BUSINESS PLAN PRO

Extra features in the Premier Edition

The majority of Business Plan Pro users opt for the extended feature set in the Premier Edition. Here are some of the key reasons why.

Track results against your plan

A successful business plan is a living, evolving roadmap for your business — not a packet of paper in a desk drawer. The Premier Edition of Business Plan Pro makes it easy to keep your plan up to date with automatic plan vs. actual comparisons, variance reporting, and annual rollover features.

Integrated management dashboard

The higher-level dashboard view gives you an instant status report on the state of your plan. You can quickly see what's going better or worse than expected. This feature is useful for ongoing planning, those with monthly reviews and those interested in assessing performance against targets.

Monitor your sales

Sales forecasting is one of the most difficult — and critical — areas for new businesses. Without ample sales all businesses will eventually fail. By projecting sales on a monthly basis, actual figures can be plugged in to Business Plan Pro Premier and again variances may show up.

This feature is useful for startups who have difficulty forecasting sales as well as companies with monthly financial reviews, close performance tracking, etc.

Manage cash flow

What happens if your debtors are slow to pay? Managing cash is a vital (yet often neglected) component of all businesses. Startups are particularly vulnerable as uncertain sales are offset against certain expenses. If sales are on credit and cash is tied up in stock problems can easily occur. With the Cash Pilot feature in the Premier Edition, you can can create 'what-if' scenarios to assess the implications arising from a various scenarios, e.g. an additional time delay in receiving cash from debtors etc.

This feature is particularly useful for startups and small businesses who need to manage their cash carefully, those who sell on credit, and those who have a lot of stock as assets.

Advanced spreadsheets

Business Plan Pro Premier includes a number of advanced financial forecasting options for those users who want additional flexibility with the numbers.

Keep close tabs on profit and loss

As figures materialise, you can plug them into Business Plan Pro Premier to check for variances. Obviously if figures differ materially from what was planned or expected, remedial action can be taken. This feature is useful for ongoing planning, those with monthly reviews and those interested in assessing performance against targets.

Import your Excel spreadsheets

Despite the extensive range of tables and worksheets in Business Plan Pro, some users want to import their own spreadsheets into the business plan. Business Plan Pro Premier has an easy import facility so users can seamlessly add their own spreadsheets.

Track investment in your business

Many businesses have some outside investment. Tracking this can be a headache — however, Business Plan Pro Premier can help you track ownership stakes, valuations, stock dilution, share of company etc. The Premier Edition can save you time and effort by tracking external investments and also helps ensure you have all the answers to hand if you ever require additional investment or want to sell your business.

Design a business plan template

Business Plan Pro Premier enables users to save a business plan outline as a template, which can then be circulated to others. This is ideal if you want to customise a business plan and ensure that all divisions use this new standard format for their business planning or if you want to create a template for clients or even franchisees.

This feature is great for business plan consultants, franchises, academics, and business planners in larger corporations.

Track major business milestones

If your business plan contains a number of clear milestones it is important that these are assigned to individuals and tracked accordingly. The milestones table helps ensure that activities are clearly assigned to individuals and have to be achieved by a certain date. Managing milestones helps ensure that plans can be kept on track.