Applications Software for Business

Applications Software for Business

Final Project
For the final project you will be developing aspects of a business plan and some tools to support
the business. Unlike other assignments which were graded just on technical correctness, the quality of the content will
be worth 25% of the grade while the technical aspects will count for 75%. This is a good opportunity to be creative and
possibly explore a business idea you have. Your quality grade is based on good use of the tool and good communication
of your idea, but not the viability of the business you are proposing.
Part 1 (100 Points)
Think of a new business venture you would like to start. It could be almost anything including a new business, an
expansion, or a franchise. It could be high tech or low tech, internet based or store front based.
Develop a PowerPoint slide show to sell your idea to investors. Keep in mind, simply showing large numbers for profits is
not very believable because investors have seen that before. Try to lead your audience through a realistic scenario that
shows potential for profits.
Some aspects of quality to keep in mind:
1. Use short bulleted phrases. Sentences can’t be read by your audience. You will be expanding verbally.
2. Use unusual animation sparingly to make a point.
3. Follow the advice in “10 Tips for More Effective PowerPoint Presentations,” at
http://www.lifehack.org/articles/technology/10-tips-for-more-effective-powerpoint-presentations.html.
Specifically, follow the specifications below:
1. Create a new PowerPoint show and save it as LastNameBusPlan (where you use your own last name instead of
LastName).
2. Select a theme.
3. Put your presentation title and your name on the first slide using the “Title” layout. (usually the default)
4. Create a 2nd slide using the “Title and Content” layout. Use “Introduction” as the title and introduce your
concept using bullets and least one sub bullet point. Add animation to show the bullet points one at a time
(Animation ribbon, Animate by first 1st paragraph.).
5. Create a 3rd slide using the “Comparison” layout to compare your concept either to the old way of doing
business or a competitor.
6. Create a 4th slide using “Picture and Caption” layout and include a picture from your own or the Internet.
Footnote or endnote the source of the picture. (Footnotes are just text boxes at the bottom of the slide.Endnotes in PowerPoint would just be on a final slide, there is no automatic footnote or endnote system like
there is in Word.)
7. Create a 5th slide to describe your customers or market.
8. Create a 6th slide using the “Title and Content” layout and select the table as content. Fill out the table as you
see fit with economic data, sales forecasts, or competitor data.
9. Create a slide using custom animated paths with drawing objects to show the major parts of your concept.
10. Create a conclusion slide.
11. In slide master view, insert a company logo on the main style slide so that it appears on all or most slides in your
presentation. Note that the logo could be an image you get from the internet or just text.
12. Hit save to make sure you have saved the presentation. Then click save as to save the as a PowerPoint template.
In the PowerPoint template, delete the slides and click save and it will just hold the layout. Hand in the two files
– the presentation and the presentation template.
Parts 2 and 3 are in separate files.

Part 2 (100 Points)
In this exercise you will develop a letter to a bank loan office to help financing for your business concept and include
your business plan as an attachment to support the request. The letter and business plan will be included in the same
Word document with a section break between them as described in detail below. Then explore the market with a
targeted letter to a mailing list of potential customers, also described in detail below.
Some aspect of quality to keep in mind are shown “Essential Elements of a Good Business Plan,” at
http://www.sba.gov/category/navigation-structure/starting-managing-business/starting-business/writing-businessplan/essential-elements-good-busines.
Letter to Loan Officer with Attached Business Plan
1. Start a simple cover letter to a loan officer requesting a loan to start your business on the first page of a new
Word document. Note a one paragraph, three sentence letter is fine. Just introduce the concept and refer to
your attached (in the same word file) business plan.
2. Insert a section break after the letter and begin your business plan description. In the business plan use at least
three top level headings and two secondary headings under one of the primary headings. Fill in with appropriate
text. Note the headings must use the appropriate styles to work with the outline view.
3. Set the margins in the cover letter section of the document to 2” all around and the margins in the business plan
section to 1” all around.
4. Create an Excel workbook for related financial calculations for your business. On the first worksheet, calculate
the monthly loan payment for your business startup loan. A review of using the PMT function is given in
YouTube at: https://youtu.be/7jA-F3Udn5s.
5. In the same Excel workbook, start a new worksheet and develop a five year budget in Excel. Use columns for
years an include expenses and revenues in the rows. Calculate profit in the last row. Think of at least 5
categories of expenses and 2 sources of revenue. Also include interest expense from the loan in step 2.
6. Cut and paste the loan information into the business plan portion of the letter you wrote above.
7. Graph the total expenses, total revenue, and total profit lines from your budget.
8. Cut and paste the graph into the business plan.
9. Under both the loan information and graph use the Insert Caption (on the references ribbon) to give each a title.
Make sure the paragraph that the two objects are in is set to “keep with next” so that the titles are not
separated. Also, make sure you reference the figures in the text the Cross-reference feature so that numbering
is always in sync.
10. Develop a third page in the work book for a list of potential customers. Label each the columns, FirstName,
LastName, Address1, Address2, City, State, Zip, Phone, Age, Gender, and favorite color. Add four lines of test
data.
11. Develop a mail merge letter in Word asking if the potential customers are interested in your product. Note this is
a separate letter and file from the letter to the loan officer written above. Have the letter automatically
customize the name and address information. Include the person’s “favorite color” in the text of the letter to
customize it to the audience. An example would be “Since your favorite color is blue, you will love the selection
of Spring fabrics.” Note that you can change the column to something other than favorite color if you want to
make this fit your business plan better.
12. Turn in two Word documents, the letter to the bank with the business plan, and the mail merge letter and one
Excel file that includes the business analysis and the data for the mail merge.