How to write a business plan

To write a business plan, work in about nine sections: an executive summary with the ask, a description of the business, the products and pricing, the market, the competition, marketing, operations and people, the financial projections with the funding request, and the risks. Decide first who will read it, research the numbers before writing the words, write the summary last and put it first, and show the cash flow low point rather than hiding it.

Decide who reads it

business.gov.au’s guide to developing a business plan starts with this step: work out who the plan is for and how it will be used. A plan to guide the owner and staff can be short. A plan for a bank or investors needs the financial detail they look for: how much money you expect to make, what you need, and how it will be repaid.

Different readers read different pages. A lender reads the executive summary and the financials, and goes back to the market section only if the revenue looks optimistic. A grant assessor reads the market and the risks. A business partner reads operations and the owner’s background, because that is where the workload sits. Write for the main reader and keep the other sections tight.

The business plan example for a fictional 40 seat cafe in Torquay is written for a named lender, and says so on its cover.

The nine sections and their order

The US Small Business Administration lists the common sections of a traditional plan as the executive summary, company description, market analysis, organisation and management, service or product line, marketing and sales, funding request, financial projections and an appendix. It also describes a lean startup plan, typically one page, for simpler businesses or plans that change often.

The cafe example uses eleven sections that map onto those nine: executive summary; the business; products and pricing; the market; competition; marketing; operations; financials; funding; risks; and the owner with an appendix. It runs to nine pages with an executive cover and a contents page, because a lender will flip straight to the financials.

Executive summary. business.gov.au recommends writing it last. The example puts the concept in a paragraph, then six stat cards: 40 seats, $186,000 start up cost, $612,000 year one revenue, break even in month nine, and the ask of $120,000 over a five year loan term. The owner contributes $66,000 in cash, taking total funding to the $186,000 required. A lender knows what is being asked and what it buys before reading about the menu.

The business. Site, hours, structure and lease in a short block: a 120 square metre former bakery, 6.30am to 3pm seven days, a company with the owner as sole director, and a five year lease at $58,000 a year.

Products and pricing. A table of four lines with price, cost and margin, from a flat white at $5.20 with a $1.10 cost, a 79% margin, to retail bags of beans at a 47% margin, blending to cost of goods of 32%.

Market and competition in numbers

Replace adjectives with figures. The example’s market section gives a resident population of about 22,500, up 14% over five years, and an estimated 850,000 visitors a year concentrated between November and March, with a chart of visitors by month that the roster and cash flow are built around.

The competition section is a table of four nearby cafes with seats, the price of a flat white, opening time and a weakness each: queues with no bookings, high barista turnover, an 8am opening, a 40 dish menu. The gap the plan targets follows directly: nobody with table service opens before 7am.

A weakness column is only credible if someone has actually visited. The example says each cafe was visited several times at different hours, with prices and hours as observed in September 2026.

Financials, funding and the cash trough

The financial section is where the plan is won or lost. It needs a three year profit and loss, the start up costs, and a cash flow forecast by month for at least the first year.

The example builds revenue from the bottom up: 40 seats, an average spend and seat turns that vary by season, giving $612,000 in year one. It projects net profit of $31,000 in year one rising to $84,000 by year three. Its cash flow chart shows the balance falling to minus $41,000 in month four and recovering by month nine.

That trough is the number a lender checks against the facility, and many plans leave it out because it looks bad. Showing it is what makes the rest credible. The example also states the ratios a lender will calculate anyway: revenue per seat of $15,300, rent at about 9.5% of revenue, and wages at about 43%, higher than an operator would like, with the reason given.

The funding section then sets out the loan amount, term, rate, repayment, owner equity and security. The SBA suggests matching projections clearly to the funding request, so the reader can see how the money is used and repaid. For a community organisation rather than a business, a budget document does a similar job with income, costs and a surplus.

Risks and the owner

List a handful of risks with likelihood, impact and a response, rather than a paragraph of reassurance. The example lists five. Close with the owner’s experience, in this case 11 years in hospitality including four managing a larger cafe, plus referees and an appendix.

A plan that is also used to win customers or tenders can borrow a page from a capability statement: past work, certifications and people, each with a number.

The sections table

The table at the end of this article lists the nine common sections, a typical length, the key numbers each should carry and the figures the cafe example uses. The note on a business case versus a business plan explains when a single project needs a business case instead, and the guide on how to write a business proposal covers the document you send a buyer rather than a lender.

Common mistakes

Words where numbers belong. “A growing market” instead of the population and visitor figures.

Top down revenue. “1% of the market” convinces nobody; seats, spend and turns do.

Hiding the cash low point. A lender will find it; better that you show it first.

No competitor research. A table filled in from websites reads differently from one filled in after visits.

Never updating it. business.gov.au suggests reviewing the plan regularly and keeping previous versions.

Build it

A business plan is a long document here when it reaches six pages or more, and long documents are planned section by section rather than written in one pass. A table of contents is used only at that scale, with titles that match the headings exactly. A cover is added only to documents a reader would expect one on and never under three pages; the seven cover layouts include executive, which suits a plan prepared for a lender. Charts come in six types, bar, horizontal bar, line, area, pie and donut, and key values have four layouts including stats, which suits the stat cards in the summary.

Documents do not print citations, so market figures and their sources are written into the text. The AI chat edits text only, so numbers in charts and tables are changed in the builder. The page on charts in a document shows the chart block, and the tutorial on creating a document with AI covers the first draft.