Latest / The Matriarchy Would Never | A Promote Yourself to CEO Podcast Series / It's Time For Our 9th Annual Plan Your Best Year Ever!

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It's Time For Our 9th Annual Plan Your Best Year Ever! · The Matriarchy Would Never | A Promote Yourself to CEO Podcast Series

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: We're in the home stretch of 2024, which means not only are the holidays just around the corner, but for us entrepreneurs, we are already dreaming those big dreams for the new year.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: But as you make those plans and scribble down the goals you have for the year ahead over your morning coffee or your holiday cocktail, it's important that you don't just look ahead.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: It's important that you take some time to reflect on your progress this last year in your business.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: I know.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: I know that the idea of reviewing this year seems tedious.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it was just a challenging year for you, as it was for many small business owners.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: We just want to skip over the hard part and get into the dreams and the big plans.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: But one of the biggest reasons many entrepreneurs don't reach their goals is that they're coming up against the same obstacles and the same mistakes year after year after year, which means they're actually working harder to break through to that next level in their business.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'm so excited because starting today, we are going to dive into the very special annual five-part series that we always host, Plan Your Best Year Ever.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: And we're going to walk you through the same strategic planning process that not only do I use personally, but that over the last decade, I've shared with tens of thousands of small business owners to help them create a solid monthly action plan for the year ahead.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: By the end of these five short episodes, you will walk away with a 12-month action plan that breaks down exactly what you are marketing, what you are selling in your business each and every month, helping you to become more predictably profitable and ultimately more sustainable so that your business can support you for years to come.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you are so excited.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: And as a podcast listener, I encourage you to head over to the URL the CEO Collective.com slash BYE for best year ever, the CEO Collective.com slash BYE, so that you can sign up and get access to the workbooks that go along with this series.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: These workbooks, I promise, are a game changer.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I have had clients come back to me year after year that have been using this process and they keep these in front of them at all times because it brings so much clarity and focus to your business.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: So go download those workbooks and let's get into today's episode.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: Are you ready to grow from solopreneur to CEO?
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: You're in the right place.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: I'm your host, Rachel Cook, founder of the CEO Collective, and I've spent the last 15 years helping women entrepreneurs to sustainably scale life-first businesses.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: If you're serious about building a life-first business that actually allows you to prioritize sustainable business growth while at the same time having the freedom and flexibility to fully love every aspect of your life, to have the time and energy to put back into your family, your health, the people who matter most to you.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Then it's time to put the strategy systems and support in place to make it happen.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: Join me each week for candid conversations about stepping into your role as CEO, the hard lessons learned along the way, and practical, profitable strategies to grow a more sustainable business without the hustle and burnout.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: Hey there, CEOs.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: I am so excited to officially kick off the Plan Your Best Year Ever challenge.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: We have been hosting this challenge now for almost 10 years, which blows my mind.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: This has been one of those things that I put together, never really anticipating how successful it was going to be and how much my community would come back to it year after year after year.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: So I am really excited to be sharing this with you here on the Promote Yourself to CEO podcast.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I share it here on the podcast in addition to having the full video challenge available because I want to make this process as accessible to you as possible.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I know for a lot of people, the way that you best learn, the way that you best consume information and content is listening in on the podcast, which is perfect.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: So as we get into this five-day plan your best your ever challenge, I want you as a podcast listener to make sure that you have taken a moment to head over to the CEO Collective.com slash BYE to sign up for the full challenge and to get access to the workbooks.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: The videos will be available as well if you want to see the slide decks.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: But the most important part for this challenge, the way that you will get the most out of it, isn't just listening to these episodes.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: Because if all you do is listen, then you're not taking the time to do the strategic thinking and strategic planning that your business really needs you to do in order to achieve what you're trying to achieve in the next year.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: So before we dive in, I just want to encourage you whether you do it right this second, you go ahead and sign up and get access to the workbooks, or you make yourself a note to come back and download the workbooks.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: I promise you will walk away from this week with so much clarity and insight into what is going to make all the difference for your business.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_00: Okay?
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: So today we are getting into the very first part of the Plan Your Best Year Ever challenge.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: And this is where we are going to take a moment, we're going to take a little time and do a year in review so that we can really understand the big wins and the big lessons from this past year.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: And listen, I know this past year has not been easy for all small businesses.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: It was kind of a stressful year between inflation, economic uncertainty, there's a lot going on in the world.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's been a massive election year here in the United States.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: All of those things have contributed to small businesses feeling a lot of disruption.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: But there's still a lot we need to understand before we can look ahead to 2025.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: Hey there.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Plan Your Best Year Ever Challenge.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Rachel Cook, founder of the CEO Collective and host of the Promote Yourself to CEO podcast.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_00: I designed this five-day challenge almost a decade ago now to help entrepreneurs and small business owners who want to see real sustainable growth in their business in 2025 to take a few days, just five, to sit down and work on their business, creating a strategic action plan for the year ahead.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: Now, why is planning so important?
