Q Products and/or Services Describe the products and services you plan to sell. How is your product or service unique? Are you producing a commodity or a differentiated product? How does your product or service compare to other products in Quality? Price? Location? What experience do you have with this product/service? ? Market Assessment A. Examining the General Market How is the market characterized? Are there clear segments in the market? Describe them. What important customer need(s) is the market not currently fulfilling? What is the growth potential for each segment of the market? What opportunities and threats does your firm face? What does an analysis using the Five Forces model suggest about your industry? Who is your competition (in light of the Five Forces)? What trends, relevant to your business, do you see? What are the drivers of change? What political and legal issues do you face, such as zoning, environmental laws, inspections, etc? B. Customer Analysis Who will be your customers? What do you sell to each of the customers? How does your product/service solve a key customer problem? How difficult is it to retain a customer? How much does it cost to support a customer? C. Industry Analysis D. Strategic Alternatives ? Strategic Implementation A. Production How will you produce your product? What value will you create and capture with your product? What is your competitive advantage? What technology will you use, i.e. reduced tillage, GPS systems, etc.? What processes will you use to produce products? What growth options will you use to develop the business unit? • Enterprise Expansion • Replicate • Integrate • Network What is the anticipated timeline? B. Resource Needs In order to effectively organize your business you need to insure the resources are available. Assess those needs here. a) Human What skills are needed? How will human resources be acquired? b) Financial What level of financial resources will be needed? c) Physical What type, quantity and quality of physical resources will be required? C. Sourcing/Procurement Strategy On what do you base a decision to buy products or services? Price? Quality? Convenience? Extra service? A combination? By what venue will you find suppliers — local dealer, Internet, direct from manufacturer, etc.? D. Marketing Strategy What is your sales plan? What advertising and promotion will be used to increase sales/awareness? Where will you sell products/services? Will you use the open market or contracts? Do you have a preferred market outlet? Are you a qualified supplier for a specific processor or buyer? How will you price the product? a) Hedging, forward pricing, options How will you use these to mitigate your risk? b) Contracting Will you use production or marketing contracting to reduce risk? c) Insurance How will you use crop, liability and other insurance? E. Performance Standards What performance standards will be used to monitor this enterprise or business unit? What are acceptable performance standards? What yield or output levels could you attain? What efficiency levels will you reach? What procedures will be used to monitor performance? Who is responsible for monitoring performance? What industry benchmarks will be used to assess performance?