 Well hello and welcome to this video. Today we're looking at how to review your year as an art business. Now usually this is something I do in quite a bit of detail with my art business academy membership members. But this year I actually asked two, three weeks ago on my email list and I did a shout out on YouTube too. If I did this with you, if I did an annual business review with you, how would you like me to deliver it? Categorically 95% of you said, could you please do a YouTube video and give us a free download as well? So behind the scenes that's exactly what we've organised. So how can you get your hands on the free download that goes with this video? Just maybe press pause, shoot below, have a look at the description and in the description there's a link that you can click. You can go and grab yourself that free download. So you can either do it now or you can watch the video first, listen to me walk you through the questions and then grab your download and do that yourself afterwards. It doesn't matter which way that you want to get that done. So long as you get it done, right? It's really powerful exercise. Not only are we going to review this past year, but we're actually going to look at setting a little bit of intentions and asking some key information about what's going to happen in the next 12 months. So that guess what? Press the fast forward button a year from now. You can grab that form and you can do the whole thing again. So hello and welcome or welcome back to my channel. My name's Sophie and I help artists just like you to set up market and grow a highly successful business doing what you love. Now we've learning more tips and tricks on how to build that successful art business exactly what you're looking for. Then you're in the right place. Don't forget to hit the subscribe button and of course the bell to get notified every time I post a new video. Okay, so are you ready to start answering the questions in your annual art biz review form? So here's two ways that I would suggest doing it. One way is you can just grab your form right now and a pen and work along with me. So watch the question that I'm going to talk through, maybe answer then and there and just do it at the same time as me. Or you can just watch this video all the way through then grab everything you need and then do that in your own time. Maybe watch it again to make sure that you've got it right. Okay, so let's go down. I think there are 18 different questions. So it's not like a it's not a five minute thing. It might take you a little bit longer. But I promise you it's going to be worth it because when we really fully understand what has happened or has not happened in the previous year and how that's impacting us as an artist and as an art business, it's going to inform decisions that you're going to make into next year. So it's a really critical piece to actually do. So at this time of year, I like to suggest a thing that I've been talking about a lot recently. Get your business plan done for next year. Once you've done that, you're going to do the review form and review your year and just set some intentions for next year. And then the beginning of next year, of course, it's all going to be, we're going to be talking about vision boarding and intention setting and goal setting. But let's leave that for January right now. Let's go ahead and dive into this form. So the very first question is what was the main art business goal that you set yourself for this year? Now, assuming that you had a business plan, that will be really easy because it will be written on your business plan. And if you didn't, maybe you set down a goal that you were working towards. What was the goal? You need to dig that out and write that down. Now, a lot of you who've done business plans with me, you'll probably know is likely a turnover goal. So your business goal for this last year was probably to hit a certain turnover. So go ahead, write that down. Really simple second part to that question. Did you achieve it? Next question, if yes, what would you say were the contributing factors? So when you think about it, you think, OK, I did actually do that. What, what enables me to do that? Did I really step it up? Did I do something different from the previous year? Did I have knowledge or information that I didn't have before? Am I just starting out? Was the goal actually very, very low and easily achievable? There's nothing wrong with that, by the way, because, you know, success breeds success. Better to have something achievable that you achieve than to set a whopping great goal up here that you don't ever achieve, right? So what were the contributing factors? Just think about what they were. What did you do well? What really happened? Why do you think that you managed to achieve that goal? Question number three, it's only pertinent if your answer was no instead of yes, right? So if it was no, I did not achieve the goal, then what got in the way of you doing that? What was it? Did you self-sabotage? Did you set the bar too high? Was the goal too large? Was there too much on your planner? Did you think you could get way more done than you really can in the year? Were there other things that got in the way? Did you lose focus off your plan? Did you take on a project that was never on the plan and it took you off in that direction and meant that you kind of lost the general direction that you're going on in the business? Did you not make the sales for what reason? Did you actually not step up and do the marketing? What were the things? So really what we want to do is take a magnifying glass. We want to get detective. We want to pick apart the reasons that you either did achieve it because we want to know those or the reasons why you didn't achieve it. So that's that sort of top section of the form. Next question is what was your primary focus for the year and did you stay on track? So if you'd said my primary focus for the year was building my mailing list and to really get my marketing on point, did you stay on track? Did you do that? Did you achieve it? It's pretty easy. It's going to be a yes or no. Yep, I stayed on track. Or no, I completely went off track. Just again, anything that comes up for you when you think about that, just jot it down. Next question, question number five, it's a bit of a long one and it's going to involve you likely needing your diary, your planners or any other way that you keep information about what you've done during the year. Do you want to list out everything that you accomplished or completed in your year? I know that could seem like a real lot, but I promise you it's a brilliant exercise because so often we default to what we