business planning for the new year

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Strategic Planning

10 Strategies for Business New Year Planning

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If you want to make the next 12 months more successful, more profitable, and more productive than the last 12 months, these 10 strategies are for you.

1. List the 3 most important objectives for your business over the next year. These should be critical “big picture” accomplishments that will lead to profits and future achievement.

2. For each objective listed above , identify your responsibility in achieving the objective. WHAT will you do? HOW will you do it? WHEN will you do it?

3. Be crystal clear in separating strategies (how and why items) from tactics (what and when items) and use “Verb-noun-date” format to create specific action steps and put them on your calendar.

4. Don’t think of the year as a whole . Break it down to monthly metrics and put quarterly goal-planning reviews on your calendar so you can adjust the dials on your plan, measure results, and take a strategic look at your marketing, sales, and business development activities every 90 days while keeping a close eye on results (profits, clients, projects, revenue) every 30 days.

5. Don’t go it alone . Remember, lone wolves starve to death. Think of partners, advocates, allies, referral sources, and joint venture partners who can help you leapfrog over obstacles and who are a great supplement and complement to your own products and services. Contact them and build (or grow) your relationship with them so you can collaborate more closely – starting right now.

6. Write down a list of professional development goals for the next 12 months. What do you want to learn, do, or become as a business owner? Go to conferences? Gain additional certifications or professional designations? Speak more? Get more articles published? Be specific and put these activities on your calendar so you make sure they happen.

7. Write down a list of personal goals for the next 12 months. What do you want to accomplish for yourself and how would you like to grow personally? Spend more time with your partner? Stay connected with your kids as they grow up and/or pursue their college or post-college adventures? Dig deeper into a special hobby or sport? Drop 10 pounds? Run a 5K? More golf? More vacation time? Where? When? With whom? Map it out to make it happen!

8. Don’t get distracted . Shiny object syndrome has a powerful pull on most entrepreneurs and business owners. Stay focused on the big picture goals you set in Step 1 above – and then relentlessly ask yourself for every new idea, initiative or project, “Does this support one of my three goals? If so, how?” And don’t let yourself off the hook as easily as you might have done in the past. If it’s a no, it’s a no. Metaphorically speaking, stop opening up hot dog stands in the parking lot and redouble your efforts to make your gourmet restaurant thrive!

9. Live out of your calendar, not your inbox . Plan your day – what MUST get done and WHEN? Chunk your day down into blocks and assign specific tasks to those blocks – Phone calls, emails, client tasks, whatever it is YOU want to do that will move you closer to your GOALS. Keep that calendar under your nose. All day. Make it your default screen. Hide, minimize or (gasp) close your email until “check email” pops up on your calendar.

10. Breathe. Relax. You got this . Any time you’re creating an inflection point in your business, it can be scary. You’re letting go of the old – letting go of what no longer works or what no longer serves you well. And you’re embracing the new – the untried, the uncomfortable, perhaps even what seems risky. But the biggest risks of all are stagnation, arrogance, or complacency. Remember – a bend in the road is never fatal… unless you fail to turn.

Category: Strategic Planning

David Newman

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• Small Business

New Year’s Planning for Business Owners

Make a resolution to review these six areas of your operation

At the beginning of every new year, it’s a good idea for business owners to take time to sit down and do a little planning, to make sure they can keep their company afloat and on the right course going forward.

Doing so can help ensure that your business has the necessary tools to meet its financial and operational goals and that your valued employees will be content with their working environment and unlikely to jump ship.

Read on for some tips on a smooth planning process for your digital presence, vendors, equipment, employees, insurance, and retirement plans.

Key Takeaways

• If you own a business, do some financial housekeeping at the beginning of each year to prevent unexpected money needs where possible.
• To avoid unpleasant surprises, make sure that your insurance policies and employee benefits program are on track and not set to lapse.
• Evaluate your staffing, vendor, and marketing efforts to keep up with your competitors.
• Consider the broader economy and determine whether factors such as labor market conditions or the pace of inflation require any changes on your part.

1. Consider Your Digital Footprint

Set up a business website.

If you want to compete, especially with the big names, you need a presence online and in social media . Begin by planning a website for your business, if you don’t already have one. How complex it has to be and how much traffic you need to generate will determine whether you can set it up yourself or should hire a professional to do it for you.

Here’s a basic checklist for this task:

• Select and purchase a recognizable domain name that customers can connect easily with your business.
• Determine whether you should share a host with other small websites, employ a managed hosting service for larger businesses, or set up your own dedicated server.
• For your budget , remember to build in costs for website maintenance and marketing.
• Develop a marketing plan to ensure that once you have your website up and running, it will draw visitors.

Develop a Social Media Presence

A social media presence for your business is essential these days. If you aren’t already, become familiar with platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, X (formerly Twitter), Snapchat, LinkedIn, Pinterest, YouTube, and TikTok.

Try to define the audiences who they serve and select those that match your customer profile. For example, certain age groups may focus on Facebook, while others may prefer TikTok. Most platforms will offer advertising kits, demographic data, and more to those interested in using their sites for sales and marketing purposes.

If you’re unsure of how or where to start building your social media presence, there are services that can assist you. You can also hire individuals or firms to help you maintain that presence if that’s not your strong suit or you simply don’t have the time to devote to the effort.

If you decide to be hands-on, create a social media team within your company to plot your online strategy for reaching potential patrons. This team should define your audience, its interests, and how to reach it with existing or newly created content. Blogging, vlogging (video blogging), and podcasts are just some of the ways to market your business and reach prospects and customers.

2. Review Your Vendors and Suppliers

Every business owner should periodically review their vendors and suppliers to make certain that they are receiving the competitive prices and quality service that they need. The beginning of the year may be the best time for such a review.

In many cases, vendors will be working on their own budgets for the year, looking to pin down business, and open to cutting deals to ensure that they achieve their quarterly and annual financial objectives.

With that in mind, business owners should ask themselves the following questions:

• Do current vendors charge reasonable rates?
• Do they provide excellent service and adapt to the changing needs of my business?
• Should I establish relationships with any new vendors or suppliers?
• Does it make sense to try out a new vendor with a small order?
• Would trying out a new vendor provide my business with leverage over an existing vendor?

Business owners with an eye on their bottom line want to know whether they’re getting the best possible products and services at the lowest possible prices. The first few months of the year are an opportune time to take stock of this.

3. Evaluate Your Equipment

Manufacturing companies and many service-related businesses depend on machinery, supplies, and a variety of other equipment to operate. However, many business owners are so focused on day-to-day activities that they forget to make sure they have what they need to operate smoothly and grow their enterprise.

Early in the first quarter is a good time to evaluate equipment needs and to determine whether any new capital investments are in order. This type of planning can ensure that your company is always properly equipped to capitalize on business opportunities. It can also help you allocate needed cash or arrange for borrowing.

Here are some questions to consider for equipment needs:

• Does your business have the equipment necessary to succeed and profit over the long haul?
• If not, can existing equipment last another year, and can your business sustain itself using it?
• What will new equipment cost, and where can you obtain quotes for it?
• Does your company have the cash on hand or the ability to finance such purchases, or will the money need to come from future operational cash flow ?
• Are there any expenses that could be cut to offset and help justify such expenditures?

4. Consider Your Employees

Your planning should also consider your staffing needs. It’s advantageous to uncover any deficiencies early on in the year, so that you can make the appropriate adjustments.

Also, bear in mind that finding, hiring, and training the right person can take a lot of time. So it helps to get started as soon as possible. That can be especially true when a low unemployment rate and hot job market mean that potential employees may receive multiple job offers.

Finally, it’s important to realize that many employees ponder their own futures at the end of the year. They may start thinking about whether they intend to stay with your company or move on. If they choose the latter, you’ll want to be ready to deal with the consequences.

5. Check Your Insurance Coverage

Though the old adage says that the best defense is a good offense, sometimes the best offense is a good defense. Simply put,  insurance coverage is a business necessity.

At the beginning of the year, new rates for health insurance , business liability insurance , automobile insurance , umbrella policies , and other types of insurance tend to go into effect, so it’s an opportune time to go quote shopping.

Be sure to consider the following questions about your insurance:

• Is your company adequately covered by liability insurance, and does it have adequate fire and health insurance?
• Are insurance companies running multiple policy bundling deals at the beginning of the year to win your business?
• Are there any new insurance carriers that might be able to provide competitive quotes?
• Has your company taken on any new assets or business interests that haven’t been accounted for and protected by existing policies?

6. Review Your Retirement Plans

Businesses that want to set up a 401(k) , simplified employee pension (SEP) , or other retirement plan should do so as early as possible during the year. Setting up a plan early can permit employees to take full advantage of their annual allowed pretax contributions and the tax advantage offered by qualified retirement plans. The longer their money can grow on a tax-deferred basis, the larger the nest egg they can potentially accumulate.

Reviewing the various plans, selecting an investment firm, and actually setting up a plan don’t happen overnight. Getting an early jump on these efforts makes sense.

Here are some questions that can assist your planning:

• What will it cost to administer the plan?
• How many employees might benefit from the plan and want to take advantage of it?
• How much, if anything, will your company need to contribute to the plan?
• Are there any advantages to setting up one type of plan over another based on costs, your company’s size, and your employees’ retirement needs?
• Which type of plan or combination of plans will best meet your own retirement needs?

Why Is Planning at the Start of a New Year a Good Idea?

Fiscal years often begin with the new year, so reevaluating and making any necessary changes at that point gives you the maximum benefit across the next 12 months. It also gives participants in retirement plans the opportunity to maximize their savings.

Which Areas of My Business Should I Look at?

Six important areas to consider are your online and social media presence, vendors, equipment, staffing needs, insurance, and retirement plans.

How Will Rising Inflation Affect My Business Outlook?

No one knows for sure whether inflation will rise or fall. But you’ll want to factor it into your financial planning. Among other things, inflation could affect your borrowing costs, the prices you pay for supplies, and the salary expectations of your employees. You’ll also need to weigh whether to raise your own prices and by how much, as well as the potential impact that might have on the demand for your products or services.

