LivePlan - Online Planning

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Product Description

The easiest way to get your business plan done today. 

LivePlan makes it easy to create a professional business plan online, with:

•  Advice from business planning expert Tim Berry
•  Built–in help everywhere you need it
•  Fast, professional results
•  Access everywhere, on any computer

With expert advice, built-in help, access anywhere, and more than 500 complete sample business plans, LivePlan makes it easy for you to create a professional plan that will wow any audience.

Easy, error-free financials guaranteed.
LivePlan makes it easy to put together your financial projections. Your knowledge about your business combined with LivePlan's powerful forecasting tools will create a bulletproof business plan.

Built-in formulas make the financials simple
Write your whole plan without ever having to look at a spreadsheet. LivePlan simply asks you questions about your business and you plug in the answers. The calculations are done behind the scenes. Our team has a combined 50 years of experience creating business plans and business planning software, so you can trust LivePlan to do the math for you.

Illustrate your financials with automatic charts
Visuals make your plan easier to digest. So LivePlan creates your charts based on the financial information you've already input. LivePlan's automatic charts will make your plan look great and save you a ton of time.

Full financials for a complete business plan
LivePlan includes all the financial tables a lender or investor expects to see, all linked together for you. You input your data, and it's pulled into the right table automatically. You'll create an error-free plan in less time than you thought possible.

Include just the information you need
You have complete control over your plan. Maybe you only need to forecast sales and expenses and don't want to worry about cash flow right now. Or maybe you want multiple years' worth of monthly data. No problem. With a few simple settings, you can easily choose the level of detail to include in your plan. And you can always go back and change it to adjust your plan for any audience.

Create a long-term plan
A typical business plan looks three years into the future, but if you need a longer-range plan it's simple to create one. LivePlan lets you include five full years of monthly projections, which you can include in your appendix, so you can show investors or lenders exactly how your business will grow.

Wow lenders with a professional plan

LivePlan gives you all the tools you need to create an accurate, complete, great-looking business plan.

Top-notch printed documents
You need to put your best foot forward when you present your plan, so LivePlan produces professional, printed plans that will impress any audience. Simply download your plan as a PDF to print or share, or export it to your favorite word processing program to give it some final polish. Your business plan will look like it was created by a professional business plan writer.

The format lenders expect
Banks, investors, and SBA-approved lenders look at a lot of business plans. If yours doesn't fit the standard format, you might get stuck at the bottom of the pile. After 15+ years in the business planning business, we know what lenders are looking for in a business plan. When you use LivePlan, your plan will meet those standards.

Easy export
With one click, export your plan to Microsoft® Word, iWork, or your favorite word processing program to customize it even more. Add a flashy cover page or images of your products. Make all the text green and pink if you want to (we don't recommend it, but you can do it). It's easy to make your plan look exactly how you want it to look.

Personalize your plan for your business
Businesses come in all shapes and sizes, and so do business plans. That's why LivePlan makes it easy for you to add, subtract, rename, and rearrange the components of your plan to suit your particular situation. Far from a cookie-cutter business plan, you'll create a truly unique plan that's just right for your business.

Real business plans to inspire you

If you're new to business planning, it can be really helpful to see some samples before you start writing your own plan. That's why LivePlan includes an extensive library of real sample business plans. 

Save time and get inspired with over 500 sample plans included
Read through as many plans as you like to see how it's done and get inspired. And if you really want to, you can even copy and paste sections to use in your own plan.

We've collected these sample plans over 15+ years, most through generous donations from happy customers who used our software and wanted to share their successful plans with others.

Plus plenty of examples built inIn addtion to all the complete sample plans, LivePlan includes example content for every text item in your business plan.
Browse through a few examples to get an idea how others have worded their Executive Summary, for instance. Find an example that really works for you? One click adds it right into your plan. Then you can personalize it to fit your business and move on to the next task.

Created by experts for expert results

LivePlan isn't just another product created by a giant software publishing house. It's the next generation in our line of business planning products that have helped small business owners and entrepreneurs for over 15 years.

