I was coaching a small business owner the other day in the area of online marketing. We were talking about creating systems for being efficient at all the stages of marketing her business online, including creating strong offers, building her email database, writing articles, blogging, and effective content syndication.

As we continued to discuss all the elements she would need to put in place, she got somewhat overwhelmed. She asked me, "Rachna- how can I possibly do all these things when I'm already so busy?"

And I laughed, but then asked, "But are you busy accomplishing the most important things?"

And there was silence.

It is good practice to periodically assess where, as a business owner, you are spending your time, and to ascertain if you are accomplishing the most important things each day to reach your business goals.

The first step, of course, is to define your business goals. And the more numerical the better- because in simple mathematics, numbers don't lie.

If you have a goal to make $X in the month, or to gain Y readers to your blog, or to increase your search engine ranking by two pages- all of these are measureable. But not all of them are equally important at the same time.

All business owners need to focus, first, on ways to build cash flow. This means that products and service offerings need to be the first focus. How can you continually assist and serve more and more of your clients? How can you do this without working harder than you already are?

Once you have a stable source of monthly revenue, then you may have some leeway to focus on goals related to building your platform or increasing your influence. But these should only happen after your basic financial needs are addressed.

Most people get this backwards- they worry about being known before they focus on being profitable.

But to build a strong business, you need to focus on profitability, first, and what it takes to stay and remain so. That's the first most important thing.

All the rest can come later.

So, as we head into the beginning of another new year, take a few minutes and ascertain, what are your most important business goals right now? And then examine if your actions are supporting them.

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A Note from Rachna:

One of my business goals for 2010 is to work more directly with small business owners and solo-pros who want to get more clients from the internet. I'll teach you how to craft the right marketing message, find your blogging "voice", and use all the tools and technology to build your presence and your reach on the internet. You'll learn how to create content that gets attention, build your email list, and build your status as an expert. I'm still defining the whats, and hows, but if this sounds like something you'd be interested in, you can get a bit more information by joining the email list using the form below. Please remember to confirm your subscription so I have permission to email you back with the preliminary details:

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I know the concept of pruning is probably more appropriate to Spring than Fall (as we have entered the Fall season here in Maryland), but I've been considering this idea of pruning back for a few weeks now and wanted to share the idea with you.

If you, like me, have been in business for any length of time, you probably have begun numerous projects, added numerous offerings, and, perhaps, have a lot of ideas and half-completed ventures which are taking up space.

This has become clearer to me in my own business, and in those of my clients, as we examine where they need to focus and what they need to let go of.

If you are a creative, self motivated, and driven business owner, you probably have at least ten or twenty ideas or strategies which you began implementing, but never actually followed through on. For my clients, this process shows up as multiple domain names which have never been used, incomplete sales pages for products, and a lot of busy work which isn't directly tied to profitability.

If you're experiencing any of these issues in your own business, it may be time to prune back. Periodically, it's a good idea to step back from your business and evaluate where you are and where you want to go. It may be time to reduce the noise, either by reducing your number of projects, or it may be time to focus more concertedly in a particular area.

Whatever your business needs, it will grow healthier if you gently cut back the extra offshoots to strengthen the whole.

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As you may know, I've been very focused on launching a new arm of my business- one focused on social media marketing.

I've been lucky enough to work with some top level clients (who have been keeping me very busy), and the results they have been getting have been just wonderful- including better search engine rank, more recognition, and greater opportunities.

I've been taking steps to promote myself more fully (as I continually recommend for each of you), and one way I'm doing this is through webinars.

My next webinar, "The Future of Social Media And How to Profit From It" is set for October 1, 2009.

I'd like to invite you to attend, and offer you a 20% off coupon you can use as well. You'll not only get 90 minutes of cutting-edge, immediately usable content, you'll also get a copy of my brand new ebook: Branding Yourself in Social Media, plus some fantastic additional content and bonuses from my co-host for the webinar, Denise Wakeman.

If you'd like to join me for the future of social media, please register here, and use the code SM20 at checkout to save 20% on the registration price.

I look forward to seeing you there!

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I'm just back from California, where I spoke at a sales training event to promote How to Sell When Nobodys Buying, where I wrote a chapter on selling more using social media. My presentation was very well received, with extremely high praise from the attendees. It was a fantastic experience. I then spent the rest of the weekend at Joel Bauer's Passion2Profit event, which focused on speaker training, as well as branding and positioning in a crowded marketplace. I'll get some pictures and videos up for you soon.

The topic I want to write about today, just before I jet off to Chicago for a 3 day Mastermind, is the idea of rate of implementation. There was a ton of great information at the events from this weekend- but none of it will do me, or my business, any good, if I don't take time to implement it.

How quickly do you implement? It's easy to be constantly in search of new information and ideas- after all, getting information is fun and easy. The hard part comes when we have to turn knowledge into action, or words into results. This is where many people have a challenge, and they don't do all they can- or all they should- to move their business forward.

I've been guilty of this myself- even now, I'm a little bit jetlagged, my mind is a bit distracted (ready to head off to Chicago, I think) and I find myself scanning down my to-do list, trying to find work to do- just to work- not because these items are the most meaningful or important.

In fact, I have, at times today, found myself avoiding tasks which felt too big or like I just didn't have time for. The irony is, though, that the "big things" I "don't have time for" are much more meaningful to my business than the small things I can do easily.

So the thing to remember is that you don't really know something until you implement it. You can't really learn something until you do it. If you made a commitment to implement new ideas within 48 hours of hearing them, how different would your business be?

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