Enjoy this week’s guest post by Kristen Westcott!
A lot of people fall into the trap of spending more time planning than actually executing their tasks. This makes planning seem unnecessary, overly complex, and overall a waste of time.
However, most successful businesses will need at a minimum, quarterly planning to help achieve their short term and long term goals. Today, I’m going to tell you some ways that I keep quarterly planning simple and effective.
Make it fun
Make planning something that you want to do, that you look forward to each quarter. It’s an important part of the process, so why not give it the significance that it deserves?
One easy way to make planning more fun is to choose an outing for the day or half day when you’ll do your planning. Go somewhere new, go somewhere old that you love, or stay home, if that’s where you enjoy being! Splurge on your favourite drink and order in lunch. Really make the day something just for you and surround yourself with things that make you feel relaxed, happy and like having fun.
Getting yourself in the mood for a successful planning session not only makes the planning more enjoyable, but it gets you in the correct mindset to plan for a successful business.
Dream big
As a fellow entrepreneur, I know that we are constantly full of ideas. If you’re anything like me, at times you may even feel like you have too many ideas. But for some reason, sometimes when we get in the groove of things that idea person takes a back seat. Totally normal.
We just have to remember to give that ideas person inside of us a prod when we’re planning, so that they can remind us of the end goal, while the integrator part of us keeps us grounded.
If you’re the ideas person all the time, make sure you bring in someone who’s able to look at the business holistically and help you set realistic goals for your business. This will help you avoid those “shiny objects” that initially seem great, but distract you from your true vision. If you can’t put on your integrator hat, perhaps you have a biz bestie who can or a coach or strategist can support you with this.
Together, you should be able to dream big and aim high, all the while setting up milestones that are achievable within the next quarter.
Do it in stages
It’s hard to set aside time sometimes for planning, especially when we can’t see any immediate benefit from doing it. But it’s so important that you set aside time, even if you have to do it in chunks to get it all done.
From my experience, these are the most important aspects of quarterly planning that you should absolutely not skip out on:
High level overview of the last quarter. An analysis of the successes, “failures”, and areas of improvements from the previous quarter.
Promo calendar. An overview of how you’re going to make profits this quarter (even if you don’t run a business with a launch model).
Content calendar. A summary of how you’re going to expose your audience to your promotions. Once you know what you’re promoting you can create content to help you take them on a journey towards working with you/buying your product.
Using this information, set monthly markers that help you move along toward your quarterly goal. These are your projects for the month, which will likely at least include one around product development (or making money), one around visibility, and one around setting up back end operations.
Keep in mind that you likely have non-negotiables on your plate in addition to these projects. These are tasks that you do on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis that need to get done. For example, weekly social media posts.
Do a quick audit of these tasks and make sure that they are all necessary before scheduling in your large projects. You don’t want to schedule in too many projects if you don’t have enough time, and you don’t want to omit a project because you think you don’t have enough time!
Also don’t forget to have your virtual assistant put all of this into a project management system to keep you on track! (my fave is ClickUp).
Wrap up
Getting a second opinion never hurts! When you’re done with your plan, it’s healthy to have someone else review your plan and help you identify any gaps or risks. This could be your accountability buddy, your biz bestie, or just someone you trust.
However, keep in mind that, at the end of the day, you want to make goals that are going to help your business succeed, not anyone else’s. Your mentors, colleagues, and community members will have advice and suggestions that sometimes aren’t going to be a fit for your business. Keep an open mind, but also know when to trust your gut!
Conclusion
Quarterly planning is a necessary part of our process to run a successful business. It acts as a milestone to help us stay laser focused on our vision and complete more meaningful work. Cut out the busy work and focus on what’s going to grow your business with ease.
Kick overwhelm to the curb with a simple quarterly plan, with plenty of space in your calendar for flexibility (no more cramming in 5 projects and exhausting yourself each month).
Keep these key components of quarterly planning in mind in order to keep winning every quarter!
Interested in learning more about how to easily complete quarterly planning in your business so you can have your most profitable quarter yet? Click here to check out the Simplified Quarterly Planning Toolkit
Kristen Westcott is a business growth & systems strategist and creator of The Freedom Track Method, who has spent the last decade in the legal and education fields supporting leaders and students in the areas of goal setting, productivity, and project management. After recognizing her true passion lies in serving entrepreneurs, Kristen honed her skills as a Director of Operations. She quickly noticed that what was holding many business owners back wasn’t a lack of drive or ability, but a lack of foundational systems that could support the day-to-day operations of a scaling business. These days, she spends her time helping online coaches, copywriters, and creatives scale without the frustration that massive growth often brings.
The post How to Simplify Your Quarterly Planning and Create Your Most Profitable Quarter Yet appeared first on Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing.