At Bplans, we’re proud of our home state of Oregon. We’re known in this part of the country for our casual way of life, great microbrew beers, and endless recreational opportunities. But there’s another way we’re unique, and that’s our abundance of business plan competitions and angel investment groups.

Sabrina Parsons, CEO of Palo Alto Software (Bplans parent company) recently wrote about Oregon’s unique startup culture on her blog MommyCEO at ForbesWoman:

“What is exciting for Oregon companies is that these conferences and angel groups have given Oregon high-growth companies an avenue to get funded, and stay in Oregon. For the first time ever, start-ups in Oregon have many, many places they can go for help, compete for funding, and feel like they get mentoring, advice, and support — without having to relocate to the Silicon Valley or Seattle.”

In the last five years, angel groups in Oregon have funded 35 companies to the tun of $17.5 million. In her blog post, Sabrina poses the question – if it’s being done so well here in Oregon, why aren’t other states doing the same. So what do you think? Are there angel groups, business plan competitions, business incubators and accelerators where you live? Are you making use of them?

-photo by flickr user Smabs Sputzer/Creative Commons

A line from Bob Dylan’s Love Minus Zero–No Limit:

She knows there’s no success like failure, and failure’s no success at all.

Once upon a time at a venture competition, the evening before the event, there was a judges’ meeting in which we all introduced ourselves to each other. You can guess most of our summaries: founder of this, investor in that, and so on.

One of us, however, said something like the following:

My real qualification for judging a business plan competition is I’ve recently taken my own company through bankruptcy, having run it into the ground by spending too much and selling too little for too long.

I’m paraphrasing, because this was years ago. But he made a good point. And all of the other judges, me included, accepted his reasoning. And he did an excellent job with the judging.

Food for thought from me, that judge (who shall remain nameless in this post), and Bob Dylan.

(Image: Granite/Shutterstock)

I got an e-mail over the weekend asking me for a list of business plan competitions. That makes sense; I’ve been posting a lot about them lately, and participating in them.  See recent posts: for example, business plan competitions grow up last week; and my business plan marathon series on my main blog. So, as a service to all, here’s a link to Biz Plan Competitions, a website focusing on exactly that: listing and cataloging business plan competitions.

I say hats off to the people at JFH Innovative LLC in Pittsford, N.Y., who are running that site. It’s hard to keep up with all the competitions these days because new ones are popping up all the time.

The second best list I know of is the one at the Palo Alto Software software (my company) website. We list academic business plan competitions, including more than a dozen of them that we contribute to as sponsors.

We’re in the middle of business plan competition season, and we’re seeing some great plans, and a lot of common mistakes. We’ve assembled some of our best advice on business competitions, below.

Ask Tim Berry – Tips for Business Plan Competitions

• Don’t Shade Your Eyes, Summarize: “I don’t care if you’re the next big thing, with an unimaginably exciting new idea and a great team, you can still create a meaningful summary in 10 pages.”
• Writing an Executive Summary: Hit these highlights, and customize your Executive Summary for the intended audience.
• Estimating Unknown Expenses: How do you predict expenses? Normally you need some experience. If you have no idea, then you might think again about starting this business.
• Why not do your best? If you’re going to a graduate level intercollegiate and international venture competition, ask somebody to edit the plan for simple practical writing. Make sure your projected income and balance link up correctly with the cash flow, and that the cash flow understands working capital. Use business charts to illustrate the main numbers.
• How to Succeed in Competitions: Competitions normally receive far more entrants than they can practically screen any other way, so the business plan is the critical document. This white paper explains how to customize and improve the output you create in Business Plan Pro to meet the sophisticated needs of a venture contest.

How to lose a business plan competition

• Top 10 Business Plan Mistakes: From “hockey stick” forecasts to technobabble to numbers without charts, Tim Berry discusses the most common planning mistakes in business plan competitions, and why they irritate judges.
• Big Mistake: On Business Plans, Cash, Investment, and Whose Peace of Mind Matters: You don’t ask for investment so you can have cash in the bank.
• Big Mistake: Business Plans And Investor Returns: Investors care about returns, but you can’t predict them accurately. Show them credible management, sales, and market knowledge instead.

Presenting your plan to judges:

Guy Kawasaki’s 10/20/30 Rule: How listening to crappy business plan pitches is giving Guy Ménière’s disease.

Ask Tim Berry – The Elevator Pitch

Sara Prentice Manela
Editor

Palo Alto Software is sponsoring the Governor’s Business Plan Contest in Wisconsin.

The Wisconsin Governor’s Business Plan Contest – the nation’s first statewide, tech-based business plan competition – is accepting entries online for the 2009 competition. Entries will be accepted now through 5 p.m. Jan. 31, 2009. The contest’s Grand Prize is worth $50,000 in cash and services.

Who’s eligable to enter? Wisconsin residents 18 years and older and teams from Wisconsin-based businesses and organziations are eligble to enter the contest.  Teams from outside Wisconsin are eligble as long as they plan to base their business in Wisconsin.

For a full list of rules and contest information as well as the form to enter the contest -  visit the Governor’s Business Plan Contest website.

www.govsbizplancontest.com

Don’t miss this opportunity to watch–and judge–an excellent business plan contest as it happens, complete with easy-to-watch Web videos of the contest, including videos of presentations and judges’ questions. That’s available now at the Forbes.com Boost Your Business page on Forbes.com. This is a great example of what a business plan contest is like. Watch the presentations, the questions and the answers.

If you’re a learn-by-example person, these are great examples. The five companies included were chosen from among more than 1,500 entrants. For each one, you get an overview of the business plan plus the video of the presentation.

And, as a special bonus, unlike any other business venture contest I’m aware of, in this one you also get a vote. These five companies are competing for a $100,000 prize. As you’ll see on the website, you get to click on your favorite and vote for the one you think should win.

The prize is supposed to go to the company that can make the best use of the $100K.

I was one of the judges and got to ask some of the questions. Now the videos are available, so you can see for yourself.

The 2008 Forbes.com Boost Your Business competition is nearing it’s final deliberations. Next week in New York City the final five finalists will present their business plans–including how they intend to invest the prize money to boost their prospects–to an expert panel of judges. One of those expert judges is Palo Alto Software’s own Tim Berry.

According to the Forbes.com Boost your Business blog: In addition to next week’s presentations, each finalist also must submit two written business plans: a full-length plan (20 pages max), that only the judging panel can see, and a condensed 3-page version which will be posted–along with videos of the presentations–on Forbes.com during the final voting period in November.

Palo Alto Software sends their good wishes and congratulations to all the finalists of the Boost your Business competition.

‘Chelle Parmele
Social Media Marketing Manager
Palo Alto Software

You can register for this competition now, at this page. Registration closes November 1.

I notice they’ve been calling it the $100,000 annual Wal-Mart Better Living Business Plan Competition, but I guess that amount is the combined total, because the winners take $20,000 for first place, the way I read it. Here are the details on the registration page:

The Wal-Mart Better Living Business Plan Competition is an opportunity to present plans for a profitable business or product with a positive impact on the environment. This year, a total of 32 schools will be chosen to field school-wide competitions, and winners will attend one of eight on-campus regional competitions. Regional winners go to Arkansas to present in front of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. executives, and have the opportunity to win $5,000, $10,000 or $20,000 for their idea! The 32 competing schools will be selected in November 2008, and the final competition will be held in the spring of 2009. We are looking for a diversity of perspectives, so all types of schools and programs are encouraged to apply. Preference will be given to schools who can field more than one team to compete at the school level, and either host or provide support for students to attend the regional competitions.

The page is hosted by Net Impact, a website focusing on business schools and their students.