2012/07/02

Another business plan alternative: your calendar - Small Biz Survival

Another business plan alternative: your calendar

Posted: 02 Jul 2012 04:21 AM PDT

Reader Carrie Bodeman at As Good As New sent this alternative to traditional business planning. You might like it too. --Becky

Sometimes you have to look back to see forward.

We keep a daily log of all activity so I can look back several years at a glance. We print out a blank calendar and each day fill in our gross sales, discounts, how many customers were in that day, weather and anything else that might affect that days sales. I highlight days that we put a promotion on (mailer, facebook promo, email etc) I total each week and month and also total all Mondays, Tues etc to see how we compare year to year. I calculate total sales by customers and see our average sale for the week/month. It makes you look at a customer different when you see that person walking in the door is worth $40 or whatever!

It's amazing how accurate it is in forecasting sales. I staple all Jan calendars together, Feb calendars together etc. from each year. If I see a week that has been historically slow, I try to figure out why and fix it! We've been lucky to have consistently higher sales each year in the 9 years we've been open!

Start a Calendar today!!!!

Thanks, Carrie!

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