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by Julie Martin
As you start your Internet business, or even if you need help
running your business successfully, you
can benefit greatly by
setting goals and sticking to them. Before you start to plan your
business, think of the reasons why you are starting it, and the
results you plan to achieve. Try to map these out before you get
started to give you an idea of how you can reach your goals in an
efficient way.
Goal setting is very similar to writing out a business plan for
your company. In fact, you can look at your goals as a roadmap for
your business plan. You will be able to see what you expect to
achieve and then you can begin to formulate ideas to make it happen.
Step 1 – Forming Your Goals
Instead of just staring at a blank piece of paper and having
nightmarish flashbacks to high school English classes, try to think
for a moment of your dreams for your business. Do you plan to retire
at 35 as a millionaire? Do you just want to have fun and make some
spare cash on the side? Try to think of the reasons why you are
starting your business in the first place.
Step 2 – Being Reasonable
So maybe retiring as a millionaire at 35 is a little out of
reach. There is no point in setting a goal that will be impossible
to achieve. Start small and set reasonable goals at first. These
goals can be as small as learning html to design your company’s
website or as large as having 1000 customers the first month.
Step 3 – Don’t underachieve
On the same token as overachieving, you can do yourself a
disservice by underachieving as well. While you may feel good about
getting through all of your goals right away, you won’t experience
the personal growth and feeling of accomplishment that comes with
setting goals that may just a little out of reach at first.
Step 4 – Laying out a path
Once you have decided what your goals are, how best can you
achieve them? Do you need to invest more of your capital into
advertising or do you need to spend more time on the smaller goals?
If you know what you plan to do ahead of time, you can portion out
your resources accordingly.
Step 5 – Goal Setting In Advance
As you set up your goals for your business in general, you can
break them up into 6 month or one year increments. Where would you
like your business to be in 6 months? Two years? Try to plan so that
you will have definite goals for each portion of the year. If you
are in a seasonal business, this can be very effective for planning
your busy season ahead of time.
Step 6 – Making your Goals a reality
Once you have laid out the path to your goals you can begin
taking a look at the best way to make them happen. Look at your goal
list as an itinerary. Each goal is an important road marker along
the way to your ultimate destination. This will give you an
incentive to keep going, even when things are at their darkest.
Step 7 – Don’t Get Discouraged
If you do not meet your goals as you planned, don’t get
discouraged and immediately give up. Instead, look at your list and
see if you overachieved in some areas, or didn’t work hard enough
to meet your goals in other areas. This is a learning experience,
not a lesson in failure. Each time you fall, pick yourself up and
retool your goals. Before long, you will have started to make
progress in achieving these goals.
Step 8 – Starting Small
If you are new to goal setting or maybe just a little incredulous
of the process, start by setting just a few goals. Keep these goals
in a conspicuous place in your office or by your computer. Each time
you look at them, you will be reminded of your goals and that might
be the little nudge you need to start making them happen. Goal
setting is for everyone, not just for the “inspirational” types.
Try it for yourself and see what kind of progress you can make in a
very short time.
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