Know-How Exchange : Strategy

I agree with Tim. Business model is most often used for startups and refers to how they plan to make money (or in the case of many Dot-coms from a few years back, the fact that they did not have a business model that was going to make any money). Business model is a term used to signify a generally high level of the strategy, but rarely any details. Here are some examples:

"The business model of Ebay is to allow buyers and sellers to come together, and collect a payment for every deal that goes through"

"The business model for a newspaper's web site is to sell advertising space"

Business strategy is somewhat similar, but usually encompasses much more details than business model.

A business model describes the way a company is structured, its value chains, revenue flows, cost structures, information flows, alliances and interactions.

Think of it like a film set.

Its business strategy is the the "Script" through which the Actors bring the story, played on the film set, to life.

The strategy has to describe the way the business makes money, it's reason for being, what is its value proposition, how it is competitive and why customers will choose it instead of a competitor.

A business case, on the other hand, is a justification process describing a putative or conditional model (with a range of assumptions) for an investment in infrastructure or strategy which shows how that investment will be recouped.

Hope this helps.

ChrisB