didn't do. We look at, oh, I didn't achieve my goal. I didn't stay on focus. I didn't do this. I didn't do that. And that is not great for your mindset. We want you to really build a positive mindset. So this exercise is going to help you because you're going to start thinking about what I did achieve. Well, I did complete those paintings and I managed to get those prints made and I did make some sales and I did complete my website and I did do some marketing and I did do this and I did do that and I did have an exhibition. So go through the diary through the planner. We like to actually do this. I do this in the membership every month. So it's really easy because if you can keep a track of what you've done every month you can just simply go through 12 of those and just go, oh yeah, I did all of those things. By the time you've written out a whole year of what you've done it's a large amount, which is why we've given you a good space on that form. Fill it, you know, fill it all the way through up the sides, round down on the back of the page, wherever you need to do. Just cram it with all the things that you've done in the year. The next question is, what was the highlight from that list? What really meant the most to you? So you could grab yourself like a highlighter pen or something and just go over the list and look at it all and think, what jumps out as, wow, that was really amazing. That was really something. That was exciting. I'm really proud of myself. I didn't believe I could do it. Whatever it was for you and highlight that major thing. And really tap into why you've highlighted it, not just, oh, you know, that was the month I made X amount of sales. That's okay if that's what it is, but maybe there was something else. Maybe there was something that happened in the year that you were like, wow, that was really, that was a game changer. I didn't really see that coming. That was really amazing. I'm really proud of that. So really tap into why that is. Next question, what new skills have you discovered? Now it could be that during your year you found that actually you were much better at doing some of that marketing stuff than you thought you were. Maybe you've learned a bit about email marketing and you realized, you know, actually I'm not bad at that. I'll write that down as a new skill. Or you've maybe done an art or creative course during the year. You've gained some new skills there. So again, bring those to the surface and write them down. Because we, again, we tend to forget this stuff. Oh, I learnt this thing, but, you know, my brain says it wasn't important, so I'm just going to push it to one side. Let's bring all of the good stuff to the surface so that you end the year being very, very aware and very conscious of what you did, what you didn't do as well, but that's okay. But primarily what's worked and what you have accomplished. So let's list out or write down what skills or new skills that you have accomplished this year. Next question, how have you celebrated your success? And I hear you from a distance saying, Sophie, I haven't done that at all. So now you need to decide, okay, what can I do that's a specific celebration for my art business success? That could be taking yourself on a beautiful walk somewhere. It could be grabbing your partner and going out for a beautiful dinner. So long as whatever you do to celebrate, you actually verbally say this celebration is because I have achieved this thing this year and you really honour it, because it's very easy to just go out for dinner and then you forget why you've gone. Really celebrate what you have done, spend some time honouring that. So next one, what was your greatest learning? So likely over the year you've learnt a few things about yourself, right? It's okay to list those all out as well, what you've learnt, but what was the greatest learning? What was the big point? What was the big thing where you're like, wow, okay, I really hadn't realised? Because sometimes when you look back at this, it's all there on black and white, right? You're writing it all down, the review process so far. So what do you think the greatest learning is? And learning might be something like, actually I'm way more capable than I thought I was. This business stuff is much easier than I thought it was going to be. Or your learning might be that actually, I have far less time than I thought I had. I tend to overload my list with way more than I can actually do. So these things are really important. And isolating the biggest learning because that's going to have an impact on how you move forward. So make sure you work out what the greatest learning is. All right, time to switch gears a little bit. So we've reviewed the past. Now we're going to take that information and we're going to point it forward and we're going to look towards next year. So with all this information in hand, you are business goal. Now again, if you've done your business plan, you might secretly just reach for your business plan and look and say, okay, what was the turnover goal? That's great. That's your goal. There it is. Pretty easy, right? In black and white. So you can write that down and make sure that you're going to focus on that. That is your business goal for the next 12 months. Oh, and by the way, if you've completely missed all the business planning stuff, then I will list out a few resources below this video and check out this one specifically, the business plan, because it's going to be a great place for you to start. You really need all of these bits of information for the end of the year, like I said, the business plan and the review doc. So for those of you who've done it, you'll be able to get your goal there. For those of you haven't yet done it, maybe you're just going to put a goal in and then you're going to keep that in mind when you do get the business plan and you might have to alter it slightly once you've gone through the planning process. Okay, next question. What will you be focused on? Now again, this sort of sits alongside the business plan because in the business plan, the various goals that you're looking to achieve, various projects that you're doing during the whole year. But what's the overall theme? When you look at the plan, you think about what you're going to be doing next year, is your primary focus going to be marketing and sales? Is your primary focus going to be creating a new collection, actually working kind of in the business on what you're making? What is the main focus? Keep it really simple, just like a big overarching theme. I love this question. The next question. How committed are you to growing your successful art business? Listen, be honest with