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Episode 76: The Ins and Outs of Quarterly Planning
169 Plays5 years ago
Today I am joined by Creative at Heart conference host and founder, Kat Schmoyer. Kat is joining me on the podcast to talk about quarterly planning, a very timely discussion at the beginning of the year here. But it is important to remember that there is nothing special about January 1st, so regardless of when you are listening to this podcast episode, you can start planning at any point during the year; it is never too late.
Kat and I discuss everything from why quarterly planning, what sorts of things are looked at each quarter, who should be involved, how far in advance you should you plan, and setting yourself up for success so that you can actually execute the plan you lay out for yourself.
If you are interested in learning more about Kat and Creative at Heart, be sure to check out episode 6.
For the show notes, go to https://daveyandkrista.com/btb-kat-schmoyer-episode-76
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Transcript
Introduction to Quarterly Planning
00:00:05
Speaker
time is precious always but in that particular season it was super precious to me and I felt like I was spinning my wheels in my business and not seeing the priorities that I needed to focus on. So quarterly planning helped me zone in. It helped me figure out what revenue do I need to focus on and
00:00:23
Speaker
What marketing strategies do I need to focus on? I need to put my blinders on. I was getting disco ball syndrome, as my friend Megan Martin says. I'm looking at all these pretty shiny things and wanting to do everything. So quarterly planning just helps me focus in on exactly what I need to do and when I need to do it.
Guest Introduction: Kat Schmoyer
00:00:42
Speaker
Welcome to The Brands at Book Show, where we help creative service-based businesses build their brands and find more clients. I'm your host, Davy Jones.
00:00:54
Speaker
Today I am joined by Creative at Heart Conference host and founder, Kat Schmoyer. Kat's joining me on the podcast to talk about quarterly planning, a very timely discussion from the beginning of the year here, but it's important to remember that there's nothing special about January 1st. So regardless of when you're listening to this podcast episode, you can start planning at any point during the year. It's never too late.
Exploring Quarterly Planning Benefits
00:01:16
Speaker
Kat and I discuss everything from why quarterly planning, what sorts of things are looked at each quarter, who should be involved, how far in advance you should plan, and setting yourself up for success so that you actually execute the plan that you lay out for yourself. If you're interested in learning more about Kat and Creative at Heart, be sure to check out the show notes, and also be sure to check out episode six, where you can learn a little bit more about her entrepreneurial journey. Be sure to check out the show notes at daveyandchrista.com for the resources we mentioned during the episode, and I wanna hear from you.
00:01:45
Speaker
Let me know what kind of content you'd like to see on the Branson podcast as we move forward. To leave your feedback, head on over to the Davey and Krista Facebook page and send us a message, or you can send us a message on Instagram at Davey and Krista. Now onto the episode.
Creative at Heart Conference Overview
00:02:06
Speaker
All right, welcome back to another episode of the Brands at Books show. We have repeat guests now. Kat Schmoyer with us. Kat is the host and founder of the Creative at Heart Conference. There is a Creative at Heart Conference registration happening now that you have to check out. But like I said, Kat has been on the show before. If you're interested in learning more about her, you should go and check out her first episode and you can learn all about her entrepreneurial journey. But welcome back, Kat. Thank you. I'm so excited to be here. Thanks for having me back.
00:02:34
Speaker
Yeah, and so the first thing I want to chat about real quick, so today, just so our listeners know, we're going to be talking about quarterly planning, and how important just planning in general is for a business. And some of the pitfalls that go along with planning, I've definitely been guilty of doing this big planning day, writing all these notes down, and then those notes, never seen the light of day ever again. So I'm excited to tackle those things with you. But since creative heart round 10, round 10,
00:03:03
Speaker
Since that registration is happening now, tell us about it. What is it? How can people sign up and learn more about it? I'm so excited. It is our 10th one. We host an annual conference every year. So this conference is happening in June in North Carolina. We have an incredible lineup of educators. Like it sounds silly to say that when like, of course, they should be incredible.
00:03:24
Speaker
I have been dying to spill the beans about our Round 10 lineup specifically, so I'm so excited that it's out into the world and people can get all of the information about Round 10. And you guys can just head over to the website and get more information about the when, the where, who's gonna be there, all of that, and let us know if you have questions. We have a chat box right there on the website so we can live chat with you and get you registered.
00:03:47
Speaker
Awesome. And one thing that I love about creative at heart is the more intimate feeling of it. So it's still pretty big though. I mean, it's still over, there's over 100 people there. Correct. But at the same time, just the way that it's set up at the venue that you guys have been at, and you've been at this venue for the last few years, which is, you know, I think it's been a really good fit. But just in terms of way that the venue set up and everybody is staying at the same hotel. I mean, it's just, it feels like, you know, a lot of family time.
