Year-End Business Review: Check up on Your Business Results and Double Your Profits In the New Year

How has business been this past year? If you want to do better (or EVEN better) in 2013, it's time to do that dreaded task: the year-end business check-up. Like a physical, the year-end check-up goes over every detail of your business to find out if everything is in order, and how well all parts are working. And like a physical, it helps diagnose any potential problems so they can be fixed before they turn into big problems. So go ahead and schedule some time. You may well want to set aside a day or maybe at least a few hours and take a closer look at how your business has been doing. Here are some of the things you should do as part of your review: 1) Check your balance sheets Did you turn a profit? How much did you make? Are you happy with the results? How much more do you hope to make in the new year. 2) Check the return on your investments What did you invest in during the year, and what were the results. There are a number of things you may have invested in, so check each of them separately: AdvertisingrnNetworking (money AND time spent on networking)rnOnline MarketingrnContinuing Training and Education for yourself and/or your staffrnNew equipment, software, hardware, and so onrnOther Check each of them and find out what worked, and what didn't. Decide where you want to invest more, and where you may want to invest less than you did this year. 3) Evaluate your marketing efforts and results Take an even closer look at your marketing efforts and find out which types of marketing brought you the best results. Try to assign a dollar figure to everything even if you "just" spent time. How can do you that? Decide how much your time is worth. Whether it's $50/hour, $150/hour, or even just $20/hour, calculate the hours you spent on various activities including networking events and find out how much you spent. 4) Tally the numbers Then take a look at your results. And not just at the net cash earnings, but at the lifetime value of the new clients and customers you got as a result of your marketing efforts. How much is each of them worth? You find out their lifetime value if you multiply their average purchases over a year by the number of years they typically remain your customer. 5) Figure out return on your investment - and take action accordingly Once you have tallied the numbers, take a look at which of your activities brought the most results per dollar spent. Plan to do a lot more of those. And drop or minimize the activities that yielded lesser results. Best of luck improving your business in 2013!