Running a business is a tremendous undertaking. There are so many steps to success and ways you can work to fit into your specific marketplace. For small businesses just getting off the ground, it’s natural to feel over-eager and set incredibly lofty goals. For any business, in fact, it’s natural to want to go above and beyond with everything you do. However, there can be some danger in setting goals that are unattainable or incredibly lofty. Instead, try to commit to more reasonable goals that will keep you completely motivated.
Without goals and key results to strive for, your whole process and team may be out of alignment. There is no doubt that setting goals are the best practice to find success as a business owner. You need to set smart goals that are realistic and strategic. Read the analytics, be reasonable about your finances, and use the right insights to gain a competitive advantage. Once you’re set up a great model, you’ll be ready to turn your small business into a booming empire. Here are a few reasons why realistic goals are significant for your company.
You don’t want to run out of money.
Everyone says you have to spend money to make money in business. You need to be sure you don’t go overboard and run out of money right away. This is where the realistic aspect of setting goals comes in. Be careful you aren’t spending too much capital right away without anything else coming into your bank account. First, you need to be sure you can produce new products and pay your staff. You can use check writing services to get paychecks out as a priority. This makes payment processing and mailing a breeze and can help you with overall bookkeeping. Your check writing should be a realistic goal for you to have enough money to keep up with your expenses and end the hassle of writing a ton of checks every week.
Set realistic expectations for your sales numbers.
As a small business, you aren’t going to see insane sales numbers right after you launch. This is where incremental progress can be significant. Set yourself up for success by being realistic about your margins and product listings. You can also use specific software tools to help you plan for higher profit margins and retail your products higher on Amazon listings. With Amazon seller software, you can set more realistic goals and work smarter with set templates. Track your profits and revenue, help with inventory management, and help with shipping. Amazon business knows what they’re doing, so rely on the software that will help you take those small, realistic steps to reach your ultimate goals.
Bring your team together in a smart way.
When you are setting your business goals, you shouldn’t be keeping them to yourself. To find ultimate success, you want to project your Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) to everyone in your company. By providing a dashboard that measures metrics by the day, week, or month, you motivate your staff to get on board with the current trajectory. Get an official OKR certification to help set up central accounts and notifications of the success you have each day. This will help your team stay on track to help your company excel overall.
Realistic goals use past data for future forecasting.
The truth is realistic goals are created in a different way than lofty goals. When you’re making a plan and setting your goals, you don’t just go in blind. You take information and data from past experiences and sales to forecast what you think you can do with your future. For example, if you sold 100 products last quarter, you wouldn’t expect to sell 5,000 this month. Setting a goal of 150 would be much more realistic. Having past data and algorithms set up allows you to set up your future goals for better success.
Inspire your team rather than intimidate them.
Lofty goals are great and can be inspiring. However, when you set goals that are completely unrealistic, it can actually end up intimidating your team. If you expect them to get more work done than they can actually accomplish, they’ll end up abandoning projects and avoiding the work altogether. Unachievable setting goals makes you seem too demanding and discourages team unity. Be realistic about what you want of your team so you can praise them when they achieve it rather than reprimand when they don’t.
Keep everything connected to your mission.
When you started your company, you had a specific mission and purpose in mind. As you grow and expand, you want to keep your integrity intact. Keep all your goals connected to your set mission statement with your customers in mind. This will make your goals more realistic and beneficial to your overall purpose.