Business owners should continually evaluate their businesses and make adjustments accordingly. However, from a number of angles—such as insurance, retirement plans, staffing, vendors, and equipment needs—the beginning of a new year is a particularly opportune time to examine aspects of your business and plan decisively.

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Planning for the New Year: How to Set and Hit Your Goals

December 07, 2023

The end of the year is fast approaching, and it’s an excellent time to reflect on how far you’ve come, fine-tune your goals, and start planning for the new year. Take the opportunity to reflect on what you’ve learned — from your successes to things that didn’t quite work out as planned — and apply these newfound learnings to your business. Key takeaways from the past year will provide you with direction for new goal setting and implementation.

Planning for the new year will give you a renewed sense of purpose in your business. It will serve as a reminder of why you started your business and give you the motivation to hit the ground running in the new year.

To get started with planning your goals for the upcoming year, it’s important to first reflect on the past 12 months. Start by reviewing your business plan for the year and consider what worked for you and what didn’t. Ask yourself why you were able to reach some of your goals and not others. You can gain clarity by asking yourself questions such as:

• Where did I see success?
• What didn’t go to plan?
• Did I achieve the goals I set for your business last year? Why or why not?

Take note of what information you can gather from different tools that can also assist in your review:

• Website analytics
• Social media insights
• Practice Better Reports & Analytics
• Client feedback

Determine Your New Goals & Objectives

Once you’ve reviewed the past year, you’ll be ready to determine what you’d like to focus on achieving in the upcoming year.

Take note of both the quantitative and qualitative aspects of your business when considering your goals. Use your dreams as inspiration, but ensure the goals you set for yourself are attainable and actionable.

1. Quantitative Outcomes

Quantitative outcomes are objective, measurable, and numerical in nature. They aren’t influenced by your personal feelings or opinions. Consider reviewing the following quantitative information when planning for the new year:

• Your income (monthly, quarterly, and annually)
• Month-over-month growth
• The number of services, packages, and programs booked and purchased
• The performance of new services and programs launched
• The number of cancellations or no-shows
• Growth on your social media platforms
• Conversion ratios of prospective clients
• Repeat business and referrals

2. Qualitative Outcomes

Qualitative outcomes are more subjective and refer to the quality of something. These aspects of your business can typically be observed but not directly measured. As a business owner, these are important considerations when thinking about the culture of your business and the type of work environment you foster when planning for the new year:

• Did your schedule feel manageable?
• How were your stress levels throughout the year?
• Did you feel in flow and aligned?
• Did your business feel authentic to you?

What a successful business looks like will vary depending on the practitioner, so whether you want to focus your goals on the qualitative aspects of your business, the quantitative, or a combination of both, there is no right or wrong focus when it comes to goal planning.

Map Out Your Goals

Implementing a strategic plan can turn your desires and dreams into real goals that are ready to be put into action. Once you’ve determined what you’d like to achieve, it’s important to further break down your goals into smaller action steps.

A strategic approach to consider is the SMART goals for creating well-defined objectives : Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-Bound. This is a formula for ensuring your goals are actionable and can be followed through on.

• Specific : Use as much fine detail and precise wording as possible when crafting your goals. Vague goals do not set the stage for easy strategizing and implementation. Specificity will help your goal be more effective.
• Measurable : Adding a quantifying aspect to your goal makes it much easier to track progress and success. To make a goal as impactful as possible, incorporate numbers that can help act as progress benchmarks.
• Attainable : Goals should inspire you and push you out of your comfort zone. While they should challenge you, they should also be realistic and within reach.
• Relevant : This is your opportunity to evaluate whether or not your goal is truly important to you and your business. Ask yourself, if you follow through with your goal, what impact will this have on your business? Is the goal aligned with your overall vision?
• Time-Bound : Objectives tied to a deadline will reduce the opportunity to procrastinate and keep you moving forward in a timely fashion. Time-bound goals should include a plan of when you’d like to have the entire goal accomplished and deadlines for your broken down, smaller tasks. You can consider what can be accomplished weekly, monthly, or quarterly to contribute to your annual goals.

Breaking down your broader goals into smaller actionable tasks will ensure efficiency and accountability and can help you turn your dreams into reality as you start planning for the new year. Consistent small steps add up to big wins! Smaller tasks will also make it easier to roadmap and create a timeline.

Starting with small, easier-to-implement tasks will also provide quick wins that can boost your sense of progress and help build momentum. This momentum will build so you have the confidence and motivation to take on bigger tasks along the way.

Work backward to break down your goals. Start at the end and think of all the steps it will take along the way to get you to your end goal. When working backward to map out your tasks, identify roadblocks you’ve experienced in the past or are anticipating encountering. This will allow you to be proactive in your approach rather than reactive as hurdles and other challenges present themselves along the way.

Create a Follow-Through Plan

Now that you’ve mapped out your goals for the year ahead, it’s important to implement a clear follow-through plan so you can stay on track when planning for the new year. There are many accountability exercises and strategies to consider:

• Understand your why : Why does it matter for you to achieve this particular goal? What will it mean to your business and you personally? Getting clear on the “why” will reinforce your goals and remind you why you started in the first place as the new year’s motivation and buzz wears off.
• Use the task feature : Take it further by creating Tasks within Practice Better for the action steps you’ve broken down your bigger goals into. Tasks can be set for yourself as a practitioner, with a due date, and will be on the first page you see when you log into your Practitioner Portal. This will provide a visual reminder to keep your goals top of mind.
• Write down your goals : Find a place to track or write down your goals so you can easily remind yourself of what you are working towards. Keeping them somewhere you will see every day will allow your goals to stay top of mind and keep you apprised of what you need to focus on at all times.
• Schedule your goals: Input target deadlines for your goals into your calendar. These scheduled reminders will keep you on the path you’ve mapped out for yourself and keep you accountable to your deadlines. Consider adding monthly and quarterly reminders in your calendar to regularly review your progress.
• Have an accountability partner : An accountability partner is someone you can check in with and who provides you with support and motivation. Consider asking a colleague or friend and sharing your goals with them, and plan to check in with one another regularly.
• Celebrate along the way : Plan to celebrate small wins along the way to maintain momentum and motivation.

The end of the year is a great opportunity for reflection and strategizing on how to reach new heights in your business. Reviewing your business to date, determining your goals, and mapping out an accountability plan will ensure you are planning for the new year with your best foot forward!

Editor’s note: This post was originally published on November 10, 2020, and has been revamped for accuracy and comprehensiveness.

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Share on LinkedIn Business Planning Tips for the New Year

Jeremy Ehardt

Business planning tips for the new year.

You may have heard the familiar quote that “a goal without a plan is just a wish.” It’s particularly apropos for business planning. As you set new growth objectives for the year to come, realizing success requires advanced thought and a detailed strategy.

Here are some tips to help you prepare for and achieve a new era of growth in the year to come.

• Set your new-year goals

As you review your current year in business and think about goals for the new year, it’s important to celebrate your past successes. Often entrepreneurs don’t realize the value of small achievements, so start by listing all of your accomplishments and then isolating the top three. Recognizing your success is a positive way to encourage a mental mindset of growth for the year to come.

However, while you’re raising a glass to your accomplishments, don’t downplay the areas where your business didn’t measure up. You can learn a lot by evaluating where you failed to meet critical metrics or lost revenue over the course of the year.

Write these down as well, and then determine how to avoid the same pitfalls in the future. Understanding where your business succeeded or may have gone astray will help guide your goals for the new year.

Another big key to developing a proactive strategy is having accurate and timely financial reporting. If you don’t know where your business is positioned financially, it’s hard to know what is working and what is not. Timely accurate financials help you to set realistic goals for the year to come and even shift direction mid-course if a change in strategy can bring about more positive outcomes.

• Create a 12-month budget

Once you’ve isolated your goals for the coming year, you’ll need to set your  business’ budget . First, determine your operating expenses and then project what can be dedicated toward each individual objective. Taking this approach also allows you to see where expenses need to be modified to support your goals.

• Evaluate your resources

Growth and business success require a minimum resource level, so the year end is a good time to evaluate where you stand. Do you have the human resources necessary to achieve the goals you’ve set? Will you need additional equipment or working capital, and will you have ready access to the supplies you need? Answering these questions allows you to take your planning to a deeper level by isolating issues that could impede your success.

• Align your business to your goals

As you prepare your goals for the new year, it’s essential that you communicate your plans to your employees and business partners. While each of your executives may have their own responsibilities and concerns, the end goal of all their efforts should be the same.

It’s a similar situation for your broader support team. Professionals, such as accountants, bankers and your legal associates, need to understand where you are headed and how you plan to get there to help ensure that your goals are in line and achievable with your balance sheet, debt structure and risk appetite.

• Mind the Critical Importance of Cash Flow

As you consider your financials from the year, one of the biggest areas you should review is the  cash flow cycle .  A strong and consistent cash flow means you’ll have the funds on hand to achieve your objectives. On the other hand, if you experienced deficits during the previous year, it’s important to understand these gaps and  how to fix them .

Too often, business owners focus only on how much cash they have in their accounts come year end. However, by reviewing cash flow over time, you can isolate patterns in liquidity, such as whether you were able to collect receivables in a timely fashion and how quickly you could turn over existing inventory. Answering questions like these will provide insight and trends that help you identify when you can be aggressive with working capital as well as when you should be more conservative.

Once you’ve determined the course for the new year, be sure to revisit your  business plan  and update it to reflect any changes to your operational structure or future goals.

While year-end planning might sound labor intensive, there is good news for businesses that take time to perform these evaluations. You’re setting your business up for greater success in the year to come.

Looking for help with your business finances?  Contact a Commercial Banker  to learn how we can help.

About the Author

Jeremy is a Vice President of Commercial Banking. He has a long and varied history of service at FNBO and finds fulfillment in helping clients determine the best plan of action to manage their finances and meet their goals.

The articles in this blog are for informational purposes only and not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations. When making decisions about your financial situation, consult a financial professional for advice. Articles are not regularly updated, and information may become outdated.

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10 Best Business New Year’s Resolutions for 2022

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You may not have been able to meet many of the goals you set for your business in 2021, a tumultuous year that brought a lot of the same challenges as 2020. Regardless, there are still ways to get back on track and prepare for a better 2022.

