Do you set time aside regularly to plan what you want to do in your business?
If it’s not something you currently do, I strongly encourage you to embrace it now as well as for the year coming up. Setting aside time to plan out what I want to do and more importantly what growth I want to achieve in the coming year has been crucial to my own success.
Over the next few articles, I want to share with you some of what I’ve learned in my own business and what I’ve found helpful in my years of working with many different businesses.
Let’s start off by taking a look at why business planning is “the secret” to success.
There are a few different factors that come into play here. The first is efficiency.
Planning Boosts Efficiency
When you go in with a clear plan, you can focus on what’s most important. Instead of spending time trying to figure out what you should be working on, what pieces of the puzzle are missing from your product funnel, or what you need to do to break through to the next income level, you know exactly what needs to come next if you have a clear plan to build your business.
With a clear goal in mind and a plan for the year, it becomes easy to walk backwards to create effective and efficient daily to-do lists.
Work on what needs to get done each day and you will reach your goals.
Next, setting a big goal for yourself helps you think outside the box.
Planning Interrupts Habitual Thought Patterns
If you don’t believe me, try it. Decide on a big income goal for the coming month. Write it down. Keep it in front of you and focus on it. Then get to work and start to notice what happens next. You start to think of things that didn’t occur to you before. You come up with creative ways to get more traffic. You decide to run a fun promo that adds dollars to your bank account.
The same happens when an important deadline comes up unexpectedly. Think back to when a report was suddenly due, or the last time your in-laws told you they would stop by later in the day. You got very creative about writing and cleaning respectively.
Last but not least, let’s talk about your subconscious.
Planning Enlists Your Subconscious
So far we’ve been focused on what we are actively doing to make progress by making a plan, setting goals and following through. There’s another dimension to all this and that’s what’s going on in our subconscious mind. While we are busy plowing through our to-do list, cooking dinner for the family, and even sleeping, our subconscious mind is working towards our plans and goals as well.
In short, planning and setting goals is important because it helps you grow faster. That means you end up with that business you love while spending less time slaving away at your desk.
If you want to make the next 12 months your best year ever check out my planning template Your Best Year Ever! It will guide your business planning to ensure you focus on the key elements and don’t get distracted by things that aren’t central to your success.