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: In my experience, the last 15 plus years of running my own small business and being behind the scenes for thousands of small business owners as a business score strategist, I have seen over and over and over again that my clients who do the best, who consistently hit their goals, who are reaching next level profitability in their business and they're continuing to see growth in their business year over year, are the ones that have and stick to a plan.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: The ones who are struggling, though, those are the ones who are constantly flying by the seat of their pants.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: They are chasing shiny object after shiny object.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: And simply put, they're not staying focused on the things that will actually move their business forward.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_00: This inconsistency really stalls out their overall business growth.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_00: And honestly, is one of the biggest reasons why so many entrepreneurs aren't able to stay in business long term.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: So over the next five days together in this free challenge, I'm going to be walking you through a strategic planning process that I personally use, but that I also take all of my clients through to ensure that the plan you're creating for the year ahead is 100% in alignment with the life and the business that you want to be creating for yourself.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: Now we're kicking off this entire strategic planning process with a year-in review.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: You might be thinking, okay, why are we starting by looking backwards instead of diving right into all the fun new goals that I want to set for the year ahead?
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: The reality is there is a lot that 2024 has to teach you.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: 2024 can tell you what's working and what's not working in your business.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm here to tell you that while this was a challenging year for many small business owners, between inflation and economic uncertainty and being a major election year here in the United States, there is a lot that has been changing in the world of small business on top of that.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: There are a lot of things that maybe worked pretty well a few years ago that simply are not as effective.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_00: So we have to be tapped in and paying attention because if you do what you did, you'll get what you got.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: And if you want next year to be better, we have to be really, really clear on what is the best course of action for us to focus on in the new year.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: Think of it this way: professional athletes know the value in reviewing their tapes.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: Many professional athletes are recording themselves constantly.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_00: They record themselves during practice, during games, during competitions, and then they spend just as much time on the field practicing, getting better, as they do in their viewing room, where they're watching reel after reel after reel a film, tearing it apart and pinpointing what are they doing really well, what techniques do they need to improve, what's holding them back, what bad habits have crept in.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_00: They can see more clearly where they're making mistakes or where there's a challenge showing up.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes they'll see that they need to make some adjustments, they need to make some shifts in order to achieve the results they're looking for.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_00: So this is the exact same idea.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: You are a high-performing entrepreneur, and we need to review your tapes from 2024.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_00: So make sure you've downloaded the workbook that goes along with this challenge.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: You can find all of the workbooks when you fully register for the challenge at theceocollective.com/slash BYE for best year ever.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: Go ahead and download today's workbook.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: And when you open it up, you will see that we are going to start by reviewing month by month what went on in your business in 2024.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: Now there's a reason we're going to go month by month in this year in review.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_00: Often we can remember the peaks, right?
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: The highest of the highs and the valleys, the lowest of the lows.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: But we tend to not remember anything in between.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: We probably can remember things that happen at the very beginning of the year, but we don't remember the things that kind of happen in the middle.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_00: So we want to make sure that we are taking a little bit of time to get clear again on what was going on in your business every single month.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: So go ahead and open up your workbook.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: And then I want you to answer these questions in your business.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_00: How much revenue, total revenue, did you earn this month?
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_00: Now, total revenue is top line revenue.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: That is all the monies coming into your business, every single sale that you made before expenses.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna look at total revenue.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_00: How much did you earn every single month?
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: How much hit your account every single month?
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: Once we understand what revenue hit your account every single month, then we want to analyze that a little bit.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_00: We want to dig in and ask what drove revenue?
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: Meaning what offers were bringing in that revenue?
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_00: What were people buying?
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_00: This will help you figure out what offers are selling the best or what clients are coming, you know, to buy from you.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_00: Understanding what is driving the revenue is really, really powerful and will help you see what is working and isn't working in your business more.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_00: And then finally, we want to look at what was your focus for that particular month?
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: Your focus being, what were you actively promoting that month?
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: What were you spending your time selling to people and inviting them to purchase from you?
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_00: So, how can you answer these questions?
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_00: I find that there's a few places I can go.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_00: First, I can look back at my calendar.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_00: I can look back at my calendar and see where I was putting my time, energy, and attention.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_00: I can see if I had a particular promotion going on during a certain time of the year, during specific months.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_00: So my calendar is a great place to look.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_00: Another place that I will look is my bookkeeping software.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: And that will help me at a snapshot, because it's up to date, look at how much revenue came in and also help me break down that revenue by different product type.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_00: So I'll be able to see out of X amount of revenue what percentage of it was this versus what percentage of it was that.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_00: So you should hopefully be able to find that in your bookkeeping software or however you are tracking all of the transactions going on in your business.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_00: And finally, you might also want to open up your email marketing software.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I find this to be really helpful because email drives a lot of our marketing efforts.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: So if I'm trying to figure out what I was focused on and what I was actively promoting during a specific month, I can literally scroll through and check the subject lines and see, oh yeah, this is what we were actively promoting that month.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: So this is one reason I developed the CEO planner.