Not sure what resolutions should make their way onto your list? Keep reading for 10 new year's resolutions for business professionals.

Small business new year’s resolutions for 2022

These resolutions should help you brainstorm how you can give your business operations a bit of a refresh this year. Think carefully about what day-to-day and overarching problems you want to solve and how you can create better habits to make them happen. Also, consider what larger projects will make the biggest impact on your business.

1. Create realistic organizational processes

While it may seem like the whole point of setting business resolutions is to be super ambitious, sometimes it can help to take a more realistic approach. While many people like to organize their homes during the new year, you can choose to organize your business. And the key to any good organizational system is to create realistic processes. It’s easy to get swept up in the excitement of a fresh new year and to have your sight set on major changes. But for an organizational system to be sustainable, it needs to be realistic.

Take a good hard look at what did and did not work for you and your staff over the last year. What processes seemed to be more trouble than they were worth? Which did you have to refresh repeatedly because the system was too hard to keep up with? Use your findings to update your processes for 2022.

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Once we uncover your personalized matches, our team will consult you on the process moving forward.

2. Learn to be okay with outsourcing

This resolution can sting a bit for anyone who is used to being the only one in charge of their small business. Many entrepreneurs are responsible for every role in their business when things are just getting off the ground, and this can make it challenging to step away from what you’ve built and let someone else take the reins.

When it comes time to outsource, consider what tasks you struggle with the most. Do creative assignments like marketing campaigns keep you up at night? Are you uncertain if you’re managing your financial accounts correctly? Do you spend way too much time on small administrative tasks that an assistant or software could handle? Your time as a business owner is valuable, so consider hiring some extra help or investing in digital tools to free up your schedule.

3. Update your business plan

Hopefully, you wrote your business plan as one of the first steps of starting your business. A good business plan can serve as a roadmap to success when you need guidance. It can help keep you organized and on track. If you decide you want to pursue an investor, seek a business loan , or take on a new partner, a business plan can also act as a tool to illustrate your business’s worth to outside parties.

In other words, a business plan is crucial to your success. But it isn’t meant to be a one-and-done document. We’re willing to bet your business has changed since you first wrote your business plan. Now is a great time to revisit it and update your plan with the latest financials, goals, competitor research, marketing ideas, and more so your business will continue to grow in 2022.

4. Refresh your marketing plan

Just like with your business plan, you’ll want to take a closer look at your marketing plan. What worked well for your business last year? What didn't? Where did your marketing budget stretch the furthest? What channels worked best for you?

Now that you’ve identified what marketing efforts helped your business the most last year, and which didn’t make as much of an impact, you can update your marketing plan with your insight and knowledge. Your new plan should cut out anything that didn’t work and prioritize what is working best for your business. Feel free to add in new strategies as well. This will help dictate where your marketing budget should go in 2022 so you get the biggest return on your investment.

5. Expand your network

When you’re swamped with work and trying to check off your must-do list, it can be difficult to visualize adding anything that won’t have an immediate impact on your business to your already overpacked schedule. This is why a good resolution for 2022 is to continue expanding your network.

If you make an effort to make a new connection once a week or monthly, you improve the odds of finding a new business lead, learning some valuable trade intel, or creating a strong professional relationship. The more you network, the more results you’ll see. Schedule networking on your calendar like any other to-do to ensure it becomes a priority and not an afterthought.

6. Identify customer service missteps

Customer service matters. In fact, 93% of customers reported they are more likely to become repeat customers at companies that offer excellent customer service.

When it comes to customer service, people remember the really bad experiences as often as the really good ones. Identify what your biggest missteps were in 2021 and outline how you and your employees can avoid them in the future. At the same time, highlight what went well and how you can build on those experiences in 2022.

7. Look for automation opportunities

Technology makes our lives easier every day, but are you using it to its full potential for your business? Look for areas of your business that you can automate. There is software that can make processes such as invoicing, managing inventory, customer service, bookkeeping, sales, and more an automatic occurrence you no longer need to worry about. Not only does this cut down on the chance of manual errors, but it also frees up time in you and your staff’s schedules to tackle other important tasks.

8. Prioritize company culture

If your small business relies on the work of your employees, then focusing on building a good company culture is a fantastic resolution for 2022. Employees that feel engaged and inspired at work are 125% more productive than simply “satisfied” employees. Having a strong company culture that makes employees feel appreciated, respected, and as if their career development matters is a great way to boost employee engagement and loyalty.

Consider surveying your staff on what changes they would like to see culture-wise. Then work toward developing a company culture that reflects your business’s values and prioritizes the needs of your staff. Happy employees are good for business, after all.

9. Build a website

If your business doesn't already have a website, now is the time to invest in building one. A good business website can do wonders for sales, audience growth, brand recognition, and customer service.

An e-commerce website builder can help you create an easy-to-use online store. And in general, a good business website can at the very least allow new customers or clients to find you via search engines, share examples of your work, and provide contact information to anyone who may want to work with you.

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10. Beat burnout

It can be rather exciting to return from a leisurely holiday break with the energy to hit the ground running in January. It’s great to capitalize on the energy that comes after taking time to rest and spend time with loved ones, but before you dive headfirst into work in 2022, consider creating a plan for beating burnout this year.

It’s no secret that many small business owners work themselves to the bone. Burnout is not good for you, your business, or your personal life. Setting clear boundaries, knowing when to take a break, and learning when to ask for help are all great ways to beat burnout. We all have different thresholds for how much we can work and varying ways of coping with stress, just make sure you’re running your business in a way that is good for you.

This article originally appeared on JustBusiness, a subsidiary of NerdWallet.

On a similar note...

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8 Ways Your Small Business Can Prepare for the New Year

The end of the year is the perfect time to start planning for the next one. You can review your company, make changes, and recommit to your purpose. It’s also an excellent time to set goals for the upcoming year to hit the ground running on January 1. Keep reading to learn eight tips for planning for the new year.

1. Evaluate how things are going

Review your processes to see how smoothly they’re running. If you notice bad habits forming, now is the perfect time to take care of them – before they get out of hand. You can also review your current workflow to determine what’s working and what needs to be adjusted.

Read also: How to Perform a SWOT Analysis

2. Consider ways to improve your marketing efforts

Review your marketing material, messaging, and plan. If it’s not doing a great job selling your company, don’t be afraid to cut underperforming strategies and start fresh next year.

3. Review your finances

Review your balance sheets and income statements to see where your company stands. Determine if you have enough funds to cover your current and anticipated expenses.

4. Reflect on your accomplishments

When you’re reviewing your company, it can be easy to focus on the negatives. Don’t forget about the things your company is doing right. Look at what your business has achieved during the past year and be proud of those accomplishments. You and your team have worked hard to get to where you are now!

5. Research outside factors that can affect your business

There are some things you can’t control. But, you can evaluate them to try to determine how they could affect your business next year. Read up on social and economic trends and predictions to get a sense of what next year will look like. You’ll be able to predict how in-demand your product or service will be and start making plans to adjust for any changes.

If you’ve researched your competitors before, now is the perfect time to update it. Look at how well your competitors are performing and how they’re marketing themselves. Then, think about how you’re going to compete with them in the future.

Read also: How to Do a SWOT Analysis of Your Competition

6. Set goals for the new year

Besides setting year-long goals, consider setting goals for the first 100 days of the new year. These are short-term, achievable objectives that will make you feel accomplished right from the start of the year. You can build on that momentum to achieve your longer-term goals.

You don’t have to wait for spring cleaning. Take this time to clean up your workspace or office, including your email inbox. Start packing up this year’s files to make room for next year’s. Once your office is cleaned up, you’ll know whether you need any new office furniture or equipment.

8. Review your pricing model

If you haven’t changed your prices in a while, consider doing so now. Consider the profit margins you want and what your competitors are charging.

Read also: How Much Should You Charge? 4 Pricing Strategies for Your Small Business

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5 Steps to Make a Business Plan for the New Year

It’s time to make an action plan for the new year! Can you believe it?! I feel like this year flew by, but then again, I say that every year! My team and I recently sat down to make our business plan for the new year, and it prompted me to pull the curtain back and show you exactly how I plan everything out in my business. This process is the key factor in turning my $100,00 a year business into making over a million dollars each year. So pull out your chart paper, sticky notes, and markers, and let’s get planning!

Step 1: Decide What Your Plan For the New Year MUST Include

The first step in making your business plan for the new year is getting clear on your priorities. If you listen to this podcast episode on planning for the new year, you’ll know that I call this your “Heck Yes” list. Write down the top ten things that you will say “Heck Yes!” to this year.

At the top of my list is babies and family and personal development. Before I even dip my toe into the business, I need to make sure I have dates and times blocked off for family and personal development. So when I’m making a plan for the new year, I know that I will be blocking off six weeks when my baby is due and any other important family events I want to prioritize.

If you’re having trouble deciding what is on your “Heck Yes” list, here are a few more that are on my plan for the new year. I base everything else I do in my business around my program launches, so that’s next on my list. Then, I prioritize email marketing, blogging, The CEO Teacher Podcast, and social media. I’m also taking this year to focus on affiliate marketing, which goes on the list too!

Step 2: Put Your “Heck Yeses” on Your Plan for the New Year First

Now that you have your “Heck Yes” list, it’s time to sit down and put those items on your plan for the new year. I have four large calendars each year in my business – one for each quarter. You may hear them called Q1, Q2, Q3, and Q4. These quarterly calendars each include three months of the year. So, when you’re planning out your Q1 (Quarter 1) calendar, you’ll be adding in all of your priorities in January, February, and March. Seeing the whole quarter at a glance, you can make important decisions and be proactive when creating your business marketing plan for the new year.

I will put what’s most important on my yearly calendar, and then I will focus on the details (social media, emails, blogging, and more) each quarter. This is what works best for my team and me, but you have to decide the best way to plan for the new year for you!

Step 3: The Best Way to Plan is to be as Detailed as Possible

As I mentioned above, I start my business plan for the year with a birds-eye-view to ensure the essential pieces are in place. But then, we get as detailed as possible when my team creates our quarterly calendars. We’ll note when we need to send specific emails , what I’m posting on Instagram, the content of my blog posts. 

