Happy New Year everyone! It has often been said that “in order to predict the future, you must first understand the past.” Therefore, as
one begins to plan for a successful 2012, it’s important to look at previous accomplishments.
In April 2011, I wrote a blog post asking my readers to hold me accountable for my goals for the second half of the year. In that blog post, I promised to report back at the end of 2011 to share whether I met those goals. The reason for making my business challenges public was to instill enough fear in myself, as a freelancer, to make sure that I would stick to my plan.
Well, it’s now time to face the music and report back on how well I did. In case you didn’t read my previous blog post, here are the goals that I set for myself in 2011:
- Have at least 5-10 phone calls or meetings with new contacts every day (my motto is always be networking)
- Have 3-5 repeat clients by the end of 2011
- Host at least 2 group presentations about B2B digital corporate storytelling by the end of 2011
- Help at least 3 small websites to put together an integrated media sales strategy by the end of 2011
- Work with 3-5 businesses to help them profile Canadian digital media trends and online user behaviours (i.e. via blogs, market insights reports, presentations, etc.) by the end of 2011
- Pitch a Canadian digital media news story to 3-5 print publications where I’d like to be published
Now, here are the goals that I did achieve:
- I am happy to say that I met my goal of three to five repeat clients by then end of 2011. I’m going to have to revise the requirements for this goal in 2012.
- I also easily met the group presentation target because I had promised to host at least two. In hindsight, I should have aimed for five to ten instead. So, I’m going to have to aim higher in 2012.
- I did work with three startups (not necessarily small websites) to put together an integrated media sales strategy in 2011. I am happy with having achieved this goal because it’s hard to find customers who are looking for help in this area. I might expand on this goal for 2012 and create more advanced challenges.
- Finally, I did meet the goal of working with 3-5 businesses to help them profile Canadian digital media trends and online user behaviours (i.e. via blogs, market insights reports, presentations, etc.) by the end of 2011.
- While I was always networking, there were, admittedly, days where I was too busy working on client projects to meet my five to ten client calls or meetings quota. I guess what I’ve learned is that once you have a set number of clients, the desire to keep pitching does slow down a bit. However, when I did go to conferences and events, I set a goal for myself to come home with at least five to ten business cards. This, I can proudly say, I achieved.
- The print publication goal is the one area where I really fell short. Admittedly, I only pitched one Canadian digital media news story to a print publication where I’d like to be published. I guess because I was writing a lot of online, time-sensitive content in 2011, it was difficult to find stories that would lend themselves well to a print publication. So, I am definitely going to have to be more aggressive in this area in 2012. That’s because I really would like to gain more experience writing for print – even though we do live in a digital world.
So, overall I would say that I didn’t aim high enough in 2011 because I easily met the majority of my goals. As a result, my business resolution in 2012 will be to aim much, much higher. I think it’s better to report back that I came in just shy of my goals in 2012, rather than report that I easily met them. Stay tuned for an update on those goals in the weeks to come.
Image source: funnypicturesimages.com