I personally find that a new year is a great time to take stock of where you were last year, and where you would like to be this year and devise a plan on how to get there. Perhaps you fell short of your sales goals last year or you would like to challenge yourself to do better than you did last year. Here are three things you can do to increase your business success in 2014.
1.Know your numbers
“You may know where you’re going, but if you don’t have a full understanding of the metrics that drive your business, you will not have a full picture of what it will take to get there. Whether its revenue, net income, customer acquisition cost or net receivables you need to know your numbers.” Knowing your numbers will help you to know where you can cut cost and save, how much you have to invest in new hires or marketing, how profitable you truly are, where your money is going, how much you need to put aside for taxes, how many leads you need to get to make a sale, how many sales you need to make to reach your sales goals, which marketing efforts are producing the most results and which ones that are underperforming that you need to cut.”
2.Identify New Opportunities
“Opportunities are the gap between where you are now and your vision. If your vision is to grow your company in the New Year, you need to be proactive in identifying those short and long term opportunities to help you get there. You need to take the time to ask, “What are my opportunities for growth?” Some of your growth opportunities are obvious. In order to grow I need to build my team either by hiring a full time employee or a virtual assistant or investing in strategic marketing. Other potential opportunities can arise out of a change in your industry, trends in the market or untapped markets. For example insurance agents may have new opportunities to generate additional business with ObamaCare or perhaps you can expand your servicing offering by partnering with larger companies who do the same thing you do but don’t have the manpower and don’t want to hire additional full-time help.”
Create a Marketing Calendar
“Promoting your business should always be a top priority, even when business is great. A marketing calendar will help you plan your marketing and promotion ahead so that you can consistently stay in front of your target market and customers. Your marketing calendar will help you to keep and implement your marketing tactics consistently so that you will have a marketing strategy in place that helps you attract more customers, close more sales and increase cash flow.”