A new year is a fresh start, a chance to make a change.

It’s time to get motivated, to set your business up for success.

Resolutions — or goals — are the first step to building a plan that keeps your business focused and progressing throughout the year.

Hopefully, you’ve already spent some time thinking about some high-level things you want to accomplish, such as increasing your sales or expanding to a new location. It’s important to break it down into simple tasks you’ll want to accomplish throughout the year. Think about how your marketing efforts and other outside tasks will play a role in helping you achieve success.

Learn about email marketing trends to help your business succeed. Check out our webinar: 3 Email Marketing Trends for Small Businesses in 2019.

The idea is to just get started. That’s why we put together these 4 tips to jump-start your resolutions this year:

1. Review the past to determine your future

A good way to think about New Year’s resolutions for your business is to review the past year.

Look at the areas and campaigns that were successful and the things that weren’t. Think about the things you should continue and the areas you should try something different.

Determine trends, good and bad by reviewing your reporting information for all of your marketing channels. Don’t forget to analyze results from your social media pages and email marketing reports.

This information will prepare you to be strategic with your goals for ongoing success.

2. Write down achievable goals

It may seem obvious, but setting a goal is one of the first steps to success. In fact, Earl Nightingale once said, “People with goals succeed because they know where they’re going.”

By setting specific measurable goals, you’ll be able to know how successful you are and what you can do to get there, all because you know where you’re headed.

You might set goals for your business to:

• Get _________ new customers by the end of the year.
• Increase repeat customer revenue by _________% before the end of June.
• Obtain _________ new email subscribers by the end of the year.

Once you determine your goals, write them down. Set deadlines to keep you motivated and working toward each goal. You’ll be able to refer back to them and understand next steps. Provide physical, written proof to keep you accountable. It doesn’t have to be like that personal resolution you may have forgotten about a few weeks ago!

The next step is to set up a plan with individual tasks to help you achieve each of your goals.

Set up a marketing calendar so you can determine how email marketing and social media will play a role in helping you reach your goals. Think about the types of content you’ll share in each channel to help you succeed.

Add those individual tasks to your calendar with deadlines so you’ll always know what you need to do next.

Writing down goals is a simple but important step for success this year. Just remember to be specific and set deadlines.

3. Try new things

While running webinars, I sometimes hear people say things like, “I would never do __________, that’s something I personally hate doing.”

I want to challenge you this year to step out of your comfort zone to try new things for your business.

We all have our individual preferences and they may differ from that of your customers. The truth is, they may respond best to that one thing you hate doing.

Success often comes in the form of risk-taking. Don’t let personal preferences hold you back, try something new!

Remember, people often become immune to seeing the same type of thing again and again. Trying new things will mean that your customers won’t get bored.

Through the Constant Contact blog and webinars, we share recommendations based on research, ideas, and experiences from our experts. The ideas we share have been proven and we share them because we want you to be successful.

Test to see what works

With the above in mind, not everything works for every business.

Perhaps, you have a unique way you run your business, offer service, or products. These are just some of the things that make your business unique, and also why some ideas will work and others won’t.

A/B testing is a common strategy to help you determine what works best in your marketing. Test ideas in your emails, for landing pages on your website, and email sign-up pages.

Keep an eye on your results. Test one idea at a time so you can easily compare the stats to determine what works.

Continue testing new things throughout the year as results can change over time. Depending on your variables, you may need to try an idea a few times to see if outside factors may have impacted the outcome.

Testing different variables will allow you to hone in what works best for your audience so you can replicate in the future.

Determine your New Year’s resolutions and get started today!

You have the power to make this year more successful than the last. Now’s the time to set resolutions and create a plan with action items that are specific to your own business.

Use these 4 tips to ensure success with your business resolutions this year.

Get started today!

Learn about email marketing trends to help you set your New Year’s resolutions. Check out our webinar: 3 Email Marketing Trends for Small Businesses in 2019.

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