Entrepreneurs tend to follow the “don’t think, just do” model of starting a business. This attitude can serve founders well in the early days, but it often causes them to overlook some essential aspects of building a business.

Writing a business plan is a valuable experience for any company founder, and TechRepublic Premium presents a quick guide to assist you in this process.

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CRAFTING THE PITCH

The pitch is an essential building block for the business plan of your startup. The pitch pushes founders to evaluate how they define their business, and most of the time, it’s what potential investors are looking for.

Arjun Chandar, Founder & CEO of IndustrialML, believes there are three things to keep in mind, “First, the VC investment model is well-suited to high risk and either fast growth or rapid failure before too much cash gets sunk in; so make sure that the value proposition and growth model you have planned for your company actually lends itself to VCs instead of more gradual investment models. Second, if the VC model is right for you, then craft your pitch knowing that any time you can convey a point using fewer words, you should do it. And third, focus on the value you provide; my biggest mistakes while pitching were to spend too much time talking about what our product did, instead of how it helped people.”

When you’re first launching a startup, a traditional business plan might not be wholly necessary. A business plan might help show that you have pre-empted some of the questions that investors might ask, but it’s not something VCs will want to sift through. Most VCs consider the founder or team more important than the business. A quick pitch conveys more of the entrepreneur and his or her vision to the VCs. So keep the business plan short and focused on the pitch when you’re first launching.

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TIME SAVED: Crafting this content required 12 hours of dedicated writing, editing, research, and design.