Happy New Year!
It’s a popular decision to use the passing of an old year into the new as a time to set a new plan, goal, mantra, or habit into your life. What if you did the same for your business? Here’s a few that we love. We’d love to hear what you decide to do, and how you’re going to accomplish it.
1. I will [gracefully and politely] terminate my worst [X% or # of] clients this year.
We heard a phrase we like recently: “If every interaction with a certain client provokes a physical stress response in you, it might be worth firing that client.”
2. I will discontinue, or otherwise stop selling my worst product or service.
Maybe it was a good thing several years or months ago, but it doesn’t make sense now. If it’s less than 5% of your revenue or profit, is it worth it? You can put the time into other things!
3. I will automate or otherwise hand off the most frustrating, time-consuming, or stressful [one-off | annual | quarterly | monthly | weekly | daily] task in my workload.
It could be payroll, sales tax, new employee onboarding, social media marketing, or 100 other things.
You can:
- Train an existing employee to help
- Look at an outsourcing firm that focuses on this one area of business
- Stop doing it entirely – is it necessary?
- Look at a software solution to handle some or all of it – Look at a DIY automation platform (If This, Then That, IFTTT https://ifttt.com/, Zapier, https://zapier.com/, or Microsoft Power Automate https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/power-platform/products/power-automate)
4. I will hire a part-time or full-time Virtual Assistant (VA) to take over a large chunk of my administrative tasks.
VA’s have made a world of difference in our lives. Once you find the right team, they become irreplaceable.
5. I will grow revenue by [X%] via [this singular, focused method].
Saying you’ll grow revenue is fine, but how? The real structure of this resolution is to pick a method, and commit to it.
To get you started:
- Pick out your favorite client. How did they come to you? Can you make that repeatable?
- Pick out your favorite type of client (vertical/segment). What if you tried to make 75%+ of your new revenue come from that type of client? What service or product do they prefer? What do they not like?
6. I will make tangible progress toward selling my business by the year [20XX], by doing [method].
Imagine you needed to take a 3-month medical leave. Could the business run without you during that length of time? If so, you’re much closer than you might think to being able to sell your business because it doesn’t require the person of you! If it didn’t work, where are the gaps? Pick the top 5, and then select one of those 5, and try and resolve it this year.
As I mentioned above, we would love to hear what your plans are for 2025. Happy New Year!