Executive Summary
(You must to a brief description about key element on this OIC.com)When the reader read must to interest, While appearing first, this section is written last. It summarizes the key elements of the entire business plan. The Executive Summary is the most important part of your business plan. Because if it doesn’t interest readers, they’ll never even get to the rest of your plan
Start your executive summary with a brief and concise explanation of what your company does. Next, explain why your company is uniquely qualified to succeed. For example, does your management team have unique competencies? Do you have any patents? Are you the first mover in your market? Does a huge, unmet market opportunity exist? Etc.Finally, include a synopsis of your financial projections in your Executive Summary. Specifically, include your expected revenues, expenses and profits for each of the next five years, how much funding you are seeking, and the key uses of these funds.
It should sum up the following areas:
Purpose of the plan, Product or service and its advantages, Market opportunity. Management team, Track record, if any, Financial projections and Funding requirements
Oman Information Centre is a special site online that will present special types of service for online customers of Oman. It will present information about Oman in term of attraction places and areas in Oman as restaurants, hotels and resorts, mall , ministry, museum schools , Park ,Heritage and natural site and so on .In additional it includes companies' sales in terms of promotion ,offered, event ,festival and so on that be related to tourism sectors and other sectors . The site also sells products from famous store and local business in Oman and delivers the goods at homes of customers. The site is designed to make online buying easy for online customers. All people can use it such as Omani citizens or tourists and foreign residents, who want to reach places and hotels in Oman. The site is made to provide services that can cope the age of globalization and technology. Furthermore, ,people can rents their items to other through money. This website gain profit by combine department ,business and other thing on one websites, it could easers to use it rather than to search through internet to get relevant fact of information. There are other store on Oman don’t have online selling can sale through this website.
Company Overview
OIC.com is an online site that presents services of information and purchasing for people live in Oman as it has information about places where people can have dinner as restaurants and places where people can stay as hotels. It also sells goods and delivers them to the homes of customers who are registered in the site such as clothes, shoes, perfumes, make up, kitchen ware, scarves and children wear and souvenir items. It made for making buying from online sites an easy thing. The company is considered an e-commerce company, which is a type of commerce that has been widely used recently.
To be alternates online store that resident and foreign find easy to use and interesting.
Company Goals and Objectives
The company has the following goals and objectives
- To provide Omani customers with information service that make reaching anywhere easy for them.
- To get revenues and profits from the site.
- To make a good name in the Omani society.
- To attract many online purchasers for buying from the site.
- To have a wide range of customers from Omani people and from tourists.
This business is based upon attracting online surfers who wish to find a site that joins providing services for them and selling items online. The current age is representing an age of globalization and online life made selling and buying an easy process which affect competition among all online sites.
Online trade or e commerce became a great industry today which requires high care from the business owners in order to reach competitive advantage as online business today is more handy by people as most people buy and sell online today. Online shopping and tourism and hospitality sector are now one of the most trade methods people prefer as the online readers send e- mails to those customers in order to make them know the sales and offers that big companies provide and also they send them the promotions of the famous brands. Online trade today has made buying and selling easier than the past because you don’t have to open a store and spend too much money on it but a website and good administrators for the website are good to manage the project. (Strauss, 2014). It also save customer time and money.
The company strengths and core competencies are as follows:
- Quality content: the site contains high quality content about places in Oman where tourists can visit and information about places for shopping and the site provides extra services that most sites don't present such as the service of selling items and delivering them home and the payment can be according to the customers' desire either by cash on delivery or by mastercard online.
- Marketing: the site is prepared according to an effective marketing plan that depends on many promotions and strategies for making the site famous online through social media sites, forums and emails.
- Expenses: the site is prepared on low expenses which makes great opportunities for profit.
- Mixing between two services which are information and selling services.
- Office: At the begging have small office for customer if there have any inquires and to do contrast with other organization to rent their business, advertising and events.
OIC.com is a sole proprietorship, operated, founded and owned by independent.
An overview of the industry sector that your business will be a part of, including industry trends, major players in the industry, and estimated industry sales; this section will also include a summary of your business's place within the industry.
OIC.com is including the e commerce industry which includes selling services and goods online for purchasers who are registered on the site. This industry is a fast growing one as it is a retailing industry which now faces the challenges of online retailing as many customers now prefer online buying because they can pay at home and receive the goods at home. The industry analysis section includes two main parts as follows:
The Market Overview section discusses the size and characteristics of your market. For example, if you are a restaurant, you would include the size of the restaurant market, a brief discussion of sectors (e.g., fast food versus fine dining) and market trends.
