Wow! It’s April already and I’m sitting here wondering where the first quarter of the year went. Only 9 months left to hit my goals for the year.
I find that the beginning of each quarter is a good time to pause for a moment and look at your goals and results so far this year. Are your goals still relevant or have you made a decision to go in another direction?
If your goals are still relevant, have you been working towards them or did you get distracted by the bright shiny object and forget about your main objectives? I’m convinced the majority of people who start a business are at least border-line ADD and we easily get distracted by something new.
If you found you did get off track, sit down and create a plan for the next 90 days: what are you going to do each week that will get you moving towards your goals. Write them on your calendar.
Too many times we lose track of our major goals because we become over focused on the day to day minutia of our businesses. But if you schedule your major goals on your calendar, you’re more likely to remember to work on them.
Now is also a good time to look at your stats: traffic to your website, incoming links, sign ups for your email newsletter, Facebook page likes, Twitter retweets and whatever metrics are important to your business. In reality, you should be tracking these each week or at least each month. But I know the truth, you’ve probably been neglecting this.
Create a spreadsheet, a chart in Word or even a handwritten note that you post on your bulletin board. Commit to recording them at the very least each quarter. Keeping track of your stats will show you which areas are growing and which are stagnating. Know this will help you tweak your marketing over time.
Since you’re in business, you need to look at the money. Are your sales in line with what you projected for the year? If they are, celebrate. Give yourself a small treat. If they’re not, figure out why that is. Did you neglect to do enough marketing? Did you forget to follow up? Do you need to rethink your offers?
Finally, make note of things that are going well so far. Congratulate yourself for your successes. And make a commitment to keep going in the second quarter of 2012. Let’s make this year the best one yet!
Andrea J. Stenberg
Please leave a comment and share how you track your business and your goals. Tell us where you are so far and what’s coming up in the future.