Conference Atmosphere and Sessions
00:04:14
Speaker
Yes, we love to say it's a big family. Like that's exactly what we want. So we have our main keynote sessions that, you know, can feel big because everybody, you get 180 people in one room. It's a lot of people, but then we also have our breakout sessions where it's workshop style. It's really hands-on. It's really specific to pain points in your business.
00:04:31
Speaker
We have over 40 educators. So there's a lot of content, whether it's heart centered, business centered, practical, there's so many different things. So you can pick and choose and really determine like what you want to get out of the experience too, which I love a lot about it.
00:04:47
Speaker
Well, I'm really excited. I'm going to be there alongside Krista. We're chatting about website related stuff. I think one of my business partners from Till Jesse Marchetta is going to be there. He's chatting about email marketing. Is that right? He is. You know all the things. Yeah. And you don't want to miss that for sure. So lots of great content. You also run and I should at least mention it, but we can talk about it a little bit more at the end. Creative 24 seven, which is a great membership site where you get a lot of the same
00:05:14
Speaker
type of high-quality content on a monthly basis. Anyways, if you're interested in learning more about that, head on over to the show notes. There'll be links to the Creative at Heart conference. There'll be links to Creative 24-7 and any other resources that we mentioned during this episode.
Personal Planning Strategies by Davy
00:05:29
Speaker
But now, let's talk quarterly planning. Kristin and I just did some quarterly planning. Typically, we don't do quarterly planning. It looks like sort of, I guess, twice a year planning.
00:05:44
Speaker
And it's kind of hit or miss in terms of we got a lot better i think at sitting down looking over some stuff taking notes in a way that you know we then create action items and you know are able to execute on those throughout the year but i think that there's still a lot of room for improvement there i think that when people sit down it can feel really overwhelming.
00:06:04
Speaker
There's just so many different aspects to business. Absolutely. I think for us too, I don't know if you'd agree with this, but there's also a lot of overlap, I think, when you're a solopreneur or a member of a small team, you're working from home with your personal life as well.
Flexibility in Business Strategies
00:06:19
Speaker
It's easy for some personal life goal setting to creep in and it's like, what should I focus on? We're going to dive all into that today. I guess we should start by just asking,
00:06:30
Speaker
What do you mean by quarterly planning? And in general, kind of what does that include? So I started quarterly planning about six years ago. I was about a year into starting my first business, which is a wedding planning company. And I felt like at that time, I was working a full time job and growing the business. So a time is precious always. But in that particular season, it was super precious to me. And I felt like I was spinning my wheels in my business and not seeing the priorities that I needed to focus on.
00:06:58
Speaker
So quarterly planning helped me zone in. It helped me figure out what revenue do I need to focus on? What marketing strategies do I need to focus on? I need to put my blinders on. I was getting disco ball syndrome as my friend Megan Martin says. I'm like looking at all these pretty shiny things and wanting to do everything. So quarterly planning just helps me focus in on exactly what I need to do and when I need to do it.
00:07:22
Speaker
So why do this on a quarterly basis as opposed to, you know, just on an annual basis, let's say. Yeah, it's for me, I feel like our businesses can change so much. I do think that the very first step of quarterly planning is to take a 365 day view.
Focus on Revenue in Planning
00:07:39
Speaker
Like we do need to have a general understanding of what the year as a whole is going to look like, which is why now's the perfect time because we're at the beginning of the year. So you're not too late.
00:07:49
Speaker
It's still time for you to look at all of 2020 and see what this could mean for your business. But by doing it by quarters, it then allows you to have flexibility and change as your business changes. I mean, y'all know we get an idea. We want to launch this new thing. It doesn't work. We start over again. Like it's so easy to just make those changes when it's quarterly versus creating
90-Day Goals and Procrastination
00:08:10
Speaker
something that feels concrete.
00:08:12
Speaker
for 12 months at a time. So yeah, things do change. I also think that that 90 day 90 days is a very actionable time period to set goals for right? 90 days doesn't feel so far out that it's like, okay, well, you can keep kicking things down the road, you know,
00:08:29
Speaker
And so, I think that's what, you know, as Chris and I sat down and really focused on quarterly planning this time around, it felt like we were putting more concrete plans together than, you know, oh, in September, we're going to do this when September feels like it's forever away.
00:08:46
Speaker
Absolutely. What kinds of things are you looking at within quarterly planning? So you had mentioned, you know, starting with sort of this bird's eye view
Aligning Content with Revenue Goals
00:08:55
Speaker
of the year. And I assume that revenue and finances are big in there. But what other kinds of buckets are included in quarterly planning? The first one I start with is revenue. Yes, we want to help people and we want to serve people really well. But we're also running profitable businesses, not glorified hobbies.
00:09:10
Speaker
So I strongly believe that it has to come from our revenue. We have to know what are the offers that I have in my business and how is that looking income wise? So are there specific offers that are bringing in more income for different quarters? So like Q1 for my business in particular is a very busy financial season for us. So other things are busy because that is coming in as a launch season for us. Q2 looks totally different.