When you can get super detailed and plan out every piece of content, every launch, every part of your marketing strategy?! That’s when you’ll win! Once it’s down on paper, we MAKE IT HAPPEN. So, write it down and MAKE IT HAPPEN! It’ll take more time now, but I promise you’ll thank me later!

Step 4: What Every Business Plan for the New Year Should Include

Now that you have your content and priorities in your plan for the new year, it’s time for the SECRET SAUCE. This is the IT factor that will set you apart from everyone else – HYPE. I see it all of the time… a teacher makes a new product line or launches a program that they’re excited about, but they don’t get the sales they’re hoping for. There are many reasons why, but one of the big reasons is they didn’t build enough HYPE.

Can I tell you a secret?! I start building hype for my launches almost TWO MONTHS before I open cart. Yup. It’s not a random thing that I think about three days before I release it. If you want to become an industry leader, you have to start thinking like one. There are tons of hype mechanisms out there, and I encourage you to try several and find what works for you and your audience. 

Hype is what your plan for the new year is missing, so think about how you could build momentum before you announce your next TPT product line or course launch. What could you do to get your community excited to purchase? Think about Nike, for example. They release a small number of pairs of shoes in a particular style, and the hype is so big that they sell out in SECONDS! Teacher friend, you can make this happen for you too. Think outside the box to make the new year the best one yet!

Step 5: Take Massive Action to See Your Plan Through

Are you ready for a little tough love?! The only thing standing between you and your success in the new year is YOU! It’s time to stop letting limiting beliefs and distractions get in your way. One of my favorite quotes is, “Action brings clarity, and clarity produces results.” Don’t make this beautiful, color-coded business plan for the new year just to let it collect dust by February. Be persistent and do what’s necessary to see your plan through. Stop letting the people you follow on Instagram influence how you run your business . Put your blinders on, keep taking massive action, and do the dang thing! I know you can do it. It may be hard, you may have to make sacrifices, but it will be so worth it in the end!

I believe in you. It’s our year, so let’s make it happen by taking massive action! Are you in?! Let me know by sharing your plan for the year on Instagram and tagging me @kaysemorris ! I can’t wait to see it and cheer you on!

[…] suit with everything else in our businesses. So, what do you need most as a teacher blogger? Consistency. This means that you should be posting regularly. That could be once a month, once every two weeks, […]

[…] 5 Steps to Make a Business Plan for the New Year […]

[…] habits. How are you going to get ready for what’s to come when you have no idea what it might be? Get your plan in place. What are your Heck Yeses, your non-negotiables? Set your goals so together we can take massive […]

[…] Create a business plan that provides potential customers with a snapshot of your tutoring services. Organize your offers with an easy-to-understand method or framework. Create a business hub (or website) to share with your audience. Include links to get on your schedule. We love Calendly as an option. That way you can schedule and receive payments at the same time.  […]

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New Year, New Goals: A Guide to Effective Business Planning

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Every January, with the hustle and bustle of the holidays behind us, many business leaders tend to pivot to a “back to business” mindset, complete with the anxiety-generating thought, “What about that annual business plan I never got around to writing?”  Indeed, January seems to pass by quickly, and before you blink, 1 st Quarter is halfway over.  To have a chance at hitting Q1 goals and setting a great tone for the new year, you need to move quickly. Here’s a structure for a quick-and-dirty New Year business plan you could handwrite on a single sheet of notebook paper.

What Happened Last Year?

Jot down the key things that happened to your business over the past year.  (You can refine it later.) You may already be close to your financial results but also think through the non-financial performance results (e.g., customer satisfaction, fill rate, etc. – specific to your business) that impacted you last year. Try to be as specific as possible, even if it takes a little time to chase down the exact numbers from others in the organization. This will set you up well for the later steps.

What Did You Learn Last Year?

Beyond the financials and performance results, what insights about your business, your internal capabilities, your competitors, and most especially your customers did you learn over the past 12 months? Your insights about your business and your customers help you differentiate from the competition.  And yet, most businesses skip this step entirely.  Try to spend a little bit of time in thought and contemplation over this. Ask yourself: “What specific insights or experiences can help me gain an edge this year?”

What Do You Want to Happen This Year?

Grounded in our recent learnings, it is time to turn our attention to the year ahead.  Looking at last year’s performance, decide what success looks like to you for next year. Again, these goals can be both financial and non-financial. (The most successful companies track both types of goals.)

And don’t forget to make these “SMART” goals. There are many definitions of the SMART acronym out there, but the ones businesses tend tend to use is: Specific, Measurable, Aligned (with long-term strategy), Realistic, and Time-Bound. 

Make sure that every goal you set has each of these elements.  And also, challenge yourself to do less this year.  Sometimes, less is more – attempting to do fewer things better is often a more successful approach than running the risk of spreading yourself too thin.

What Do I Need To Do to Achieve Those Goals? 

A goal without a way to achieve it is less than worthless. For every one of your goals, think through a high-level strategy and a step-by-step action plan (with rough milestone timing) to make it happen. You don’t need to write a novel, but you do need to provide enough detail to guide yourself and your team when the ideas aren’t as fresh in your head.

How Can I Stay On Track?

The point of your newly-crafted plan is not to sit in a folder or gather dust. Set check-ins for yourself and your team in a time frame that makes sense. Scheduling a quarterly review of the overall plans is usually a good idea.  And if, later in the year, you find yourself off-track on any of your goals, don’t beat yourself up. Instead, determine what it would take to course-correct yourself toward the success you originally envisioned. Allow yourself to factor in what you know to reframe your going-in plan and target something realistic based on what you know.

Rather than write a drawn-out conclusion paragraph, I’m going to implore you instead to pull out your pad and pen and get started right now.  Start jotting down rough thoughts. You can crystallize them later. But bear in mind – any planning at all that you’re able to do is going to be 100% better than no plan at all. 

If getting ahead of your staffing needs is part of your goals for this new year, we can help! Here at Labor Finders, we're dedicated to helping our clients put their best foot forward this year and beyond. Connect with us today to see how we can help you achieve your new year's business goals.

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11 New Year's business goals for 2024

Setting business goals at the start of a new year allows for a clean slate and a chance to refocus on objectives that align with evolving market trends and strategies. Here are 11 business goals to set in the new year.

As the new year approaches, it presents an ideal opportunity to set fresh business goals. The transition to a new year naturally encourages reflection and renewal. It’s a time to assess past performance, learn from successes and setbacks, and recalibrate the company’s trajectory. Setting business goals at the start of a new year allows for a clean slate and a chance to refocus on objectives that align with evolving market trends and strategies.

What is a business goal?

A business goal represents a desired outcome or achievement that an organization aims to attain, whether in the immediate future or over the long haul. Business goals exhibit diverse variations, ranging from inspirational and motivational objectives, like enhancing customer service, to precise targets such as attaining specific financial milestones like revenue targets, net income, profit margins, or profit goals.

How to set business goals?

Setting effective business goals begins with defining a clear vision and mission, which serve as guiding principles. Break down this vision into specific, realistic SMART goals that align with company values. Engage your team in the process, and regularly review and adjust goals to stay adaptable. Don’t forget to track progress and celebrate achievements to maintain motivation and focus.

Why is it important to set business goals?

Business goals are vital for various reasons that impact an organization’s overall performance and achievements. They serve as a metric for tracking progress and direction, providing clarity to employees and fostering accountability. Moreover, they enhance decision-making by ensuring alignment with the company’s objectives.

11 New Year’s business goals to set in 2024

As your partner in all things records and information management, here are the top goals we recommend considering for your business in the year ahead:

1. Cultivate resilience from the outset:

• Develop a resilient mindset in your team, starting from day one.
• Strategic resilience can yield substantial benefits in terms of customer satisfaction, employee retention, risk management, and progress toward environmental, social, and governance (ESG) goals.
• Encourage the formation of cross-functional teams to swiftly diagnose and respond to disruptions. Resilience should permeate every level of your organization.

2. Revamp records retention policies:

• Carefully review and update your organization’s records retention policies  to ensure they remain current and comply with regulatory standards.
• Create a plan for the secure disposal of documents that have met their retention requirements, ensuring compliance with regulations.

3. Efficiently manage legacy records:

• Establish a streamlined process for organizing, digitizing, or securely disposing of legacy records.
• While this process can be resource-intensive, it lays the foundation for digital transformation and more streamlined workflows. Consider partnering with professionals to expedite this project.

Related: What are your legacy records cleanup challenges?

4. Forge connections with supply chain partners:

• Recognize the impact your sustainability efforts have on your chosen vendors and partners.
• Regularly engage with your partners to discuss collaborative initiatives.
• Integrate your partners’ data into your sustainability reporting to demonstrate accountability and transparency in your sustainability efforts.

5. Embrace renewable energy solutions:

• Investigate opportunities to transition to renewable energy sources, reducing or eliminating reliance on fossil fuels.
• Prioritize energy-intensive areas such as data centers for renewable energy adoption.
• Consider environmentally friendly alternatives like colocation offerings powered by renewable energy.

6. Proactively tackle data security threats:

• Adopt a robust data protection strategy, such as the 3-2-1-1-0 approach, which includes multiple data copies, offsite and offline storage, and a no-errors backup for data recovery.
• Implement a zero-trust network and multi-factor authentication to fortify your data security.
• Vigilance is key to safeguarding critical systems and data, so be prepared for worst-case scenarios.

7. Enhance data and IT security:

• Scrutinize your IT asset disposition process  to ensure it’s both sustainable and secure.
• Safeguard sensitive data by securely destroying retired IT equipment while adhering to eco-friendly practices.

8. Embrace social responsibility:

• Integrate environmental, social, and governance (ESG) goals and commitments into your overarching business strategies.
• Collaborate with vendors and partners whose business practices align with your organization’s values and commitment to social responsibility.

9. Evaluate your return to office strategy:

• Recognize the evolving work styles of your employees and reshape your work environment accordingly .
• Create workspaces that foster collaboration, innovation, and focused work, catering to the changing demands of remote and hybrid work settings.

10. Digitize your corporate mailroom:

• Assess the volume of paper-based mail your organization receives each month and explore opportunities for automation through digitized or intelligent mailrooms.
• Reducing paper-based mail can enhance efficiency and support the transition to a more digital environment.

