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PaloAlto Software's Business Plan Pro 2007 provides a super software program that enables you to quickly create a business plan. Once you have installed the program, it gets right to work for you. Opening the program presents a prompt allowing you to choose from starting a new business plan, open a sample plan, or open a plan already in progress.
Most new owners will likely want to jump right into creating their plan, and will be pleased that the program structures most of this with handy wizards to guide you through the initial setup process. For example, the EasyPlan Wizard will guide you though the steps to start a business plan with selections at the bottom of the screen, and a set of brief instructions at the top.
The wizard asks you a series of questions dealing with whether you are going to sell products or services, and if you are running a profit or nonprofit business. The wizard will also present questions that are very specific to the type of business plan you want to set up, just like a consulting service.
After the initial “Plan Setup” is complete, the program presents its concept kick-start. This section is where the basic business assessment is completed. Things like the mission statement, objectives, and keys to success are entered into this portion of the Wizard.
Next, the program presents the “Your Company” part of the wizard, which lists a reference to one of the resource books Palo Alto includes with the software. The “Starting a Business” section of the book is meant to help users with filling out the next step.
The program’s “Market” section allows you to input the customers you want to target, as well as the projected growth rate over the next five years. The sales forecasting section allows you to input some rough numbers as to your projected earnings. The marketing plan portion then prompts you to either create a new plan, or import an existing one from Palo Alto’s Marketing Plan Pro.
The next few steps involve mapping the content to be included on your business’s Web page. More financial information was also provided, such as creating a break-even analysis and start-up costs. All these fields were handled the same way as the others.
After completing the rest of this financial information, you are prompted to search for your company type in a database of profiles. Business Plan Pro will pull up a list of businesses related to your search term. The final step is the “Finish and Polish” portion of the setup Wizard. A section on business strategy and implementation will be presented, as well as one marking down important milestones for your business.
At the end of the Wizard process there is an option to “Review My Plan.” This feature is intended to review the plan for any critical errors and possible problems. As the Wizard runs through your plan, it will check for financial statement errors and conflicts. It will also cross-reference things like company growth and sales forecasts with a database of the established industry standards, or common figures.
If the review Wizard sees something that it does not like, it will throw up a red flag, represented with a large red X, and then offer a description of the problem and why it was flagged. Finally, the Wizard will bring you back to the section conclusion, and offer some suggested reading in the “Hurdle” book included in the product package.
The descriptions of some of the more complicated financial sections will be helpful in deciphering what type of information is needed in that particular section of the plan. Reviewing the plan is just as easy as making it, as is exporting the plan to a print preview, or to PowerPoint slides.
The main menu is exceptionally easy to navigate through, and you should have little trouble opening and editing a saved business plan. With Business Plan Pro 2007, you should be able to create a fairly detailed business plan for your business in under two hours and have it all automatically indexed for you.
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