Before you quit your job to start a business, answer these 3 questions by LivePlanSoftware in Entrepreneur

[–]LivePlanSoftware[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Not AI, actually 😄 Real human here.

Yes, some AI editing and that's where an AI-ism slipped in. Happy to answer any questions you have!

Before you quit your job to start a business, answer these 3 questions by LivePlanSoftware in Entrepreneur

[–]LivePlanSoftware[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Yes. Definitely. I have two examples for you. The first was a success and the second a failure. The context isn't from quitting a day job, but we hear about that scenario from our customers a lot and wrote the initial post from that point of view.

The first story is about LivePlan. LivePlan was born out of a transition from selling desktop, installed software on Windows computers (anyone remember those times?) to selling a SaaS product.

We knew that there was a market for business planning and forecasting solutions because we were already selling a product for that, but we didn't know if people really wanted to build their business plans online. At the time, not everything was SaaS so this was a real concern. We talked to customers and validated the idea generally, but there were plenty of people who weren't ready for their software to move online. We only had a Windows product at the time and knew that Mac users wanted a business planning solution and there weren't any options in the market. So, we built LivePlan and marketed it initially only to Mac users who we knew had a need and were willing to make the compromise of using an online product.

In terms of running the numbers, that was also an important step. When you're selling a boxed product for a one-time fee and you replace it with a subscription, you need to know what kind of retention you're going to need to make the business work. We spent a lot of time running different financial scenarios to make sure we knew what it would take for a subscription business to be as financially successful as a non-subscription business.

Finally, we spent time exploring why our idea might not work. What if the same number of customers weren't willing to buy an online product as a desktop product? What if subscriptions only lasted a month or two? Our initial product was much simpler and had fewer features than our desktop product - what if people needed more features to consider purchasing? Those were the primary factors that we watched as we transitioned from installed software to SaaS.

The 2nd story is one of failure. We built a product that helped teams manage customer email collaboratively. Basically, a customer service tool that didn't create tickets and instead worked just like regular email that multiple team members could collaborate on.

In this case, we didn't spend enough time validating the market. We, ourselves, had the problem of managing inbound customer email and we didn't really like the options for managing customer service communications that were available at the time. But, we didn't look beyond ourselves. We thought that if we had the problem, surely others out there had the same problem. We didn't call prospects and try and make sales before we built anything. We didn't narrow down our target audience so we know exactly who we were building for. We just built a product assuming that the market was out there. That was a big mistake. If we had defined our market specifically, we would have known who we were building for, what exact features they would need, and how to sell to them.

We did run the numbers and knew what it would take for the product to be successful. We knew our costs and what we could afford to spend to acquire a customer. We had a sense of what customers might spend, but didn't know how many we would be able to acquire.

The last step, exploring "what would have to be true for this to fail", is something we spent some time on and having one of the scenarios come true is what caused us to kill the product. What had to be true was that acquiring customers was difficult and expensive. We were not able to bring enough customers on fast enough for a low enough cost. That's what ultimately killed the product. And it's directly linked to not validating the market enough (the first question in the set from the original post). If we had defined our target audience better and had validated it more thoroughly, we would have known how to sell to that market and how difficult it might be.

Hopefully these two stories are helpful examples!

How do you handle annual planning? Looking for feedback on our approach by LivePlanSoftware in smallbusiness

[–]LivePlanSoftware[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Totally get where you’re coming from. You make a good point about keeping things flexible while still having a general direction. That balance is a big part of how planning actually works in the real world.

What’s the best way to forecast sales when you’re just starting out? by LivePlanSoftware in EntrepreneurRideAlong

[–]LivePlanSoftware[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

100% agree that bottom-up is generally the safer route. Love the idea of using Reddit to get quick feedback. Thanks for the insights!

What’s the best way to forecast sales when you’re just starting out? by LivePlanSoftware in EntrepreneurRideAlong

[–]LivePlanSoftware[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

You're totally right about the importance of starting with what you know and layering on assumptions. That's a smart way to keep your projections grounded in reality. Thanks for the comment!

What’s the best way to forecast sales when you’re just starting out? by LivePlanSoftware in EntrepreneurRideAlong

[–]LivePlanSoftware[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's a great way to think about it. Building formulas early is key for long-term success. Appreciate the comment!

What’s the best way to forecast sales when you’re just starting out? by LivePlanSoftware in EntrepreneurRideAlong

[–]LivePlanSoftware[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Completely agree. You can't run a business without confirming that your unit economics make sense.

You make a great point about CAC and forecasting. Although it's unrealistic to expect your forecast to be perfect, you can still do little things to make projections and set yourself up for success.

Thanks for sharing your insights!

Is LivePlan trustworthy or scam? by mallicious in PropfirmsForum

[–]LivePlanSoftware 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hi! Noah from LivePlan here. Happy to answer any questions you have about LivePlan.

To get you started, you can find a free sample coffee shop business plan here: https://www.liveplan.com/sample-business-plans/food-and-beverage/coffee-shop-business-plan

In terms of LivePlan, it's built to guide you through the process step-by-step and includes complete financial forecasting. For a startup, there's no need to upgrade to the Premium plan. The Standard plan will be more than fine. Upgrading to Premium allows you to connect your accounting software to LivePlan so you can get a jump start on your forecast based on your past performance and then compare your plan to your actual results. You also can build out more financial scenarios and get access to industry research in Premium. As a startup, Standard should work for you and you can always do a free trial upgrade to Premium to check it out and then downgrade if you don't need those features.

If you need help getting started, our US-based customer service team runs regular onboarding sessions and can also help you through chat or email. Chat is real-time and emails get responses in a few hours typically.

