You had a great idea. It can become a business but it is still not.
An idea is a start (without it nothing can start) but it is not a point of arrival. To develop an idea and making it viable and profitable (which means transform it into a business) you need a plan. Don’t think the plan is something you need to give to others, the plan is something you need to order all the crazy (and probably creative) ideas you have in your mind. Because until you are not able to create an order in your creativity, you have no chance to realize really what you thought.
A lot of times in our experience they ask a business plan to get a loan, to present to the bank, to support an investor and so on but mostly of the times we answer that the business plan is needed for the entrepreneurs because it helps them to have clear vision on how, what and when.
How: it means the way you can realize what you thought. We want to create an Italian fast food able to serve fresh pasta in 1 minute. Wonderful idea! But how do you think to cook a pasta (that needs 5 minutes) in 1 minute. So you need to specify how you want to do that
What: it means the exact thing you want to realize. It seems strange asking yourself what but sometimes the idea is a dream and when you awake, you find out you were thinking something different
When: we can have the idea to go to Jupiter, it is nice but when is this possible? Probably in 100 years so our wonderful idea is useless. Timing is important
And most important of all: for whom?
I had the idea to create a pen for Asian people that use the left hand but lives in Western countries (because they write with Western alphabet). Nice idea! But how many customers can you get? And how easy is reachable your target?
This is a simple summary of what a business plan must be able to focus and describe. More will follow