00:09:38
Speaker
It's on the opposite side of the scale. So it's helpful for me to start with revenue. So I know what are my offers and I literally break it down by offer. So I just, you can pull up a Google doc, you can write it on a piece of paper. It doesn't have to be difficult. Just write out what are you offering in your business? How are you generating income and go ahead and give yourself goals for what 2020 as a whole should look like for each of those offers.
00:10:04
Speaker
And then once I have the financial part of it, then I break it into, okay, now quarterly, what does that look like? For us, as I'm going to say, the majority of y'all out there, we're not able to do this the easy way. Unfortunately, we're entrepreneurs, so things are seasonal. So it's not like you can say, well, I want to make.
00:10:20
Speaker
$40,000 this year, I'm just going to divide it by four. And that's what I want to bring in every single quarter. Like it doesn't work. We have booking season, we have launch season. So that's where it starts to get a little bit more strategic with planning your quarter. So once you know, okay, here's my overall goal for 2020. Now I want to break this down by quarter. What is happening in Q1? What is happening in Q2? What is happening in Q3? And you can go ahead and figure that out and at least get somewhat of a strategy in place as you're jumping into the year.
00:10:46
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. And I think if you're just starting out for the first time, I mean, this doesn't work so much if you're starting out for the first time. But if you have a year under your belt or two years under your belt at this point, or more, you can go back to last year's numbers and see month by month what has happened. And that's probably a good gauge to understand, okay, what should my goals be going forward for these quarters in terms of revenue? Yes, definitely.
00:11:09
Speaker
And so as you plan out each quarter, and you're looking at your offers, and I really like how it's offer driven, because I think one thing that I can overwhelm myself with is all of the things that I can do. But then once I start, you know, stripping things away that actually don't move the needle when it comes to dollars in the bank, right?
00:11:27
Speaker
All of a sudden things feel a lot more manageable and things are a lot more clear as well. So do you then go down to things like content and talk about what content looks on a quarterly or monthly? I do. So I'll start with the offers and then I personally like to pick one to two offers per quarter.
00:11:46
Speaker
I feel like we confuse our audience. So say you have six different revenue streams in your business. It can be really confusing for the people out there following you on Instagram, reading your email marketing. If you're talking about every single thing all the time. So I like to pick one to two priorities for each quarter. And that's what I'm focusing on. So then my content stems from, well, what are my priorities? I'm talking about coaching and I'm talking about our membership community. So these are the two things.
00:12:11
Speaker
that I want all of my content to point people towards and go towards that. So even things like email marketing, like my lead magnet for that specific quarter might focus on coaching because I know that that's what the offer is that I'm trying to drive home in the second quarter of the year or whatever it might be.
00:12:28
Speaker
do you have a certain and this is obviously going to be different by business. I mean, even in terms of the offers that you're focusing on, because some people out there might have pretty much the same offer all year long, which to a certain extent makes things really easy. I do 100% agree, though, that if you do have, let's say multiple courses, for instance, that you offer, it doesn't necessarily mean that you can't offer all of them all year. But if you're trying to talk about all five courses that you have, every time that you get on Instagram, or every time that you
00:12:55
Speaker
get on Facebook, it's going to be overwhelming. I don't think it's going to land as well if you're talking about one to two things. Do you have a general kind of framework for what kind of content you're creating on a quarterly basis? So it sounds like you have at least one lead magnet. Then are you primarily publishing things through blog posts? Or is it YouTube? What are those channels?
00:13:17
Speaker
In 2019, our channels were blog, YouTube, Instagram, and email marketing. Those are our channels. So that's what we're focusing on in 2020 as well. And similar to, I mean, you know, the whole disco ball syndrome, doing all the things. There's so many different options out there for what your marketing channels can be. So I do think it's helpful to pick.
00:13:37
Speaker
Where are your people? What are you saying on those channels? And then we try to make sure that they're being concise and cohesive. So YouTube is going to reflect similarly to what's on the blog in that quarter. Like I want it to feel like this is one umbrella. This is all working together. If somebody is at the YouTube channel, they're seeing similar things on the blog. They can see similar things on Insta story and it's all working well for whatever that offer is.
00:14:02
Speaker
Yeah, and I think that's a really wise way to go about it, just even in terms of like not being overwhelmed with having to create too much content, right? So if you're publishing a different blog post than what you posted to YouTube and what you're posting on Instagram, I mean, that's overwhelming. Yeah, you're creating four or five different pieces of content each week.
00:14:19
Speaker
So I think it is wise to do what Creative Hard is doing, which is really pushing out one core piece of content, it sounds like, and then disseminating that content through various channels. And it looks different, of course, like a written blog post versus something on YouTube. But if you've already done the YouTube video or you've already done the blog post, I assume that then appropriating it for Instagram or YouTube is a lot easier.
