Three Steps to Business Success in 2009

In 2009, my wife Jill and I launched a business that is, so far, surpassing our expectations. Here are three of the main factors that contributed to our success in 2009…

1. Commitment
Early this year (May) I was laid off from my 9-5 job. I had two choices at that point; go look for a job or start a business to make enough money to support my family. After much prayer and discussion with my wife, we decided to start our own business. Prior to being laid off I had been creating websites and marketing them in my spare time, but I never COMMITTED to making my business a success. I always had my 9-5 job to fall back on for money, which kept me from ever totally committing to the business.

All of the people I have known who have had a successful business online have committed to it. Many of them even quit their jobs before starting their business because they understood the importance of commitment. While I don’t recommend you leave your job, I do recommend that you commit yourself to making your business successful. Without commitment it will likely fail. Set some hard deadlines and stick to them.

2. Focus
I have talked about the importance of focus before (see this post). Until I focused on making money with one business (our web marketing and design business), success was elusive.

Now that my wife and I are running a successful business I don’t want to lose focus on that business or it might stop growing. Focus is one of the biggest factors in our success this year and it will continue to be one of the biggest factors in our ongoing success.

3. Time Management
Changing the way I managed my time has made a huge difference in my productivity. Now that I only check my email after I have completed 2 hours worth of important work, my productivity has greatly increased. I learned this and other techniques from various sources, including a very good book on the topic. If you are looking for great time management tips without spending a ton of money, I highly recommend the book, “Getting Things Done”, by David Allen. You can buy a copy at most bookstores or check it out for free at your local library.

One of the other things I did to improve my time management is to create a daily and weekly todo list. I manage the todo list with a very simple free online tool called Voo2Do. At the beginning of each week I create a new todo list with the highest priority items being done earliest in the week to make sure that they get done. In my case, that means that marketing tasks for our clients are done at the beginning of the week. You can also organize your days that way, with the highest priority items being done first and your less high priority items (like checking email) coming later in the day. I also leave some space towards the end of the week for those tasks that get bumped down the priority list by things that required immediate attention, like proposals for clients. Making good use of your time makes a big difference in your business success.

Now, there was a fourth factor that both Jill and I consider to be a bigger factor than any other factor… our belief in God. While everyone may not embrace this view, I do believe that prayer played an important role in our success.

Those were the three things that I did to have a successful 2009, what were the things you did to improve your business?

PS. This post was part of a my friend Daniel’s writing project (Daniel is one of those people I knew who quit his job before starting an online business). You can read all about his project by clicking here.

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