it to.
For example:
- “I want to start a clothing business” is too broad.
- “I want to sell sustainable gym wear to women aged 25-40” is much clearer.
The more specific you are, the easier every decision becomes later.
Think about it this way. If someone asked you what your business does, would you be able to explain it in a single sentence? If the answer is no, you may need to spend more time refining your idea before moving forward.
Many people make the mistake of trying to sell everything to everyone. While it might seem like this gives you more opportunities, it often has the opposite effect. When your offer is too broad, it becomes harder to market, harder to stand out from competitors, and harder for customers to understand why they should buy from you.
Let’s look at another example.
Imagine two people want to start a bakery.
The first says, “I want to sell baked goods.”
The second says, “I want to create gluten-free celebration cakes for families and businesses in London.”
Which business do you think will find it easier to attract the right customers?
The second business has a clear focus. They know what they’re selling, who they’re selling it to, and what makes them different. That clarity helps with everything from branding and marketing to pricing and product development.
As you’re defining your offer, ask yourself:
- What product or service am I selling?
- What problem does it solve?
- Why would someone choose it over other options?
- What makes it different from competitors?
- Is there enough demand for it?
Don’t worry if you don’t have every answer straight away. Brainstorming is part of the process. Grab a notebook and start writing down ideas. You can always refine them later.
A useful exercise is to imagine your business one year from now. What is the main thing you’re known for? What do customers come to you for? If you can answer that clearly, you’re already building the foundations of a stronger business.
Tip
If you can’t explain your business idea in one sentence, spend more time brainstorming on a piece of paper before writing your business plan. The clearer your offer is today, the easier it will be to make decisions as your business grows.
2. Understand Who Your Customer Is
Not everyone will buy from your business, and that’s perfectly normal.
One of the most frustrating parts of starting a business can be trying to work out who your customers actually are. You might have a product you believe in, a service you know people need, and a website or social media account ready to go, but you’re still struggling to get people through the door.
This doesn’t necessarily mean your business idea is bad. Sometimes, you simply haven’t found the right people yet.
Before you start thinking about advertising or spending money trying to reach more customers, take a step back and think about who is most likely to need what you’re selling.
Your target customer isn’t just a description of someone’s age or where they live. You want to understand what they need, what matters to them, and what might make them choose your business.
For example, saying your target audience is “women aged 25-40” doesn’t tell you very much. There are millions of women in that age group with completely different needs, interests, budgets, and reasons for buying.
Instead, think about the person behind the customer.
Perhaps you’re selling sustainable gym wear. Your ideal customer might be a woman in her 30s who regularly exercises, cares about where her clothes are made, is willing to spend more on quality products, and discovers new brands through Instagram or recommendations from friends.
Now you have something much more useful to work with.
You can start thinking about where that person spends their time, what type of content they respond to, what price they’re comfortable paying, and what would convince them to choose your business.
Start With the Problem
A useful way to find your target customer is to start with the problem you’re solving rather than trying to find a group of people to sell to.
Ask yourself:
- What problem does my product or service solve?
- Who experiences this problem?
- How are they currently solving it?
- What is frustrating them about the existing options?
- Why might they be looking for something better?
For example, if you’re starting a bookkeeping service, your customer isn’t simply “small businesses”. You might be trying to help small business owners who are struggling to keep their finances organised, don’t understand their accounts, or are spending too much time trying to manage everything themselves.
That gives you a much clearer starting point.
Where Do Your Customers Spend Their Time?
Once you have an idea of who you’re trying to reach, the next question is where you can actually find them.
This is where many business owners become frustrated. They try posting on every social media platform, run an advert, receive little response, and assume that nobody wants their product.
Before spending money, do some research.
Think about where your potential customers already go when they have a problem your business could solve.
Do they search Google? Do they use TikTok or Instagram for recommendations? Are they buying through Amazon or Etsy? Do they belong to Facebook groups? Do they attend local events? Do they ask for recommendations from friends or other businesses?
You don’t need to be everywhere.
In fact, trying to be everywhere when you’re starting out can quickly become exhausting. It is usually more effective to understand where your customers are already looking and focus your efforts there.
Use Your Competitors as a Starting Point
You don’t have to figure all of this out from scratch.
Look at businesses that already sell something similar to you. Pay attention to who is commenting on their posts, what customers mention in their reviews, what questions they ask, and what they seem to like or dislike about the product or service. Customer reviews can be particularly useful because they give you an insight into what real people value.
If customers repeatedly praise something, that could tell you what matters to your target audience. If they repeatedly complain about something, you may have found an opportunity to do things differently.
This isn’t about copying another business. It’s about learning from the market that already exists.
Create a Simple Customer Profile
You don’t need to create a complicated customer persona with pages of information. Start with a simple description of your ideal customer.
For example:
My ideal customer is a small business owner who has been trading for one to three years. They are making sales but struggle to keep their finances organised and don’t have the time or confidence to manage their bookkeeping themselves. They are looking for an affordable service that makes their finances easier to understand.
That one paragraph can tell you a surprising amount about how to market the business.
You know what their problem is, what they need help with, and what they are likely to value when choosing a service.
You can then build your marketing around that information rather than simply posting content and hoping the right person sees it.
Don’t Be Afraid to Refine Your Audience
Your target audience isn’t something you have to get perfectly right before you launch.
You might start with an idea of who your customer will be and discover something completely different once you start speaking to real people and making sales.
