In the blink of an eye January was over, which means it’s time for my first goal progress report of the year!
If you haven’t already seen them, you can read about the goals I’ve set for the first 6 months of 2020.
In today’s post I am giving you a quick run-down on how I got on with each goal in January.
I divide my goals into categories which are essentially different roles I undertake, having learnt about this while doing Tony Robbins’ Time Of Your Life program (affiliate link) last year.
I have 8 personal categories and 4 business categories:
Personal
- Physical body health
- Outstanding family life
- Extraordinary friendships
- Spiritual and growth
- Absolute financial freedom
- Home sweet home
- Feeling alive and adventurous
- Giving back in a big way
Business
- Serving my Inspiring Life Design community
- Growing my Inspiring Life Design community
- Distributor of life changing products
- Manager of Inspiring Life Design (mostly an admin category)
Under each of these categories I track my individual goals…
Category: Spiritual & Growth
GOAL 1: Finish Tony Robbins’ Ultimate Edge audio program (affiliate link)
This goal has been on-hold for me in January. This is because I had been working through this fortnightly with someone from my morning intention calls, however he went away for all of January and did not have much internet access. I may resume this in February or possibly even push it to March.
GOAL 2: Read 3 self growth books
Sadly no real progress on this goal during January. I did read a few pages here and there, but nothing to significantly move me toward this goal.
I appear to have a couple of books on the go at the moment, which probably doesn’t help with getting either one of them finished!:
- “Money, Master The Game” by Tony Robbins
- “How To Win Friends And Influence People” by Dale Carnegie
GOAL 3: Do at least 2 meditations guided by Master Stephen Co
I have enjoyed taking part in live meditations by the Pranic Healer Master Co in the past. I didn’t manage to find one happening at a sociable hour in the UK for me to attend (his events are marketed in Pacific Standard time which is 8 hours behind the UK - often the live events fall in the middle of the night for me).
I am keeping my eye on meditation opportunities in the emails that I receive and hope to do one in February.
GOAL 4: Set goals for the next 6 months July-December 2020
I won’t even begin to look at this goal until June, when I will have a better idea of what I’ve achieved and what I want to accomplish in the next 6 months.
Category: Absolute Financial freedom
GOAL 5: Fill my 2019/2020 ISA with £20K before April 5th
My long-term goal is to build an overall investment pot that is sufficient to allow me to live off the profits assuming a 3-4% withdrawal rate per year. I have written about this strategy before if you’re intrigued as to how this works.
Maxing out my ISA every year forms part of my strategy to achieve this longer-term goal.
I still need to research a new ISA provider for this tax year so that I can spread my risk across different banks. This is so that I can stay protected by the £85K FSCS bank protection limit.
So no progress with this goal in January.
GOAL 6: Reformat my finance spreadsheets
I took quite a bit of time in January to prepare all of my budget finance sheets for 2020. In fact I even created monthly spreadsheets all the way to June 2021 (got a bit carried away!)
I still have work to do for this goal though, because I’ve mostly just copied the old format of spreadsheet from 2019 (to get me started). Now I need to go through each month and adjust the spreadsheet to cater for things like my charity saving goal and making use of my new savings account.
GOAL 7: Transfer the excess cash that is in my current account to my instant access savings accounts
This is the first goal that I can truly mark off as DONE!
I skimmed all the spare cash from my current account (which gives no interest) into my Marcus by Goldman Sachs online savings account, which has an interest rate of 1.34% plus a bonus rate of 0.1% until November 2020. Interest is paid monthly.
This was a really good job done, because as far as I’m concerned every little helps when it comes to interest on money. Cash sat around (even if it’s your emergency fund) loses value over time due to inflation, so getting some sort of interest on it is important.
I’m delighted to be able to cross my first goal off the list for this year!
GOAL 8: Keep my finance spreadsheets up-to-date on a monthly basis through to June 2020
Coupled with goal #7 I updated my January spreadsheet as I went through the month, so this goal is on target so far.
Category: Feeling Alive & Adventurous
GOAL 9: Interview Dean Graziosi for my YouTube channel
As I mentioned in my original goals post for 2020, I successfully completed this interview on 15th January, and boy did it push me outside of my comfort zone! This goal was set under my category of feeling alive and adventurous because it was something out of the ordinary and exciting - the reality definitely lived up to expectations.
I spent days getting everything set-up so that things would run smoothly - testing my audio, the lighting, the recording equipment, creating a good background and preparing the questions to ask.
The interview itself whizzed by really quickly, and Dean was so open, honest and kind to me. I was so proud of myself once it was done. I never thought that it would challenge me at a nervous level as much as it did!
I hope now that I will have more confidence to conduct interviews and collaborative videos with other big names, because I have proven to myself that it’s possible.
I will be publishing the video later this month on my YouTube channel - so if you haven’t already subscribed it’s a good time to sign-up so that you’re notified when that amazing video goes live. It’s not everyday you get to interview a multi-millionaire best selling author who just happens to be best buddies with Tony Robbins!
So that’s my second goal for the year that I can mark off as DONE.
Category: Giving Back In A Big Way
GOAL 10: Give 1% of Inspiring Life Design profits to charity
Rather than filter off money each month for this goal - because sometimes with my business accounts it can take me a little while to reconcile after month-end - I’ve decided to look at my 6 monthly profits around June/July time so that I can set aside 1% to donate to charity.
