Out With The Old, In With The New by Cara Lumen

This is one of those times I get reflective about how I'm doing and where I want to go. How can I make the next quarter better? Or the next year? Or the next five years? Am I headed in the right direction for me? Am I headed for success?

How has my vision changed? Can I see myself playing bigger, reaching more people, touching more lives? Have new paths opened up that I want to follow or explore? Starting right this minute, what do I want to attract, create, and manifest over the next twelve months?

Write it down. Make it concrete. Prioritize. What's at the core of all you do that you want to keep doing? Why do you get up in the morning and do what you do? What is your passion and is it still showing?

We are always learning and changing. What have you learned, discovered, experienced that has brought a new realization or insight that you want to incorporate into your life and business? I added a new coaching credential that expanded my coaching practice. A friend says Blog Talk Radio is easy to do so I may go do that. I've met new people to partner with. Write them down, see how many ways you can use them, prioritize them and take action.

Get real with your dollars and cents. What is earning you money? What is fun but doesn't bring in income? How can you streamline your costs? What help do you need to get? Shed the worst 10% of everything you've got - that includes clients, products and time wasters. That leaves room for you to add 10% more of the great stuff.

Only do things that forward that goal you have chosen for the year. That will help keep you on target and producing results. Do you want to get more clients? How many? What do you need to do to make that happen? Get a coach? Do more networking? Do more referral education? Pick tangible goals with measurable results and track your success. That helps you know what to keep and what to toss at your quarterly 10% house cleaning toss.

This is the easy way to increase income. Reprice - as in raise them. Don't look at what you do according to the time it takes you to do it. Look at the value it produces and price accordingly. When I coach a person in developing web content it's not about the time we spend together or the time I spend strengthening the copy, it's about the value of the results she will get with the content we produce. That changes our thinking, doesn't it?

Repackage - position your offering so people sign for longer periods of time so they only have to make the buying decision once. This can go up or down. I have a big 15 week Book Yourself Solid Coaching program I offer. But I broke it down into smaller sections - Positioning, Expert Status, Marketing, Web Strategy, Writing Strategy, Speaking Strategy - so people can start at a smaller price point. And in the same breath I will say package it so you can work with them for longer periods of time so you have time to produce results. If you can only see yourself offering three sessions to accomplish what you offer, start looking at what other offerings you can make to upsell. You want to keep finding ways to serve those loyal customers who already know and love you.

Reposition your offerings to a new target market - expand or narrow as you need to. I can have a target as entrepreneurs or it can be "resourceful women entrepreneurs with a burning desire to stand tall in their service of others." I can focus on web content development and information product development or I can focus on helping people get booked solid - or all three. I can add new partnerships like joining with another to give a teleclass or host a radio show.

If you continue to move more deeply in service, to continue to find ways to support, nourish, guide, encourage, inspire your target market, you'll be happy and they will keep coming. Don't throw out everything. Don't start over with everything new, but take time to reflect on how you're doing and how you'd like it to be different. Then simply take the steps to make it happen.

Cara Lumen, MA, Your Idea Optimizer helps you turn your ideas into steady profit. As a business developer, content developer and educator, Cara helps you make money from what you already know. You can learn more about how to put your wisdom to work through her radio show www.blogtalkradio.com/passioantelyonpurpose and her Passionately On Purpose emagazine at www.caralumen.com