Reflection on First Twelve Months in Business

In this post, I want to reflect on the first twelve months of my business. It's been a big year, and I'm excited by all I have achieved. It's hard to believe it is already the end of 2022! The year has flown.

My highlights for this year include the following:

• I launched my website!
• I ran a course for eight weeks for a group of ten amazing mamas to help them get started in online business
• I set up and started one-on-one coaching
• I started building content and my community, including a weekly newsletter, regular blog posts and starting on socials.

The goals I wrote down for the last quarter of 2022 included the following:

• I want to carve out dedicated time each week that I can work on my business (at least six hours/week)
• Keep building my community – on socials, talking to others, sharing my business card
• Keep adding to my website and post at least weekly on my blog
• Continue documenting my journey: blog posts, newsletter, and social media.
• Mindset goals include: minimise drama, being proud and excited to promote my business, stepping into my future business owner self, managing my time well, and having a go and making the most of all opportunities
• Have an offer for sale by the end of the quarter
• Make one sale before the end of the year

I am so pleased with all the progress I made, and I learnt a lot about myself and about getting started in an online coaching business, including:

• My energy levels ebbed and flowed across the months, particularly after my course finished. I need to factor into my planning that I can't expect my energy levels always to be the same – including each day I allocate time to work on my business and other weeks and months of the year. For example, November and December are hectic months in the current season our family is in, and in the future, I will need to reduce my expectations of the amount of time I can work on my business. I must plan for this and schedule as much content and offer/sales periods as possible.
• I need to work on a social media posting strategy and a posting calendar because I am very restricted with how much time I can engage with social media each week around our family life.
• I love working in my business. It is never a chore, and I love working with Mums, creating content and developing new ideas.
• I can generally work well in the time allocated to my business and minimise distractions and time wasting.
• Putting myself out there is hard, and I will need to keep working on this as my business develops.
• Given I have a limited amount of time I can dedicate to my business, I need to make sure that the tasks I work on are important and move the needle forward of my business.
• I need to keep managing the feeling overwhelmed from having so much to do and so little time. I need to be patient and keep celebrating my achievements rather than focusing so much on what is still left to do. I will also focus on putting tasks on a calendar from now on rather than working so much from to-do lists.
• I also need to be careful not to overcommit and over-stretch myself. I must keep honouring the season I am in and do what I can with the available time.

My goals for 2023, which I am so excited to get into, include the following:

• Carve out ten dedicated hours per week on my business now that my son has started school and my daughter has started preschool.
• Launch my first course for sale – Online Business for Mamas
• Continue to build my community by sharing content and making offers: podcast (which I plan to launch!), live Instagram videos, Pinterest, Instagram and Facebook
• Make lots and lots of offers through webinars and lead magnets
• Keep building my profile
• Be consistent with my content delivery
• Go live for the first time!!!
• Make the most of any new opportunities that pop up
• Keep developing my coaching skills by working with Mums
• Mindset goals include: being more patient and celebrating what I am achieving; watching comparisons and focusing more on creating social media content than consuming it; doing what I can, when I can; staying motivated and having a go; and keep taking the next steps.

I hope you are enjoying some downtime between Xmas and New Year and looking forward to what the New Year will bring for you. I love spending some uninterrupted time writing down goals and reflecting on them, and I am sure you will get a lot from doing this too. It is such a helpful process. Goalsetting and reflection help steer you in the right direction, gives you something to work towards and celebrate and allow you to learn from setbacks and challenges to grow. So be sure to set some time aside at the beginning of 2023 and get planning!