That means no specific progress on this goal during January.
Category: Serving My Inspiring Life Design Community
GOAL 11: Pick The Niche I Am Building My Business To Serve
I have made more progress on refining my niche during January. My current thinking is:
I help people who are passionate about personal development, to create and grow their own business, so that they can achieve financial freedom
I still feel like I have a bit more rewording and tweaks to make, so this goal isn’t quite done yet.
GOAL 12: Write Down Who My Ideal Customer Is And What They Need
I didn’t make progress on this, because I feel that I need to first lock-down my niche, then turn my attention to understanding and profiling who my ideal customer is.
GOAL 13: Create An Achievable 12 Month Content Plan for the Inspiring Life Design Website
I have made a start at thinking of future post ideas, but I haven’t created a plan at all yet. Most of this goal is still to be done.
GOAL 14: Create & Schedule Content For Inspiring Life Design
I am really pleased and proud of myself that I stuck to my intention of posting at least 1 new blog post and 1 email newsletter per week in January.
Maintaining consistency of content on my blog and on other channels is something I’ve struggled with in the past, so to keep this train going is a big achievement for me.
By the end of June I am hoping to have scheduled content in advance so that I am planned all the way through to the end of September.
GOAL 15: Grow My Email List Subscriptions From 47 to 350
Despite focusing on increasing the regularity of posts on my site I didn’t manage to increase my email list subscriptions at all in January, so I still have a long way to go for this goal. I need to consider more ways that I can encourage new traffic to visit my site.
If you haven’t signed-up yet, I send out a weekly email where we deep-dive into different types of side-hustles that you can create to set-up ongoing income streams. There’s also offers and freebies from time to time. Sign-up today and get access to my Profit From Online Workshops Course for free.
GOAL 16: Increase Inspiring Life Design Domain Authority From 25 to 26
My Domain Authority remained at 25 during January. I still need to actively look out for other websites that I can do link swaps with or write guest posts for.
GOAL 17: Hit 1,000 Sessions Within A 30 Day Period
Nerdy goal alert: If you’re not sure what a session is, refer back to my 2020 goals post where I explain.
At the start of February my sessions for the last 30 days were at 372. Although this is still quite a way off the 1,000 goal, it’s an increase on where it’s been hovering around last year, so this is good progress.
Category: Growing My Inspiring Life Design Community
GOAL 18: Create A 12 Month YouTube Content plan
I planned my YouTube content through to the end of March during January. I also came up with a lot of ideas for future YouTube content, which should make it easier for me to plan the remaining 9 months of the year.
This goal is in-progress.
GOAL 19: Grow YouTube Subscribers From 351 To 1,000
My subscriber count increased to 361 by the end of January. It’s nice to see an increase but there’s still a LONG way to go!
Help a girl out and subscribe on YouTube if you haven’t already!
GOAL 20: Grow Instagram Follower Count From 2,330 To 3,000
I always knew it would be tough to grow my Instagram count, based on where this has sat for the past 6 months or so. In January I gained 11 followers taking my total to 2,341.
GOAL 21: Grow Twitter Follower Count From 1,434 To 2,000
Well this is embarrassing! My Twitter count actually decreased in January, to 1,428 - so that’s a loss of 6 followers.
I’m not really worried on this one - I like to keep an eye on how things are going with Twitter, but it hasn’t been my priority social media, so it’s no surprise that my engagement and following is a bit down.
Category: Distributor Of Life Changing products
GOAL 22: Fully Support The Knowledge Broker Blueprint 2.0 Launch
Things have started to ramp up in terms of how much information I’ve been receiving from Dean’s team at Mastermind.com. The next launch is near the end of February and I’m so excited for it.
Last year I spoke to so many new people about the Knowledge Broker Blueprint program so that they could decide whether this was a business opportunity that was right for them. I am passionate about helping people understand all the ins and outs, as well as supporting anyone who decides to go for it, to make sure that they really maximise the business opportunity.
In January I kept up-to-date with all the latest training from Dean, as well as carrying out my own preparations for how I intend to support and promote the launch.
Definitely on target for this goal!
GOAL 23: STRETCH GOAL - Create An Evergreen Course
I haven’t started looking at this goal yet - no progress in January.
GOAL 24: Create Printables To Sell On Inspiring Life Design
I didn’t spend any time on creating new products in January. I dedicated my time to writing posts, newsletters, creating YouTube content and preparing for the KBB launchh. This goal is likely to wait until March or April.
That’s it for my January goals update. How did you get on with your goals in January? Let me know in the comments below…
Get my Profit From Online Workshops Course for FREE!
You will learn how to make your first income by running simple online workshops or events, about subjects that you already know and love.
Discover my simple 10 step process - perfect for beginners and entry level side hustlers!
INCLUDES MY GREAT BONUS: Tried & tested templates for a hassle-free start-up
CLICK HERE to get FREE access to Profit From Online Workshops today!
Previous & Next Posts
In my last post I wrote about 5 side hustles to consider starting in 2020
Meet more UK Money Bloggers in my next post about the Spring 2020 prize giveaway (now closed)
I sometimes use affiliate links in my posts. This means that if you buy a service or product using my link I receive a small commission at no extra expense to you. You can navigate independently to the sites mentioned if you prefer not to use my affiliate links. I only link to products or services which I personally use & recommend.