5 areas to improve your business this year

5 Areas to Improve Your BusinessThis Year

Dr. Rachna Jain

Biggest Lessons of the Past YearI was reflecting on my biggest lessons of the past

year, and what I’ve learned that I want to carry forward in this new year, specifically in my business.

These are areas I’ve identified that I could further improve in; and I’m sharing them with you in the hopes that they will either confirm your thinking about areas to improve - or even spark some new ideas for how you can make this year better than that last.

Make Offers• This refers to a conscious and consistent process of

offering your services and products more frequently.• They might succeed, they might fail, but either way, I

think strengthening my “offer making muscle” is a good thing.

• When you look at making more offers, remember that you don’t always have to find new groups of people to offer something to.

• Your existing or past clients may have needs for additional services, or add-on services, or they may need a refresh or update to whatever work you’ve already done together.

Improve Communication With Your Ongoing Clients

• As in any long-term relationship, there can be times where we make assumptions or don’t ask new questions.

• Contact them each every few months and make sure that you're working towards the same goals.

• This is especially important for the clients for whom I provide “done-for-you” marketing services - we don’t typically have as much regular contact as I do with my coaching and consulting clients.

Track What Matters and Do It Better • The idea with tracking is to find some key metrics

and key indicators that you can use as a CEO dashboard- telling you if your company is moving in the right direction.

• I’ve simplified my tracking systems- and I am tracking just these areas as I go forward:• Total visitors generated• Total leads generated• Total customers acquired• Total revenue generated• Total profit

Work Less• I notice that I’m very good at putting in long days.

However, not always does this hard work translate into meaningful results in my business.

• If we follow the Pareto Principle (80/20 rule)- it says that 80% of your success comes from 20% of your efforts.

•  I’m curious to find the exact 20% that will give me the biggest boost to my business and its growth.

• I think the other benefit to working less is that it moves you to focus on what’s most important to get done in the time you have.

Simplify• Simplification ties into the

idea of working less; but I’m also referring to simplification as a mental schema or stance as well.

• Ask yourself “What do I want from this [project]?” and then “What is the easiest way to get that result?” In most cases, this will help simplify and streamline how you proceed.

• Remember, being in motion for the sake of motion is not usually better than being in productive motion.

Goals for Next Year• My goal for this next year is

to build a more profitable business with better productivity, and less work.

• How about you? • What lessons did you learn

last year which will make this year better?