Description

"How much is everything going to cost? When will you break even? Do you have any statements or projections available? These are all questions banks and investors want to be answered. But answering these questions aren’t just important for banks and investors, but also for your business. Creating a financial plan is a vital step in your business, and will help to keep you consistent with any business decision you make in the future. But, how do you create a financial plan? The Financial Plan MasterClass will not only prepare you to pitch your business to banks and investors but also help you get your business finances in order. This MasterClass contains all the tools you need to work out your cash flow, profit and loss, staffing projections, as well as a full set of financials and a complete financial model to apply to your business."

Description

Making money is the very reason your business exists – but often, entrepreneurs don't pay enough attention to the financials that drive the bottom line. Sound financial planning documents can not only win over investors; they're valuable tools for monitoring the company's progress toward profitability. In this course we'll examine and counteract common mis-perceptions about financial planning, learn about different models for revenue and cost projections, and use worksheets to build the statements that matter most. We have included a full financial model that you can use to build a complete financial model for your business. Please note this course does not walk you through how to use the model. This course is intended to create a solid foundation so you can move on to create a financial forecast for our business.

Description

Revenue forecasting is a form of predicting the future – which makes it intimidating, and may be why so many entrepreneurs hazard wild guesses to get it over with as fast as they can. But tying income projections directly to marketing and sales activities and using industry research to justify growth predictions is essential if you want to transform your revenue model into a useful tool for tracking performance and staying on top of your cash flow. In this course, we’ll look at what drivers create revenue, which revenue models work best for product, service, and subscription or membership businesses, and how to predict how fast your business will scale. Detailed worksheets accompanying this course help you develop your own models that are succinct, understandable, accurate, and actionable.

Description

The success of your business depends on the people you employ, and preparing to bring the right talent on board just when you need it will be crucial to a successful launch and ongoing growth. The more you know in advance about when you’ll need to hire, for which positions, and at what rate, the better you’ll be able to forecast staffing expenses and put management structures in place to prevent turnover. And developing an accurate model for predicting how much each member of the staff will contribute to income generation helps you create realistic revenue forecasts. We’ll not only cover how staffing plans interact with the rest of your financial reporting, but we’ll establish guidelines for whether to build staff or hire contractors, how to set pay rates and predict costs of benefits, and calculate the ROI of positions across the organization. Using the accompanying spreadsheet tool, you’ll develop a staffing plan that matches your talent needs with the right personnel at the right time. “Where did all the money go?” may be a common refrain when paying the monthly household bills, but expenses should never be a mystery when you’re launching a business. A thorough understanding of the costs of doing business – from rent to trade show marketing collateral – is essential to keep track of income and cash flow; you can track actual expenses against the projections as you move past launch and adjust activities accordingly. You also need to know baseline expenses so that you can price your offering appropriately and eventually realize a profit. This course also details potential expenses and their classifications, along with their potential tax implications, and offers a detailed worksheet for breaking out and tracking all the costs involved in running your business. Armed with this information, you’ll not only build solid financials for your business plan you’ll also build a buffer against overspending.

Description

The income statement, or P&L, is the financial report investors will scrutinize the most – and with good reason: it's where all your projections and calculations are summarized to tell the story, in numbers, of how your business will make money. This course will help you bring everything together to develop a P&L that's accurate and convincing. Given that 8 in 10 business failures can be attributed to poor cash management, tracking how much cash is coming in and going out is crucial to startup success. The cash flow statement provides an ongoing record of income, investments, and expenses so you can adjust activities and stay on target. You can also predict how much you need to invest in the business before your business achieves positive cash flow – more money coming in than going out. In addition to addressing these crucial calculations, this course delves into strategies for managing cash flow and establishing a realistic basis for cash flow projections. Using the accompanying spreadsheet in tandem with on-demand expertise, you’ll develop a sound cash flow strategy that sets your company on a path toward growth.