119: Think Differently About Sales Whether You Are Starting A Business Or Side Hustle
119: Think Differently About Sales Whether You Are Starting A Business Or Side Hustle, A Solopreneur, Entrepreneur, Mompreneur, Freelancer, Bookkeeper, Virtual Assistant, Business Owner, Or Self-Employed
With the start of the new year, do you feel discouraged when you look at your sales figures for the year? I understand how easily this can happen when you consistently think you are starting the year out with zero sales and you have a huge mountain to climb to get your sales to where you want them to be. In today’s podcast episode, I’m letting you in on a little secret to avoid that discouragement altogether. It’s a new way to think about your sales. It will create a positive mindset that will have you bringing in additional sales before you know it. My goal with this podcast episode is to help you feel more at ease with your sales figures when starting out the year and help you be more productive while moving forward this year. After all, if you are like most business owners, your goal is to continuously increase your sales numbers, inspire more customers with the products and services you provide, and fulfill your goals. Whether you are starting a business or side hustle, you’re a self-employed individual, a solopreneur, entrepreneur, mompreneur, freelancer, small business owner, a remote, virtual, online, or in-house bookkeeper, or a virtual assistant or VA; I want you to incorporate this simple yet resourceful way to think about and monitor your sales not only at the beginning of the year but throughout the year as well. These tips are essential whether you are using a computerized software system like QuickBooks, Xero, Wave, or FreshBooks for your business finances; or doing your bookkeeping manually with an Excel spreadsheet or even a Google Document…
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Show Notes:
With the start of the new year, do you feel discouraged when you look at your sales figures for the year? I understand how easily this can happen when you consistently think you are starting the year out with zero sales and you have a huge mountain to climb to get your sales to where you want them to be. In today’s podcast episode, I’m letting you in on a little secret to avoid that discouragement altogether. It’s a new way to think about your sales. It will create a positive mindset that will have you bringing in additional sales before you know it. My goal with this podcast episode is to help you feel more at ease with your sales figures when starting out the year and help you be more productive while moving forward this year. After all, if you are like most business owners, your goal is to continuously increase your sales numbers, inspire more customers with the products and services you provide, and fulfill your goals. Whether you are starting a business or side hustle, you’re a self-employed individual, a solopreneur, entrepreneur, mompreneur, freelancer, small business owner, a remote, virtual, online, or in-house bookkeeper, or a virtual assistant or VA; I want you to incorporate this simple yet resourceful way to think about and monitor your sales not only at the beginning of the year but throughout the year as well. These tips are essential whether you are using a computerized software system like QuickBooks, Xero, Wave, or FreshBooks for your business finances; or doing your bookkeeping manually with an Excel spreadsheet or even a Google Document…
Welcome Back…Looking at your sales or revenue reports in a year-to-date format when starting out the year can be somewhat discouraging, but you know as well as I do that each year has to start out this way. Utilizing a year-to-date report is how most business owners look at their sales. But what if I told you that there was another way that you could look at your sales that would help you to have a more positive outlook and could potentially help you to even grow your sales without having those feelings of discouragement, overwhelm, and doubt? What have you felt when looking at your year-to-date sales this year? Are you ready to be resourceful and create another way to review your sales so that you can be inspired and ready to take on this year?
Although you’ve heard me talk about making sure you are watching your profit and loss report or income statement on a year-to-date basis so that you know exactly how you are sitting when it comes to filing your tax return, I want you to know that the process I am going to talk about today is NOT a system you want to use when you are estimating your taxable income. This is another tool you can use to help you build confidence in your business without the feeling of starting the year with zero sales.
All right, so this system of looking at your sales differently is to take a look at your sales on a rolling or trailing twelve-month report. When you do this, you are consistently looking at your total sales for the last twelve months. You are never starting over at zero, and you never have to feel nervous or uneasy about having zero sales at one time in your business. Numbers don’t lie, and this is just another tool you can use in your business to keep you motivated and take a look at your sales numbers from a different angle.
