Your business will be able to accomplish its strategic goals by using the SMART goals technique. SMART objectives are defined as being precise, measurable, attainable, pertinent, and time-bound. This tactic can help you achieve your goals more effectively by concentrating your team members on the most crucial aspects of your company’s goals.
We included some SMART goal examples that you may use to help you formulate your own and maintain focus on your objectives. The greatest approach to properly comprehend how SMART objectives are used in small company today is via practical implementation. These illustrations demonstrate how the procedure may be used in your own company.
1. Create a Marketing Plan for a New Business within 1 Month
There are plans within plans to be made when launching a new firm. A crucial SMART goal is to develop the new company’s marketing strategy.
Specific: In order to make sure we included the most crucial information, we need to establish a marketing strategy with a clear structure we can follow.
Measurable: To guarantee completion within a month, we will complete 25% of the plan’s specifics each week of the month.
Achievable: A month should be enough time to do all the necessary market research and company analysis to produce a solid marketing plan.
Relevant: Without a strong marketing strategy, the business is missing a key element of success.
Time-bound: A month is the allotted period.
2. Pay off $10,000 in Business Debt within 30 Months
Setting financial objectives is a crucial first step in taking charge of your company’s finances. Paying off the business’s debt may be one example of a SMART objective. Doing so would free up more funds for initiatives like employee pay raises and other endeavors.
Specific: Pay down $10,000 in full.
Measurable: By keeping an eye on our cash flow as we go and tracking our performance month to month, we can monitor our progress.
Achievable: We will cut back on spending on growth-related products and seek to incentivize vendors to make full and on-time payments.
Relevant: Throughout the year, we will draw attention to project and development possibilities that will require more funding once the debt has been paid off.
Time-bound: We’ll accomplish our goal in 30 months.
3. Set up a Remote Sales Networking System within 7 Days
In the first few months of 2020, many businesses had to face the sad reality of this circumstance. At the start of the COVID-19 epidemic, setting SMART targets for moving to remote operations was a crucial component of preserving an efficient sales culture at a highly stressful period. This SMART goal illustration is based on an actual situation that many people have encountered.
Specific: Every member of our remote sales staff must be able to communicate and work.
Measurable: When the networking system is operational and our remote workers are able to work, the task is finished.
Achievable: Despite the fact that this objective may be ambitious, we are able to bring it to the top of our list of priorities and temporarily divert resources from longer-term initiatives in order to finish it.
Relevant: Even in the absence of a pandemic, remote work is an excellent setting. Remote networking made it possible for businesses to go on in 2020. Remote networking supports employee productivity and business success in the post-COVID era.
Time-bound: This objective has a seven-day time constraint.
4. Increase New Customer Reviews by 30% Year Over
Year recognition is one of the most important factors in today’s business success. Your brand awareness increase year-round is one of your most crucial branding objectives.
One example of a SMART objective for this is: We need to see a 30% YoY growth in the number of new customer reviews.
Specific: Boost customer reviews by 30%.
Measurable: Our monthly reporting allows us to track our development and determine whether or not we are on track to meet our goals.
Achievable: Last year, we saw a 20% rise in customer reviews. We think we can reach the 30% goal.
Relevant: According to our study to far, a rise in customer reviews is correlated with a rise in sales across our top growth channels.
Time-bound: This is a year-over-year comparison.
5. Ensure All Our Overseas Factory Workers Are Paid a Living Wage within 3 Months
Demand for items supplied ethically is rising as customers become more aware of where their things are made. You may increase client loyalty and charge more if you ethically source your items.
The term “ethical” is ambiguous and has several meanings. Different businesses are equipped and willing to apply different ethical standards. You may, for instance, demand that the foreign laborers who produce your goods be paid 25% more than the sector’s average salary or that you’re manufacturing lines offer lucrative positions and essential job training to women fleeing domestic abuse. You may also use planting trees to offset the carbon emissions created during product creation to make your production carbon neutral. The particular aim in this SMART goals illustration is to examine the working conditions in our foreign companies and guarantee that each employee receives a living salary.
Specific: Our main concern is that all of the foreign industrial workers receive a living salary.
Measurable: We will ask our international partners for information on their cost of living, then assess how closely they adhere to our living wage objective or choose new partners on a region-by-region basis.
