It’s almost the new year, which means that a lot of people will be going through that resolution ritual thing. Starting next week people will be setting their sights on new goals and will make an effort to change some aspect of their lives.
Unfortunately, most of those who set resolutions will have given up within six weeks. It’s true: surveys show that the majority of people who make a resolution abandon it within a month (possibly much quicker), and fewer than 10% are still sticking to them a year on.
Resolutions in your personal life might be difficult to keep and they often don’t make a great deal of difference to how your life is lived. But when it comes to resolutions that affect the success of your business it’s often easier to set goals, more important that they be met, and—believe it or not—easier to achieve them.
Resolutions targeted at improving some aspect of your business can be vitally important. In a competitive environment, these improvements aren’t optional: they’re necessary steps you need to take to remain competitive. Many of these improvements can mean the difference between a profit and a loss, or even the difference between staying in business and going out of business. This isn’t a matter of going to the gym three days each week instead of one, or of losing five pounds by St. Patrick’s Day. Those are great personal goals, but they probably won’t help the health of your business.
On the other hand, setting a goal of signing on five new clients this quarter, or adding a new product or service before Labor Day, or trimming raw material expenses by 3% year over year might be vitally important to the health and future survival of your enterprise. These things might not be a matter of “nice to do” but rather be in the category of “must have.”
Many pieces of advice have become common in recent years when it comes to improving the success of a resolution: keep it manageable, give yourself permission to fail and try again, approach it with a positive attitude, and so on. One important bit of advice which is even more applicable to business resolutions is to do it with help. When it comes to a goal for your business, you don’t have to be self-reliant: you can seek out and screen experts, identify which is best for you, and then contract with them to develop and execute the plan that will successfully achieve your goal.
At Waltham Word Works, we don’t claim to be miracle workers. We can’t achieve all your business goals. But we can help with some very important ones. If your business needs to develop a portfolio of material to demonstrate its expertise, we’re exactly the type of expert who can help you do it. If you have a resolution for your business that involves transforming a little-used blog section on your web site from an afterthought to a productive component of your online marketing strategy, we’re the sort of team who can get it done. If you’re interested in polishing the image you present to prospective customers, and improving how—and to what depth—they find you through relevant searches, we understand how to make that happen.
If you’ve made any personal resolutions for the coming hear, the team at Waltham Word Works salutes you for simply making the effort, and we encourage you to stick to it.
When it comes to important resolutions (and this goes double for those that apply to your business!) we learned a secret long ago which we continue to apply: when something needs to be done, don’t wait for the New Year’s holiday to make a commitment. Set the goal now, whatever that goal might be. Then create the plan that will achieve it. Then get started, right away.
Finding the right partner who can help you do this is important. Contact us today to discuss your need and decide if we’re that partner. We wish you a happy new year—and we hope to hear from you soon.
Waltham WordWorks 