00:14:45
Speaker
Absolutely. And we have to remember, sure, we have some tribe followers, all of us in our brands. Like we have men and women who are likely seeing every single thing we're putting out there because they love our brands so much that when something new drops, like they're the first to listen or watch or read.
00:15:00
Speaker
but not everybody's doing that. So it's okay if it's a little bit overlapping on what's on YouTube, what's on the blog once an Insta story, because you're hitting people differently. Somebody who likes to read might not be the one who likes to watch it on YouTube or might not have been able to catch it on Insta story that day.
00:15:16
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. And I think one thing that I used to do more consistently, but we've been trying to get back to it is publishing a blog post and a podcast at the same time. And when I stopped doing that, I actually got emails and people saying, Hey, I used to love that you would you do this because I always listen to the podcast where I always read the blog post, you know, and even though we probably have our preferences in terms of how we share information,
00:15:40
Speaker
I think it is nice for people to be able to get the same piece of information, whether it's going to a blog post or whether it's going to a YouTube channel. So really appreciate that. What are some of the other things, I guess, too, just kind of along the lines of content, but I also want to talk just some of the other things that might be involved in quarterly planning.
00:15:59
Speaker
but you know kind of how you write this down in a way like how do you organize this information i know for christina it's easiest for us to pull up a google doc and then kind of put everything there and then actually go to the google calendar that devian christa uses as a business.
00:16:15
Speaker
and making sure that dates, launch dates, the titles of the podcast and blog posts and things like that that are going live are actually on the calendar so that not only that we do it, but that the rest of the team knows about it as well. So how do you organize this content in a way that you make sure it gets done?
00:16:32
Speaker
Yeah, I have a similar method, except I use Trello, and so I have a Google Doc. I know, I know. Trello is my jam. I love it so much. If you do, I will say if you used to have resources, and maybe you still do, you used to have resources on how you use Trello, too. Yes, and we do on our YouTube channel and on the blog for Creative at Heart. Yeah, you can find all of those.
00:16:52
Speaker
So Kat, I always joke around with Kat that I despise just the stain. Just I can't understand how anybody would use Trello, but I know it's a super popular tool. They also have a free option, right? It is free. Yeah, so it's free. So it doesn't, you know, you can't really beat that, right? So I'm gonna get back to letting you share how you do that. But if you want to probably get a little bit more in depth view of how Kat uses Trello, I'll make sure that I get the names of those posts that I can put them in the show notes.
00:17:19
Speaker
But go ahead. So I love Trello. I know David doesn't, but I do. So Trello is just really great for me. My brain literally thinks in the layout of Trello at this point. I've been using it for so long in our business and I'm able to create lists. So I'm able to do our quarterly plan. Again, we'll have our offers in there. We'll know what we're pushing for each quarter. And then I'm able to write things out, add checklist to things and tag our team and get our team in the loop. And then I go to Google calendar and I make sure
00:17:48
Speaker
You know, we're checking our launch dates. We're checking the content dates of when things are, you know, going live and being put out there. So I definitely use the two hand in hand. And I like that it is a virtual system that our team is able to look at, unable to pop in and change things. You know, again, we want to be flexible. So sometimes you're tweaking things even in that 90 day period and that's okay.
00:18:07
Speaker
I can easily have wiggle room and move things around as needed based on how the quarter is going. It's also great because it's so simple to be able to then reflect back on the quarter as you're moving forward to the next because it's right there available to you.
00:18:22
Speaker
Yeah, I really, I really like that concept. I do think and that's why I like Google Calendar so much is because I can just drag things into different places that I can easily modify stuff in a way that, you know, writing stuff down on paper, which is initially how I like to get stuff out, but just not as good for that kind of stuff, right?
00:18:38
Speaker
You do, if you are like me and you don't love Trello, we use ClickUp, which is similar to Asana. And then like I said, we use Google Calendar as well. So we talked about looking at revenue first or taking a bird's eye view of what the year looks like, looking at revenue and the offers that drive that revenue, focusing on, depending on your business, but focusing on one to two of those offers each quarter, and then creating content that drives people to those offers.
00:19:06
Speaker
Is there anything else that you're looking at on a quarterly basis as you sit down and do? And I say that understanding that that's a lot. What we just talked about, just sitting down and doing those things, that's a lot. But is there anything else that we should be focusing on on a quarterly basis?
00:19:22
Speaker
So there's two additional things I do want to bring up that I like to focus on every quarter. One, I actually, in order to get that work done to move the needle in each quarter is I have a day of the week. That's my like project management or AKA quarterly planning day.
