
Photo by pasotraspaso
New Year’s Day is just a few days away. Have you made any New Year’s resolutions for your internet business?
Actually, rather than create hard and fast resolutions, I believe it is more productive to think about the successes and failures you have had in the past year, and then to set some goals for the new year.
Here are some things you might want to think about:
- What worked for you last year? If it worked for you last year, why not expand on it, doing more of the same - only on a bigger scale?
- What did not work so well? You can learn a lot from your failures as well as your successes. Analyze what went wrong and decide what you need to do differently in the future. It might be that the particular idea should be abandoned, but it could also just mean that it needs to be revised a little to be successful. Think of all your projects as experiments, and learn from the failures as well as the successes.
- Are you taking your internet business seriously? Maybe the reason it is not going so well is just that you have not spent enough time on it. You can’t expect to be haphazard about your business and still succeed. You need to treat it as a business, even if you can only work on it part time. At least during the time you can devote to it, be whole-hearted and businesslike about it.
- Have you been focusing on the right things? I believe a business will do best with clear goals that you focus on. A lot of internet marketers make the mistake of hopping from one thing to another and losing focus easily. In the new year, try to focus on one thing at at time, so that you give it a chance to succeed. It is ok to abandon something that is not working, but be sure you gave it a fair chance first.
- Have you set some firm goals for yourself, and have you written the goals down? This is something that is a lot more important than you might think. Studies have shown that people who write down goals for themselves will have a much better chance of achieving those goals than people who don’t write them down, or, especially, those who don’t even have goals.
For example, think about your income goals for the next year. Write down a figure for how much you want to earn from your business. After you do that, you can break it down into monthly, weekly, or even daily goals.
Personally, I have an income goal that I want to achieve this year, and I have written it down. Let’s see if having it written down helps. (I’ll let you know next year.)
I’d like to share with you some of the plans and thoughts I have for my business for next year.
First of all, l have noticed that, once I worked out some personal issues that I was grappling with, I suddenly was able to have a clear vision for my business. I found that when my personal life was up in the air, I could not form a good business plan either. Thank goodness now that has changed, so I expect great things from my business this year.
Some of you may know that I have moved a few times this past year. I have now settled down in Sheboygan, Wisconsin. My business address is still in West Bend, because that’s where I have my business mailbox. I will move it to Sheboygan eventually.
Side note: Did you know that Sheboygan is the bratwurst capital of the U.S.?
I heard that on the radio the other day. Some of you might not even know what a bratwurst is… it’s a spicy sausage, very popular in Wisconsin, which originally comes from Germany.
Anyway, back to my business plans:
- Build an email list. I don’t have an email list set up for this blog yet. As I mentioned in a previous post, I was thinking of creating an email newsletter.
I now have a great idea of how the email newsletter will be structured. I don’t think anyone else is doing this. It will be a good way for you to learn about making money online. I’m not going to say any more until I roll it out, but I think you will really like it.
- Post regularly, at least once per week. I used to try posting 3 times per week on this blog, but that got to be too much. But I want to post at least once per week, to keep the blog current. It might not always be on Mondays, but look for a post once a week from now on.
- Create more videos. I have found that I need to do this regulary, or else I get out of the mode of doing it. It’s kind of like exercise. You get out of shape if you don’t do it on a regular basis. I haven’t created videos for so long that I have forgotten the Camtasia settings that I used, or even where my microphone is. So that’s something I need to get back to. Some of the videos will be free and some will be paid products.
- Which brings me to: Create more products. I am going to start creating products on a more regular basis. There are so many things I know how to do, that I could create products on. I am sure the same is true for you too. You know more than you think. So maybe you should be thinking of products you could create, as well.
- Continue creating websites. For a while at least, I am going to continue to create websites to sell on Sitepoint. It is a good steady source of income. It does take some work to set up the sites, but I have only had one site that did not sell, and I know why. I won’t make the same mistakes again. Most of the others have sold for $99 at the buy-it-now price. A few have sold for less, but they have still earned me money.
One thing I am going to do differently there is to charge for hosting. I have a reseller account set up at Hostgator. So far, I have been offering a year’s worth of free hosting to my website buyers. In the new year, I will only offer one month of free hosting, and then charge a minimal amount for hosting. After a while, it will add up.
So I hope you have enjoyed this little peek into my plans for next year. Don’t forget to review your own internet business, and make some business plans of your own.
I wish you all the best for next year. May it be happy and prosperous, no matter what you decide to do.
– Pat Doyle
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