How to Set and Crush eCommerce Goals

This is the time of year where many business leaders look at the calendar and encourage their teams to make a push for end-of-the-year numbers. Others look ahead for the opportunity to set goals and crush it in the new year. As an eCommerce seller, it’s important to do both. However, we’re diving deeper into crushing it next year, so let’s look at how you can set yourself – and your business – up for success in the 12 months to come.

Let’s be honest. The new year comes with a certain feeling of excitement that’s often difficult to maintain. Rather than start the marathon off running as fast as you can, let’s look at how smart planning and smaller steps can turn your next year up for a growth mindset.

Set Goals

We all know that often-quoted cliché whereas the idea that goals not written down are merely wishes. This actually holds much weight. Writing down your goals will help solidify your ideas and keep you accountable to yourself. Go one step further, and share those goals with someone – a mentor, a coach, peers, your team.

Set SMART Goals

If you’ve worked on any persona development, you’ve likely heard of SMART goals. If not, you’re in for some new learning. Either way, it’s important to consider this strategy and truly understand its power.

SMART stands for:

Specific
Measurable
Attainable
Relevant
Time Bound

Set Specific Goals

You must clearly define your goals. Vague or generalized goals will not help; they don’t provide sufficient direction. Remember, your goals will show you the way. Your decisions next year should refer back to your goals. Get to where you want to go by defining precisely where you want to end up first.

Set Measurable Goals

Include precise amounts, dates and other metrics in your goals so you can measure your progress and success. “Reduce expenses” is too vague. How will you know when you’ve succeeded? In one month’s time if you have a 1 percent reduction or in two years’ time when you have a 10 percent reduction?

If you don’t measure your success you miss out on the celebration that comes with knowing you have actually achieved something.

Set Attainable Goals

Larger-than-life goals can excite and stretch you. However, missing the mark defeats us and discourages progress. Set goals you can achieve.

Setting of goals can be tricky especially when compensation is tied to those goals, but the idea isn’t to lower the bar too much. Accomplishing a goal that you didn’t have to work hard for can be anticlimactic at best, and can also make you fear setting future goals that carry a risk of non-achievement. Keep it challenging yet realistic and maintain the balance you need. These are the types of goals that require you to “raise the bar” and they bring the greatest personal satisfaction.

Set Relevant Goals

Goals should be relevant to your business. As an eCommerce seller, setting a goal of opening a brick and mortar store may sound exciting, but if it’s not part of your overall strategy as an online business, maybe skip it. By keeping goals aligned with your business strategy, you’ll develop the focus you need to get ahead and do what you want. Setting crazy, irrelevant and inconsistent goals will lead to serious frustrations and keep you from crushing it in the new year.

Set Time-Bound Goals

Set that deadline so you know when you can celebrate success. When you work on a timeline, your sense of urgency increases and achievement will come that much quicker. Keep those deadlines in your calendar and hold yourself accountable for monthly and quarterly gut checks to ensure that the activities you are performing are helping attain those goals.

BONUS: Measure Leading Indicators

Consider setting daily and weekly activity goals which will lead to your ultimate success. For instance, a goal of 1,000 new customers by the end of the year may seem great. However, it’s the end result of what you do every day. Instead, set a goal of connecting with a network and making 5 new connections every weekday, in hopes of tapping into a larger circle of influence.

Leading indicators – the actual activities which lead to results – can keep you on track each morning with bite-sized “things to do” rather than lofty numbers. Pairing these goals together adds much power to your yearly plan.

Increase Sales

Lead generation. Marketing. Relationship building. Social media outreach. Build an email list.

With whatever way you plan to bring in new customers, the end result of increased sales is always guaranteed to help you crush it in the new year.

Inbound marketing, content marketing, social media, SEO, lead gen… it’s a lot to take in as an eCommerce business. You may also be wondering if any of it matters to your situation.

Think about marketing as the start of a conversation with a relevant connection which could turn into a customer, a referral source or a great partner in some way. Begin that conversation where those ideal connections are. If you’re serving a business client, social media like LinkedIn may work well. If you’re looking to reach a younger demographic interested in lifestyle products, Instagram and Pinterest are fertile ground.

Remember to focus on the client rather than making it all about you and your business. If you can offer advice which relates back to your offerings while educating and entertaining, you’ll find new clients with your attractive marketing.

Increase Customer Satisfaction

As an eCommerce business, customer satisfaction can take on a variety of looks. From on-time delivery to unique packaging, happy customers are made through first the little experiences. All the great marketing in the world (covered above) won’t help if your service is terrible.

Crush your financial goals next year by taking a good look at just how you can delight your customers, increasing things like Net Promoter Score and your online ratings.

One great way to find out how you’re doing is to simply ask. A customer survey can tell you a lot, from how your clients perceive you to what would delight them even more.

Decrease Costs

Want to crush it in the new year for your business? Decrease costs. Look for efficiencies. Research new tools.

Maybe you can find a great email automation tool for much less than you’re paying now – or for free! Perhaps you find a way to cut shipping costs, passing the savings along to customers while cutting your own expenses.

Just because you’ve done something one way, doesn’t mean you have to keep doing it that way. Look for new strategies (have you ever researched Lean Manufacturing principals and thought about how to implement them in your eCommerce world? Sometimes taking cues from an unrelated industry can help you find efficiencies and reduce costs.

Work with a Trusted Partner

As a direct-to-consumer catalog marketing company, your success hinges on providing seamless and efficient customer transactions. From order receipt to payment processing to returns management, every step of the process must work in perfect tandem for you to maintain satisfied, loyal customers.

Find a trusted eCommerce partner who allows your organization to focus its time, talent and resources on the functions that drive your unique differentiation and value with the assurance that each consumer interaction is managed with the standard of care you would provide yourself.

 Photo by Denise Karis on Unsplash