# Startup Business Planner > Turn a startup, SaaS, app, developer tool, website, repository, or product idea into an evidence-backed business plan, monetization strategy, pricing architecture, editable 12-month financial model, and 90-day execution roadmap. Use when Codex needs to analyze how a startup can become a sustainable business; decide free versus paid, monthly, annual, usage-based, one-time, or lifetime pricing; design tiers and upgrade triggers; estimate unit economics and break-even under explicit assumptions; compare scenarios; or produce a native Markdown business plan, formula-driven Excel workbook, and CSV roadmap from a URL or description. - Skill: `kappaemme-git/startup-business-planner` (Agent Skill, multi-file: 8 files) - Install (CLI): `npx skillmds@latest add kappaemme-git/startup-business-planner` - Raw SKILL.md: https://api.skillmd.com/api/skills/kappaemme-git/startup-business-planner/raw - Safety review: pending - Works with: Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex - Category: Product & Planning - Author: kappaemme-git (https://skillmd.com/u/kappaemme-git) - Updated: 2026-09-17 - Page: https://skillmd.com/skills/kappaemme-git/startup-business-planner --- # Startup Business Planner Turn a startup URL, repository, or description into a decision-ready plan for how the product can acquire customers, charge, cover its costs, and reach a testable first version of sustainability. Read [references/research-playbook.md](references/research-playbook.md) before researching. Read [references/analysis-schema.md](references/analysis-schema.md) before creating the analysis JSON. Read [references/financial-model.md](references/financial-model.md) before generating the workbook. Resolve `SKILL_DIR` as the directory containing this `SKILL.md`. Run bundled scripts from `SKILL_DIR`. Write deliverables into the user's current workspace, normally under `outputs/`. ## Workflow ### 1. Understand the startup - Inspect the supplied URL, repository, landing page, pricing page, README, screenshots, or description. - Identify the product, stage, geography, currency, primary user, economic buyer, painful job, promised outcome, delivery model, current free or paid offer, and founder's immediate objective. - Distinguish verified product facts, public market evidence, user-supplied numbers, working assumptions, and unknowns. - Ask one concise question only when the answer changes the economic model materially and cannot be represented safely as an editable assumption. Otherwise continue and label assumptions. - Never inspect private analytics, billing, customer, or financial data unless the user explicitly supplies or authorizes it. ### 2. Research the market and business model - Use current public evidence. Prefer official product, pricing, documentation, terms, and company pages. - Research the current prices and packaging of at least three relevant competitors or substitutes in `standard` mode; aim for five to eight when the category supports it. - Identify the most plausible customer segment, economic buyer, distribution channels, value metric, revenue streams, cost drivers, and defensible advantage. - Treat competitor pricing as an anchor, not proof of willingness to pay. - Link every material competitor price and market claim to a direct source with a checked date. - Define a narrow initial ICP, buying trigger, qualification signals, anti-ICP, positioning, and the cheapest reachable distribution wedge. - Build TAM, SAM, and a realistic 24-month SOM bottom-up only when eligible account counts and annual revenue per account are sourced or visibly labeled assumptions. Otherwise keep the values unknown and show the missing formula inputs. ### 3. Design monetization and pricing - Compare at least four plausible monetization models. Always evaluate a recurring model and explicitly decide whether one-time or lifetime access is safe. - Choose one primary model and one credible alternative to validate. - Propose concrete tiers with target segment, monthly-equivalent price hypothesis, limits, included value, upgrade trigger, and expected paid-customer mix. - Make free versus trial, annual discount, usage overage, and lifetime decisions explicit. - Reject uncapped lifetime access when meaningful hosting, API, inference, data, support, or storage costs continue. - Present prices as hypotheses until supported by transaction or customer evidence. ### 4. Build the financial inputs - Capture opening free and paid users, monthly acquisition, free-to-paid