With 2017 on the horizon, now is the perfect time to reflect and build a blueprint for your business in the year ahead. New Year’s Resolutions are a longstanding tradition for setting goals and strategizing productivity, but keeping up with your intentions is a challenge.
Here are some helpful goal-setting tips to keep you motivated in pursuing your ambitions for your company throughout the year:
1. Be Specific
Adding a specific element to a broad goal can contextualize the steps needed to achieve it. Instead of thinking about a looming, monumental goal, break your vision down into something less scary.
Examples:
- »
Make a collection⇒ Design a dress prototype that retails under $150 - »
Make more money⇒ Raise profit margin by 10% - »
Start a company⇒ Draft a business plan and speak with investors
2. Be Realistic
Dreaming big is never a bad thing, but to make real progress on a goal, it’s got to be practical. If you’re an entrepreneur, you can imagine you product as the next sensation – think hoverboards – but a more achievable aim for 2016 might be reaching a point where you have the ability to expand your product offerings or bring on another employee.
We also recommend keeping the number of goals you’re working on at one time feasible – instead of a laundry list of 25, choose 3-5 to really hone in on. You can always add on more once you accomplish those initial goals.
3. Make Them Measurable
Being able to measure your progress is a great way to stay on track. Build in periodic checkpoints at which you’ll evaluate if your numerical goals are being met. There are many online metric tools that you can take advantage of to monitor various aspects of your business.
Examples:
- » Goal: Increase traffic to website by 10% per quarter. Tool: Google Analytics
- » Goal: Spend less time managing your social media platforms Tool: Buffer
- » Goal: Optimize customer behavior on your website Tool: Crazy Egg or Optimizely
4. Make Them Actionable
Make your goals such that you can start working on them immediately. If your end objective will occur far into the future, think of what you can do to start planning for it now. Creating a sense of urgency can drive motivation and minimize procrastination. If you feel that you’ve made little progress on your goals, revisit the list from time to time and see if there are ways you can further break down daunting tasks to make them more digestible.
Examples:
- » Want to launch your product line in May? Start exploring and building upon an ecommerce platform now.
- » Is securing funding your 2016 mission? Write your business plan and work on your pitch deck this month.
5. Write Them Down
Mentally deciding to do something is okay, but you are much more likely to follow through on your goals if you write them down. You can start off by reflecting on the past year while you set this year’s goals. Acknowledge the accomplishments you’ve made, no matter how small. Listing those out on paper alongside your future goals should be a reminder of what you can achieve.
Then, take pen to paper (seriously) and keep your new goals somewhere visible, like a wardrobe door, your desktop screen, etc.
2017 on Maker’s Row
This year, we hit the milestone of introducing 10,000 factories on our site – in apparel, accessories, furniture, packaging, and a diverse array of other industries. Start bringing your product ideas to life through our platform!
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