Article by Sandy Nelson.

A business plan is incomplete without a financial section that forecasts how the owner expects the company to grow and how much revenue he believes the company will generate based on his reading of the market for its products or services.

But unless that projection is grounded in reality, it won’t make the desired impression on a lender or investor — or even on a landlord who wants some assurance the business will last as long as the commercial lease.

Lenders, venture capitalists and other investors who finance startups deal in concrete numbers, because they’re betting real money on a concept or enterprise that’s typically untested. If they’re presented with an educated guess about the market that exists for a given product or service, they expect it to be a well-educated one. Continue reading →