11. Initiate digital transformation:

• Unify your physical and digital data to improve productivity, efficiency, and business insights.
• Follow a structured five-step plan for digital transformation  that enhances support for both onsite and remote work environments.

By implementing these detailed strategies, your small business can position itself for success in the year ahead while addressing critical areas for improvement.

If you’d like to see how Iron Mountain can help you reach your goals in the coming year, explore our small business solutions .

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Strategic Business Planning for the New Year

Take stock of where your business currently stands and plan your business’s future. Here are 6 steps to plan for next year.

The start of a new year is a great time to take stock of where your business currently stands and turn your attention to the future. What are your business goals for the year to come, and what kind of planning do you need to do to get there?

Strategic business planning basically answers three questions:

• How is your business performing?
• What business goals do you want to set for the new year?
• What are the best ways to meet your goals?

Here’s how to plan out the new year for your small business in more detail, by following these six steps.

1. Set Your Business Goals

The first step toward any strategic plan is to determine where you’re headed, so spell out in concrete terms what you’d like to accomplish this year. Be specific. Don’t just say you’d like to increase sales. By how much? In which area? How? The clearer you are, the easier it will be to map out ways to achieve your goals.

There are three areas to consider as you set your business goals:

• YOUR VISION FOR THE BUSINESS: Your vision is what caused you to start the business in the first place. What did you see when you looked to the future? Why did you start this business?
• THE MISSION OF YOUR BUSINESS: Your mission is the specifics of what you’d like to accomplish, whether it’s making the best widget available or serving the most awesome tacos.
• YOUR PERSONAL VALUES: Your values encompass what’s important to you in the way you run your business. What would you like your employees and customers to experience?

Articulating these three things – your vision, mission, and values – will help you put a strategy in place to accomplish them. Your plan will affect everything from the number of employees you hire to the types of goods and services you offer.

2. Do a Reality Check

Now that you’ve analyzed where you’d ideally like to be, figure out where you stand in relation to those goals. Sales figures are one way to measure how you’re doing, but success can mean many things; it all comes down to what success means to YOU.

Money is likely a big factor, but it also helps to think in terms of what your community involvement is like, how green your business is , and what kind of programs you have in place for your employees. Again, measure yourself against your vision, mission and values.

3. Choose Your Focus

Once you know where you are, compared to where you’d like to be, you can start working out how to get there. Most likely, you’ll have more things on your list than you might be able to accomplish at once, so you probably have to narrow it down a little, or at least choose priorities, or an order in which to proceed.

Based on your resources and capabilities, choose a handful of specific targets and start planning. Choosing just a few things to concentrate on will help you achieve your goals in actuality. It may sound simple, but work toward your strengths and away from your weaknesses.

4. Know When to Say No

As you start coming up with ideas, always keep your vision for the company and its purpose in mind. Reject any strategies that don’t fit. You’ll also have to shelve ideas that you don’t have the resources for right now. Those ideas may be wonderful, but you’ll need the right people , facilities, time and money to put your strategies into effect, so don’t plan what you can’t pull off. Understand what you can accomplish and what you can’t.

If you have ambitious plans, don’t be afraid to strategize how to get there down the road. You may not have the resources today, but part of what you’re planning for is to be able to develop in areas that will help you accomplish what you want in the future. Concentrate on longer-term business goals, like how to grow your business, improve the products and services you offer, and improve the way you run your company.

5. Create Your Implementation Strategy

Your strategic plan amounts to nothing more than an intellectual exercise until you start to implement it. Your next challenge will be doing the work to execute your ideas, making changes, and monitoring their effects.

Figure out how and when you will address each element of your plan. For the implementation of your plan to be successful, it’s helpful to assign specific responsibilities, activities, deadlines, and budgets.

6. Evaluate Your Plan’s Performance

Strategic planning isn’t a one-shot deal, but an ongoing process. You will need to evaluate how things are going after you put the plan into effect. As you move forward, don’t be afraid to change course if something isn’t working out the way you thought it would, and don’t be afraid of a little discomfort as you alter the way you’ve been doing things.

Schedule the time to take a look at what’s working and what might need tweaking. Make sure you and your staff are clear about your business goals and what needs to be done. For parts of the plan, you might decide on a daily or weekly check to see how the implementation is going. For other changes, monthly or quarterly reviews will do.

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New Year business planning: Bring in 2022 without loose ends

Table of Contents

Measure your progress from 2021

Set goals for 2022, short, medium and long term goals, use your network, make bookkeeping easier.

An essential part of planning for the New Year is tying up any loose ends from the year before. It’s important to use your experiences from the previous year to help you decide the direction your business will take going forward.

This article will show you a few ways you can start your New Year business planning while resolving any lingering issues from last year. The full list of topics we’ll cover includes:

• Set goals from 2022
• Use and expand your network

One of the best things you can do as the year draws to a close is measured how successful your business was in 2021. By doing this, you’ll better understand what progress you’ve made and what you need to do now to capitalise on that progress. 

There are a few different ways of measuring progress, so make sure you choose the most appropriate method for your business. One of the simplest ways to see how well you’re doing is to count your sales or the revenue you’ve made from sales. By comparing your sales from recent months to those from the start of the year, you can see if sales have increased.

You might also want to consider how many new contacts you’ve made or what goals you’ve achieved in 2021. Alternatively, you could measure the success of your marketing campaigns by looking at things like customer loyalty and the number of new customers you’re seeing. You can do this by looking at things like website analytics or asking for customer feedback.

The way you measure success depends on what you hope to do with your business, so think about your aims before you pick your success-measuring strategy.

An important part of your New Year business planning is figuring out how you want your company to develop going forward. Doing so will help you make business decisions: if you know exactly what you want to achieve, it’s easier to pick options that bring you closer to achieving that goal.

Different companies will require different goals. You might choose something simple, like a set of sales targets, or a more complex goal like improving your brand awareness. If you’ve already measured the success of your business, choosing goals is easier as you’ll better understand areas that you’re doing well or doing poorly in. 

It’s important that you don’t only set yourself a single goal for the year. Instead, try to set a mix of short, medium, and long term goals so that you’re always striving for something in 2022. 

If you only have long term goals, it’s unlikely you’ll see much progress until the end of 2022. But by only having short term goals, you might find yourself struggling to prioritise because you’ll have a lot of very close deadlines. 

By having a mix of goals and objectives with different timelines for success, you can plan out your entire year, as you’ll know exactly what you need to achieve and when you need to do it.

A great business tip for the New Year is to make the most of the traditional January business slump. That means that New Year business planning doesn’t just mean working out what you’re doing next summer; it means finding out what you’re doing in the days after New Year’s Eve. 

A good way to do this is to do your business planning chronologically. That means planning out your January before you do anything else, then creating plans for each following month. Doing so can help immensely with future business decisions and helps avoid any unforeseen circumstances. 

As the progress (and money) you make in earlier months will affect months later in the year, it’s not a bad thing if your December has a much vaguer plan than January does. That said, you should still try to do a rough forecast of how much you’ll make and what you want to focus on in that month (i.e. sales, marketing, business development).

Using your network is a great way to tie up loose ends from the previous year while advancing your business interests in 2022. The idea is simple: you’ve likely managed to expand your network over the past year. As well as considering how you’ll meet even more contacts, plan out how you’ll use and engage with the people you met in 2021 going forward into 2022.

Networking like this is very important for a small business , as each new contact could bring huge benefits or business opportunities to your company. For example, you might meet someone with a lot of business experience that you could bring on as a partner. Alternatively, you might meet an investor who’s willing to put money into growing your business.

You don’t need to plan out exactly who will come in handy and when, but always keep your 2021 contacts in mind when planning out 2022. For instance, you might list potentially helpful contacts when you make your goals for each month of the New Year.

Financial management is a huge part of your business, so make sure it’s a part of your 2022 business plan. If you struggle with different accounting tasks, consider downloading the Countingup app to make financial admin easier. 

Countingup is the business current account with built-in accounting software that allows you to manage all your financial data in one place. With features like automatic expense categorisation, invoicing on the go, receipt capture tools, tax estimates, and cash flow insights, you can confidently keep on top of your business finances wherever you are. 

You can also instantly share your bookkeeping with your accountant without worrying about duplication errors, data lags, or inaccuracies. Seamless, simple, and straightforward! 

Find out more here and start your three-month free trial today. 

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Small-Business Planning for the New Year: 2021 Spotlight

You may not be able to run your business exactly according to plan next year. If it’s anything like 2020, 2021 could be a challenging time for many small businesses around the country. With so many unexpected events and unpredictable impacts possibly in store, business planning for the new year is more important than ever. Creating a sound business plan today will help you know your options and be better able to adjust quickly tomorrow.

The importance of annual business planning

The process of planning is as valuable to your business as the ultimate plan you make. The research you do, the numbers you crunch and the processes to monitor, measure and report, all provide important inputs to your plan. Planning for small-business success is like studying a road map. When doing annual business planning, you determine where you want to go, how best to get there and also keep in mind alternative routes to take if things change.

Setting your small business’s goals for 2021

Business planning for 2021 should begin with goal setting. Take a look at how your business performed in 2020. Did you meet your goals? Take a deep dive into your data to see when, where and how the challenges of the last year had an impact on your results.

Given everything that has happened and future trends, what are realistic small-business goals for the new year? Perhaps your small business is struggling to survive. Or maybe it’s on the rebound. Some businesses actually grew in the unusual climate of the last year. Your goals should fit accordingly.

How to Develop Your Strategic Business Plan for 2021

Small-business challenges are multiplied in times of uncertainty. Take special care to consider several different scenarios when plotting out your strategic business plan, particularly the part that includes the new-year marketing plan. Doing so will help you develop workarounds, alternatives and completely new strategies that may even transform your business for the better.

1. Get started immediately

Start your annual business planning as soon as you can. It’s better to start with incomplete data and update it as you go along. If you wait until you have everything in hand, it will already be too late.

