P.J. Wilkerson Wilkerson 1
Capstone Seminar
March 29, 2010
Dr. Huesca
Project Outline
For my Capstone project, I will be creating a business and marketing plan for a start-up
web design company. This plan will be used to present the company to potential investors and to
allow for a more efficient and thought-out launch to the company. The client for this project is a
potential investor named Keith Adams. Keith has a background in computer science and web
design and wants to become more involved in web design. However, due to time constraints in
his life, he believes he can be more effective as an investor. However, before he will even
consider investing in the company, he wants to see a fully developed business plan with an added
emphasis on marketing. This will allow him to determine if the company is a worthwhile
investment.
The audience for my project is potential investors. While Mr. Adams is the specific client
that will be evaluating this business plan, the plan will be presented to other investors as the
company ages. While that business plan might have updated statistics based on how long after
launch the presentation is made, this project will layout the basic format of the company’s
business plan allowing for easier editing when needed.
My preliminary plans for my project involve two things: the actual creation of the
business and marketing plan and preparation for the assessment of the project and how it relates
to the communication major. The business and marketing plan will be completed through the
assistance of two books: Anatomy of a Business Plan by Linda Pinson and The Successful
Wilkerson 2
Business Plan: Secrets and Strategies by Rhonda Abrams. These were the two highest reviewed
business plan books that I could find. By using them both to help format and order the business
plan will allow for a more professional and standard final plan. However, neither book has an
extensive section on marketing. I will be adding this section using the handout on integrated
marketing campaigns provided by Dr. Huesca and my own experience from my marketing
classes. The exact location of this section in the business plan is yet to be determined. The
second part of my project will be assessment and reflections section of the final project. Since
my Capstone project has less to do with communication than many others, this section will allow
me to show how the communication curriculum relates to my project. One example of this would
be how new media allows small start-up companies like mine to compete against much larger
and more established firms. This section will also delve farther into the public relations and
advertising parts of the integrated marketing campaign, explaining why certain choices in media
usage were made.
Feasibility is my biggest concern at this point. The requirements for a good business plan
are much more involved than I expected and adding a marketing plan to that is pretty intense.
However, since I do have a lot of reference material to go off of, that should speed up the
process. Overall, I am fairly confident that all of this can be accomplished by the assigned due
date. The rough draft is the only part I am worried about because these books want the person to
go step-by-step through them and having to have fully finished sample prepared by that date
could be difficult. If needed, I can remove some of the more tedious financial sections for the
rough draft, allowing me to have a full paper without some of the drier aspects of a business
plan.