Expert guidance at every step
LivePlan provides tons of built-in guidance, including video instructions from renowned business planning expert Tim Berry. You might not be familiar with his name, but Tim literally wrote the book on business planning (The Plan-As-You-Go Business Plan), and it's included with your LivePlan subscription.

With LivePlan, you get the peace of mind and the professional plan that you'd expect from working with a planning consultant. Without having to pay consulting fees.

Instructions you'll understand
You don't have to know everything about business planning to get your plan done. LivePlan is packed with easy-to-follow instructions, helpful advice, and additional reading (if you want to dive even deeper). You get to focus on what you know best — your business — while LivePlan provides the support you need to turn your great ideas into a great business plan.

Best-selling planning book includedThe PDF version of The Plan-As-You-Go Business Plan is included with LivePlan. It details Tim Berry's no-nonsense approach to business planning, helping you break away from  cookie-cutter business plans to embrace an easier, more practical plan that will evolve with your business.

Video instructions and tutorials
Create the best possible plan for your business by watching Tim Berry's planning tutorials. Originally created for the Small Business Administration, the tutorials break planning into manageable pieces and help you understand the principles behind the process.

Legal advice and forms
From choosing a legal structure to understanding trademark basics to a collection of ready-to-use legal forms, LivePlan includes additional resources to help you succeed.

The marketing expertise you need
You'll find tons of helpful marketing tips and guidance built right into LivePlan, including a valuable ebook from John Jantsch, of Duct Tape Marketing fame.

Everywhere you go, your plan is there
At home, at the office, on the road...Regardless of where you are or what computer you\'re using, LivePlan is there. When you want to work on your business plan, log in from any modern Internet browser - Internet Explorer, Safari, FireFox, and Chrome are fully supported.

Works on Macs or PCs
It doesn't matter if you use a PC at the office and a Mac at home, or both. You can access LivePlan on any and all the computers you own or work on, including your iPad. It's the beauty of online business planning software - it works on any computer, everywhere there's an Internet connection.
Team up with colleagues across town or across the globe
Because your business plan is online, you and your partners can work on your plan from anywhere. Learn more about collaboration features.

Business planning for teams

Share your workload by having colleagues work with you on your business plan or give an advisor access to provide feedback and guidance. With LivePlan, you don't have to plan alone.

Truly easy collaboration
Finally, it's easy to collaborate on a plan with your partner or team. No more emailing files back and forth or losing one person's changes because you accidentally saved over them. And forget having to figure it all out by yourself because of a restrictive software license. LivePlan makes business planning a team activity.

You choose who sees what
If you've got several versions of your business plan, or multiple partners and multiple different plans, it's easy to manage permissions. Allow specific collaborators to see and work on only the plans you want them to see. The plan owner decides who can access what, on a plan-by-plan basis.

Get comments and advice from your team
You don't have to give somebody access to edit your plan to get their insights. Invited users can comment on any section of a plan. You get feedback that you can implement (or ignore) without worrying about somebody actually changing the work you've done.

Share with advisors or investors
Say you want advice from your accountant. Give him instant access by inviting him right from your laptop or even your smart phone. Meet a potential investor at a networking event? She can be reading your plan, and thinking about investing in your business, in minutes. You can invite unlimited readers to view your plan, for free! And don't worry, you can take access away from any guest, at any time.

Track your success as your business grows

With the Scoreboard feature, you can use your business plan to help you stay on track and manage your business better.

Log in and get right to work
Once your business is up and running, use your business plan to stay on top of your performance and how it compares to what you planned. LivePlan makes it easy to input your actual sales and expense numbers, so you can adjust your plan for what's going on in the real world.

Easy to update, easy to understand
With one click and a few keystrokes, your plan is updated with your actual results. You can update each month as you get your final numbers, quarterly, or on whatever schedule works best for you.
Once your figures are in, you've got a clear view of the variance between your forecast and your actual results. If you're doing better than you projected, you can revisit your plan to budget for additional income you didn't expect. Or quickly address areas where you're underperforming before they get out of hand. Smart planning is a great way to avoid unpleasant surprises!