When is the best time to start business planning for the new year? For many businesses, the end of the third quarter (September 30) gives you enough information to start with the basics. The fourth quarter (October 1 through December 31) is often busy, so getting a jump on planning helps. Even if your plan isn’t complete, it’s better to have a partial plan in place before the end of 2020 than to delay.

2. Review your 2020 finances

The best place to start your strategic business plan is with your finances. Review your 2020 books, paying particular attention to cash flow, overhead costs and variable costs. Do you have seasonal fluctuations? What events typically influence these numbers? How do the changes over the last year impact past patterns and future expectations?

It’s important to understand so-called normal financial patterns of the past and separate them out from the unusual situations that took place in 2020, such as government-ordered shutdowns. All the information is useful, but some data is much more likely to apply to your business well into the future than other data.

3. Revisit your 2020 small-business plan

Take a look at your 2020 strategic business plan, especially your underlying assumptions. What was different in 2020? What do you expect 2021 to bring? If you’re like many small businesses, you made changes on the fly during the course of the year. You may have been able to cut or delay some expenses. Perhaps you were able to reduce business energy costs . Do you think the changes you made could end up being permanent, or at least long term?

As you look at month-over-month and year-over-year revenue and costs, try to understand what drove the outcomes so you have context for business planning for 2021. It isn’t easy to do, but compare your business to your competitors. Did you do better or worse? What are they doing that’s different? What’s working in your field, and what isn’t?

Top consultants have developed many models for analyzing a business. You can easily adapt them to your particular situation for your small business. The insights you get can help you with new-year business planning. But different models help with different aspects of business planning. For instance ROI, return on investment, helps you to balance costs with expected results. It’s grounded in dollars and cents, helping you weigh different investments to decide which are going to bring in the most money for your business.

But what if you want a way to view your business that isn’t strictly tied to profits and losses but could help you prioritize? For that kind of model, you may want to try a SWOT analysis.

What is a SWOT analysis?

SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. This classic analytical model helps you clarify the strengths of your business, your weaknesses, the opportunities you might have and the threats that could damage your business.

Take the example of a restaurant business. A SWOT analysis may look like this:

• Strengths: You have a loyal clientele and a reputation for excellent cuisine.
• Weaknesses: Your dining room is too small and you don’t offer takeout or delivery services — which could be an especially big problem during a lockdown or for government-mandated social distancing.
• Opportunities: Your weaknesses might present an opportunity to actually grow your business to serve a larger market, if you can build a successful takeout business.
• Threats: A threat could be a well-funded restaurant a few blocks away that got started with deliveries years ago and can do so profitably at volume. They may threaten your ability to build your takeout and delivery customer base.

Now, you have a sense of what your restaurant may need to do. At this point, you can go back to the ROI model to see what would be a cost-effective solution. For instance, if you were thinking about signing up with a third-party food delivery service to reach more customers, how many deliveries would you need to make it worthwhile? Going back and forth between models in this way can help you make the best decisions going into the new year.

4. Focus on online sales in 2021

The move toward online business has been underway for decades, but it increased dramatically in 2020. If you don’t have the ability to service customers in the digital world, you could be leaving money on the table.

Many businesses can benefit from having a digital aspect. People naturally think of e-commerce or restaurant delivery apps, but many other kinds of businesses can find solutions in the online world, too. Say you have a plumbing business. You can let customers schedule service appointments and then update them when you’ll arrive via their phones. You can bill, take payment and provide a receipt online, as well.

Look for ways to provide convenience to your customers and take advantage of the digital world to promote your business, such as participating in a virtual Small Business Saturday .

5. Prepare marketing strategies for 2021

No strategic business plan is complete without a new-year marketing plan. Talk to your customers. Market research doesn’t have to involve hiring a pricey specialist. You can uncover opportunities by taking the time to ask customers about their lifestyles, needs and wants, either in person or via email or an online survey. Many will tell you exactly what they think of your business and will tell you how you could do better serving them. With a little information, you can build a winning new-year marketing plan.

But think twice before going with the same old methods. This year has brought many changes, so you may want to think about new kinds of digital media, such as a social media platform that your customers may be inclined to use. However, in-person opportunities may also be effective, as people are eager to get out of the house. Sponsoring events, painting the side of a truck and renting billboards in strategic locations could also raise your profile.

6. Find ways to support — and keep — your staff

Good employees are invaluable to a small-business owner, and they’re difficult and costly to replace. So, it pays to hold on to your staff, especially those in key roles. Many people are struggling with the new normal, including parents with children learning at home and those who are adjusting to new commute patterns. Think about offering new kinds of benefits to meet the moment, including flexible schedules, reimbursement for child care, extra sick leave, work-from-home options and home office setups. This might be a good time to upgrade outdated technology in the workplace .

Small-business recruiting strategies may also play a role in your business planning for the new year. Many companies downsized during the past year and, as business recovers, will need to rehire. This is a good time to think about the structure of your company, the roles you need filled and the cost of hiring. Are there roles you don’t need any more? Are there roles you could combine? What about bringing on new kinds of expertise? Smart business technologies may enable new ways of working and add to your talent pool many new candidates who might not have been available to you even a year ago.

7. Shoot for your goals in 2021, but be realistic

In business planning for the new year, 2020 has reminded us that there are no guarantees. The future can change in an instant, with no warning. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t set goals and do the work for a strategic business plan. The key is to set reasonable, thought-through goals that you can take practical steps toward achieving. And stay ready to adjust as fast as possible if the situation changes.

Planning is time-consuming and takes hard work, but you can do it if you start early enough and take it step by step. It’ll pay off by keeping you on track toward achieving your business goals, and you’ll be better able to respond to shifting situations. Uncertainty brings stress. But change can also bring opportunity — for those who are ready.

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• 6 steps for operations leaders to build ...

6 steps for operations leaders to build a better annual plan

An effective annual plan is critical to keep your teams, departments, and company together, working toward the same goals. 

As an operations leader, you oversee how your organization runs its business. By reviewing how your company performed in the past year, you and your operations teams can identify which strategies worked—and which fell short—to build an effective annual plan designed to maximize the impact of every department.

Here’s what you need to know about building a successful annual plan.

Connect everyone's work to company-wide goals

87% of workers with individual goals tied to company-wide goals say their business is well-prepared to meet customer expectations. Discover how Asana can transform the way your organization aligns work to goals.

Annual plans drive clarity and accountability 

With an annual plan, departments can start the year off with a strong understanding of the overall vision and how their work contributes to larger business goals. Without an overarching plan, it can be difficult to understand how a specific project or initiative moves the business forward. 

Clear goals establish benchmarks for project progress

Your annual plan shouldn’t be a set-it-and-forget-it goal. Rather, periodically check project progress against your annual plan so you can see how your operations teams are doing. Doing this throughout the year will not only give you a sense of how your teams are tracking towards their overall goals—it can also help you understand if they’re ahead or behind schedule, and adjust accordingly. 

If you notice that a specific initiative is not on track to meet the strategic goals outlined in your company’s annual plan, you can use this data to pivot and double down on—or divest from—specific initiatives. 

Establish concrete goals for a specific time period

The more specific your goal, the more concrete your action plan. Providing detailed and specific goals gives your employees a clear understanding of what work to prioritize and what deliverables they’re responsible for. 

Make sure your goals are measurable, as well. Clear KPIs and OKRs demonstrate how tangible work connects back to larger business goals. 

6 steps for annual business planning

The annual planning process often takes place near the end of the calendar year or at the end of your company’s fiscal year. As you get closer to annual planning time, consider these six steps of the annual planning process. 

1. Reflect on previous strategies—and develop new ones

Before your business can start planning for next year, ask yourself, your stakeholders, and your operations teams: How did we perform against the strategies laid out in last year’s annual plan?

No matter the answer, use these recent data points to steer your decision-making when building your next annual plan. That could mean doubling down on big programs or initiatives born in the last year—or going a different direction entirely. 

A well-built annual plan factors in reflection on what did and didn’t work—and improves off of it.

2. Transform your business’s greatest needs into goals

After reflecting on last year’s performance, hone in on the most significant growth and improvement opportunities. Use this for guidance as you construct company- and department-wide goals.

It helps to have a consistent framework for goals across the business, to accelerate the goal-setting process and ensure greater understanding of goals within all corners of the organization.

The exact goal framework you use will depend on your company, but a few good ones to consider are: 

The Objectives and Key Results (OKR) method , which helps your business set goals using the framework “I will [objective] as measured by [key result].”

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) , which use leading and lagging indicators to track how you’re performing towards your goals. 

The SMART goals framework , which helps ensure the goals your organization sets are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time-bound.

3. Create an action plan to maximize impact

The next step is to create an action plan for your business to achieve the goals outlined in step three. Your action plan should outline the list of steps your teams need to take to accomplish their goals. Think of an action plan like the map you’ll use to arrive at your final destination. 

From there, delegate the work laid out in the action plan to specific teams and departments. Connecting the work that your operations teams complete to larger company goals makes it easier for each team to understand the impact their work has on the business.

4. Ensure the annual plan is everyone’s plan

Not everyone can be involved in building the annual plan for your company—but every team member should feel like their work is seen and accounted for in the plan. 

As the annual plan comes together, meet with leaders and employees across the business to ensure varying perspectives and priorities are factored into the final product. This step is critical for getting buy-in and generating excitement across the business. 

You don’t want to be in a position where you’re just telling everyone what the annual plan is—you want to bring every department along for the journey and get them excited about what they’re working toward in the coming year. Consider conducting a presentation to not only share the company plan and why this plan matters, but also to outline timelines and how departments will use it to achieve the company’s goals. 

5. Execute your strategy, monitor metrics, and adjust as needed

At this point, your organization’s annual plan is completed, but nothing is ever fully set in stone. As the year progresses, make sure you’re continually monitoring success metrics and KPIs. If the results of your strategies are not behaving as you expected them to, it’s important to adjust so your business will still hit the goals outlined in your annual plan. 

6. Repeat again for next year 

At the end of the year, it’s time to start the process over again. Align with your strategic plan, look back at the past year’s results, and create another plan to achieve those business goals. 

What does a good annual plan include?