Achievable: It is feasible for us to select new business partners and suppliers based on our current requirements because we already operate with foreign factories.
Relevant: Many consumers base their purchasing decisions on their moral principles. Gaining devoted customers will be made easier by our ethical product sourcing.
Time-bound: Within the next three months, this objective is to be completed.
6. Grow Worldwide Market Share of Our Top-selling Software at Least 10% by the End of the Year
End most businesses, big or small, want to increase their market share.
Specific: We are aware of the region, product line, and rate of growth (10%) that we are seeking.
Measurable: We will be able to gauge our success by keeping tabs on the number of new clients, market expansion, and general market expansion.
Achievable: We grew by 8% overall last year, so we believe we can accomplish this higher objective.
Relevant: Increasing market share frequently has positive effects on revenue and client numbers in addition to other advantages.
Time-bound: We’ll complete our mission by the year’s conclusion.
SMART goals are crucial to develop and use because they provide everyone involved a point of reference. Your team may then reevaluate if it was indeed “achievable” at the conclusion of the measurement period.
7. Transition IT Support From Contract to In-house in 6 Months
IT assistance is a must for every business that uses computers. To handle their computer demands, many businesses contract with IT support organizations. As a business expands, it could be more cost-effective to establish an IT department and take care of those needs internally rather than hiring a service, as in the case of this SMART objective.
Specific: To accomplish this aim, a new department must be created and staffed.
Measurable: The establishment of an IT department makes this objective quantifiable. Because SMART objectives can and typically do contain extra goals necessary to make the plan materialize, the number of employees who will need to be employed is another measurement that will be decided in a sub-goal of this overall goal.
Achievable: We have the means and know-how to establish this department and employ capable personnel, and this deadline is realistic for the objective.
Relevant: By reducing downtime caused by technology, an internal IT department will increase productivity while saving us time and money.
Time-bound: This objective has a six-month time frame.
8. Plan 5 Customer Education Webinars by the Fourth Quarter
It could be a good idea to schedule and carry out five customer education webinars by the end of the fourth quarter, with an average of 15 attendees each event and at least 80% expressing high or very high satisfaction with the material.
Specific: Five webinars are to be scheduled.
Measurable: We will disseminate and evaluate the findings of the attendee survey and gauge the number of people that watched each webinar.
Achievable: The system and staff resources are present, and the demand is present.
Relevant: These webinars will assist our brand build market authority and/or bring in more consumers.
Time-bound: This will be finished by the end of the current year’s fourth quarter.
9. Increase Sales Cold Calls by 10% This Year
Cold calling is crucial to sales in many industries. If your company strategy demands you to reach out, whether you’re conducting business-to-business or direct-to-customer sales, then upping your number of cold calls may be the key to achieving greater sales objectives, as shown in this SMART goals example.
Specific: This year, we plan to make 10% more cold calls than we did.
Measurable: It is simple to contrast the volume of calls made this year to that of last year.
Possibility: We can increase rewards to encourage our employees to make more calls. We can expand our workforce if necessary or convert certain part-time workers to full-time status.
Relevant: If our calls continue to convert at the same pace, our entire revenues will rise.
Time-bound: We must fulfill this objective before the end of this year.
10. Increase Website Traffic 25% by December 2023
If your website is profitable, you are already aware of your total conversion rates, including the number of clicks from search engines and social media that result in purchases as well as the number of clicks that result in sales altogether. In this SMART business goal example, more website visitors will result in more sales as long as your sales conversion rate is about constant.
Specific: More specifically, we want to see a 25% increase in site traffic.
Measurable: Increase our yearly visitors from 100,000 to 125,000, which is measurably.
Achievable: Our inbound marketing team has strong plans in place for content generation and social media. If more professionals are required, we may recruit them to boost our online presence and website traffic.
Relevant: Our reach and revenue grow in direct proportion to the volume of traffic we receive.
Time-bound: We aim to fulfill this objective by December 2023.
Conclusion
Lack of a goal is comparable to going on a hike without a map or constructing a boat without a plan. Making your objectives SMART guarantees that you have a clear understanding of what you want to accomplish as well as the steps you will take to get there (as well as a mechanism to track your progress as you go). We recommend reading more about using SMART objectives into your performance management procedure.
