It’s a new year and a time when as business owners you
review your business and decide what you will be working on over the following
year, any changes you need to make and so on. For Karen at
Bead Bitz, 2015 was the year she made changes to
increase her potential to earn a better wage. Karen also joined
TheProfessional Crafter’s Guild. This Q+A with Karen will show that you can change
your business for the better and hopefully provide you with tips on how to do
that.
Q: How long have you
been in business?
A: Bead
Bitz has been established for about 3 years.
However at the beginning of 2015 I made a
conscious decision to develop it and move it to the next level.
Q: Why did you want
to change aspects of your business and why do it at the beginning of the year?
A: It was a case
of use it or lose it – I enjoy the craft work I do and I have been paid many
compliments on the quality, design etc.
In addition I had some success in selling items. It is a long held desire to have a part time
income from this business – so in order to achieve that I had to either move
forward or do nothing.
2015 was at a time in my life when I felt the most confident
and positive to be able to do this. The
name was gaining a small amount of recognition so it was as if all the forces
were coming together to do this.
Q: How did you
prepare for changing your business?
A: I finalised
the business cards – came up with a small business plan, which included what
sales I wanted to make – what fairs I would attend etc and went about trying to
achieve it.
Q: What has changing your business done for
you?
A: It has given
the business a better profile – higher sales and more regular viewers on my
Facebook page.
It
has made me realise that I need to get the
website changed and updated (
this one I
am struggling with due to lack of knowledge).
I have a better idea of what
arena I want to be in and how to go about getting there.
2016 will be a continuation of the same with
an intention to capitalise on the lessons I have learnt through this year.
Karen has made some
great points here, you can’t make changes unless you know what you need to do.
So;
- Make a plan of what you want to achieve for
the year.
- Set yourself goals of when you would like
to achieve each point on your plan.
- For each point, jot down ideas on how you
can achieve it (It may also be a good idea to look back on 2015 and see what
didn’t work and cutting lose things that take up your time and don’t produce
results you want).
- Put your ideas into practise !
Blog post created by Sarah O’Connell
