New Year, New You? Here's the Real Deal

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‘Tis the season—the big holidays are in the rear-view mirror, and the new year is just over the horizon.  Everyone from the TV weatherman to your mother-in-law is spewing some New Year’s resolutions.  Ironically, the experts tell us the following:

1.     88% of people who set New Year’s resolutions fail them within the first two weeks (Source: “New Year’s resolutions: Why do we give up on them so quickly?”)

2.     20% of those making resolutions will actively keep themselves accountable when sticking to their goals, but it’s unclear what percentage of these individuals ultimately succeed (Source: “New Year’s Resolutions Statistics and Trends [2024]”)

3.     9% of people who make New Year’s resolutions are successful in keeping them, while 41% of Americans who make resolutions indicate a significant failure rate (Source: “Studies Show 91 Percent of Us Won’t Achieve Our New Year’s Resolutions. How to Be the 9 Percent That Do”)

4.     43% of people expect to give up their New Year’s resolutions by February (Source: “Research Shows 43% Of People Expect to Give Up Their New Year’s Resolutions By February - Sundried”)

 

With these nifty factoids in mind, this article is for the 20 percent who hold themselves accountable.  Better yet, unlike all those pieces on healthy lifestyles and losing weight, these resolutions are guaranteed to add some heft to your wallet and some street-cred to your resume.

 

Here are some valuable suggestions that can make a difference:

For Salespeople:

1.     PLAN your time, your work, your week—bonus points for confirming appointments.

2.     Start your day with a pre-planned appointment at 8:00.  This will get you away from stray phone calls and get you out into your territory.

3.     Prioritize and allocate time to the opportunities that represent the greatest potential, not the ones that are the most enjoyable.

4.     Review and follow up on your commitments from your sales calls every week.

5.     Have personal goals, not just the ones set for you by your manager.

6.     Know and understand your organization’s strategy.  Bonus points if you can recite a cliff-notes version.

7.     Align your goals and your actions to your organization’s strategy.

8.     Use White Space/GAP analysis to identify product categories your customers are not currently buying and try to understand why they are not.

9.     Use the information gathered in #8, above, to sell new product categories to existing customers.

10. Identify new customers you should be selling to and build a game plan to get to know them and their business.

11. Use and leverage your CRM system.  Track opportunities even if you have very little chance of success. Why?  Supply Chain issues, and competitors who lose salespeople can result in those opportunities coming back to life.

 

For Sales Leaders:

1.     Make sure your team knows and understands your organization’s strategy.  This includes sharing the strategy often.  Elaborate on various components throughout the year.  Challenge your team to memorize a strategy summary.

2.     Make sure your team has concrete goals that align with the strategy.

3.     Maintain a strict commitment to approving and supporting goals and actions that align with the strategy, and refrain from supporting those that do not align.

4.     Spend time with your salespeople observing how they work and understanding what motivates them.

5.     Give your salespeople feedback that will help them get better and grow.

6.     Offer your salespeople feedback often and don’t wait until the annual performance review to do so. Bonus points for monthly check-ins.

7.     Support your team with new customer acquisitions.  Remove roadblocks and provide tools for success.

8.     Show your team that CRM is a valuable tool, not a weapon.

9.     Use the information gathered in #4 above to properly motivate and reward your salespeople.  Hint: Their motivation is not always money.

10. Fight for your team when necessary.

 

A final word: PLAN

We started this list for sellers with the word PLAN.  Reviewing the list for both salespeople and their managers, plans, and planning play a role in many of the resolutions.  Are there negative connotations floating through your mind?  Does planning equate to drudgery?  Is planning just another one of those words with a hidden meaning?  Are planning and hard work synonyms? Or, are planning and discipline closely related keys to long-term success? We think so.


Since this article launched off with interesting research/factoids, let’s return to data and spend a minute on planning. 

  • Research from Psychological Science showed that people who set specific goals and create plans to achieve them are 42% more likely to achieve their goals, contributing to higher life satisfaction.
  • A study published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology found that individuals with high levels of perceived control report greater happiness and lower stress. It went on to say, planning is a common way to exert this control.
  • A study from ProfileTree.com highlights that companies with written business plans grow 30% faster than other companies in the same industry.

 

If these don’t convince you, here is our personal favorite.

A study in the journal Applied Research in Quality of Life revealed that the anticipation of a planned vacation increases happiness levels more than the vacation itself.

 

Don’t think of planning as something only for business.  Here are seven personal resolutions


that involve planning:

1.     Plan to find joy and satisfaction in the things you do.  Make them fun whenever possible.

2.     Don’t just plan your workday, plan for personal time, too.  Block off time for social interaction with friends and family. 

3.     Plan time for your hobbies.

4.     Plan a call to a former coworker, college roommate, or your brother who lives in Alaska, and follow through with it.

5.     Plan on establishing friendships with customers, colleagues, and suppliers.

6.     Plan on making your last activity of the week something fun.  This could be a call on a favorite customer.

7.     Plan on celebrating your accomplishments every week.  Don’t just focus on what went wrong or what could have gone better.  Take the time to appreciate what went well and resolve to keep doing those things.

 

We wish you a healthy, happy, prosperous, and productive 2025!




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