Let’s set SMART Goals for a Quarter and Beyond

We just figured how important content and focus is and that’s why today I’m here to create a plan and set goals for the last quarter of 2017. I don’t think I’ll write 1500 word blogposts every day but I really want to give you a lot of content this month to get on track – not just here but also on my other websites.

SMART Goals

We learned that goals need to be SMART which means smart, measurable, actionable, reasonable and time-bound. I think I’ll set goals for the last quarter of 2017 but basically they will also be valid for the year or even years to come. I’ll start with the minimum I need to do to keep things running. It might be that I still put too much on my plate because I will have to do whatever I write down four times – one time for each website. It might be challenging but I think if I plan ahead and work in batches it actually is doable. What about you? How are you going to manage your different passions or tasks you need to do? I know although I’m struggling I’m in a much better position than most of you. I can do that full-time while many of you might still have a day job and do their business on the side. I get it, huge struggle and challenge as well. Still, I believe wether there are four websites which need your attention or a full-time job in both cases you need to use your time wisely. Writing things down here also makes me feel like I have committed to do them.

So what I learned about goals so far:

• Make your goals actionable because then they are measurable
• Write them down and tell anyone about them (in my case I tell all my readers OMG!)
• Get everything sorted in your head
• Focus, focus and more focus!
• Plan ahead

My Goals

I decided to break my goals down in weekly, monthly and three-monthly goals. So here on top the overall goals which are measurable this way:

3Monthly Goals

• increasing sales by 50% on Digidesignresort
• increasing organic sales (not from Groupon) to 2 per month on CMDacademy
• increasing sticker sales on Etsy by 2 orders per week
• making more affiliate sales on LFM and DDR
• setting up drip content on DDR Classes
• setting up LFM Classes
• rework the classes on CMDacademy over and add more PDF and material

Monthly Goals

• Clean up Pinterest Profile for all 4 Websites, one for each, create boards and start pinning daily
• Set up new Freebie on Digidesignresort
• Set up new Freebie on LivingForMondays

Weekly Goals

• making editorial calendars and setting up my planner for all these goals

Digidesignresort:

• Post daily on Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram (daily)
• VLog about what happens in my Life, it’s about scrapbooking = preserving memories (daily)
• 2 Newsletters (weekly)
• Blogpost about the new Collaboration Kit (monthly)
• Affiliate Post, e.g. Best Printers etc. (monthly)
• Post related to Sunset Scrapper Club
• Post related to Safari Lounge
• Tutorial for Safari Lounge >>> in Safari Lounge
• Tutorial für Sunset Scrapper Club >>> in Sunset Scrapper Club

LivingForMondays

• Blogpost (daily)
• Video (weekly)
• Post daily on Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram (daily)

SimpleLifeStories

• Blogpost (weekly) >> Plan with me Video
• Post daily on Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram (daily)
• Creating new sticker (two monthly)

CMDacademy

• Blogpost (daily)
• Post daily on Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram (daily)
• Video (weekly)

I know this list isn’t done by any means. Beside that I set up my goals a bit strange. Actually you’d set a 3 month goal and break that one down. I went from the bottom to the top which is wrong. But for me it was also important to write down the daily stuff so I can start immediately – today actually. While I was writing my goals I got site tracked. I quickly created a VLog for DDR, I posted the VLog on Facebook and Instagram. I also uploaded to YouTube and at some point I felt overwhelmed. So guess I need to work over that. But for now, that’s a plan. Also thought it would be nice if we all had a PDF to download to put in our goals, wouldn’t it? I’ll put it on my list. Pretty long one! Need to get sorted though – I’m really not done with planning and setting goals. Oh well… Figured though that, if I wait for everything to be perfect, I’ll never be done. So if I first revise the website here (which I should do asap!) it will take me a week or longer and I don’t get any content up. And before I’m done I might have forgotten about all my goals and I’m pretty behind as well. So let’s get started first and then revise.

Action for today: Go ahead and create something. No matter if it is a blogpost, a vlog, something creative – whatever piece of content you like to create, today is the day!

By the way, I decided to use my Happy Planner for all that. Some may think it’s not “Business like” but, oh well, I like the colours and all the icons 😀 So choose something you really like then you don’t mind using it. You can, of course, use whatever you want but if you are interested what Planner I use, you can have a look here*.  The picture of the Planner above is also the Happy Planner but actually a private one where I played a bit around. My business planner is in the office and already looks a bit fuller by now. That was more to try out if this system could work for me. Also I played around with the stickers we are creating. As you can see it doesn’t fit by now. Anyway, it’s fun to decorate things a bit, just for the fun and the little girl in me ;-).
*Product links are mostly Affiliate links. While I get a small commission if you buy something there is no disadvantage to you, it’s the same price.

Filed in: Blog • Blogging Tips