313. Your Quarterly Planning Blueprint: Do Less, Achieve More

t’s one thing to dream up big goals for your business, but it’s a whole other thing to break those goals down into bite-sized, actionable steps you can actually accomplish without losing your mind. One of the most common traps entrepreneurs fall into—myself included—is overestimating what we can realistically get done in a week, month, or even a year.

Spoiler alert: you’re probably trying to do way too much. That’s why today we’re diving into how to map out your goals over the year in a way that makes sense for your bandwidth, aligns with your business priorities, and sets you up for sustainable success. Ready to do less, focus more, and actually see results? Let’s get into it.

PREFER TO LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE? CLICK HERE

Breaking Your Goals Out Over the Year

Now that you have a handle on your goals, it’s time to map out your year. 

When it comes to making plans, and to-do lists if there’s one thing that’s common across every entrepreneur I know and every CEO I’ve ever worked for it’s that they can be a little unrealistic about what can actually get done in any given period of time. My last boss, was one of my favorite bosses ever—and I would work for him again in a heartbeat. But his biggest flaw was not having a full grasp on how long some things take to complete. I try not to hold it against him though, because pretty much every human is guilty of that. 

One of the biggest unlocks my Lounge members have is when they’re going through the playbook and I tell them they have to choose max 1-3 goals for the year, quarter, month, etc. Of cours, the monthly goals should lead them to the quarterly goals, and the quarterly goals should lead them to their yearly goals. 

But in every case, it’s a max of 3-ish goals. The way I word it to them is, “If I only accomplished these 3 things in my business I’d be happy” I can’t take credit for that positioning, I swiped it from the productivity planner, but the concept is an important one because it forces you to prioritize what is truly important in your business. 

The most common response I get is, no wonder I’m always so overwhelmed, I’m trying to do too much. The truth is, most of us are. And when we get really specific, and focus on doing fewer things better, we’ll make more progress. 

Recently a lounge member posted in the group that in September she saw YOY growth of 40% in revenue, 56% in gross profit, 12% in AOV and a 19% decrease in customer return rate. Real quick, I know a decrease in customer return rate sounds bad, but in her case it was a good thing. She’s been at much higher than the benchmark meaning she didn’t have enough new customers so this decrease while still hitting benchmarks for repeat customers is actually a huge win. 

What did she do to realize this growth? At the beginning of 2024 she went through the yearly planner and made the somewhat counterintuitive decision to let social media fall by the wayside. As a one-woman show, to make the progress she wanted to make, something had to give. And social media was it. Instead, she focused on SEO, updating her email automations, and improving her product photography. She posted all of 5 times on social in 2024 and she she still saw tremendous growth in her business. 

I promise you… doing less will actually make you more money. You might not realize those gains in the short term, especially if what you’re working on takes time to make a measurable impact, for example SEO. But those gains will snowball and start to compound bringing you results you might not have 

As you sit down to start mapping out what the rest of the year will look like for your business, I want you to be super intentional about what you’re going to focus on. Let the data drive your decisions, and don’t be afraid to say no to some things. 

Make sure everything you put down on that to-do list is ultimately designed to get you where you’re trying to go. 

How to Decide When to Do What

You’ll also want to make sure you’re intentional about when you’re going to work on what so that it lines up with when it can be most impactful for your business. 

For example, because SEO takes time to catch traction, 3-6 months at a minimum, it makes sense to do this earlier in the year so you can hopefully see some of the benefits in Q4. 

Want to be featured in Holiday Gift Guides this year? Well, you’ll need to start sending your pitches in June/July. Anything you need to do to be pitch ready, for example, updating photos, identifying who you’re going to reach out to, etc. You’ll want to make sure you have that penciled in for Q2.

How about your email automations? If you know they need a refresh, this is something you’ll want to do sooner rather than later as well so they’re optimized for all your marketing initiatives moving forward.

Ultimately, as you work your way through your planning for the year, by the time you get to Q4, you shouldn’t have anything on your to-do list other than what it takes to show up and market your business during Q4. 

Science-Backed Goal Setting

Once you’ve got your big goals mapped out, then it’s time to get into the nitty-gritty and create the to-do list for each of your projects. 

You don’t have to go through this process for your entire yearly plan, but you should try and do this a quarter at a time. 

When it comes to creating this to-do list I want you to get as granular as possible. The smaller and more focused each action step, the easier it will be to make progress and accomplish your goal. 

This concept is backed by science, too. Every time you knock out one of those tasks, you’ll get a dopamine hit that rewards you for that win which will keep you excited to keep moving forward. 

I talk more about this in episode 41 – setting and accomplishing goals like a badass. If this is something you struggle with, I recommend you take a listen. 

Your Next Steps

Alright, so what are your next steps? 

First, if you skipped any of the episodes in this mini-series, please go back and listen to them from the beginning. Take action after each episode vs. binge-listening to them. 

At this stage in the game, it’s time to map out what you’re going to focus on for each month. Lounge members, you already have a sheet for this in your Yearly Ops & Marketing playbook, it’s the tab called Year at a Glance. 

Going back to the Holiday Gift Guide example, you might say in April you’re going to do a photoshoot for the products you plan on pitching. In May you’re going to do the research for the publications you want to pitch. In June you’re going to send the actual pitches. 

Once you’ve got that high-level plan mapped out, then you go into the nitty-gritty to-do list for each of your goals in Q1. Remember, that’s where you want to get really specific about every little task you need to complete so you can build momentum and get those dopamine hits as you check off your to-do list. 

As we move through the year, you’ll want to check in on those goals every month and every quarter to make sure you’re still on track. If life happens or something throws you off track, that’s okay. You can just shuffle those goals around, maybe you have rejig things, maybe you have to push something off until a later date. It’s all good. This is to be expected. That’s why I created the Yearly Ops & Marketing Playbook in a Google sheet so it’s super easy for you to make adjustments along the way. 

If this is your first time making plans like this and you’re starting to feel overwhelmed… take a breath. Focus on just planning one quarter at a time. Planning is not supposed to stress you out—it’s supposed to do the opposite. If you find yourself getting stressed it might be because you’re trying to fit in too many things. Remember, go back to the idea of if I only accomplished these 3 things during this time frame. That’s 3 things per year, 3 things per quarter, 3 things per month, etc. I would be happy.

If you absolutely have to do more than that… it’s a sign you need to hire more help. So think about that. 

Other Episodes in This Series

310. Kickstart 2025: Setting Your Strategic Vision for the Year Ahead

311. The CASH Method: Your Framework for eCommerce Growth

312. Using Data to Make Smarter Decisions in Your Product-Based Business