A common theme in our daily, overstimulated, highly social lives is the constant idea of ‘what’s next?’. How are you changing, growing, achieving, and where do you see yourself in the next year, five years – ten years?
In life and business, it’s hard to predict tomorrow, let alone three to five years from now, but ultimately, making a long-term plan isn’t about predicting – it’s about envisioning. Keeping your vision clear, your goals evolving, and your strategy agile is the key to keeping your long-term plan like a simple snapshot of the future.
Planning is undeniably helpful, but when it comes to following through, think of your one, two, and three-year plans as the roadmap and your five-year plan as the North Star.
What is a Short-Term Business Plan?
A traditional, detailed business plan is a hefty document that ranges from 20+ pages. This document guides the business’s and its team’s day-to-day tasks to consistently work towards the overarching, long-term goals. Short-term plans are critical for companies to get off the ground and become profitable.
A detailed business plan looks into the immediate one to three-year scope, detailing expensed expenses, cash flow, projected sales, marketing, target audience, etc. A detailed business report outlines in great detail everything, including:
- Long + short-term goals
- Competitor analysis
- SWOT analysis
- Customer demographics
- Products + services
- Financial Details, targets, and forecasted spending
- Expected ROI
What is a Five Year Business Plan?
A long-term plan (business or personal) should look more like an overall vision statement and strategic plan for the future without deep diving into the details.
Your five-year plan should explain your business, what you do, the customers you envision serving in the future, and what position scaling over five years will put you in.
A solid long-term plan looks at projected major milestones, leaving the details of what needs to be done to get there in the short-term handbook. Focused on a long-term, overarching strategy, the five-year plan includes broad financial projections, marketing strategies, and operational scope (or changes to scope) that will punctuate the coming years.
Decisions about the day-to-day need to be agile and flexible, so remember that your five-year plan is a long game and may evolve as your business evolves.
Why You Need a Five-Year Plan
There’s no question that businesses need a long-term plan, but it’s often overlooked in favor of short-sighted urgencies. Creating a five-year plan should be the foundation for short-term plans because we all start with the dream in mind.
Here are the top reasons you need a long-term plan:
Showcase Your Vision:
Creating a plan helps business owners articulate their goals, strategies, and financial projections, demonstrating their vision and potential to potential investors. It removes the confusion of explaining your dream and executes it clearly, concisely, and visually.
Long-Term Goal Setting:
Looking at the big picture is broad, but the saying is still true what gets measured gets done. Clearly identifying long-term goals helps to refine the steps, obstacles, and processes that will need to take place to achieve those goals. Measurable goals are significantly more likely to be accomplished (scientifically speaking).
Accelerated Growth:
Studies show that businesses that adhere to short- and long-term plans and goals scale 30% faster than businesses that don’t. That’s a big number to overlook.
Risk Management:
Looking at a long-term plan helps business owners to uncover weak spots and opportunities for risk management. Planning for risks and potential setbacks helps owners to develop strong contingency plans and get ahead of the problem.
Measurement of Success:
Creating goals (of any kind) is a roadmap for measuring success in tangible and intangible ways. If goals and targets are missed, this can also act as a roadmap for approaching something through a new lens or from a different angle to find success.
How to Create Your Own 5-Year Business Plan
Like any good plan, you need to start somewhere, so StellaPop has created a five-step plan to creating your five-minute plan in five minutes or less:
Envision: take a minute to envision your ideal business outcome over the next five years: what are your products or services (and how will they change), and how many employees/locations do you have? What is your financial freedom goal?
- Expand: Look at your current demographic and target audience and think about how they will change/grow and how their needs might expand in the next five years – this is your expansion scope so that you can continue to meet the needs of your audience long term.
- Start Small: Free write these goals and this vision into a one-page plan that outlines your core strategy, core audience, and basic (scalable) business model. Make this a snapshot of the next five years with your key vision as the end goal. What will you need to get to this goal?
- Stay Broad: When looking at departments, expenses, and expansion, stay broad. Set lofty, overarching goals for these categories without going into detail about the ‘how.’ Use broad numbers, for example, tripling revenue in five years or increasing marketing spend to 20% of overall sales. What is the big, big picture for your business?
- Revisit and Revise: Revisit this plan every month, making adjustments and predictions as dictated by the movement of the business. Be open to changes and adjustments to keep you on track. Make this small, easy-reading document your go-to to help guide more long-term business decisions.
The Do’s + Don’ts of Your Five-Year Plan
Do:
- Keep it simple, concise, and brief: details or flowery language are unnecessary.
- Include a small executive summary, a short SWOT analysis, and a brief forecast for your ROI
- Think big picture without restrictions, hesitations, or stress about how to make it happen – let your mind run free!
Don’t:
- Spend too much time on the details, metrics, or data. Be short and sweet, and focus on major milestones.
- Forget to create your exit plan: this helps investors (and you) see clearly the end goal or what the end investment/setup looks like.
- Include financial reports, statements, or capital investments, but DO show potential for ROI
Looking for a little more structure and direction in creating a sustainable, achievable long-term plan (or short-term plan, because we do that too)?