00:19:38
Speaker
So yes, some of the things that you're doing for that quarter are content wise. So you might have another day where you batch your blog content or you're, you know, updating your Instagram posts and planly or whatever that might be. But sometimes we have things throughout the quarter that aren't maybe marketing driven that still need to get done. So like, for example, right now our business, we're moving our whole email marketing system over. So that's like a project that needs time and space to be able to do, but it is helping us with our quarterly plan.
00:20:05
Speaker
So for me, it's Thursdays. Every Thursday, I never take appointments. Well, you know, there are sometimes, but I try not to take appointments on Thursdays. And I know that this is my quarterly planning day. So I'm able to look back at that Trello board that has our quarterly plan. I'm able to look at our Google calendar and I'm able to just kind of maintain that bird's eye view on how things are going as well as continue to get started on those projects. So I love having one day a week where I can batch
00:20:34
Speaker
work for the quarterly plan projects. It's just helped me really feel like I'm checking them off the list.
00:20:39
Speaker
Awesome. So as far as that day goes, it is not the day where you're sitting down and doing the quarterly planning. This is something that you do to kind of maintain what you've planned. Correct. Yeah, to actually get the plan done. Awesome. I really like that. I tried to implement something similar towards the end of last year. I don't know if you've ever read the book Deep Work, Cal Newport. I need to it's literally sitting on my bookshelf. I got it off of Amazon and I haven't started yet.
00:21:06
Speaker
Honestly, I wish that this was like one of the first books I ever read when getting started in business. I just think it's that powerful. And yet I have not done a good job of kind of implementing what he preaches in that book. But I tried to do something similar where I took Wednesdays and I took no meetings, didn't look at Slack, didn't look at my email, and it was really just for
00:21:25
Speaker
deep work, you know, to get these sorts of things done. So yeah, that's as much as I have to say about that. If you look at my calendar this week, it's just like every day, you know, like five or six calls in the afternoon. And I'm still like batching stuff. But it's you know, here I am. I'm just making excuses at this point. So I mean, it happens we get so busy and batch work though is my favorite kind. And I feel the most productive on Thursdays. And it's one of those days like
00:21:49
Speaker
don't take a shower. I wear what I wore to bed the night before, you know, it's like, I don't know, I can literally just like do work, like do the work that I love to do. And I'm excited to do. And I don't have to worry about what other people, you know, need from me or might have like on their plate site then. So it's great. Yeah, for sure. And I need to get better that just turning off my email and realizing that most people don't need a response, you know, immediately, right, right, right.
00:22:11
Speaker
And I even have systems in place so that, you know, emails still be attended to that day if I didn't check it. But it's so easy, you know, if something were to come up, and this is my problem is something comes up and I'm like, all right, I'll just do it on Wednesday, because I have nothing that day, you know? And it's like, that's not what it's for. But anyways, enough about that. There was one other thing that you wanted to mention in terms of kind of what quarterly planning or an aspect of quarterly planning.
00:22:36
Speaker
Yes. So I am a goal setter. So that is, I feel like I should put that disclaimer out for everyone that for me, goal setting is very exciting and empowering. And I know not everyone is like that, but I do love to set goals. But one of the things I personally like about goals is I want something that is measurable that I can be able to look back on and know like, did this work? How did it work? What could I have done better if it didn't work? So for every quarter with our offers, we create a good, better, best goal.
00:23:06
Speaker
And this allows me to then at the end of the quarter, be able to reflect back and see like, okay, did we hit our good, better, best? I think that in our industry, it's so easy. I know I keep mentioning that like disco ball center, but it's so easy to just feel like we're not doing enough. And we're so distracted by the other opportunities that are out there or what other people are doing. So by having a good, better best, it allows me to numerically see in my business, did I hit good, better, best?
00:23:33
Speaker
which one did I hit? And how could I potentially do better next time with a similar offer or similar goals? Is the good, better, best goal setting? Is that primarily around revenue? Or is it? Yeah, it's typically revenue. Sometimes I will like kind of drive in some impact driven with that. So for example, if I have, I do coaching, so I'll coach women who are launching products.
00:23:57
Speaker
So I might say that I want to like my good, better, best is almost revenue goals for them too, because I want to see the impact that my coaching is having on their business. So I do think that it can be impact driven by typically start good, better, best with our revenue in the business for whatever offer. So if you have two offers that you're pushing, wedding photography and coaching, a good, better, best for wedding photography for the quarter and a good, better best for coaching.
00:24:22
Speaker
It could be booking though too. So like with wedding photography, you get the retainer and you don't get the final payment until closer to the wedding. So you could make your good, better, best. I want to book three, five or eight weddings. That's good, better, best three, five, eight. So you're not necessarily seeing all of that income in that quarter, but you know, it's coming. So you've done it by the booking. Our good is always bare minimum. Like what do we need to survive in terms of that offer? Like revenue wise, that's our good.
00:24:50
Speaker
our better is that extra profit. Like what do we want it to be? Like what is that additional profit we would like to bring in? And then our best is the scary one. It's, I like to make the one that's, okay, this might not happen, but I want to put it out there. I want to challenge myself and I want to see if I could hit that number.