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, if you've never checked out my 90-day CEO planner, it is a 90-day planner that helps me at a glance when I'm doing this year in review, I can actually just look through this year's planners because there's a planner for each quarter.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_00: So I can very easily see where my time and attention was going.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: I can see what I was focused on, I can see what I'm actively selling, and I track my revenue in there as well because every week in my CEO date, I want to see how I'm doing revenue-wise.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_00: So go through month by month, reviewing month by month, answering those questions, and pretty soon you'll have mapped out in front of you everything that happened in your business over the last year.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: Once you have gone through your month-by-month review, then you can actually sit back and analyze what is working in your business.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_00: And this is really powerful information.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: As you go through this process, the first part of this workbook, you're going to see patterns.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I want you to be thinking about what offers were the most successful, were the most profitable, what sold the best, what marketing strategies produced the best results?
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: What felt easy or fun for you?
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: This will let you know what is really working and what you want to continue doing in your business.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: You'll also start seeing what didn't work, right?
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: So what flopped?
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: What offers didn't sell?
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: What products, programs, and services didn't sell as much as you had hoped or at all.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: What marketing didn't work?
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_00: Was there anything you tried that you didn't get results from?
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: And what plans just didn't happen?
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_00: This is really helpful information because things that aren't working are things you might want to consider letting go of and pulling out from your plan in the next year.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: I finally want you to ask, what got in your way?
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: You might realize that there are things that happened in life, because life happens to all of us, that got in the way of your plans.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: So were there any big life things that were going on?
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: Were there any times where you were unexpectedly sick or you unexpectedly had to go take care of a family member?
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_00: Was there anything that kind of took you by surprise and slowed you down or stopped your progress?
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: Any major changes in your life or business could really impact these results of the plans that you were working on from this past year.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_00: And it's really helpful, I find, to pay attention to this, especially because some of these things are predictable.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_00: We can know with a pretty high degree of certainty that if you like me are a working mom, you might have times where your kids are sick or you need to be, you know, more hands-on with the family.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: If you're a caregiver for an elderly adult, you might have additional responsibilities that maybe you didn't account for previously.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: So we want to make sure we're paying attention to any of the external circumstances that are potentially getting in our way.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: They could also be internal circumstances.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you had a challenge, maybe you went through something, maybe you had a period where you were sick or you just needed to unplug, and that derailed your plans.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: But asking yourself some of these questions will help you to have more clarity about what to expect next year.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_00: Ultimately, we want to be paying attention to where do we need to double down on what works.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: When you look at this past year, what got the best results for you?
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: We want to double down on that.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: We don't need to overcomplicate and add more and more and more.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: Instead, we just need to take what's working and continue to implement that strategy.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: We want to do more of that or learn how to optimize that to get even better results.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_00: And on the same side, we want to stop doing what doesn't work.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: If you are not seeing results from something, if you tried something and it didn't get the results you were hoping for, and you put in a decent amount of effort, you were consistently trying to test out a strategy or see if an offer would fly and it didn't work, then just stop doing it.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_00: Don't give yourself work that's unnecessary, that's not actually moving the needle in your business.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_00: So make sure that as you go through your 2024 year in review, you are downloading this workbook at theceocollective.com slash BYE and go ahead and do your year in review.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: This process sounds simple.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_00: I promise it sounds so deceivingly simple.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_00: And it is simple, but it has major insights and clarity that it can give you.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_00: All right, I'll see you in the next challenge.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_00: So there you have it, friends.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you love this challenge to help you plan out the year ahead.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: There is so much more goodness headed your way, but to make the most out of this free plan your best year ever challenge, I encourage you to head over to theceocollective.com slash B Y E so that you can download all of the workbooks.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_00: The workbooks are the most important part, right?
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_00: I know it's easy to listen to a podcast and think I should go back and download things and actually do this, actually put it into action.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_00: I can promise you, after so many years of running this challenge, that we have people returning year after year who are reviewing their past year's workbooks and seeing the momentum that happens when you have a documented, checkoffable, follow-throughable plan that actually makes sense for your life and business.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_00: So make sure you have signed up for the full challenge, the CEO Collective.com slash BYE.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: And as you are completing the challenge and you're going through the workbooks, take a moment and connect with me on social media.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_00: Instagram is the best place.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_00: Take a quick picture, DM me, tag me at rachel.cook.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: I want to hear your insights and aha's.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_00: All right, I cannot wait to keep on going here and help you plan your best year ever.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: So stay tuned for the next part of the challenge.