There has never been a better time to set up a professional nanny business or nanny placement agency. As lifestyles change and parents adopt busy lifestyles with minimal hours spent at home, there is a lot of demand for reliable, trustworthy, and professional childcare, something only a nanny agency can provide.
What Is Nanny Agency Business Plan?
Setting up a nanny agency is quite easy compared to other businesses. However, you need to have some experience or training as a nanny, babysitter, early childhood educator, or generally know and enjoy caring for the young as a parent or guardian. As with all other businesses, it all starts with a business plan.
A good business plan documents everything about your nanny agency in a structured, organized, and easy-to-read format for you and others who may use it. It should contain factual information and projections about your nanny agency, such as goals, business structure, mission, vision, etc.
Why You Need A Business plan
Use your business plan to document everything you need to do to get your nanny agency up and running and what you’ll do in the future. You can also use it to get startup capital from your bank, investors, lenders, or local government in places where there is financial aid for nanny agencies.
How to Write A Business Plan for A Nanny Agency
Here is how to go about creating a business plan for a nanny agency:
1. Start with An Executive Summary
The first part of your business plan is the executive summary, which will likely be the only section some investors, potential partners, or lenders will look at. This section summarizes your nanny agency as a business and what it aims to achieve financially and as a vital community asset. It should ideally cover the following points:
Your Mission Statement
State your mission statement in full as part of your nanny agency’s business plan executive summary. A mission statement comprises specific goals or aspirations, your target audience, and the practical impact you will have with the services you intend to provide.
Here is an example of a mission statement for a fictional nanny agency in Fort Worth, Texas:
“Our mission is to help match parents and guardians in the Fort Worth, Texas, area with perfect nannies. We hope to help give our clients peace of mind by sourcing, vetting, and training the best nannies we can find in and around Fort Worth on their behalf.
Here are some of the key things you can immediately notice from the above mission statement:
It is specific– Even though they are meant to promote and reassure, mission statements should be specific about what your company does and communicate your value proposition precisely and effectively.
The example above shows us that this is a nanny agency in Fort Worth, Texas. Its main job is to help match parents and guardians with nannies. The value proposition is that the nanny agency does the sourcing, vetting, training, and management of nannies so clients can have peace of mind knowing they have a good nanny.
It introduces the services- The mission statement captures all the services the nanny agency will provide to its clients as a list but in paragraph form. Clients who get to read the mission statement will know what they can get from the nanny agency without delving into specific service sections. They will likely place a call after reading the mission statement as soon as they see the mission statement.
It is in summary form– Your mission statement, while capturing specific services, should be short and precise. It would help if you aimed to have not more than three short and precise sentences in your mission statement.
Your Vision Statement
Your nanny agency’s vision forms part of your executive summary at the start of your business plan. The vision statement reflects what you want to be as a nanny agency, especially in about five or ten years. It should serve as an internal creed or point of reference when making decisions because it contains your values, aspirations, and standards as a business.
Here is an example of a vision statement for a fictional nanny agency in Fort Worth, Texas:
“We aim to be the best, most trusted nanny agency in and around Fort Worth by focusing on providing real, measurable value to our clients.”
As you can tell from the vision statement above, there is no need to delve into specifics. The vision statement reassures your target audience that you are a good business with good values. It also constantly reminds you about your values, ethics, and standards.
2. Your Nanny Agency Description
Put the important details about your nanny agency business right after the executive summary so that someone going through it sees them first. Ideally, the description section should be in bullet or numbered format with short but concise points that are easy to skim over. The description section of your business plan should contain the following information:
Legal Business Name, location, contacts, and key staff members
You should register your nanny agency as a legal entity in your state and have a valid business name. An LLC is probably the best choice for a startup nanny agency in most states. However, you are free to explore other business types depending on your situation. Being a registered small business will help you with taxes, credibility, and contracts with nannies and suppliers.
Include your business name in the detail section alongside your business location, full contact information, and staff member plus their summarized bios. Don’t worry if you don’t have all the details at this point- like a business address- but put as much info as possible, especially in the staff bio section.
Here is an example of a business description for a fictional nanny Agency in Fort Worth, Texas:
Business Name: Happy Kids Nannies
Location: Fort Worth, Texas
Address: 1604 Waldeck Street, Forth Worth, Texas (TX), 76102
Telephone: (817) 415-3703, (817) 683-1219, Email: info@happykidsnnannies.com
Our Staff
Megan Ericksen: MSc. Child Psychology
Our chief executive officer Megan Ericksen has a master’s in child psychology from the Texas Christian University (TCU). She has years of experience as a practitioner in child psychology and child caregiving, mainly focusing on early childhood development and education. In her early years, Megan worked as a babysitter and full-time nanny, an experience she attributes to her love and passion for the care of the young ones.
Detailed description
This is the section where you detail your nanny agency business, accurately describing its business structure, ownership structure, history, present status, and what you aim to achieve in the future as a nanny agency.
Tip: Try and cover as much as possible in the description section. It is where other parties will be spending their time to understand what you are about and whether your business is viable or not. It will help if you include some visual illustrations or charts to describe the ownership structure, business structure, and even the history part with a clear visual pathway to the future.
Detailed Business Goals – the third part of your nanny agency’s business description should be used to enumerate your business goals, accompanied by a short description. This is where you get the opportunity to explain what you plan to do so that other parties- especially investors or lenders- can understand and appreciate why you need a capital injection.
Your nanny agency’s business goals should capture your short-term and long-term goals and provide concrete reasons and justifications. More importantly, they should be specific, factual, and relevant to the nanny agency business, not generalizations. Use simple, direct business language and prose when enumerating your business goals.
Examples of a nanny agency’s short-term and long-term business goals with descriptions:
Short-term goal example: To set up an online searchable database of nannies that parents and guardians can use to view and shortlist candidates before they engage us for interviews and nanny placements.
Long Term Goal example – To source, vet, and train at least 100 nannies to be part of our on-demand nanny database. These nannies will be presented to clients on first contact and placed with matching families on-demand.
3. Your Nanny Agency’s Products and Services
The third and perhaps most important part of your nanny agency business plan is where you list and describe the specific products and services you intend to offer your clients. Since it’s a business plan, you don’t need to use persuasive language to describe your products or services. Instead, focus on putting your ideas to text and expressing your value proposition with clarity and conviction.
Here is an example of a product and service you can include in your nanny agency business plan:
Service- Nanny sourcing – Our agency will use its expertise and networks to source eligible persons in and around [insert location] who are ready to be trained and employed as full-time nannies, part-time nannies, or professional babysitters.
Parenting manuals – Our experienced nannies and in-house child psychologists will develop a range of parenting manuals with insights and ideas from their years of experience and training. We will develop potty training manuals, speech training manuals, mobility training manuals, first-aid for children below [insert ages], weaning manuals, etc.
Financial Analysis and Projections Section
The financial analysis section comes last among the main parts of your nanny agency’s business plan. Use the section to analyze your agency from a financial standpoint to prove its viability as a potentially profitable entity. Since it’s a new business, you must prepare Pro-forma statements to capture hypothetical financial projections on things like startup costs and expected revenues.
Appendix Section
Your business plan is not complete without an appendix section. Use the appendix to add additional information that you think is important for your nanny agency, especially from a business model and strategic perspective. For instance, you can use the appendix to describe your marketing plan and the strategies you will use to gain a sustainable competitive advantage.
As you can tell, a lot of research and preparation is needed to prepare a good business plan that will guide you as you set up your nanny agency. At the same time, you must keep in mind other parties who will consume the content in your business plan and make critical decisions using that information. All the best!