00:25:06
Speaker
Yeah, I really like how it's not just a single number. It's not just like a, you know, there's this continuum. Also like how you set that up from, you know, bare minimum to survive all the way to a scary goal. And I'm sure there's a number of different ways that people can utilize some sort of sliding scale in terms of goal setting. So I don't know, you know, I could probably be better about
00:25:27
Speaker
being a goal setter, you know, I would say that I'm more like systems oriented. Now, don't get me wrong. The other thing that I wanted to say as well is I do think that there's probably a lot of value in your goals typically being revenue driven, you know, I'm sure and I like how you mix in some impact stuff for sure, because it's not I don't want to come off as saying it's all about the bottom line, right? Right.
00:25:47
Speaker
it is a very measurable number and at the end of the day, it is ultimately what pays our mortgage and puts food on the table. Absolutely, yes. It's like putting that CEO hat on and saying, well, I am providing for my whole family, so I need to have revenue goals and know what's coming in and what's going out.
00:26:03
Speaker
And there's a great trickle-down effect I think from you starting with revenue and then looking at your offers and looking at your content because I think it probably cuts out a lot of the extra fluff that could potentially be created. And then in addition to that, it does keep you very
00:26:18
Speaker
centered on actually achieving your goals and executing your plan. So big fan of all that. I would say that for me, I'm typically trying to look at systems that we can improve, you know, versus goals. Again, you know, I think it's probably a distinction without the difference though. So
00:26:34
Speaker
I do have a number of other questions though about quarterly planning. First, how far in advance that you plan the quarter? For Krista and I, what we – and I think that this was kind of one of the aha moments and I hesitate saying this live because I feel like it's embarrassing that it took me this long to have this aha moment. But planning January 1st through March 1 or whatever or the end of March rather, the time to do that is not on January 1st, right?
00:27:01
Speaker
And I think that's part of the problem is that assigning kind of a undue weight to January 1, like you can goal set any time of the year, you know, so if you're listening to this podcast, and it's the middle of the year, this still applies to you just, you know, or it still can apply to you, it doesn't mean you have to wait for the new year to get started. And I think I was kind of in that mindset, well, you know, it's not January 1, so it's a why not set goal, you know, or whatever.
00:27:24
Speaker
Out of sight, out of mind, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So we have a plan to do our quarterly planning at least a month in advance of the next quarter, right? But I would love to hear about how you, you know, organize your year. So you're sitting down at some point, I assume during Q1 to start planning for Q2.
00:27:41
Speaker
So again, with starting with that 365 debut, to me, that's super important. So whether you are jumping in in July, then look at the last half of the year, like start right then and look at July through December with your business. So right now I know the offers that we're pushing every single quarter. I don't have all the nitty gritty details and flushing out through content and all those things, but I do have a general idea. Is there room for flexibility? Yes, because I don't want to go so concrete and have every single thing planned out.
00:28:11
Speaker
I can't make changes but right now I do know what's happening in terms of the big picture things in every quarter of 2020. So then what I like to do is similarly to what you all are doing typically about like 20 to 30 days before the end of the quarter is when I start looking at the next quarter in terms of nitty gritty details. I like this because I'm also able to start looking back
00:28:35
Speaker
typically a launch has already occurred or you're hopefully already bringing in revenue for the quarter that you're currently in. So I can start to evaluate the good, better, best, even before the quarter ends and have a better handle on that as I'm moving into the next quarter.
00:28:50
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. And just as far as evaluating stuff on a daily, weekly, or monthly, quarterly basis, most financial dashboards have some sort of filtering option where you can look at what you're doing, let's say, this month compared to what you're doing the same time last year, right? And you can set those up. I think, for instance, in Stripe, I think it's default to set to compare to your last period, which is typically 30 days. But you can set it up however you'd like.
00:29:15
Speaker
Again, just for people out there kind of wondering how they can do this. So if you're using Stripe, it's easy. PayPal is easy. Wave apps for those of you who use Wave. I'm sure QuickBooks has probably something similar as well. It does. In terms of who should be there because we both work with teams as well. We both work very closely with our spouse. Yes. So I guess what do you like to do kind of on your own versus what do you like to kind of loop your team in on? How do you balance those sorts of things?
00:29:42
Speaker
This might sound a little conceited, I guess, but I am the quarterly planner of the business and that's works for us. Like I will sit down solo and I'm like, yes, we'll reflect back together in like various team meetings, you know, and things like that in terms of like looking back on the last quarter, but I will assess and make what I feel like is the most strategic plan for the next quarter. And then basically present it to the team. It's kind of like, okay guys, this is what we're doing.
