Posted on February 23, 2011
Many virtual professionals I know have gone through that phase where they just put one foot in front of the other and hope that things go well.
The problem with that is that if you don't have a plan in place, you can experience a lot of issues:
- you can go off track
- worse, you can go nowhere
- you can't measure your successes
In order to know whether things are going the best way possible in your business it's important to determine where you want to go, how you want to get there, how you are GOING to get there, and how things look when you arrive. That's called strategic planning, and every business owner should practice it.
It's not as difficult as you might think. Whether you are tackling your client intake process, your marketing calendar, your revenue planning, or your newsletter, you need to go through these four steps to make sure that your process makes sense and that it will work for you.
Determine where you want to go
Sit back regularly and look at your business. Break things into chunks if it's easier for you, for instance - if you decide that you want to communicate more regularly with your audience, think about increasing the frequency of your newsletter. If you do it quarterly, plan for monthly. If you do it monthly, plan for twice a month. If you can, try to figure out if you can produce it weekly. Don't just make a decision, really look at your calendar to be sure that what you are deciding to do fits with your schedule (because once you commit to it you will want to be sure to be able to produce it easily). Read More...
Posted on January 13, 2011
Do you want more from your business? Perhaps you want more customers, more revenues, more profits, more fame or just more free time? Whatever it is that you want more of you can have when you apply the following seven keys to getting more to your business. What are they?
1. Grand Vision
All too often entrepreneurs and business owners get caught up in what is going on today, what fires need to be put out and what they are going to do to meet revenue goals for the next month. Working in this way will certainly make it hard for you to achieve your ultimate goals through your business. You need to build your business and systems with your grand vision in mind and always keep your eye on the big prize if you want to obtain it.
2. Resourcefulness
No matter what business your are in, you can see that competition is tougher than it has ever been. However by being resourceful you can do big things, grow your business and get more of what you really want without having to expend huge amounts of valuable resources. How can you leverage your current assets? How can you get more from every contact and how can you do more marketing without spending an obscene amount of money? Read More...