conversion, direct paid acquisition, churn, variable costs, fixed costs, acquisition spend, setup revenue, and starting cash. - Store every input as `{value, status, confidence, basis, source_url}` using the schema. Use `status: user`, `public`, `assumption`, or `unknown`. - Never invent a hidden number. For a missing input, either use `null` with `unknown` or create a visible, conservative assumption and explain its basis. - Create conservative, base, and optimistic scenarios by changing explicit drivers rather than pasting desired outputs. ### 5. Validate and score the plan Write `outputs/startup-business-analysis.json`, then run: ```bash python3 "$SKILL_DIR/scripts/prepare_plan.py" \ outputs/startup-business-analysis.json \ outputs/startup-business-prepared.json ``` The script validates evidence, ICP, market sizing, positioning, go-to-market, pricing mix, financial inputs, scenario coverage, and roadmap coverage; computes a deterministic readiness score and 12-month preview; assigns `EVIDENCE_BACKED`, `PROVISIONAL`, or `INSUFFICIENT_DATA`; and returns `HEALTHY`, `FRAGILE`, `UNSUSTAINABLE`, or `INSUFFICIENT_DATA`. Do not manually override its score, status, or verdict. ### 6. Generate the business plan and roadmap Run: ```bash python3 "$SKILL_DIR/scripts/generate_business_plan.py" \ outputs/startup-business-prepared.json \ outputs/startup-business-plan.md \ --csv outputs/startup-90-day-roadmap.csv ``` The Markdown file is the narrative business plan. The CSV is the operating roadmap, with an objective, action, deliverable, metric, and decision rule for every 90-day phase. ### 7. Generate the editable financial model - Use the Codex spreadsheet runtime and `@oai/artifact-tool`; do not substitute another workbook library. - Load the bundled workspace dependencies, create a `node_modules` symlink in a writable working directory pointing to the provided Node packages, and use the provided Node executable. - Run: ```bash node "$SKILL_DIR/scripts/generate_financial_model.mjs" \ outputs/startup-business-prepared.json \ outputs/startup-financial-model.xlsx \ --preview-dir outputs/startup-financial-model-preview ``` - Verify every sheet visually, inspect representative formulas, scan formula errors, and keep the generated previews only as QA support. - Treat blue-font cells as editable inputs, black as formulas, green as links to another sheet, and yellow fill as an assumption or missing input requiring attention. ### 8. Deliver the result Return clickable absolute links to: - `startup-business-plan.md` — strategy, business model, pricing decision, risks, and narrative plan. - `startup-financial-model.xlsx` — editable inputs, pricing, unit economics, scenarios, 12-month forecast, dashboard charts, sources, and checks. - `startup-90-day-roadmap.csv` — execution sequence and evidence gates for days 1–90. Summarize the recommended business model, base price hypothesis, readiness score, first go-to-market channel, financial verdict, break-even estimate, and largest unverified assumption. If the result is `INSUFFICIENT_DATA`, say which exact inputs must be measured before using the forecast. ## Modes - `quick` — Use available evidence, up to three comparables, provisional assumptions, and a compact plan. - `standard` — Use three to eight comparables, four monetization models, all three scenarios, and the complete deliverables. Use by default. - `deep` — Add broader competitors, channel evidence, contradiction checks, and more granular costs. - `pre-revenue` — Focus on monetizing a free product with no historical revenue or conversion data. - `audit` — Evaluate an existing business model, pricing structure, and economics before proposing changes. ## Safety and quality bar - Never claim guaranteed demand, conversion, profitability, product-market fit, funding, or growth. - Never hide invented CAC, churn, conversion, costs, margin, or customer volume inside the model. - Never label competitor pricing as willingness-to-pay evidence. - Never invent market size, eligible accounts, customer pain, willingness to pay, testimonials, partnerships, or competitor capabilities. - Never recommend uncapped lifetime access against ongoing variable or support costs. - Never change live prices, billing, checkout, product limits, customer subscriptions, ads, or outbound campaigns automatically. - Keep taxes, payment fees, refunds, contracts, migrations, and regional pricing visible as limitations when relevant. - Prefer a reversible 90-day test plan over false precision.