yourself. Sometimes when I ask people that in a one-to-one capacity, and they say, I'm really motivated, like 20 out of 10. I'm like, how does that work? And other people, when they really think about it, they're like, actually, not so much. You need to be highly motivated if you're going to grow a business. Any type of business, specifically this business. So really check in that you're in the right place, on the right page, doing what you really want to do. And there could be a few reasons why you might not be if you look at it and kind of go, well, I'm a four out of 10. That's not a lot of motivation. So my question might be, are you creating the right product or service? Are you happy with what you're making? Or does that need to change? Have you got a clear, big vision? That's something I've been talking a lot about recently. Have you got a big vision of where you want to go with the business? Because if you haven't, that's not great and you can easily lose motivation. So maybe you need to sort that out. Or maybe it's something else. But whatever it is, you want to address it because how motivated you are is going to determine the results that you're going to be looking at this time next year when you do this exercise all over again. And the next question is probably my favorite. It's number 13. So that's probably good. Who do you need to become in order to achieve this? Sometimes we need to really examine the game that we're playing with ourselves. Are you really showing up fully for your business, for your art, for your creativity, for your life? If you're not fully showing up, then don't expect great results. If you are fully showing up and you're fully committed and you've got all the energy behind it, then there's probably no stopping you. Do you need to become somebody that perhaps you really admire and you think about, I bet that person could achieve what I want to achieve? Well, just think about who you need to become. What different attributes and qualities do you need to perhaps adopt in order to get the results that you want to get? Now, if you're not doing any form of personal development journey, you might be going, Sophie, what planet you're on, that you need to know that I love all of that. That is totally a big part of my world. It's enabled me to completely change my life over the years. So I highly recommend looking into some form of personal development. There is more to building a successful art business than just the art and the business. There is also the whole mindset piece and where you sit in terms of your own development. It's a three-pronged attack. If you like, here's some quick, simple questions. What do you need to be doing differently? I love these questions. So when you think about it and you think about the goal that you did or didn't achieve, the things that you've done, where you want to go, all of it, do you need to be better with your time? Do you need to outsource a bit more? Find some people to come and help you? Do you need to get up earlier in the morning and get going into your day? What do you need to be doing differently in order to achieve what you want to achieve? Next question. What do you need to do more of? It could just be as simple as, I need to do more marketing and sales, Sophie, because I want to make more sales. I want to make more money. What do you need to do more of? Perhaps you need to do more creation. You need to create more. What do you need to do more of? Perhaps you need to show up on camera more. Who knows what are the things that you need to do? Whatever you need to do more of, write that down and commit to yourself to getting it down as well. What do you need to do less of? Is that the old social media scrolling? Do you need to do less of that? Do you need to do less procrastinating? I have somebody very close to me who goes to the end degree to procrastinate on everything and it's quite painful to watch. I think, my goodness me, by the time you've gone through that whole procrastination strategy, it would have been quicker and easier just to get up and do that thing. Is that something you need to do less of? What about the next question? What do you need to stop altogether? Do you need to stop scrolling on social media? Do you need to stop getting up later in the day? Do you need to stop being distracted by everything? What do you need to stop doing? Only you will know the answer to that question and by now you'll be looking through the form going, oh yeah, right, okay. It could be actually as simple as there's been a marketing strategy you've been doing that's not really getting you the results. You need to stop that. Just stop doing it altogether because you don't really want to be wasting your time. You ought to be investing your time in the best possible things for next year. And then last but not least, any further comments? Anything else that's coming up for you as you've gone through this process? So remember, the first part of the form is reviewing the year that's gone. The next part of the form is using that information to plan ahead into the next 12 months. So here we are at the end of the review. And for those of you that have been working along with me, I guess you've got most of it, if not all of it done. For those of you who are listening through it, now it's your turn. Grab that download, grab your pen and paper, get your planner, diary, all the things that you might need and just sit down and maybe put the timer on for like 20 minutes. You don't want to spend too long on it because if you do you end up overthinking things. Sometimes I think you just need to grab, grab the moment, grab the answer, grab the quick with it and move forward. And just imagine what better results you can get next year having learnt from this year. This is a learning opportunity. It's a learning journey. So let me know in the comments once you have completed it because we really love to hear who's actually showing up and doing the work. Now obviously if you are on my email list I'll be talking about it over there as well so you can send me a quick email back and say, yeah, I've done it. Let me know what stood out for you, what question really kind of gave you the biggest ahaz what you've realised and what you're committed to for next year. Now from here, why not get stuck into my artist workshop the top three secrets for art business success. If you haven't watched it already, I promise you it's going to give you some things to think about in terms of setting up your business for next year. If you have watched it, I've got some other suggestions that you can watch next below this video as well. As usual, thank you so much for watching and I will see you on the next one.