Plan Your Small-Business Startup at TheIdeaStartup

Every business begins with an idea. And every idea needs to be fleshed out into a business plan. TheIdeaStartup offers specialized collaboration tools to help you develop that plan, complete with financial projections and intellectual-property security.

Arguably the toughest part of the process is actually writing the business plan. TheIdeaStartup (TIS) provides a robust plan-builder that walks you through each section, from Executive Summary to Marketing Plan to Revenue Summary. It includes tips and examples, saves previous versions of your content, and even spell-checks your work.

TIS also walks you through a five-step process for generating pro-forma projections, including a revenue model, P&L, balance sheet, and statement of cash flows over five years. And it has real-time collaboration tools so you can chat with partners, share calendars, track tasks, and so on.

Want to learn more? This five-minute demo video shows you some of the ideas behind TheIdeaStartup:


TheIdeaStartup HD from Matt Chepeleff on Vimeo.

You can try TIS free for 30 days, after which you'll pay $24 per month for a Pro account. That strikes me as a somewhat weird pricing model, unless you're the type of person who generates lots of business ideas. I think for most folks, one or two months with TIS would do the trick.

Either way, you've got a month to find out. TIS looks like a superb solution for anyone looking to turn a business idea into a business plan. [via Web Worker Daily]