How To Write A Business Plan: Part 4 "Market Research & Industry Analysis"

I have written over 200 business plans for clients large and small and I am documenting how to write a business plan for those who want to write their own business plan.  If you need a business plan writer for hire I am here to help, if not, these post will help you develop your business plan on your own.

This post explains how to write the market research and industry analysis section of your business plan.  This is by far the easiest part of the business plan to develop.  In this short video I explain how to develop this section of the business plan:


To keep it simple, the Market Research & Industry Analysis section of a business plan is all "copy & paste".  This means you are not writing anything original in this part of the business plan.  First you find a great source.  For example, if you are writing a business plan for ecommerce you may add the statistics for revenue or sales in the ecommerce industry in the USA.  A great source would be the US Census bureau sales data.   You will copy and paste these numbers/statistics into your market research section. 

Why copy and paste?  In the financial projections section of the business plan you will be making assumptions on how much you will make (your revenue projections).  You financial projections are based on the data you researched in your market research and industry analysis section.  This is basically an educated guess on how much money you will make based on your research.  You want a reliable basis (a true premise) to your assumed financial projections.  Your market research, which should include footnotes & sources of where you found the data, are the basis for these assumptions.  

In addition to factual data you may want to conduct surveys or polls to see what your target market or industry is thinking. 

Include as much data and research as possible,  Things to include in this section are statistics on your potential customer base, trends in your industry, population of a certain geography you are targeting and data/research from legitimate and well respected sources.   

We are moving along with our basic outline of a standard business plan which has the following sections:

If you need help developing or writing your business plan, feel free to reach out to me.  Hope this was helpful,


The PushYourRank Team
Posted By: Nicholas Coriano



About The Author: Nicholas Coriano is a Business Plan Writer & Entrepreneur, Web Developer, Social Media Marketer, SEO Consultant and the founder of this blog, www.NewYorkWebsiteDesignCenter.com, and many other online businesses.  While developing websites for his own businesses and marketing his entrepreneurial ventures online, he began blogging useful tips and "how-to" articles on PushYourRank.com for reference purposes.  To retain Nicholas for help with your business plan, website launch or product launch, email PushYourRank@Gmail.com