00:30:08
Speaker
I presented to my husband first. And then I move on to other team members after he and I have been able to talk through some of the more strategic aspects of the plan. Yeah, absolutely. I think there's a lot of value in that. You know, anytime you're working with a team, I was talking with a friend of mine who does church planning, and he was talking about he was sharing, basically, if you don't sit down and determine the direction, then if you sit down with too many people to try and do that, then maybe the direction takes a different shape than what it ought to.
00:30:35
Speaker
so as far as sitting down and doing that planning process so for us it was Kristen I sitting down and doing that and then you know kind of sharing the bones of that with our team and then at that point just as soon as the ship has a direction you know people are able to chime in and contribute and
00:30:52
Speaker
come up with ideas on how we can reach those goals or get to where we want to go. But as far as like the environment you create in order to do quarterly planning, does it kind of look like just your typical, you know, Thursday where it's, you know, you wake up, you go shut yourself in a room and and get to work? Or do you like to get out of the office? What does that look like?
00:31:11
Speaker
It usually does just look like a typical day for me and it's a similar like I make sure there aren't appointments that day like it's a sacred time so I know that when I'm jumping into work it's just jumping right into all of those details. I make sure that the team is aware that that day is happening so you know my Trello isn't going off I'm not getting all these notifications and feeling like I need to stop this vision casting and jump into the nitty gritty details of current day business and that's been really helpful to
00:31:40
Speaker
again, put my blinders on and unless something's on fire, they can handle it and they don't need to clue me in for the time that I'm doing that. Yeah, absolutely. I found it's when I was doing a better job of taking Wednesdays and doing deep work, I found that it was really helpful for me to get out of the house for at least part of the day. So of course, since pretty much my entire life revolves around food, I go to my favorite deli, which it's like a deli that's not set up for work either, you know, but I go there anyways.
00:32:10
Speaker
They're like, why is that guy on his laptop over there? Yeah, you know, I mean, they do have like tables and people just like kind of sipping coffee and reading books and stuff like that. And I think this is intentional. I haven't asked obviously, but no outlets everywhere. So like, or anywhere. So if your computer dies, you know, let's, it's time to move on to other stuff.
00:32:27
Speaker
But I do find it helpful to get out of the house, put on real clothes, you know, because a lot of times I'm just you know, I'm wearing sweats or just kind of lounging around. So I really do find it helpful kind of changing up my environment and getting myself into a into a different place. I think that probably the most important thing for people is just if you know that you're going to sit at home and turn on the TV or right and get distracted and not actually do it.
00:32:52
Speaker
Yeah, just kind of like all of a sudden, you know, you find Facebook's up or whatever. It's probably best to change that setting, you know, and potentially loop somebody else in even if you're it's another business owner, I think. And you all can sit together silently, but at least you could hold each other accountable in terms of actually getting some planning done. I love to do that for when I'm planning at the beginning for the whole year, when I'm doing that bird's eye view and looking at everything kind of looking back at the last year.
00:33:19
Speaker
the last couple of years I've done that with friends. So it's been, we've somehow scheduling it's worked out where we've been together at the end of November, you know, kind of close to the end of the year. So we blocked off that time. I am a verbal processor too. So it's nice to have other business women to be able to bounce those ideas off of right then come home, have more of those conversations with Matt. Like to me, the year plan can take a little bit long. You know, it's almost like several days and like multiple little conversations here and there as I'm processing through.
00:33:47
Speaker
what I want it to look like and we're speaking with our business coach and we're really trying to look at all of the different variables that we need to look at and not just like on a whim, like slapping things up on the calendar and like calling it a day. So that definitely to me takes a little bit more time and I like to be much more involved with other people when I'm doing that.
00:34:06
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. We did something similar I think two years ago. We met with mutual friends of ours, Ryan and Anna. And it was nice because it was somebody who's outside. I mean, we're all in a similar industry, but we're all doing pretty different things within that industry. So it's nice having somebody speak into your business that has a completely outside perspective.
00:34:25
Speaker
Yeah, to kind of call out like, hey, you know, why are you doing this? Or have you ever thought about doing something like this? Because it's maybe a pain point they feel around website design that we would just never guess because we're website designers, you know? Yeah, exactly. So it's just it was super helpful doing something like that. And again, you know, for people who
00:34:44
Speaker
work from home or work, you know, as sole preneers or small teams, it's nice just to get out and be with other people and have sort of a more office collaborative setting once in a while. So a good excuse to do that. Before we wrap up here, is there anything else quarterly planning wise that I have just I should have asked? No, thanks. So no, I know. I'm like, what did we not talk about? No, I feel like this. I hope it was helpful for those of y'all listening to just
00:35:11
Speaker
I want to encourage you to do it. Like to not feel like, Oh, I don't like it is already July or I'm so busy with X, Y, and Z. Like at least put together some sort of, even if it's a loose framework, like it doesn't, again, we're not saying it needs to be this concrete thing. And if you don't measure up to it, you failed at your quarterly plan. Like you're the boss. So you can switch it up however you need to, but just starting with that revenue and understanding what you're doing and why you're doing it.
