The New Year is around the corner which means it’s time to get planning.

While it’s never too late to start this process, you’re sure to feel a sense of relief if you tackle it early – giving yourself clarity on where you want to go and what you want to achieve. 

Now, this post assumes you already have an idea of your goals for the year because that's a huge part of your strategy. 

If you don't have goals or haven't written them down, that's an essential first step.

Determining your goals

Here are some questions to help you think about your goals for the year: 

1. What revenue number do you want to reach this year?

2. What will you sell to allow yourself to reach that revenue goal? Break your sales down by offer, based on what you believe is realistic to sell.

3. Do you want to develop any new offers? When do you want to have them ready and how do these fit into your revenue goal?

4. Do you want to outsource any work you're currently doing? Can you do this with the revenue goal you've set? Do you need to stretch your revenue goal a little further to accommodate this?

5. Is there anything else you want to do in your business this year? For example, maybe you want to plan a rebrand, add a new content type/platform to your marketing, increase community involvement, implement new software or systems to maximize efficiency, or update your website. What do all of these entail? How do they play into your revenue goal? 

I have multiple other blogs on goal setting including a general introduction to the S.M.A.R.T framework for goal setting and how to structure your goals for your business, as well as the types of goals you can set for your business.

So, if you’re stuck, start there! 

Once you’ve developed a sense of your goals though, it’s time to embed them into your business strategy for the year. 

Developing a strategy based on your goals

This strategy will support you in determining the actions you can take to achieve your goals, based on your priorities, values, and the resources you have at your disposal to bring those goals to fruition. 

On the flip side, it also supports you in determining what you’re not going to do. 

“The essence of strategy is choosing what not to do.” ~ Michael Porter

Your strategy gives you an overview of your position in the marketplace, involving competitive analysis, potential challenges or barriers to success, and how you’re going to stand out from others in your industry as a unique business. 

Your strategy should also define who your audience is, the problems they have, and how you help with those problems. This part of your strategy should provide additional insights as to where it's most valuable to spend your time, whether on social channels, networking in person, or other marketing platforms that will most effectively reach the people in your target audience. For example, if your focus is on professionals, LinkedIn will likely be more valuable than Facebook.

You’ll also want to think about the places people find you most often before they hire or buy from you and put effort in there. Don't forget to consider local networking groups as a way to expand your reach!

Creating action steps and plans to take you to the finish line 

By this point, you should have an overarching idea of what you want your year to look like, what parts of your business you want to focus on, and how you’re going to allocate your resources strategically to make those goals happen. 

Now, we're going to start breaking down your goals into the steps you need to take to achieve them.

Because large goals on their own can be overwhelming, we need to find ways to make them more manageable so you’re motivated to get to work on them. 

Consider: 

1. How many people do you need to talk to about your services to make enough sales to meet your revenue goal? Determine how many consults you need to do per month/week. Or, how many people do you need to get in front of to make a sale? Determine how you plan to reach that number through organic social media posts, blog posts, your email list, paid ads, or a combination of all of these.

2. How do you plan to book those consults? Will you get them from social media posts, referrals, networking in person, or a combination of all three? For products, where will you direct this potential traffic? Do you have sales processes and automations set-up? 

3. Do you want to give a referral fee or discount for people who send you clients / customers? Will you establish this with specific collaborators (for example, other business owners who work with your audience) or will it be with anyone who sends you potential clients or refers a sale?

From here you can also establish some minimums that will help you achieve your goals:

• Platform/type of content = X posts per week/month

• Networking events = X times per month

• Networking follow-up = X emails per event and X 1:1 meetings per week

• Referral partners = X agreements for the year for X% of the client fees before taxes

• Affiliates = X referrals for the year for X% discount or money back 

This process is great a way to double-check that your goals are actually realistic. If you're walking through answering these questions and starting to feel overwhelmed by the amount of work you have to do to generate the business, get creative!

Think about what you can do to shift your plans to make more money. What can you do to work smarter rather than harder? 

Can you hire support? Outsource certain tasks? Is there a piece of software you can purchase to help reduce your manual workload? Can you automate redundant processes? Is there anything you’re doing out of habit or obligation that you don’t need to? 

Remember that the whole point of laying out a plan for how you're going to achieve the goals you set is to give you a way to structure the work you do so you can stay on track.

You don’t need to do everything. In fact, you shouldn’t. 

Trying to be omnipresent, especially if you haven’t yet built up the team or systems to effectively do so, is going to do you more harm than good. 

Instead, focus on 1-2 platforms where your audience hangs out, and that you’re excited about creating content for, and work on being consistent on those first. Otherwise, overwhelm can lead to inaction.

It's okay to look at your year and reduce your goals and activities for the times you plan to be away or busy because you know it's just not going to be feasible to work as much (or at all). 

In fact, planning for time away from your business is a good way to avoid burnout.

It's your business and your rules. YOU get to decide your goals and priorities. You also get to change your goals and priorities, even if it means you shift to less ambitious goals.

And that's why the plan is important. There needs to be a clear focus on your goals and the steps it takes to achieve them so you know what you’re signing up for and how to set yourself up for success. 

This initial planning can help you better prioritize you, your needs, and the work you need to do for your business (over other opportunities that will inevitably come up and distract you). That might look like setting boundaries, regulating your energy, and/ or setting up systems of support. 

That's also not to say though, you should devote all your time to your business and never stray from thinking about it. Quite the opposite.

I'm a big believer in setting both yes and no boundaries. And if you need to list these out to remember when something comes up that isn't aligned with what you want, that can be a great way to stay on track.

Remember, it’s your business! And if saying no is going to support you in growing a business that allows you to live your life on the terms you set, then it’s worth it, even if it means potentially taking a little longer to achieve the goals you set. 

The best part about that is it shows clearly that you're achieving the greatest goal of them all: deciding what's right for you and going for it.

When you shift your plans to make room for other priorities, it gives you more information about how to approach the planning process the next time to set even more realistic goals and intentions.

So, go forth and create your new year strategy. Be inspired. Dream big. Get creative. Set-up a plan to execute. And remember to do so on your own terms, keeping your vision for your life in mind, too.