It’s one of my favorite times of year, and no it’s not necessarily because of all the
Christmas lights and delicious goodies everyone is baking right now, although that definitely
doesn’t hurt; in business, it’s time for an end-of-year review and planning for next
year.
And that makes me happy.
So let me share some of that excitement with y’all and give you the rundown of how you
can do a review of 2021 and start getting your plans together for 2022.
Hey y’all!
Savanna Bell here with My Massage World where I give business advice and strategies for
the real world.
If you haven't done an end-of-year review before, here's the basic rundown of what you
need to be doing over the next couple weeks to properly close out this year and prep for
the next.
So, to close out 2021...
#1 You need to review the plans and goals you had for this year and see how you’ve
done.
So look all the way back at January to what you were doing and what your goals were for
this year.
Did you reach those goals?
Did something happen this year that threw a wrench into things and made you make some
major changes to those plans?
Did you just not carry things out like you wanted to or should have?
Some things you can’t help and some things you can, so celebrate your wins, learn from
your mistakes, applaud the necessary flexibility needed at times, and give yourself some grace.
But it’s still important to take stock of what went right, what went wrong, and what
you can do to get even better going forward.
#2 Catch up on any bookkeeping and metric tracking that you're behind on.
Data is what’s going to determine a lot of your goals and plans for next year, so
you need this stuff at hand.
Set yourself a day or 5, whatever you need, and catch up on any of your bookkeeping that
you’ve let yourself keep putting off for however long.
And don’t forget all your KPIs too, your profit per session, rebooking rate, average
client spend, all that good stuff.
Add up, calculate, and get those numbers in front of you, per month, per quarter, and
for the year.
#3 Analyze those numbers.
Your finances and KPIs for the year need to not only be written down or typed up somewhere
but you need to take some time to really look at them.
Notice any trends, mistakes, successes, obstacles, anything you want to improve going forward.
If your net income isn’t what you want, that’ll determine what you do in your plans
for next year.
Raise your rates to increase revenue, cut expenses, upsell more to increase average
spend, whatever.
You’re not going to be able to make really clear plans unless you have a really clear
understanding of those numbers.
And #4, check in with your current business plan.
Your branding, your pricing, your ideal client, services, all of those components that make
up your business as a whole.
Is everything still how you want it or are there changes you’d like to make moving
forward?
And most importantly, what data is showing you those changes are actually necessary?
Now, prepping and planning for 2022...
#1 Prepare everything for tax season so you can get that out of the way early.
I mean, there’s nothing quite like rushing a packed box of receipts over to your accountant
the day before the tax deadline, but it’s not exactly ideal, right?
So since you took that time to catch up on all your bookkeeping and your financials should
all be sorted, go ahead and prep anything else you need for tax season, so you can just
send it over to your accountant, or plug in the numbers if you do it yourself, and be
done with it as soon as possible once the new year rolls over.
#2 Create a new marketing strategy for the new year.
Check in with what your ideal clients are doing and planning, check what events are
going on next year in your community, mark any holidays or seasonal stuff you want to
do, check out how local businesses have gotten eyes on their marketing in the past, and start
putting together a real strategy for next year.
A general overview to start is great and then break it down by quarter, then month, then
week.
#3 Schedule any upcoming changes.
So remember you did a review of your business plan, seeing if your pricing, your ideal client,
your branding, all that stuff was still good to go.
Well, if you want to make any changes to any of it, put it on your schedule.
No excuses, it’s a deadline that has to be met.
#4 Mark all regular events you'll attend or are interested in attending.
Whether that’s local community events, promotional stuff going on in your area, lunch and learns,
employee appreciation days at this or that local business; whatever it is, go ahead and
mark everything in your calendar so it’s not going to be forgotten going forward as
you get busy in the day to day stuff of business and life.
And lastly, #5 set very clear, very specific goals.
Whether that’s a certain client number each week or month, a certain revenue or income
total, whatever, be extremely clear about your goals for the end of the 2022.
When you’re sitting there next year doing this kind of review, what do you want it to
have turned out like?
What wins do you want to be sure to have?
Now, break that down by quarter, by month, and by week so that you’re constantly staying
on top of those goals and working toward them and November and December of next year don’t
sneak up on you and before you know it another year has passed without making much progress.
And bonus tip…remind yourself it’ll never happen perfectly.
All those plans and the goals are great and really necessary, but we live in this wonderful
world called reality and in reality, life happens and plans can go up in smoke.
So while I’m saying making all the plans and push forward and do everything you can
to reach those goals, also be flexible and give yourself some grace along the way if
things don’t go quite as perfectly as you hope.
And before I go, what might help you a lot with this…our 2022 Business Planner is available
right now.
Keep up with appointments, marketing plans, track all your key performance indicators
like your rebooking rate and profit per session, and all kinds of other stuff.
Customizable and rearrangeable so it can work for almost any massage therapist.
Thank you so much for watching today.
Be sure to check us out over at MyMassageWorld.com, follow us on all your favorite social media
platforms, sign up for our emails, join our Facebook group, and keep an eye out for updates,
business tips, free content, and all kinds of other goodies to help you grow your massage
practice.
See you next time!