Do you ever wonder why some people kick butt at getting things accomplished while others set their dreams big but never seem to achieve them? Are you one of these people? It may surprise you but it has nothing to do with luck or accident. After talking with several successful entrepreneurs, we found that their success is in their goal-setting not their IQ. SMART goal setting is something they all have in common and in order to rock your next big dream stick to these key factors:

Specific
Measurable
Achievable
Realistic
Timely

5 different types of goals that can ensure your success, listen up and take notes as we break these down…

Specific goals

These types of goals are specific to the what, why and how goals. For example, this type of goal might read: “Increase our market reach and gain more traffic on our website by implementing an e-mail marketing campaign.” The why is to expand market reach and gain more traffic on their website. The how is implementing an e-mail marketing campaign.

Measurable Goals

Goals should be measurable so that you have real factual evidence on whether you’ve accomplished your goals. To build on our last example, a measurable goal would be: “Increase our marketing reach and gain 50% more traffic to our website by implementing an e-mail marketing campaign.” This shows us where we started, where we want to go and by how much so that we can gauge our progress based on numbers.

Achievable goals

Everyone has made goals in their life that are clearly unachievable like climbing Mount Everest in 2 hours. There’s just no way that’s possible unless we have a jet pack or a time travel machine. But then again, we don’t want to limit ourselves by saying we could never climb Mount Everest because that is an achievable goal. So, it’s best to find an equilibrium as to what will challenge you and your company but won’t be so difficult that you give up. Keep yourself, employees motivated with foreseeable goals.

Realistic Goals

Always make sure when you are setting goals that they are results-focused, focusing on the results in our efforts, not necessarily the activities we undertake to get there.

Timely Goals

Lastly, you want your goals to be achieved in a discrete period of time. Goals without deadlines fall into distant dreams if you keeping putting off the inevitable. So let’s round out our example at the beginning to bring this concept home. Let’s say you started your e-mail marketing campaign and now have 3,000 subscribers to your list and increased traffic to your website by 1,500 people each month which took you 6 months to achieve and now you want to keep that number going up by 50%, applying the goal-setting tactics we just learned your SMART goal is:

“Increase our e-mail marketing subscribers in 6 months to increase our website traffic 50 % by implementing an e-mail marketing campaign.”

You have your workable goal, your deadline which seems achievable based on what you accomplished in the last six months by getting 1,500 new visitors to your website plus now you have traction to build on.  

Now, go, use these key factors when implementing any goal, big or small and you will start to realize that more and more of your goals are being accomplished and soon you will be thought of one of those people whose dreams always come true.  

AJ Printing & Graphics and Wine Country Signs is a commercial printer in Santa Rosa, California specializing in digital and offset printing. We put our relationships with our clients over everything in order to ensure their success. With over 30 years’ experience in the industry, leave the printing to us and focus on other things. We are a green business, recycling all of our paper and buying from trusted businesses that commit to the sustainability of our planet. We are your partner in print, design and marketing located at 1315 North Dutton Ave, Santa Rosa, CA (707) 525-8600!