If you are using a computerized software system like QuickBooks Desktop or QuickBooks Online, and you have all of your information up to date, you can easily generate reports to view. And you know, I’m going to say, this is just another reason why keeping your bookkeeping up to date is so important. There are so many reasons to have your bookkeeping up to date that I talk about on this podcast, but having reliable and up-to-date information at your fingertips is so essential for your business and the decisions you make for your business. So, getting back to generating those reports. If you are using QuickBooks, you can simply select the profit and loss report and change the dates to reflect the last twelve months you need to look at. You can also run a comparative report for the prior twelve-month period as well, and you can customize the report by selecting the dollar amount of change as well as the percentage of change in this report. It’s a super simple report you can use that you’ve been using all along to take a different approach to viewing your sales numbers. You can even memorize the report once you’ve created it so that it is as easy as a click of a button to get your report the next month. If you are using a manual way to do your bookkeeping, you can do this same process of creating your twelve-month rolling revenue report by calculating your sales for each month and then adding the last twelve months together to get your total rolling sales.
I like to utilize this system for viewing sales, especially when I am working with a business that is seasonal. If your business has a peak season in the spring or any other time of the year for that matter, it can be hard to look at your sales numbers in January, February, and March, but if you take that same business and view their sales on a rolling twelve months, you don’t see those months with dips in revenue, you see the twelve months as a whole. It smooths out your month-to-month numbers but always measures the same duration. It always includes your year-end as well as any increases or decreases in sales throughout those twelve months.
Once you have your numbers, you might be asking what you should do with them next. My answer is to analyze your trends. You can do this with the total gross amount you have over your rolling twelve months, or you could take that total gross amount and get an average by dividing the total sales by the number of months. Either way, you have a number you can start tracking. Most of the clients I work with like to see that total sales number. They are using this to see when they reach their first twenty-five thousand, fifty thousand, one hundred thousand, five hundred thousand, or even one million dollars in revenue in a twelve-month period. It doesn’t matter which level you are at, you are setting your own goals, and you can watch this number keep trending towards your goal, reaching your goal, and surpassing your goal as you create more courageous and focused goals for the future. This is what keeps you motivated throughout the year and not discouraged from starting at zero again.
As you are analyzing your numbers, make it visual. Many of you have a vision board, and you know how this helps you to see your future. Do this same process with your trending twelve-month rolling sales figures. You’ll be able to visualize and watch as your numbers trend higher and higher. Your goals will be easy to visualize when you have them plotted out, which will allow you to make celebrating your achievements inevitable when you reach them. When you analyze your numbers, view your trends. Are they trending upward, or are you seeing a dip? Ask yourself questions when analyzing your information, like who are your best customers. Where are your leads coming from? Make sure you are tracking your leads because this information is what will drive your sales growth. Are you on track to meet your goals? If there is an increase or decrease in your trend, ask yourself why? If you are seeing more leads, again, ask yourself why and where they are coming from. Use this data and information to provide a plan for how you can improve your sales and what you can continue to do to achieve your sales goals. This data will not only help you optimize your sales process but your growth strategy as well.
When I work with my clients, we use their twelve-month rolling sales figures to help motivate them to do more in their business. They see where their business is going. They see how their business is growing month by month by viewing the trends they are seeing. They use this as fuel to keep moving forward and not stop in their tracks and feel hopeless when they are starting the new year with zero sales. They know they need to keep their eye on their goals and keep taking baby steps or milestones toward achieving them. If you are ready to start seeing what’s possible in your business as well as what you need to do to achieve your vision and goals, you can sign up for a free consultation session with me by going to www.FinancialAdventure.com and clicking on the work with me button. I enjoy hearing how the tips I recommend in this podcast are helping you in your business. If you could take a minute and let me know just how much you see a difference in how you view your sales in this new year with the rolling twelve-month sales report, go to my website and send me a quick email. I’m really looking forward to hearing from you soon.
And, you know I’m going to ask…what’s at least one thing you will take away from this episode that will help your business succeed and grow your bottom line? If you need some accountability, join our PRIVATE Facebook community and post your action item, we’d love to support you.
