New Year's Resolution Every Small Business Owner Needs to Make

Towards the end of December, a lot of people start using phrases like “New Year, new me”. This is mostly the reason why gyms are packed full during the first two weeks of January. However, for a business and a business owner a start of the new calendar year can mark a date when you start to implement a series of massive changes. With that in mind, here’s a list of New Year’s resolutions that would revolutionize your business, provided that you actually go through with them.

I will learn how to say no

The first thing that every entrepreneur needs to learn is how to say no, yet, a surprisingly large number of people run their businesses for a long time before learning this delicate art. Therefore, you need to learn how to say no to unreasonable employee demands, suppliers and partners. Most important of all, you need to learn how to say no to your customers.

No, the customer is not always right and sometimes, no matter how hard they want something or how much they’re willing to pay, you’re not the one who can give it to them. Agreeing to a project that you know you can’t complete, either with a satisfactory result or in time will ruin your reputation, make the client outraged, make your team doubt in themselves and it might even result in a fee. This means that you’ll overcommit to finalize a project that’s too much for your team and, in the end, you’ll end up losing money instead of earning it. This not-so-fictional scenario alone should be a significant enough motivator.

I will listen more

The next thing you need to do is start listening to what the people around you are saying. Now, before you dismiss this item believing that you already listen, what we mean by this is that you should start actively listening to everyone who has something to say. Feedback is a cornerstone of every successful enterprise. By listening to your employees, you get a way to create a better work environment and boost your productivity. Then, by listening to your customers you can create a better customer experience and improve your business model by quite the margin. By listening to your partners you’re going establish a better B2B relationship, one based on trust and understanding.

I will spend some money on leisure

Think about it, if you’re too afraid to spend any money on your own leisure than what’s all of this about? Why are you trying so hard, working insane hours and giving up everything if there’s no reward whatsoever? We’re not just talking about finding an exhaust vent or treating yourself with something expensive every once in a while. What we’re talking about are these small gestures that you do for yourself in order to feel good. For instance, on your next trip to New Zealand, instead of using a cab or some other form of public transportation, you could contact an agency like Avis Car Rental and get yourself a vehicle worthy of an executive. In this way, you’ll remind yourself what all of this is really about.

I will work harder on my online presence

While a lot of businesses already heavily invest (both resources and effort) into digital marketing, there’s always something more you can do. For instance, you can increase your blogging efforts or invest more time in your SEO. Nowadays, with the concept of white label SEO, you can even do some things in-house while outsourcing others. Other than this, you can become more active on social media and start using platforms that were underutilized by your brand in the past. This may include new formats like podcasts, vlogs and the creation of infographics. This form of content diversification can help out your content marketing efforts quite a bit. For instance, you can now revamp an old piece in a new format or cover a single story in several different ways.

I will set my goals early on

Establishing your goals early on in the year will help you set some milestones to track your progress. It’s one thing to say that you want to achieve an X boost in profit next year, however, is it really efficient to wait until December 31^st to know if you’ve achieved your goal. It’s impossible to set some milestones mathematically on calendar either. For instance, you can’t expect that your retail business will achieve one half of X by the end of Q2 since Q4 contains the holiday season (Black Friday, Cyber Monday, etc.). Therefore, you need to set both your goals and your milestones early on. In other words, you need to know what an acceptable profit is for each quarter so that you can improve something if things aren’t working the way they should.

The thing about the above-discussed list is the fact that these tips hold true in any aspect of life, not just in the business world. Setting goals, listening to people, going with the time, spending money on yourself and learning how to say no are as much lifestyle tips as business advice. Needless to say, this is something more than worth thinking about.