A business plan precisely defines your business, identifies your goals and serves as your firm's resume.  It describes the products and services you will sell, the customers to whom you will sell them, production, management and marketing activities needed to produce your offerings,  and the projected profit or loss that will result from your efforts.  The business plan should provide answers to:  Who are you?  What are you going to do?  Where are you going? How are you going to get there? 

Completing a business plan forces you to examine all decisions of management, marketing, personnel and finance issues in an objective and organized way.  Another important benefit of the planning process is that you will project the amount of financing needed for start-up and the early stages of your business.