Effective annual plans should contain components that are essential for completing the work outlined in the plan itself, and context for why this plan will be effective. Here are a few examples of components you would find in an annual plan:

Reports of the previous year’s performance: Your company’s annual plan for the upcoming year should be based on the data from the previous year’s performance. This provides context for your teams as to what they’re capable of doing within one calendar year.

Budget estimates: A common KPI investors track is return on investment (ROI). Knowing how much money different teams are spending makes it easier for your organization to calculate ROI and adjust strategies. Providing budget estimations also gives departments the context they need for the amount of resources they have at their disposal for the year.

Clear and specific goals: Annual plans should use the SMART goal framework so that your company can easily measure progress and report back on it later. 

Important milestones: Your business can accomplish a lot of work within one year—but to do that, each department needs to know how they're doing. Milestones operate like checkpoints, giving teams and departments a sense of direction and an idea of how they're pacing against annual goals.

Project buffers and contingency plans: Unexpected things happen all the time, and it’s better to be prepared than caught off guard. Develop a contingency plan for how your organization will get back on track in the event of an unexpected roadblock. Also set aside some resource buffers, such as a small portion of your company’s budget, to accommodate for unexpected expenses.

Gear up for next year

After a year of hard work, it’s time to reflect back and plan for more great things in the future. While annual planning takes time, collaboration, and thoughtful strategy, the efforts show in the form of your business success. 

Still have questions? We have answers. 

What is annual planning.

Annual planning is the act of developing a strategy for the upcoming year based on the learnings from the current year’s performance. This provides an opportunity for your operations teams to iterate on strategy from the past year and incorporate those learnings into your upcoming plans. 

In essence, your annual plan should contain: 

The goals your business needs to achieve

A strategy for how your organization will hit those goals

Clear tactics for what each department will work on

Any important milestones that benchmark progress

What’s the difference between annual planning and strategic planning? 

Strategic planning and annual planning are both important business planning methods that help set your team's strategy for the future. However, the scale of these planning strategies are different.

Strategic planning is the long-term strategy for your business. This encompasses a basic roadmap of how business should develop within three to five years. You will use your strategic planning process to inform your annual plan. 

Annual planning represents all of the goals and strategies that you want your business to achieve, similar to a strategic goal. The main difference here is that an annual plan only encompasses one calendar year, instead of a few years. If you think of it like a pie, annual planning is just one slice of the larger strategic plan pie.

When should your operations teams start annual planning?

Begin your annual planning process during Q4, so you can begin day one of Q1 with your plan in hand. If that’s not an option, do your annual planning as close to the start of the new year as possible. 

There are two benefits to planning earlier. First off, you’ll beat the end-of-year crunch, and avoid the stress that traditionally comes with the end of the year. Additionally, if you run an efficient annual planning process with your leadership team, your operations teams will still be free to execute on high-impact projects throughout Q4.

Related resources

Unmanaged business goals don’t work. Here’s what does.

How Asana uses work management to effectively manage goals

Beat thrash for good: 4 organizational planning challenges and solutions

Use critical success factors to support your strategic plan

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Tax changes small business owners should be aware of as the tax deadline looms

FILE - A cash register is seen on the front counter at the Alpha Shoe Repair Corp., Feb. 3, 2023, in New York. As Tax Day, April 15, approaches, there are plenty of things small business owners should keep in mind when filing taxes this year. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer, File)

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As Tax Day approaches, there are plenty of things small business owners should keep in mind when filing taxes this year.

April 15 is still the annual tax deadline for many small businesses although, unlike individuals, small businesses can have varying deadlines depending on the type of company, the state the taxes are filed in, and other factors. Quarterly estimated tax payments are generally required throughout the year. And certain types of small businesses had to file by March 15.

Since business tax filing is complex, most experts recommend small business owners work with a professional tax adviser rather than trying to file on their own or even with tax-filing software.

“Taxes should not be scary, especially when you have a certified tax professional or someone who is your trusted adviser,” said Amber Kellogg, vice president of affiliate origination and management at business consultancy Occams Advisory. “I always say you don’t go to the dentist to get your oil changed, and you certainly shouldn’t do (taxes) yourself unless you’re an expert.”

But even if small business owners aren’t filing taxes themselves, it’s still important to stay informed about any tax changes during the year. Here are things small business owners should consider as the April 15 deadline looms.

Consider an extension

Because of some pending tax legislation in Congress this year, Mitch Gerstein, senior tax adviser at accounting firm Isdaner & Co., said it might be a good idea to file for an extension. When you file an extension you still pay estimated taxes, but final paperwork isn’t due until September.

This gives your tax provider adequate time to file a return. And it’s cheaper to file an extension than an amended return, which costs more in administrative fees.

One reason Gerstein recommends an extension this year: a bonus depreciation write-off used by many small businesses is set to decrease for 2023. The bonus depreciation allowance was designed to spur capital purchases and it let businesses write off 100% of certain new and used assets in 2022. But beginning in 2023, that will decrease to 80% for used assets, dropping another 20% each year thereafter. However, a tax bill pending in Congress could restore the write-off to 100%. It’s rare that there is such a significant tax bill pending in Congress when taxes are due, Gerstein said.

Optimize your retirement plan

The Secure Act 2.0 passed by Congress in late 2022 gives small businesses some tax advantages if they offer a retirement plan. There’s a tax credit for small businesses starting new employee plans. The credit is up to 100% of the startup costs for adopting and maintaining a new 401(k) plan, capped at $5,000. There’s also a tax credit based on employer contribution, up to $1,000 annually per employee, over the plan’s first five years.

Changes in research and development write-offs

Scott Orn, chief operating officer of Kruze Consulting, works with startups backed by venture capital. Orn said the number one concern his clients are calling about is “Section 174,” a part of the tax code that involves writing off research and development costs.

In the past, companies were able to deduct 100% of research and development expenses from their taxable income. That was helpful because often that deduction meant the company was operating at a loss and wouldn’t have to pay taxes.

But starting in 2022 due to new legislation, companies have had to “capitalize” the expense – or spread it out over several years. That means they must now write off the expenses over five years for U.S.-based R&D, or 15 years for foreign R&D expenses.

Large and small companies alike are affected by the change, but small businesses are hurt the most, Orn said.

“(Small businesses) are the ones who are swinging into profit where they thought they were like safely losing money and not ever going to pay taxes for a while,” Orn said. “And that’s why it’s such a big surprise for them. It’s hurting people, it’s like it’s a lot of money these companies don’t have.”

Avoid underpayment penalties

Yet another reason for small business owners to use a tax professional is the fact that underpaying will cost more this year. In the past, underpayment penalties hovered at around 3%, but this year they’re more than double at 8% . That’s because the penalties are based on the federal short term interest rate plus three points, said Danny Castro, Florida Market Tax Leader at BDO USA, part of BDO Global, a global accounting network.

“The cost of underpayment is as high as it’s been in a long time,” he said.

One credit to skip: the ERC

At one time, the pandemic-era Employee Retention Credit seemed like a boon for small businesses. Designed to help small businesses keep employees during pandemic-era shutdowns, the generous credit let businesses file amended tax returns to claim the credit.

But that led to a cottage industry of scammers trying to entice small businesses to help them file for the credit – for a fee – even if they didn’t qualify. The IRS has launched several initiatives to claw back some money improperly given to businesses. To date, the IRS said 500 taxpayers have given back $225 million via a voluntary disclosure program, which ended on March 22, that let small businesses who thought they received the credit in error give back the money and keep 20%. And 1,800 businesses have withdrawn unprocessed claims totaling $251 million.

Get organized, stay organized

The best thing small businesses can do to help their tax advisers file their taxes is stay organized. A shoe box full of receipts isn’t helpful when trying to file timely taxes. Owners should log receipts in an orderly database they can turn over to their adviser. And stay on top of quarterly estimated payments.

“(Small business owners) need to be able to keep accurate records throughout the year and not have to go back in April and go, gosh, what what was this receipt for,” said Occams Advisory’s Amber Kellogg, “Keeping those, accurate records is very, very important.”

This story has been corrected to show that BDO USA is part of BDO Global, not BBO Global.

Business planning startup Pigment raises $145M in rare French tech mega-round

Paris-based startup Pigment has raised a $145 million funding round just five years after its inception. The enterprise software company offers a business planning platform for large companies to visualize their past financial performance and forecast upcoming quarters.

This funding round comes as a bit of a surprise as large rounds have been few and far between in France. According to a recent study from EY , funding rounds in the French tech ecosystem were down 38% in 2023 compared to 2022.

But if you remove buzzy AI startups like Mistral AI and capital-intensive infrastructure plays that are not really tech startups, like EV charging networks (Driveco) and EV battery factories (Verkor), funding rounds are drastically down. Pure software startups have had a rough couple of years.

Pigment appears as an exception with its Series D. Existing investor Iconiq Growth is doubling down by leading this new funding round. Sandberg Bernthal Venture Partners, IVP, Meritech, Greenoaks and Felix Capital are also participating — many of them were existing investors too.

And there’s a reason why Pigment managed to raise so much at a significantly higher valuation less than a year after its previous funding round . In 2023, the startup managed to triple its revenue and double its customer base with well-known clients like Unilever, Datadog, Kayak and Merck. Half of Pigment’s clients are based in the U.S.

“Our current investors told us ‘if you’re going to raise money in 18 months to scale with others, we might as well offer you great terms right now for an internal round.’ And everything happened very quickly … In one week, it was a done deal,” co-founder and co-CEO Eléonore Crespo told me.

Before Pigment, Crespo worked for VC firm Index Ventures and Google. She co-founded Pigment with Romain Niccoli, who was the co-founder and CTO of adtech startup Criteo — an early success of the French tech ecosystem.

“IVP — one of our backers — benchmarks the growth rate of all SaaS companies. And since we’ve been selling our product, we’ve been in the top 5% of SaaS companies with the best growth rate ever, in terms of revenue growth,” Crespo said.

Image Credits: Pigment

Pigment is a flexible business planning tool that is used by chief financial officers and finance teams to create reports and budgets. It’s a modern SaaS platform, meaning that you can integrate it with all your company’s data (ERP, HRIS, data lakes, etc.) and use it as a collaboration tool.

In addition to finance teams, sales teams can use Pigment to create quotas and see how everyone is performing against quarterly quotas. HR teams can see how they should scale the workforce up and down based on strategic changes and financial objectives.

