Creating Your Own 2010 Economy!

by TERESA ALLEN, author "Common Sense Service"

One of the best ways to bring about success in a new year is to celebrate the successes of the current year while at the same time being painfully honest about the failures or lost opportunities in 2009.  This will open the door to identifying positive steps to take in 2010.

 With involvement of your staff, conduct an internal audit of your sales and service progress in 2009 and make plans for 2010.  Involvement of staff is critically important to this process.  There will be more buy in to any necessary changes of they have helped to determine what went wrong and what went right!

 Determine the answers to the following 10 questions:

• 1. What percentage of our sales came from new business and old business?
• 2. What were top three generators of new business?
• 3. What percentage of new business came from referrals?
• 4. Could we have grown our existing business MORE?
• 5. If answer is to number 4 is yes, quantify 5 ways to target that goal in 2010.
• 6. How did our customer service impact our 2009 sales? What are 5 specific things we could we do to improve our service image and reality in 2010?
• 7. What are 3 technology improvements that would positively impact sales in 2010?
• 8. What are two ways we use social networking to grow business in 2010?
• 9. Who are our top 5 customers? What did we do for these specific relationships in 2009 and how could we innovate and be creative in strengthening the relationship with them in 2010?
• 10. In what capacity could our company make a positive impact on both our local community and any national organizations supporting our industry in 2010.?

 Now that you have conducted your audit, assign a team to work on each of the identified opportunities in 2010.  Ask these teams to set specific tasks, objectives and goals, not just for the year as a whole but for specific quarters of 2010.  By doing this NOW, you will have a leg up on your competitors as you begin the new year!