Omani retailing market is a very busy one, which depends on many branches of retailing such as stores and online sites. The retailing business in Oman is increasing greatly as news tells that about 57% of Omani expect that the retailing market will improve and their profits as customers of Oman have strong activity especially online. Oman retailing market tells that most people today prefer online purchasing than store buying processes. This raises the company's opportunity in making profits in this field. (Oxford business group, 2013)
The relevant market size is a much more specific calculation of your market size. It is the annual revenue your company could attain if it attained 100% market share. Your relevant market size is calculated by multiplying 1) the number of customers who might be interested in purchasing your products and/or services each year and 2) the amount these customers might be willing to spend, on an annual basis, on your products and/or services
Basic Questions
1) What products/services are you (will you be) selling?
2) What are the features and benefits of what you sell?
3) What position do you have (or want to have) in the market?
4) How do your products/services differ from the competition?
5) What makes your products unique and desirable?
6) Why do (will) customers buy from you?
Oman market for retailing is a developed market with great size that attracts retailers from all over the world as the AT Kearney’s Global Retail Development Index in 2012 has ranked Oman as the eighth emerging retailing market in the world and refers to its retailing market as a stable one. Oman economy is growing because the customers have confidence in it. This sector was expected to grow more to 29% in the next years. Among the Middle East countries, Oman is ranked the fifth related to customers' confidence. The total value of wholesale and retail trade in 2011 was set at OR1.95bn ($5.08bn) by The Oman Chamber of Commerce and Industry (OCCI). (Oxford business group, 2015)
Customer Analysis
Your Target Customers section precisely identifies your current and/or intended customers. Include as much demographic data on your target customers as possible, such as their gender, age, salary, geography, marital status and education.
OIC.COM is targeting specific customers who are residents of Oman from all ages and sexes because the site is presenting two main services which are providing the online service of providing the people with information about places for tourism in Oman and those may be citizens or tourists and another service which is selling products online and delivering them home so those customers are residents in Oman in all cities and areas of Oman. Customers from the site can be at any age or from any sex. In addition is target student employees who related to tourism and hospitality and enterpunership of business man and woment.
In this section of your business plan, specify why customers want or need your products and/or services. For example, do customers care most about speed, quality, location, reliability, comfort, price, value, etc.?
Questions for Existing Businesses:
1) Who are your current customers? (List largest customers or categories)
2) What do they buy from you?
3) Why do they buy from you? (Quality, Price, Reputation, etc?)
OIC.com customers have basic needs which are finding places of entertainment in Oman such as hotels and restaurants and knowing their information such as address and phone numbers. Customers; needs also include finding the goods they want to buy from a variety of goods related to the retailing market such as clothes, kitchen machines and foot wear. They need the site to be working properly, registration process is easy and flexible and they need their products to come at homes safely, to come exactly as they wanted and the price to be the same and time is not very long to receive the goods.
Direct competitors are companies that fill the same customer need you fill with the same solution. For example, if you operate an Italian restaurant, other Italian restaurants would be direct competitors.In this section of your business plan, outline who your direct competitors are, and their strengths and weaknesses
The site has direct competitors such as the sites found online for online purchasing in Oman and information sites in Oman such as the following ones:
- Namshioman.com
- Sukar.com
- Souq.com
- Muscat ads
Indirect competitors are companies that fill the same customer need you fill with a different solution. For example, if you operate an Italian restaurant, a French restaurant would be an indirect competitor.In this section of your business plan, outline who your indirect competitors are, and their strengths and weaknesses
OIC has indirect competitors such as the retailers, which are having stores in Oman such as Salman stores and Sultan centre. These competitors are indirect because they are not having online stores.
Importantly, identify your Competitive Advantages in this section. Specifically, state what is it about your company that will allow you to effectively compete (and win) against both direct and indirect competitors.Basic Questions:
1) Who are (will be) your largest competitors? List them.
2) How will your operation be better (and worse) than your competitors?
3) How are competitors doing? What are their sales and profits?
4) (If Start-Up) How will competition respond to your market entry?
An overview of the industry sector that your business will be a part of, including industry trends, major players in the industry, and estimated industry sales; this section will also include a summary of your business's place within the industry. Your Industry Analysis section has two sub-sections as follows
OIC.com has many competitive advantages such as:
- Mixing between being an information site and a site for online purchasing.
- Providing fast delivery services.
- Having a very simple site with a clear interesting user face that has a simple sign in way using emails or Facebook information.
- Having a simple advertising plan depends on social media sites.
- Having a unique interesting web design for the site.
Information on historical development and growth. By investigating past trends, it is often possible to anticipate future opportunities in the market
Oman retailing market has a great history represented by the great demand of customers and the growth throughout time and the high demographic factors and the technology systems that added too much amendments on the industry Online marketing began as since the beginning of the 21st century, online trade was very common as many people began their online businesses as having their online sites and the trade became more famous till it took a great position now. The tourism industry has a great position in Oman today and this raised the importance for having online sites that provides information for those tourists about hotels and restaurants and other important places where tourists can go. In the past tourists used to use maps and investigate tourism offices for finding information, which was very difficult and tiring. Online trade and e commerce businesses provided solutions for many problems that people and tourists suffered in the past. As online trade evolved and more advancement had been added to it, this industry of online retailing became very important and lead to a great market competition that increases every day. (Gorvet, 2015)
Oman is the target geographic area prepared by the site as the area is focused on because the information provided in the site is all about places in Oman as many tourists visit this area yearly. Oman is one of the Gulf countries that attracts many customers to purchase from online sites. The great size of the country provides a better chance for the site to spread.
