How to describe your business idea

In many occasions you need to describe your business idea. But how to ensure that your audience have a clear understanding of your idea? I suggest start with these key aspects below.

• Market
• Who are your target customers? Can you distinguish them from others?
• Calculate the size of your market, work out a reasonable number. The calculation procedure must be defendable.
• If there is any assumption or dependency, let your audience know.

• Definition of your product
• What do you sell? What are the specifications of your product?
• If your product is a kind of service, describe the interaction detail as specific as you can.
• Sometimes you should also tell the audience what you would not sell.

• Value that your product can bring to customer
• Why would your customer buy your product? What are the pains you can cure for your customer?
• Among your many products (or product models/types), which one is most attractive to each type of your customer, and why?

• Pricing model
• How would the customer pay you? For example, the amount, timing and pre-condition of payment.
• Membership discount? Points reward?

• Sales channel
• Direct sale? Channel sale? Online sale? Face-to-face sale?
• Telephone sale? Direct mail? Promote event?

• Cost estimation
• Roughly calculate your cost.
• So the margin could be estimated.

• Future outlook
• Ask and answer "what if" questions.
• What if you get scale of economy? What if technologies evolve? What if your customers get old? What if industrial monsters enter the same market?

Once you have a clear idea of what your business is, you can further elaborate your idea into a business plan.

• 市场。给出市场数字，以及推算出这个数字的具体方法。如果有前提假定或者有基于第三方统计的数据，一定要说清楚。
• 产品定义。讲清楚你想卖什么赚钱。一定要说明白究竟你的产品有几个，每个是什么。必要的时候也澄清一下哪些是你肯定不卖的。
• 产品对客户的价值。也就是说清楚客户为什么要买你的。你的n个产品当中，哪一个是最吸引客户的。
• 产品价格策略。说明白你想按什么方式卖钱，卖多少钱。
• 销售渠道。是网上销售？批发给代理商？只卖给大客户？
• 成本估计。价格策略定了之后，再估计出成本，就可以知道盈利情况了。
• 发展。比如规模效应，比如对技术和市场发展的估计和应对。