Tips for writing a business plan for your APP startup

Nowadays Mobile apps are creating turbulence in the world of technology. Some of these are entry-level apps while others are enterprise level apps. However, creating supercool apps perfectly tailored to the needs of your customers is not that easy. Developing high-quality mobile apps is expensive and a significant amount of money needs to be invested in bootstrapping it decorously. Raising investments for your mobile app might seem to intimidate you at first, but approaching the potential investors with a legitimate business plan will fecundate your collective effort.Crafting a comprehensive plan on a business model involves effort and time. Investors want focused and buoyant business plans from aspiring entrepreneurs and in the hope of securing funding from them, one has to slog for hours to create a compelling b-plan. 

Here are some important steps you need to follow to build an ideal startup business plan to compete in the space of mobile app:

1. Exclusive Details of the App

Current Problem: Before starting with anything, the first and foremost thing an entrepreneur needs to do is to define the problem.How big is the problem and how are your customers dealing with it every single day? Prolific mobile app startups have identified the problem they are addressing and acted accordingly by bringing an innovative product to the market to abrogate the woes of the customers

Suggested Solution-Why build an app?

Why is there a need for the app? How is the problem getting solved by the customers without the help of this app? How will the app solve the problems of the end-users? Google play store and iOS store together have a count of more than 6 million apps. Then how is your app different from others?Another way of mentioning the need for your app is by highlighting the imperfections of the similar apps present in the market.You have to describe in a paragraph or two as to how your app will placate your end-users and what are the prerequisites for using your app.

Value Proposition and Objectives:

Unique Value Proposition is the factor that differentiates a startup from its counterparts. It is always advisable for the newbies to highlight the unique selling points of your app in front of the investors.Your USP will help the investors to procure a rough idea of your position in the pool of startups. It also demonstrates how you are positioned against your competitors.

Another important aspect of your business plan should be your goals. A very common question is what are the key achievements you want to accomplish within a specific span of time.The investors might also start asking about your exit plan.What numbers do you want to accomplish by the end of 2-3 years?Generally, they want to be aware of the metrics you are intending to achieve by the end of a fixed span of time.Having an idea on how to reach the break-even point of the startup is mandatory for every budding entrepreneur.

2.Company Overview

This is the sector where every key detail about the company is going to be mentioned.Common information includes the type of business entity whether it is a private limited or an LLP Firm, where is the office located, when was the company created, what is the current size of the company in terms of employees. Investors often put importance on the portfolio of the members of the founding team. The focal point of this section is the expanded details of the governing team members. Try to accommodate space for specifics of the members- name, degrees, relevant work experience, and their responsibilities in the company.One should be prudent enough to include the company history section in the business plan.This section would comprise details on the key factors that motivated you to build this app, major milestones achieved till date, app demo, and launch. You might also depict how you have garnered candidates from various domains and collated them as a unit.

3.Marketing and Promotional Necessities

Investors always want a pragmatic approach from the team members in popularizing the product among its end users. Marketing campaigns are organized by the startups in order to create a customer-centric awareness about their products. So a marketing plan for a mobile app startup is indeed necessary to showcase at the time of pitching the b-plan. However, the marketing plan will typically consist of the following sections:

Marketing Channels

Most of the startups fail to succeed in the market as they shy away from spending on promotional activities or they promote their product on the wrong platforms.The optimal target audience for any mobile app platform is found online. Hence in order to disperse your marketing collaterals, the following channels are preferred:

Social media ads (Facebook/Instagram)

Retargeting campaigns

Content Marketing

Incentivized User Downloads

Search Engine Marketing

Email Marketing

Affiliate Marketing

Mobile site redirection

Mobile app wall ads

These channels will provide you with the required performance metrics of your campaigns based on parameters such as CPM and CPI. Alternating ROI coupled with flip-flop response from the customers help you identify the best channel for your marketing activities.In order to witness the exponential growth of a mobile-app startup, a smarter marketing approach and out of the box sales strategy are indispensable. Establishing a successful mobile app startup is an onerous task. So it is important to twirl intelligently when needed.

4.Financial Plan and Business Model

Every mobile app startup face difficulties in minting money at the beginning.Your investor needs to know how much money do you need exactly and how are you planning to spend the money.A logical monetary approach is needed to surmount this problem.

Monetization Strategy

Some of the common ways to monetize the user base are:

In-app advertising: If you have a considerable user base and your app is free for your users, they advertising on your platform might be a great idea to generate revenue through your app.

Free + Premium Services: Most of the apps like LinkedIn, Tinder give certain features for free while other features remain unlocked and can be only availed by paying extra bucks.

In-app purchases: E-commerce apps like Flipkart, Amazon sell physical good to users while apps that involve gamification sell virtual goods to users.

Subscription bases: Apps like Netflix, Amazon Prime, Altbalaji, Saavn are some of the endearing apps in this space. Subscription-based app model is gaining momentum in this space. These apps charge the customers on a monthly, quarterly, half-yearly or yearly basis.

Customer Acquisition Cost

You need to pitch typical strategies for acquiring new customers. It is a crucial metrics for the investors to evaluate your startup. You might have to mention the cost per app install or CPI in your business plan.A quantitative proposition of acquiring customers from each channel is extremely mandatory.It gives you an approximate estimate of how much can you expect to spend after high-end users who are going to install your app and make the desired action such as sign up, purchase, subscribe.There will always be a section of users who are going to uninstall your app without interacting with it. You have to devise out a strategy in prompting them to install your app again and engage with it.As most of the funds will empower the growth of the startup, having a rough idea on cost per engagement strategy will be wieldy for the investors.

Startup expenses

For a startup, having a reasonable estimate of financial expenses is of utmost importance.Exact numbers are difficult to portray. Make sure you include all the expenses on your list- some of them are one-time charges while others are recurring ones. Try to append expenses like the salary of employees, general overhead charges, company incorporation expenses, office leasing rent, costs on utilities. Some of the charges are stable and fixed while other expenses will vary time. Try to lower the burn rate as much as you can.

Customer Lifetime Value

This number beckons the plausible amount you can expect to make from your end-users or customers. A high Customer Acquisition Cost and a low Lifetime Value are loathsome and may come as a roadblock to the development of your app.Such factors unnerve the financial viability of your mobile app and create a strong sense of disinterest among your investors.

Profit and Loss Statement

Your business plan must contain a forecasted profit and loss document that should contain financial projects on assets, liabilities, and earnings for a fixed duration of time.

5. Market Projections & Competitive Study

No business is perfect until you make it perfect. Your mobile app might have weaknesses and disadvantages but including them in your business plan helps the investors to recognize your potential problems and ensures them that you are working against all the odds to curtail them.This section would contain a rooted analysis of the potential market your product is addressing. Profound market knowledge with latest projections needs to be transmitted in this section.Incorporate the growth rate of prolific companies in your industry and highlight the advantages and disadvantages in competing with them. Include terminologies like Total Available Market(TAM) and Serviceable Available Market(SAM).This component of your business plan would give an objective overview of how you are competing against your rivals in the same industry.

Conclusion

As you are more focused on building a mobile app, you should not stress enough to create a pertinent business plan.Launch the app in the market and start collecting reviews from the customers. In most cases, you'll get mixed reviews. That's fine!you are doing it right. Now since you have a pre-fabricated asset and some numbers to exhibit in front of the investors, follow the above process and start creating the B-plan for your business.