Population of Oman are estimated as 4, 157,783 persons as about half of them live in Muscat and the rest are distributed on Omani cities. The site is specifically targeting youth more than other age because the young people are more interested in online sites and they use their mobiles and laptops for online purchasing too much. Income of Omani people is good and suitable for online purchasing processes. The Omani society likes to buy from the internet, which gives good opportunities to OIC.com. (World population review, 2015) .The office will located on city centre Muscat , because willayat Al-Seeb is have a huge population in Oman and this mall have crowed around the year. Or may be located at Oman Tourism College or ministry of tourism to support independent through marally.
Oman's people prefers buying and shopping than any other activity while they have free time and some money, they also like the internet too much so the best thing is to make an online site for providing them with all what they like of activities. The Omani taste is considered when the site was designed. Opinions of visitors are asked to be put on answering some questions on the site.
The benefits that the site is expecting are based on the way Omani people purchasing their products online as the rate of their usage to internet stores as online shopping became a part of the Gulf people shopping behaviours. A survey was done in Oman showed that more than one of the participants in the survey made online purchasing in a past three months, which tells that online purchasing became very ready to buy online. This also declares that Omani people can be loyal to a specific site when they feel happy using it and that they can buy not even on holidays but all times of the year.
7P’s of marketing mix which are following
Figure 1- 7’P’s of Marketing Mix
Source: (Professional academy, 2015)
In this section you need to thoroughly describe your product or service, along with any proprietary features and future development plans.
Describe your proposed products or services (technical specifications, drawings, photos, sales brochures, and other bulky items belong in Appendices).
For each product or service:
• Describe the most important features. What is special about it?
• Describe the benefits. That is, what will the product do for the customer?
What factors will give you competitive advantages or disadvantages? Examples include level of quality or unique or proprietary features.
The product the site is focusing on is mainly information and retailing goods, information are those databases present for providing the customers and tourists with the information about the places and all they want to know in Oman. The site is also focusing on retailing products manufactured by big companies with good brands such as clothes, footwear, accessories and kitchenware and so on. The product quality is the main objective of the site as the products are of very good quality. The customer can choose as many products as he wishes and then make the order to buy them after registration process.
Detail your pricing here. In particular, discuss how your pricing relates to competition. For example, are you the premium brand? Or the low cost brand?
For most small businesses, having the lowest price is not a good policy. It robs you of needed profit margin; customers may not care as much about price as you think; and large competitors can underprice you anyway. Usually you will do better to have average prices and compete on quality and service.
· Discuss your expected branding based on your chosen pricing model.
· Discuss the pricing strategy and policy for your product or service. Show how your pricing approach will enable you to: penetrate the market, maintain and increase market share in a competitive environment, and make a profit.
· Explain your method or methods of setting prices.
· Does your pricing strategy fit with what was revealed in your competitive analysis?
Compare your prices with those of the competition. Are they higher, lower, the same? Why? How important is price as a competitive factor?
· Do your intended customers really make their purchase decisions mostly on price?
· What will be your customer service and credit policies?
· Explain markup policies.
Pricing policy is made according to the market needs and limits as the role of the site is to take a commission from companies that put their products on the site. Sales revenues are based upon the price so only valued products are sold with high prices and the prices are reasonable as the site chooses products from companies that have good reputation in the market and a good brand. Some less valued products are found on the site in low prices such as second hand product, which are used products, but in good condition.
Probably you do not have a precise location picked out yet. This is the time to think about what you want and need in a location. Many startups run successfully from home for a while.
· Analyze your location criteria as they will affect your customer
· Is your location important to your customers? If yes, how?
· If customers come to your place of business: Is it convenient? Parking? Interior spaces? Not out of the way? Is it consistent with your image?
· What is it customers want and expect? Where is the competition located? Is it better for you to be near them (like car dealers or fast food restaurants) or distant (like convenience food stores)?
The site is basically based in Oman which is a country in the Gulf countries and it is found in Asia. Oman country is proposed for this project for many reasons such as its richness in cultural issues and famous places tourists seek so the site can present the place in a way that attracts tourists and encourage visitors of the site to come again. The place is also proposed due to the big area of it and the diversity of places found in it. Products are chosen according to the demands of the place and its nature
. The office will located on city centre Muscat , because willayat Al-Seeb is have a huge population in Oman.
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