00:35:38
Speaker
I think will really help you not feel like a hamster on a wheel that just keeps going and going and isn't actually going anywhere, but you'll start moving and seeing hopefully revenue increase in your business as well as just additional opportunities coming your way.
00:35:53
Speaker
Yeah, and I think something that Krista and I have found is that it doesn't take or doesn't have to take as much time as maybe we assume it has to. I mean, remember, you're the boss, right? So you as a business owner can make that decision on how much time you want to allocate for this. But Krista and I took a couple hours, you know, instead of putting aside a whole day and putting our pressure on ourselves to fill that whole day, you know, it was something like two hours sat down,
00:36:14
Speaker
got a lot done and then just walked away with action items on who's going to be responsible for what and who's going to put this up on the calendar and whatever. That was what was needed for a quarter. If you are asking yourself right now, like, I just don't have the time for this, you probably can make the time for it and it probably doesn't have to be this massive event.
00:36:36
Speaker
And I think that if you do something similar to what Kat was talking about, making time on a weekly or biweekly basis to actually sit down and dedicate your time to making sure that you're implementing whatever objectives that you laid out for yourself, it's going to feel a lot more manageable than maybe just taking a day once a quarter or taking a day once every six months. So break it down how you need it to be, make it look like what you need it to be. I think the important thing is just that they are written down and they are somewhere and that you have thought about them.
00:37:06
Speaker
Yes, absolutely. Even if you don't have a team, I started doing this before I had a team. So I was quarterly planning and delegating to myself, but it still allowed me to understand like what I need to do and how I need to do it. So even if
00:37:19
Speaker
It's going to set you up for better success as your business grows and you potentially bring on team members if you have a system in place that allows you to know the strategy and what you're doing every quarter. I mean, there's just so much research out there too in the value of actually writing things like goals down. There's something about that that makes it more likely to achieve those things. So it really doesn't matter whether you're a sole prettier or whether you're working as part of a smaller large team,
00:37:43
Speaker
you want to get those things written down, you want to make a measurable because it's going to make it much more likely for those things to happen. And I think that just in general, something that I've learned certainly over the past year is that, you know, do things that will make it easier to scale down the road. Yeah, even if it feels like kind of a weird thing to do in a one person business, record systems, things like that, because as you grow, you're going to have those things in place and it's going to make it easier for you to grow. Anyways,
00:38:11
Speaker
We have, I do want to mention real quick, Creative 24-7. Also, remember, registration is happening right now for Creative at Heart. It was such a great conference. I've met some of my best friends at Creative, Matt, Kat's husband included. So, I mean, it really is such a wonderful conference and environment, both just from the community aspect of things and the education that
00:38:33
Speaker
you'll get. So check the show notes for links to that sort of stuff. But Kat, real quick, tell us a little bit more about Creative 24-7. When things like registration opens for that, how people can learn more and sign up. Creative 24-7 is our membership community. Davey is actually our educator for the month of March, which is awesome. So that will be coming up. If you like listening to him on the podcast, you would potentially like listening to him as an educator in the community. Potentially. Potentially.
00:39:03
Speaker
Creative 24 seven was basically my way of wanting to continue what we do at the conference on a daily basis, but so much easier for y'all because it's digital. You can log into our membership community and have access to over 20 hours of content from top notch educators on a wide variety of topics from business to marketing to growth. We didn't want to niche down and just do one pain point in business. We want to try to help you with a wide variety.
00:39:28
Speaker
of business pain points that you are dealing with. We also have an exclusive Facebook community where you get Facebook live Q and A's with the monthly educators, office hours with myself every month. So we've got a lot happening inside of our community and are loving it a lot.
00:39:43
Speaker
registration will open up again actually the very beginning of March. So you would be able to jump in in time to hear Davey as our March educator. Awesome. And in March, I'm talking about paid advertising. So that's something I think the principles that I'll talk about can apply to really any industry. And then I think, correct me if I'm wrong, I've contributed content on SEO in the past. And I think that's part of like a vault that you get access to just by signing up, right? It is.
00:40:10
Speaker
Awesome. And that's just the stuff for me. There are I mean, I know Nancy Ray was in there earlier this year, right? I mean, there's just so many great educators that are contributing content to 24 seven. So be sure to check out that all of that. Plus, hopefully some sort of download around quarterly planning will be available in the show notes. So check out that cat. Thanks for joining me again on the podcast will of course have to have you on again. But hopefully you'll get to see us all at creative at heart this year. Yes, it was so fun. Thank you for having me, baby.
00:40:42
Speaker
Thanks for tuning into the Brands That Book Show. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider subscribing and leaving a review in iTunes. For show notes and other resources, head on over to dvandchrista.com.