Nyamuka Zambia Business Plan Competition
March 2016
NYAMUKA BUSINESS PLAN
COMPETITION APPLICATION
GUIDELINES
1 What is your business idea?
This is about capturing the essence of your idea and your story behind it
You should explain and summarise your business idea. Only one business idea is allowed.
Statements such as “my idea is farming” are not winning ideas as farming is an occupation, not a
specific business idea. An acceptable sort of idea could be that you want to process flour from
cassava and market all the other by-products from this process to wholesale dealers. An idea that
would be difficult to judge and reduce the chances of success would be where you want to grow
rice, keep chickens and run a taxi service all at the same time.
What exactly is the product or service you want to sell? What made you think of this idea? When
did you think of this idea?
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This is the most important aspect of your application as this what the competition is all
about and what you will be judged on.
The winning ideas are not about being clever but one that shows that you can make it
happen and sustain it and one that sets you above the rest of the competitors.
It needs to be clear, concise and make an impact. Use the space in application form to fully
explain your idea.
Good ideas should demonstrate:
o Innovation
o Show potential for growth
o Are feasible, robust and can be financed
o Owned by the Entrepreneur
2 Why do you think your idea will win the competition
and why do you think YOU can make this idea
succeed?
This is about understanding and capturing your passion, energy and drive for your business idea
You should explain what makes your idea a winning idea. What is the uniqueness you feel about
your idea and what do you dream it will become? You should explain why you think you are the
person to make it happen, do you have the energy, passion and the drive to see this idea through?
What can you say that will demonstrate this?
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Nyamuka Zambia Business Plan Competition
March 2016
3 What experience and skills do you, or anyone else
involved have, to help you develop this idea into a
successful business?
This is about finding out whether you have any potential and experience to realise your idea and
have thought of the support you might need for your idea
You should explain any previous relevant education and experience you have that demonstrates that
you can develop your business idea successfully. Have you done business before or has any member
of your family been involved in business before who can help you? You should explain any skills you
have or have access to that will help you to succeed, please give specific examples where possible
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Work experience that you can use
Education and training that you can use
Skills and personal qualities that you can use
Personal and professional contacts that you can use
4 Is there anyone else already providing this service
or product? How will you compete with them?
This is about finding out whether you have a basic understanding of the market for your product /
service
You should explain who your potential competitors are and how you will compete (e.g. your price,
costs, quality, location and availability versus your competitor’s prices, costs, quality, location and
availability) and how you will successfully market you product or service
What will you make? What service will you provide? What will you sell? Who will be your
customers? What is your target market? How does that work? What does that involve?
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Do the basic market research
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Know who your target customer is
Know your key competitors and their pros and cons
Have a demand estimate for your product or service
Have a clear unique selling position, that will make customers convert to you
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5 How do you intend to put this idea into practice?
How much time will you need?
This is about how you will put your idea into practice in terms of time and resources you need, for
example, premises, equipment, seeds, land and human resources. It is also about understanding how
long it will take for you to set up your business and make your idea a reality
Do you need to set up an office / shop? How will you do this? When is it needed? Do
you need any tools, machinery or computer equipment? When will you need them?
Do you need raw materials (e.g. tomatoes, coffee)? Where will you get this from?
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Nyamuka Zambia Business Plan Competition
March 2016
How will you organise production of your product / provision of your service? How will you get your
product / service to market?
6 Do you think there are any risks involved in
developing this business? How will you find a way
of avoiding or overcoming these risks?
This is about finding out if you understand the risks involved in setting up a business and has thought
of ways to overcome these risks, for example:
What happens if you cannot source your inputs reliably? (e.g. if there is crop failure, or if suppliers
cannot deliver reliably). What happens if you (or another critical person) become ill? What happens
if the sales price of your product / service drops significantly? What happens if your route to market
is obstructed? What happens if you are unable to raise sufficient cash to fund your business? Is
there a danger of fraud, theft or damage to your goods / premises? If you are buying or selling
goods from overseas, what happens if the foreign exchange rate changes significantly?
It is up to you to identify and prioritise the risks facing your business. The most important ones
(those that have a high probability of happening and that will have a high cost to your business)
should be explained on the application form. You can overcome or reduce the impact of risks by, for
example, taking out insurance, registering your company as a limited company, putting in place good
compliance and management structures.
7 How much will it cost to put this idea into
practice? Where do you propose to get the capital
to start your business?
This question is about trying to understand if you have thought about money, the cost of setting up
and running your business idea and how you will get the money to do this.
You should have a basic understanding of the costs of putting your idea into practice. This should be
linked into the responses you have provided for the other questions.
This requires a brief breakdown of the big start-up costs (the ‘capital’ cost of setting up the idea,
such as land, machinery, office furniture, vehicles and computer equipment).
This is different from the ongoing operating costs to run your business (the costs of running the
business, such as people’s salaries, cost of goods sold, cost of inputs to the manufacturing process
etc.) and such costs should be excluded unless you have a long time between purchasing stock for
your business and the sale of these goods (e.g. the purchase of a large number of vehicles for a car
sales company or if you are growing, say, cocoa that will take 1 year to grow).
You should be aware that the competition has a limited prize fund and that you may not win first
prize. In addition, your investment plan (how much money you will need) is very likely
to be more or less than the prize fund available. With this in mind, where will you
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Nyamuka Zambia Business Plan Competition
March 2016
obtain the money from to start your business? For example: from family and friends, as a cooperative, from a bank, etc.
8 How much money do you think you will make from this
idea?
This is about understanding if you have thought about how much profit you could make from your
business idea and whether you have thought about your profit margin per good / service sold
In order to ascertain the likely profit from your idea, you may firstly consider how much your goods /
services will sell for? If you then know how much this will cost then the sales price less the cost of
sale = the profit margin per unit / service. This is all about how financially robust your business idea
is going forward once it has been set up. So your ongoing costs should exclude the start-up costs.
Further Information:
FINANCE BASICS
Profit Margin
Sales Price per Unit
=
Less Cost of Goods Sold Per Unit
Profit =
Turnover
Less Cost of Goods Sold
Less other Operating Expenses
Cash flow=
Profit less Working Capital:
Less Capital Expenditure
Less Cost of Finance:
Investment
Required
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How much will you charge your customers per
item/ service sold?
How much will it cost you to manufacture/
purchase your goods/services sold per item?
Number of goods/services sold x Sales Price per
unit
Number of goods/services sold x Cost of Goods
sole per Unit
Such as the cost of your premises, employee
salaries, office expenses, mobile phones, tax, etc
Inventory (Goods you have made but which you
have not yet sold) Debtors (customers who owe
you money by haven’t paid you yet)
Creditors (Suppliers to whom you owe money
but haven’t paid them yet)
Cost of land, machinery, office furniture,
computers
Repayment of bank loans and interest
The amount of cash you need when your cash flow and cash balance is less than
zero