New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs

New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs

New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs.  Like many business owners, Patty Moreno-Fletcher has a few major year-end deadlines. Hers are a bit more unpredictable and life changing than most: She’s a doula—a non-medical coach who supports people through the labor, birth, and new-parent process, or as she calls it “mothering the new mother.” Three of her clients have due dates around the holidays. New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs

She’s setting a deadline for herself, too: In 2009, she purchased the domain name for her practice, Butterfly Babies NYC, but has procrastinated ever since. After relying for years on just positive word-of-mouth among New York families, she’s now made this her primary New Year’s resolution: Develop the website and start a blog to reach out to more potential clients. New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs

“Being a doula—it’s very hands-on work. But when it comes to the Internet or a Web presence or even managing an office or billing, it just give me a headache thinking about it,” she says, laughing. With 2013 just days away, business owners can celebrate the end of another year of hard work and look ahead at what’s to come—and what they might do differently based on what they’ve learned. While one notable study found the track record for successfully maintaining attempts at change wasn’t all that great, the dawn of every new year brings optimism for starting anew and becoming a little wiser and maybe a bit more efficient. Here’s a look at what a few business owners are saying they are hoping for, possibly with some inspiration for your own next 12 months. New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs

Hire new staff John Kwan, chief executive of VeriPic, says he’s resolving to increase hiring in 2013. With the economy still sluggish, “there are plenty of talented people available and many just want moderate pay,” he says. “This is the perfect environment for expansion as labor costs are low and this is also an excellent way to help the economy by hiring people.” New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs

Value your time “What entrepreneur doesn’t want to focus more?” asks Will Mitchell, a founder of the Startup Bros. business consultancy as well as owner of online marketer Clear Presence Media and reputation manager RepAssured in Tampa, Fla. He resolves to concentrate on one task at a time in order to see it to completion. “Once you start taking the initiative on this, it’s pretty impossible to ignore, particularly if you set up time-tracking software on your computer,” he says. He uses RescueTime, which tracks how much time you spend online and, importantly, shows where those stolen moments on Facebook or fantasy football sites are adding up, and detracting from more important tasks. New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs

Get better rest Mitchell says his family is full of entrepreneurs (he’s been doing business online since he was 14) and all have struggled with being able to tune out and get to sleep. “Most entrepreneurs will tell you the one thing they can do to improve their performance is get more rest,” he says. “But it’s rare that they’ll actually put down the computer and go to bed.”. How long have his resolutions lasted? “With sleep, historically I can get two to three months into that before the first crisis comes up and kind of ruins that,” he admits, chuckling. New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs

Be able to “glide” That’s what Heddi Cundle aimed to do after a hectic year of starting up myTab.co, a travel gift-card system she’s founded. After months of 18-hour days getting her start-up off the ground and chasing venture capital from Silicon Valley, Cundle says she and her team in San Francisco recently altered course and decided to license out myTab to e-commerce sites—a move that she said has been received with great enthusiasm. It’s also changed the company’s outlook going into 2013. “Things are falling into place,” Cundle says. “In the next 12 months at least, we can glide a lot easier because we’re not trying to push and strive to fit into a specific mold that we thought we needed to be in to generate revenue. We just found a different sort. Now we’re gliding into 2013. By licensing our technology to verticals, we can use revenue to invest back into myTab.co travel.” New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs

Get ready to market online New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs

Business Planning Harness the power of planning your time well, taking care to allocate your schedule according to priorities. Wait when it’s appropriate, hurry when it’s appropriate, and apply patience, vision and common sense. — Tim Berry, Business Plans

Social Media Do whatever it takes to get out of your comfort zone and into your “power place” to grow your business. Embrace change and new technologies, including social sites. Choose what works best for reaching your target market, and run with it. Most important: Have fun. — Starr Hall, Social Media

New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs Sales In 2011, show up to the meetings that you would have passed on previously. Never underestimate the power of face-to-face meetings for building stronger relationships and connections with your prospects and customers. Activity creates opportunity. — Barry Farber, Make the Sale

E-Commerce Develop and implement systems that will free up time that you can spend on other pursuits. What really matters most is making a measurable amount of progress in a reasonable amount of time and spending time with loved ones. Do the only things about which you’re passionate and work with only your ideal clients. — Lena West, Ask Entrepreneur

New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs Technology Take the security of your business seriously. Change all your passwords. Close down old unused accounts for emails, business software and social networks. And set up a password for your mobile phone. — Jonathan Blum, Office Technology

Managing Resolve to invest heavily in the people and technology necessary to meet client demands and seize market opportunity. — Paul Spiegelman, Corporate Culture

Online Marketing Understand your customers’ experience with your business. It’s essential for businesses to look at what they do from their customers’ point of view and then smooth out any rough edges. Customers have so many options. You can’t afford a single reason for one to choose a competitor’s business over yours. — Gail Goodman, E-Mail Marketing

Communications The new year will see an acceleration of the reinvention of media. With so many ways to reach so many different types of consumers, reaching out to a variety of outlets through diverse media is critical. Craft customized content and send it via multiple platforms engage customers wherever they may be. — Rachel Meranus, Public Relations

Productivity It’s critical to get absorbed in your business niche to achieve mastery. But, most importantly, laugh, love and live more fully. — Scott Halford, Brainy Business

Starting Young Forget the mantra of “work hard, get good grades and go to school to get a job.” For too long, young people have been force-fed this nonsense from their parents and mentors. It’s stifling their income generating potential. Gen Y needs to become the most entrepreneurial generation in history. — Scott Gerber, Never Get a “Real” Job

New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs Video Marketing Create at least one professionally-produced video for the homepage of your website and social media sites. It should show y why your business is the best choice among the competition and include a compelling incentive to make an immediate purchase and share the video with others. — John Arnold, Marketing Tools & Technologies

Selling a Business Prepare yourself psychologically. Make sure you’re emotionally committed and ready for the sale, or you may turn buyers off to your business. — Domenic Rinaldi, Buying & Selling a Business New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs

Buying a Business Making a concrete plan to pursue your entrepreneurial dreams, and take at least one action every day that will help you achieve your goal. Set a realistic timeline for when you will reach the major milestones on your path to entrepreneurial success. — Mike Handelsman, Buying & Selling a Business

Real Estate Question the experts in your field and find out who the real experts are. Hint: If they’re in Washington or on television, they might not be experts. — Greg Rand, Real Estate Realities

Growing Turn your small mom-and-pop business into a bigger opportunity this year by launching the projects you never got around to in 2010. — Lisa Druxman,Mompreneur

New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs Prioritizing Ask yourself, “What can I stop doing?” Begin to put stronger accountability practices into place to create a better business foundation. — Nina Kaufman, Making It Legal

Mobile Marketing Make mobile marketing a high priority. Capture mobile shoppers by updating your website to load quickly in a variety of browsers and making them Facebook and Twitter interactive. Offer competitive pricing and tap into the soaring popularity of coupons by texting them to your customers’ mobile phones. — Kim T. Gordon, Marketing Read more: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/217806#ixzz2mVpdpnAB New Year’s Resolutions for Entrepreneurs