Can I list more than one product idea in the Start-up business plan?

and welcome to this site! :-)

Investors generally want to see that entrepreneurs are 110% committed to their business. When you pitch investors you must have one and only one pitch. So what you need to do is to research your ideas' potential thoroughly, pick one, and kill the other.

That said, Paul Graham of Y Combinator recently said that he mostly invests in the team, not the idea. So maybe Y Combinator would accept multiple ideas -- but this would be very unusual indeed. I wouldn't count on it.

Don't confuse focusing on just one idea with not learning. Of course you're supposed to change your planning when important new facts emerge. The Lean Startup Methodology is especially adept at this, and uses the term "pivot" about changing but not abandoning a product strategy.

As a side note, these days you are very unlikely to get funding on an idea alone -- you need a validated market demand, and preferable a prototype implementation too. And even with that, most people who seek venture capital or business angel capital do not get it.

Jason Cohen, one of this sites hosts, recently began a good series of articles about the basics of pitching for capital. Read it at Jason's blog, from the article "5 Lessons from 150 startup pitches" and forward. Also, I would assume you know and read Venture Hacks.

Stick to one idea and focus on it. That's what investors want and it makes sense in that you have limited resources and you should spend them in a single direction. For instance, researching the competition for two different, even related, products takes longer than for a single one.

Pick the best of the two and focus on it, both in the business plan and in your mind.

Having said that, once you're funded and have tried this idea, if it doesn't work, you can always look at the second one as a back up. Investors are not surprised when this happens. But at this point, you should totally put the secondary idea aside.

I agree that focusing on one thing when you have limited resources, energy and time is a good principle, but you don't say how complementary the two activities are. I'm working currently on a suite of products/services that are highly complementary, but because it's only me doing the work, I obviously can only finish one at a time. Once everything is in place though, the various parts will support eachother in terms of sales/marketing and also technically (I need parts of no. 1 to do no. 2, etc.).

My point is that investors want to see that you are laser-focused on your (single) business idea, but they also value that you have thought about the space and can see other supporting opportunities.

However, as others have pointed out, any lack of clarity about where your primary (even if it is initial) goal is will most likely hurt your pitch.

HTH.

If your business is currently in the "idea stage", then venture capital investors will likely stay away from your business.

Try to put yourself in the shoes of the person or institution that you'll ask funding for: do they wanna see somebody who will put of all of his eggs in one nest and fight for them until the end? Or do they wanna see somebody with several options/sources of revenue?

Also, what if you just pitch one idea to one investor and the other to another investor?

Good luck! A.