Your business plan must show that your numbers can be made a reality. The bank will be repaid, investors will receive their expected rates of return, and you will make a good living too. So, your sales projections and the evidence that there is, indeed, a market for your product or service is crucial.

In this area, it is all too tempting to measure the overall market and make it seem very large. Too many business plans state something like, "There are fifty million Americans who buy widgets each year." It doesn’t take much time or thought to look up these numbers, so if you’re going to mention them a business plan, keep in mind that they are not really evidence that anyone will buy your product.

An easy second step is to take the projected sales of the business and divide them by the total market to measure projected market share. This amount usually turns out to be quite tiny, with the implication that such a sales level will be very easy to achieve. It may seem reasonable on paper to say, "We only need to obtain five percent of the total market in downstate Illinois to achieve our sales goals." But, this type of thoughtless projection most often turns out to be too good to be true.

Your sales and marketing plan should, instead, be built from the bottom up. To do this, you must identify potential customers that, one-by-one, add up to sales volume. Perhaps the most tangible evidence that your sales plan will come to fruition is the existence of written contracts or purchase orders or if your business has a backlog of orders. These details should certainly be included in your plan, and your plan should also always include lists and details of significant existing and potential customers.

Unfortunately, not every business has the luxury of having a bunch of orders in hand, especially when it is new. But, there is still a great deal you can do to show that a market exists for your product or service. If your customers will be other businesses, then rent a booth at a Chamber of Commerce event or a trade show. Ask potential customers to fill out surveys; offer them discounts or prizes; exchange business cards; create an e-mail list or an informative website. Your attendance at such a show, your communication with potential customers, and, perhaps most importantly, their answers to your questions will go a long way toward gauging your true market.

If your customers will be individuals, then you may also try to survey them. Meet them at home shows, purchase lists from a local mailing list vendor, start a blog, or post to other blogs. If you have a retail store, then you may want to shop at a competing store and keep track of foot traffic and purchases. Call your competitors and act like a customer; find out their prices. Better yet, if you can find a similar business in a different geographic market, it may be a good idea to take a trip there, shop, talk to the owner, and make some notes.

It certainly takes creativity mixed with hard work, but you should do all that it takes to present a "bottom up" sales plan to show how you will actually make your plan a reality.