Your data security is our top priority

We do everything possible to keep all your data safe and private. We'll never lose it, sell it, or let it be compromised.

Confidentiality guaranteed
We understand how important your personal information is to you and we are committed to keeping it strictly confidential. Your privacy is not for sale. We will never sell, rent, or otherwise abuse the private information you have trusted us with.

The most trusted name in business planning for over 15 yearsFor over 15 years, business owners all over the world have trusted Palo Alto Software. They've used our software to write their plans and we've protected over a hundred thousand business plans on our secure servers. You can count on us. 

Ironclad security
We use the same security and safety measures as the world's top financial institutions and undergo regular security audits to ensure that our service is as safe as it can possibly be, at all times.

All account and plan data is written to multiple disks instantly, backed up daily, and stored in multiple locations. The servers we use take advantage of the most modern techniques to remove bottlenecks and points of failure. Click here to learn more about our security measures

Automatic saving and backups
Your plan is saved automatically every few seconds, so you don't have to worry about losing data. Ever. Power outage while you're working on your plan? No sweat, your plan's backed up. Stolen laptop? At least they won't get your plan files. Virus wipes out your hard drive? Rest easy knowing that your business plan isn't at risk. Your plan is always safe and secure, backed up, and ready for you.

Designed for business owners and entrepreneurs like you

You're here to write a business plan, not become an expert in our software. So we made LivePlan incredibly easy to use. From setting up your plan to sharing it with your team to printing the finished product, the entire process is designed to be painless.

Log in and get right to work
There's no learning curve with LivePlan. It's straighforward and accessible, so from the first time you log in, you'll be able to concentrate on writing your business plan, not dealing with overly technical software packed with tons of jargon.

There's no need to worry about training classes or technical manuals either. We believe software should get out of your way and help you accomplish the task at hand. That's what LivePlan does.

Takes the guesswork out of planning
LivePlan is set up to help you think logically and write your plan effortlessly. You'll find helpful recommendations and suggestions throughout, intended to lead you through the process of writing your plan without a lot of guesswork or backtracking.

All the help you need
Whether you have technical questions, are looking for more in-depth coverage of business planning concepts, or run into unfamiliar terms or concepts, LivePlan's Help Center will help you find the answers you need quickly and easily. It includes how-to instructions, frequently asked questions, written and video content from business-planning expert Tim Berry, and much more.

We understand small businesses because we are a small business

At Palo Alto Software, we're passionate about entrepreneurship and small business success, because it's where we come from. Founder Tim Berry was a professional business plan consultant and writer, working mostly for large companies. Smaller companies couldn't afford the services of a professional like him, and because he believed so strongly in the benefits of business planning, he decided to come up with a solution.

The answer was to start his own small business. He took his years of expertise writing business plans for other people and created Palo Alto Software and Business Plan Pro, desktop software that allowed average business owners to do the job themselves.

That was over 15 years of market leadership ago. Now the team at Palo Alto Software is building on that long-standing history and reinventing business plans again. With LivePlan, we've created the software we'd want to use if we were starting our company today.

We're rethinking business plans, reimagining business plan software, and reinventing the process of writing a business plan.

It's not about one person sitting in a room cranking out a 50-page document to turn over to a banker. It is about starting your business smart. Preparing your business for success. Getting input from your colleagues. Writing the right plan for your situation.

We're here to help
We've been doing software support and customer service for a long time, a lot longer than most web-based applications have been around. We love talking to our customers, and have a great team of customer service and technical support professionals in-house to answer all your questions. Give them a call right now at 1-888-498-6136, and they'd be happy to chat about LivePlan with you.
We take great pride in the part our software plays in your success. That's why we make ourselves available by phone and live chat, and why we answer emails as fast as humanly possilbe. We want to hear from you, and we want to do everything we can to help you succeed in your business.

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