“We’ve done a lot of work to address other teams, not just finance teams. We’ve developed a lot of modules that enable us to serve HR teams, supply chain teams and sales teams,” Crespo said.

In fact, as more teams start using Pigment, it becomes an important tool for cross-team collaboration. And it’s supposed to work better than legacy tools from Oracle and SAP.

Like many software companies, Pigment has also added AI features. As Pigment acts as the central repository for all the important metrics of a company, customers can ask questions to Pigment AI in natural language to get a quick answer. Examples include “Can you give me a breakdown of revenue per country?” or “Why was our actual revenue lower than our forecast last quarter for this product?”

But more importantly, the company has optimized its core product so that it works well even with large datasets and complicated calculations. The best enterprise software products are must-have products, which means that companies usually don’t need to spend a lot of resources on improving the product — clients need this tool to operate. Pigment is still the challenger in this industry, so it believes it needs to provide a better product to compete with other business planning products.

The 2024 solar eclipse is next week! Here's everything you need to know.

The april 8, 2024 total solar eclipse will cross the united states, with millions of americans witnessing the spectacle. here's info on the eclipse's time, path, how to find glasses and more..

We are exactly one week from the April 8, 2024 solar eclipse that'll cross a wide swath of the United States, with an expected 34 million Americans witnessing the celestial show.

The 2024 solar eclipse will last longer than the one viewed  by more than 20 million people in August 2017 , and according to NASA won’t happen again  for another 20 years . Fifteen total solar eclipses have been recorded in the U.S. in the last 150 years, with the next one expected in August 2044 .

Even if you're not in the path of totality, like most of Michigan, you can still watch the spectacle. You will need special eclipse glasses to be able to take in the experience so you don't risk eye damage . Thankfully, there is still time to get your hands on a pair — or create your own eclipse viewer at home .

Here's everything to know about the April 8, 2024 solar eclipse.

What is a solar eclipse?

Solar eclipses occur when the moon passes directly between the sun and Earth’s orbits , creating an eclipse of Earth’s view of the sun. The term "eclipse" traces its roots to the Latin  “eclipsis,” drawn from the Greek  “ekleipsis.”

The  path of totality  is the predicted path of the eclipse; in this case, from Mexico, through the U.S. across Texas and North America to the coast of Newfoundland, Canada. States  in the path of totality  for the 2024 solar eclipse include Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine.

What is the 2024 solar eclipse path?

Use the map below to see NASA's prediction of the April 8 solar eclipse's path of totality. Keep in mind that this is a prediction, and predictions can vary, but they may only affect you if you're on the very edge of the path .

More: What is the meaning of the word 'eclipse'? Here is its origin ahead of April 8 event

When is the solar eclipse 2024? When does the solar eclipse start near me?

The 2024 solar eclipse is Monday, April 8, 2024. Its path of totality will cross the United States from approximately 2:27 p.m. to 3:35 p.m. Eastern time. That's when, if you're in the path, the sky will darken for several minutes and the air will get colder.

Use the ZIP code locator below to find out when the eclipse begins and ends in your area — and what it will look like. (Can't see it? Hit refresh.)

What time is the solar eclipse in Michigan?

Only one small sliver of Michigan is in the 2024 eclipse's path of totality, in southeastern Monroe County. That includes Luna Pier, which sits along Lake Erie, just north of Toledo. Its residents are getting excited , albeit a little concerned about potential traffic snarls.

Most of the rest of Michigan will see somewhere between 90-99% coverage of the sun , though it won't be visible to the naked eye; you'll need special glasses or a viewer (more on that later).

When is the solar eclipse in Detroit?

In Detroit, where there will be 99.4% coverage of the sun, the 2024 solar eclipse will begin at 1:58 p.m. and reach maximum totality, or coverage, around 3:14 p.m. It will conclude with a final partial eclipse at 4:27 p.m.

What is the April 8, 2024 weather forecast in Michigan?

Clear skies will be essential to viewing the eclipse, especially since most of Michigan doesn't fall in the path of totality.

As of Friday, the latest weather forecast for southeast Michigan shows potential cloud cover, but encouraging signs that it'll be clear enough to view the eclipse .  AccuWeather  predicts a high of 63 degrees in Detroit on April 8, with "variable cloudiness" and a chance of a shower in the morning.  Weather.com  also predicts partly cloudy skies and a high of 66 degrees.

If these predictions hold up, that would give eclipse viewers in southeast Michigan  a chance to see the eclipse at least somewhere within the 2.5-hour window, as long as the clouds break at any point. (But remember, it's Michigan; the weather forecast changes fast. Stay tuned to Freep.com for the latest.)

How to find 2024 solar eclipse glasses

First of all, make sure the eclipse glasses you're searching for are safe. According to  NASA's eclipse safety website , the agency does not recommend specific eyewear for eclipse viewing but  does  recommend glasses that come with an IOS compliance label, or standard, of 12312-2, on the packaging. The eyewear may also be labeled IOS 12312-2:2015. According to NASA, torn, scratched, or otherwise damaged eyewear should be discarded.

While local hardware and big box retailers may have eclipse eyewear on their shelves, buyer beware, especially if they claim to be endorsed by NASA. NASA does not make specific recommendations.

Here's where to find eclipse glasses :

• The American Astronomical Society  has a list of approved solar-eclipse glasses suppliers  here .  You'll be able to find eclipse glasses on  Amazon  in bulk; just ensure they are approved before you buy them. Here are more ideas on where to find free eclipse glasses .
• Warby Parker , the eyewear company,  is giving away eclipse eyewear at its stores beginning Monday , but does not have details about the availability of the free glasses at its locations. According to its website, the chain has six stores in Michigan: Grand Rapids, Novi, Troy, Ann Arbor, Detroit, and Birmingham.
• Check your local library: You also may be able to find free eclipse glasses at your local public library in Michigan, along with special programs. Check your library nearest you for details.
• Check these retailers: The American Astronomical Society says some locations of these retailers may sell eclipse glasses: Walmart, Lowe's, Menards, Kroger, Meijer and Staples.

Here's more information on how to safely view the eclipse . Also try the the American Astronomical Society's website  or to  NASA .

More: Michigan Science Center offers eclipse glasses for $2, plans viewing event at Ford House

Watch for eclipse glasses scams!

Please don't forget the scams. Consumers should exercise caution when buying eclipse-related experiences or goods, according to Melanie Duquesnel, president and CEO of BBB Serving Eastern Michigan and the Upper Peninsula.

So far, she said, the Michigan BBB has not received eclipse-related complaints or scam reports. Even so, you want to take extra care to avoid fake products, like counterfeit eclipse glasses, and rip-offs, like too good to be true deals for  special tickets  or deals on hotel rooms. Here's finance columnist Susan Tompor with more tips on avoiding eclipse glasses and hotel scams.

How to make your own eclipse viewer

Want to watch the eclipse without glasses? You don't necessarily need special glasses or filters, but it takes a little creativity and a handful to household supplies to make your own pinhole box or pinhole projector, also known as a pinhole camera.

Here's what to know, including step-by-step instructions , about building your own eclipse viewer.

Will the eclipse affect my pets? Will it affect other animals?

There are four things likely to happen to animal behavior during the April 8, 2024 eclipse, according to Erica Cartmill, professor of anthropology, animal behavior and cognitive science at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana:

• Animals won't do anything unusual.
• Animals will do evening behaviors. For example, if a dog is used to a bedtime treat, he may go to the kitchen to wait for it.
• Animals will display signs of increased anxiety such as scratching, yawning, circling and pacing or if they are animals that typically flock together, they will start grouping.
• Animals display unexpected behavior.

Here's more on what to know from reporter Jamie LaReau .

When is the next solar eclipse after 2024?

Not for another 20 years. According to NASA, after the total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024, the next total solar eclipse that can be seen from the contiguous U.S. will be on Aug. 23, 2044 . Here's how we're able to predict eclipses so far ahead of time.

It'll be much longer before another solar eclipse's path of totality crosses Michigan. The next solar eclipse to cross the state will be Sept. 14, 2099, when  the path of totality crosses the southwest Lower Peninsula .

Follow the Detroit Free Press on Instagram ( @detroitfreepress ), TikTok ( @detroitfreepress ), YouTube ( @DetroitFreePress ), Twitter/X ( @freep ), and LinkedIn , and like us on Facebook ( @detroitfreepress ).

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Trump's social media stock tumbles, erasing early gains

Scott Horsley

Stock in the parent company of Donald Trump's social media company fizzled on Monday, reversing last week's big gains. Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images hide caption

Stock in the parent company of Donald Trump's social media company fizzled on Monday, reversing last week's big gains.

Stock in the parent company of former president Donald Trump's social media platform fell sharply on Monday, erasing last week's market gains and shaving more than a billion dollars off the value of Trump's stake.

The drop came after a regulatory filing , in which the company — ticker symbol DJT — reported losing $58 million last year, on revenues of just over $4 million.

The platform, Truth Social, which Trump started after being kicked off Twitter (now known as X), has far fewer users than other social media outlets. And its heavy dependence on Trump's own posts make it vulnerable.

"The value of [Trump Media and Technology Group's] brand may diminish if the popularity of President Trump were to suffer," the company said in its filing. "To the extent users prefer a platform that is not associated with President Trump, TMTG's ability to attract users may decrease."

Some foreign-made cars might be delayed as auto companies figure out port deliveries

Despite Truth Social's financial losses, Trump loyalists eagerly snapped up shares in the parent company when trading began last week . The stock jumped more than 30% in its first two days on the market, making Trump's shares worth more than $5.2 billion.

Half a million California workers will get $20 minimum wage, starting today

That early enthusiasm didn't last. The stock fell more than 6% last Thursday and another 21% on Monday, reducing the value of the former president's stake to $3.8 billion.

That reduced sum could still come in handy for Trump, as he battles legal challenges and must post a bond of $175 million this week while appealing a civil fraud judgment in New York.

Trump can't sell his stock any time soon, though. Monday's filing confirmed that he and other insiders are barred from selling their shares for six months.

• truth social
• Donald Trump
• Stock market