That’s useful information, not failure.
Perhaps you thought your main customers would be younger people, but most of your enquiries come from customers in their 40s. Or perhaps you expected people to care most about price, but your customers are actually more interested in quality and convenience.
Pay attention to what your customers are telling you.
The more you learn, the better you can refine your products, marketing, pricing, and customer experience.
Tip
If you’re struggling to identify your target audience, don’t start by asking, “Who can I sell this to?”
Start with, “Who has the problem I’m solving, and where do they currently go for help?”
That small change in thinking can make your research much more focused and help you find potential customers without wasting time and money trying to reach everyone.
3. Work Out How You’ll Reach Customers
Now that you have a clearer picture of your customer, you can start thinking about how to put your business in front of them.
This is where many business owners jump straight into marketing without first deciding what they are trying to achieve. They create social media accounts, pay for adverts, or start posting content, but have no clear idea of whether those activities are actually helping them reach potential customers.
Instead, take what you have learned about your customer and turn it into a simple plan.
Think about the journey your customer takes before they buy. They may discover a business through a Google search, see a recommendation from a friend, watch a video, read reviews, visit a marketplace, or come across an advert. Your job is to understand which of those routes makes the most sense for your business.
Think About How Your Customer Makes a Buying Decision
Different products and services require different approaches.
If someone needs an emergency plumber, they are unlikely to spend weeks following plumbers on Instagram. They may search Google, compare reviews and contact the first few businesses they trust.
Someone buying a wedding dress may behave very differently. They could spend months looking at Instagram, Pinterest, wedding websites and reviews before deciding where to buy.
This matters because the way your customer buys should influence the way you market.
Ask yourself:
- Where would my customer look when they first realise they need something?
- What information would they want before making a decision?
- Would they need to compare several businesses?
- Would reviews or recommendations influence them?
- Is this something they buy quickly or something they research over time?
Your answers will start to show you which marketing channels are worth your attention.
Choose Channels That Match the Buying Journey
You don’t need to use every marketing channel. You need to use the channels that give your business a realistic opportunity to reach the right people.
For example, if you run a local cleaning business, having a strong Google Business Profile, appearing in local search results and encouraging customer reviews could be more valuable than spending hours creating videos for TikTok.
If you’re selling handmade products, a marketplace such as Etsy could put your products directly in front of people who are already searching for them. You could then use social media to demonstrate the products, build trust and bring people back to your shop.
The important point is that the channel should have a purpose.
Give Each Channel a Job
Rather than simply saying, “I’m going to use Instagram,” think about what you want Instagram to achieve.
Perhaps it will:
- Introduce people to your brand
- Demonstrate how your product works
- Answer common customer questions
- Build trust through customer reviews
- Send people to your website
You can do the same with every channel you choose.
This stops your marketing from becoming a collection of disconnected activities and starts turning it into a strategy.
Make It Easier to Measure What Works
One of the advantages of planning this before you launch is that you can decide what success looks like.
If you spend money on Google Ads, for example, you should know what you’re hoping to get from that investment. Is it website enquiries, bookings, product sales or something else?
Likewise, if you’re building an Instagram account, don’t judge it purely by the number of followers you gain. A smaller audience that regularly visits your website or becomes customers can be much more valuable than thousands of followers who never buy anything.
Simple tools such as Google Analytics, platform insights and advertising dashboards can help you see where your visitors and enquiries are coming from.
You don’t need to become a data analyst. You just need enough information to answer a basic question: is this helping me reach customers?
Start Small and Learn
Your first marketing strategy doesn’t need to be perfect.
Choose the channels that make the most sense for your customer, give them enough time to produce useful information, and pay attention to what happens.
You may discover that customers are finding you through Google rather than social media. You might find that a particular type of content generates enquiries, or that customers regularly ask the same questions before buying.
Use that information to improve your approach.
This is one of the reasons your marketing strategy should not be treated as something you write once and never change. Your customers will teach you what works if you pay attention.
Tip
Before you decide where to market your business, write down how your customer is likely to go from discovering a need to making a purchase.
Then choose the channels that can help you reach them at those points.
You’re not trying to market everywhere. You’re trying to build a clear route between your customer having a need and your business being the solution they find.
Final Thoughts
Before you start writing a business plan, take the time to understand the business you are actually planning.
Start by getting clear on what you’re selling and what you want your business to achieve. A well-defined product or service gives you a stronger foundation for making decisions about pricing, positioning, marketing, and future growth.
Next, identify your target audience. Understanding your ideal customer is about more than knowing their age or location. You need to understand their needs, problems, buying behaviour, and what influences their decisions. This research will help you create a business that is built around genuine customer demand rather than assumptions.
Finally, work out how you will reach those customers. Your marketing strategy should be based on where your target audience looks for products and services and how they make purchasing decisions. Choosing the right marketing channels allows you to focus your time and budget where they are most likely to produce results.
Once you’ve worked through these three areas, you’re in a much stronger position to write your business plan. You have the foundations of your business idea, a clearer understanding of your target market, and a starting point for your marketing strategy.
A business plan should bring all of this thinking together. It should help you understand where your business is going, how you’re going to get there, and what you need to do to make it profitable.
You don’t need to have everything figured out before you begin. What matters is taking the time to research your business idea, understand your customers, and make decisions based on what you learn. That preparation will make writing your business plan easier and give you a much stronger foundation for starting, growing, and scaling your business.