START, GROW, AND SAVE MORE LOCAL BUSINESSES
No matter if you're talking about new entrepreneurs or existing business owners, Pebble Plans increases the ability & readiness of the business owners you are working with to explore & communicate their business ideas and plans in a clear & concise manner that makes it easy for your board or a bank to evaluate.
Our system will save you time on the front end by filtering out applicants that are not ready for funding yet, while preparing those that are, with a comprehensive business plan.
On the back end of deals we provide a proactive way for you to help clients in trouble get back on-track without embarrassing them or filling your calendar with long and uncomfortable meetings.
WHAT WE HEAR FROM YOUR PEERS:
After talking with hundreds of economic developers from cities & towns across America, we have learned that depending on the needs of the local economy, the vision of the director, and the temperament of the board, they use our software & service differently.
We invite you to review some of the noteworthy things we have been told to see if the perspectives of these economic developers resonate with you.
ENTREPRENEURSHIP AND BR&E IN ONE TOOL:
Even after the lessons learned from Covid, most small businesses at not ready to adapt if their markets change quickly or their day-to-day operations get interrupted.
There are dozens of risks beyond a local businesses control that can wreak havoc on their ability to serve their customers efficiently, pay their bills, and make payroll. Our recovery planning service gives economic developers an affordable and easy to implement business retention option that can help your local small businesses turn things around before they get out of control and you either bail them out, or watch them fail.
While you cant keep bad things from happening, you can give your local business owners the tools needed to create a comprehensive plan that addresses both how they will grow in stable times, and how they will survive in tough times. You get a detailed report that shows your board the proactive steps you took to help your client correct their problems and in doing so support the local economy.
Pebble Plan can help give you visibility into parts of your local economy where you are losing jobs but you don't see it. Most BR&E programs are 90% focused on expansion, and retention becomes and afterthought. We can help you put your retention programs on autopilot and get some wins for the community.
REDUCED RISK THROUGH EDUCATION
Giving a struggling business more money is unlikely to fix their problems if they don't change what got them off track. Education addresses problems money alone doesn't.
Pebble Plan was designed from the ground up to be educational; not just the curriculum, but the whole app has been designed to lead users from one learning to another. The way questions are asked, the order they asked in, the options & limitations applied to answers, and the automated back-end data checks all work together to challenge assumptions while bringing the business that the user envisions into focus. Once that business is in focus we help them stress test it in the software so they experiment less with customers.
We use real numbers to reflect real-life problems they will have to solve, and help users get a realistic understanding of how much they are likely to earn or lose based on their operational choices. We teach that financials flow from operations and that financial hopes without operational support are guesses, not goals. We also provide built-in validation tools and help resources that make it easy for users to learn as they go, but if they do get stuck they can invite live help right away and get un-stuck so they keep making progress.
Operations Planning
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Define work processes
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Set correct expectations
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Detailed risk analysis
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Easy to edit & update
8 sections / 20+ subsections open up assumptions and dig into how & why small business owners plan to run their day-to-day operations.
Validation Tools
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COGS
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Pricing
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Sales
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Staffing
As we gather data and check for understanding we uncover what users know & don't know, then we give them the tools to fill in the gaps
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Financials
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Last year
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Current year
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Next year
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5-year projected
Our system teaches users how to create & read a balance sheet, income statement, and cash flow statement, plus how they connect
On-demand help
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Built-in curriculum
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Knowledge base
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Outside resources
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Live Help
Topic specific help is 1-click away on every page so users can keep making progress and don't feel intimidated and don't give up