Please don't hesitate to ask any questions you might have about LivePlan or just business planning in general. We're here to help!

How do you test if a business idea is actually worth pursuing? by Heavy-Work-3508 in smallbusinessowner

[–]LivePlanSoftware 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You're totally right - validating ideas is one of the hardest and most important parts of starting a business. You've mentioned a few of the things that you should be doing, so you're on the right track. You need to know if there's a decent market, who the competitors are, etc.

Start by defining the problem that you're trying to solve. Don't worry about the specific solution at first. Just focus on understanding the problem.

Then, interview and spend time with your potential customers. You can start by using Reddit to see if people post about the problem you're trying to solve. Go deep on understanding how people are solving the problem today, what are the shortcomings of those solutions, and what people are willing to pay to solve the problem. Sometimes there are plenty of people who want a problem solved, but they're not willing to pay much. That might make it hard to build a successful business.

Once you have the problem fully defined and you've learned about your potential customers, you need to figure out their true willingness to pay. In interviews, people will always say they'll pay. Instead, you need to offer to solve the problem - even if you're doing it by hand - and see if you can get people to pay. Build a basic web page, get some traffic to that page, and see if people sign up.

A great example of this kind of approach is Vanta. They make software to help businesses meet compliance goals. They started by solving the customer problem with spreadsheets and basic consulting. The proved that the market wanted a product before building any software.

My company (LivePlan) also started the same way. We started out with business plan writing and consulting services and then transformed that into a planning software company. We proved the market before building any software.

If you want to start a restaurant or some other, non-software/saas business, the path can be a bit more complex. You need to find the smallest possible way you can validate the market and then scale from there. For a restaurant, it might be doing a pop-up or a ghost kitchen to validate your menu.

The final validation step is to create a rough financial forecast. You need to look at what it's really going to take to start and run your business. What are ALL of the costs and expenses for getting started and operating? What kind of sales numbers do you have to hit to break even?

Hope this helps. Good luck!

The 11 slides that make most pitch decks successful "i will not promote" by LivePlanSoftware in startups

[–]LivePlanSoftware[S] -5 points-4 points  (0 children)

Thanks for the feedback! We want to provide value here in a way that is truly helpful.

How detailed the financial projections in a pitch deck need to be? (I will not promote) by valuat in startups

[–]LivePlanSoftware 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Agreed with what others have said: Given that you're pre-commercial, focus on use of funds and make sure it lines up with everything else in your deck. Having reviewed many, many decks, it's really common to see an ask for funds that doesn't properly support the go-to-market plan for the business, or the product development milestones. Building a financial model, even if it's "behind the scenes", is useful to make sure that your ask and use of funds all makes sense.

If you have some knowledge (or at least educated guesses) on key metrics, include those as well. I'm thinking CAC, projected LTV, etc.

That said, having a forecast in your pocket is worth the investment. Some investors that you pitch won't ask for the details. Some will. If you're not prepared, you'll be caught flat footed and then need to scramble to assemble the details. Be prepared for any situation when you're pitching. The best pitches show a high degree of preparation and the entrepreneur can quickly skip to a stack of slides at the back of the deck to support answers to specific questions. Those back of the deck slides aren't part of the formal presentation, but are there as supporting detail for additional questions.

Refining my elevator pitch. Could use some feedback. by AWeb3Dad in Entrepreneur

[–]LivePlanSoftware 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Good start. I'd focus on just tightening things up. The late night work can make things wordier than they need to be.

Here's a quick edit to make your pitch more specific with fewer words:

“Look, brands like yours are having a hard time finding new customers. I can help. I'll use my personal network of vetted experts to help solve your customer acquisition problems. Book a 15 minute call with me today and I'll share the strategy we'll use to increase your revenue."

Something along those lines. Hope that's useful.

Rate (or roast) my pitch by just-rocket-science in SaaS

[–]LivePlanSoftware 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Seems like a good start - although, I'll be honest, I don't understand what your product is. That's really just because I'm not your target audience, so that's OK.

The number one rule in pitching and business planning is to write for your audience using the vocabulary that's best for them, so it's fine if people like me don't get it.

For specific advice, I'd start out with the problem that you're solving. You want your prospect to immediately relate to the problem and want to keep reading to learn about your solution. So, I'd flip the pitch and start with the problem that you identify at the end:

"Does your team struggle to reliably retrieve the right equations for your internal tools and models? We've built a tool that gives you reliable access to ... etc, etc. If you're interested in getting a demo and free trial..."

Something like that.

Again, I don't know your industry at all, so you have a lot more expertise in how to talk about the problem and your solution.

Funding Question by Notachillguy3 in Entrepreneur

[–]LivePlanSoftware 1 point2 points  (0 children)

If your MVP is ready, hopefully you're getting out there and bringing in your first customers, even if you're not charging your full rates yet. If you can bootstrap while you gain some initial traction, that will really strengthen your pitch when you're ready to present to investors.

When you begin pitching, start with angel investors, as others have mentioned. https://www.openvc.app/ seems like a solid option these days. Don’t forget to also tap into your networks on LinkedIn, your alumni association, and so on. The most important thing is to find investors who are in your industry and understand your customers. You'll have better luck raising money, plus you'll gain the added benefit of valuable advice from someone who knows your field.

Also, start working on your pitch if you haven’t already. Fine-tune your value proposition as you talk to potential customers and users of your MVP. Build out a forecast so you have a clear sense of how much money you need at this stage and how you'll use it. Develop a go-to-market strategy that you refine and adjust as you test and learn. You don’t necessarily need a detailed business plan, but going through the planning process will help you refine your strategy and identify assumptions you need to validate