Seven steps to spring clean your business

The season for cleaning out garages and spare bedrooms has arrived. But spring cleaning isn’t necessarily just for your home, your business can benefit from a good decluttering too. Award winning business coach, Deborah Coskey of ActionCOACH Ignite shares seven tips to help business owners effectively spring clean their businesses.

1. Review your marketing plan

Make time to review and revisit your marketing plan and evaluate which lead generation strategies have and haven’t worked. It may be necessary to rework or adjust certain strategies or choose a few new ones.

2. Review your annual goals

How are you tracking against your annual business and personal goals? Do you need to ramp up certain activities as we enter the last quarter of 2018? Now is also a good time to start thinking about your goals and plans for 2019 and jotting down your ideas.

3. Update your website and social media

Go through your company’s online presence and ensure that the copy, tone and images accurately reflect your brand. If not, now is a good time to address these small details that make a big impact.

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4. Review your finances

In order to increase financial control and account for fluctuations in the economy, conduct a thorough review of your finances – both business and personal. Ensure that your spending is under control and that you cut out any unnecessary fat.

5. Monitor your time

Step back and measure where you spend your time. Split your time up into two categories, ‘in-the-business’ activity and ‘on-the-business’ activity. This exercise will quickly reveal any areas that may be slowing your company down. It is important to remember that anything ‘in’ the business can be delegated or outsourced.

6. Reconnect with your clients

Take some time to review everyone you’ve worked with over the past year and send an email to anyone you haven’t heard from. Before contacting them, take a look at each client’s website to learn what they’ve been up to – enabling you to provide suitable suggestions on how your company could assist them. By simply reconnecting often results in new business.

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7. Take a break

Taking a break is crucial to your health and that of your business. This may be as simple as getting out of the office, going away for the holidays or spending quality time with your family. The key is to be outside of the ‘work’ context both mentally and physically. You will find that when you return to the office you’ll be able to approach your business with a fresher perspective.

“Remember to work harder on yourself than you do on your business,” concludes Deborah.