At the Postal and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe (POTRAZ) Innovation, an entrepreneurship mentor presented on business proposal writing. Dr. Sacrifice Madenyika Chirisa gave a list of things that funders are looking for at your proposal. This article gives some of the things sponsors are looking for in order to offer you funds for your proposal. This may help you in writing a proposal as an innovator or entrepreneur or just thinking of starting a business.

Does your business idea/innovation have a market?

One of the things you need to know is whether your proposal has a market? This implies that in your proposal you have to identify a market for your business. You should know the targeted customers whom you are targeting and tell why you believe that is the main market of your product or innovation.
Does the targeted market have the money? Your business may flop if your target market does not have the money. Considering this it is important to prove that the market which you are selling. The purpose of starting a business or an innovation is to make money. This implies that your market should be a ready market which has the money to buy a product.
How quickly are you getting money? Because you are applying for a loan, funders need to know if they are going to get the money within their prescribed time frame.
Where are you going to get the money from? You need to do a market segmentation for your market in order to show the funders where the bulk of the financial inflows are coming from in your business plan or proposal. Market segmentation is diving your market of potential customers into groups based on different characteristics. These characteristics include demographic, behavioral, psychographic, geographic and so on.  The market segmentation also helps understand some of the questions above.

Marketing Plan

Funders to you idea also want to know the marketing plan that you will be using for your idea.
How are you going to be known? Your innovation has to reach the market and the funders want to know what you will be doing to reach the market.
What mediums are you using? Your proposal must also show the mediums you are going to use to reach the market. These mediums may include the use of social media and also traditional media such as broadcast (radio and television) and print (newspapers). You may use your market segmentation to help you find the best mediums to your market. If your market is the youths, then you may try using social media but the old age might distrust the Social media and rather go for traditional media.

Know Your Competition

One other thing the funders need to know is your competition. There is always a competitor in your business idea. If your business idea is unique or it is an innovation you will be competing with what the market is doing without your innovation e.g if people are currently using candles for lighting and you invent the bulb, your main competitor here are candles which people are using before the invention of the bulb.
How different are your competitors from you? You should show the difference between you and your competitors in business. E.g There is a need to show how different are your tomatoes from the person who is selling tomatoes next to you to the funders in order to get funding. You may also give the advantages of your products or idea to your competitor. If it is an innovation or an invention then show the difference between what the market is using and your innovation. Back to the candle bulb example, you should show the difference between using the bulb and using the candles.
to be continued…