Of all the strategies I have learned and developed since starting my business six years ago, there is one tool that has been the most important. It has carried me through so many different things, and has allowed me to grow and change my business. It has affected every aspect of my business, and is applicable not just in business but in life in general. If you asked me to lose all of my tools in my entrepreneurial toolbelt except one, this is the one I would pick!

So I’m breaking it down for you today!

The One Strategy: Baseline

The baseline strategy is based on the concept that all the work and effort you put in produces the results you get in any aspect of your life. In other words...

Your Effort = Your Results

I know, you’re thinking “How does an equation help my business?” Think back to grade school math with me for a minute. When working through an equation to discover the components of each side, we would manipulate the equation. Whatever was done to one side had to be done to the other. If you take something away from one side, it must come off the other. If you’re like me, it’s been a while since grade school math and it wasn’t easy! So I’ll give a quick example:

If you start with 4 + X = 23 and you’d like to determine X, you remove 4 from each side of the equation so that you end up with X = 19.

4 + X = 23

4 - 4 + X = 23 - 4

X = 19

It’s the same process for every other area of your life. So if you want to change your results, you must figure out what your efforts are and change those. You must either add something to your efforts, or take something away from what you’re doing. This is where the baseline strategy comes in.

The Baseline Strategy

Because you can’t change what you aren’t aware of.

This strategy is all about tracking what you’re doing and making subtle changes to your efforts in order to produce a change in your results. In other words, it’s about having a baseline you’re adhering to which is producing your results. And in equation speak? It’s about knowing what you have on each side of the equation so you can change the effort side in order to change the results side. It’s a long-term strategy that requires you to keep careful track of what you’re doing, but it can help you produce some fantastic results!

What you’ll do is sit down and think about the area of your business (or life) that you want to see a change in. Open a document and begin writing down all of the things that you do in that area, and the frequency with which you’re doing them. This is your baseline.

E. G., your Marketing Baseline might look something like this…

• Marketing:
• Blog Post Weekly
• Social Media Daily
• Attend 2 Networking Events Weekly
• Complete a Podcast Interview Monthly
• Call Media for Publication Weekly

Once you’ve completed your first list, you can go back through and group activities together by frequency so your list looks like this:

• Marketing:
• Social Media Daily
• Blog Post Weekly
• Attend 2 Networking Events Weekly
• Call Media for Publication Weekly
• Complete a Podcast Interview Monthly

Grouping by frequency allows you to come back to the list every day, week, and month to see exactly what you need to accomplish based on what time/day it is.

Once You Have Your Baseline…

Now it’s time to start tracking your results! If you’re consistently hitting your baseline, and consistently not getting the results you want, then it’s time to make some changes to your baseline. Add something in, take something out, do a little of both if you think it will help, and then come back to your baseline in roughly 1-3 months to see what it has changed and if you need to continue to make adjustments to your baseline.

And once again, the baseline strategy can be applied to any area of your business. You can branch it out as much as you want in one department, and continue to tweak it until you’re getting the results you want.

This strategy has been absolutely transformative for me and my clients, and is one of the all-time best strategies I’ve ever learned. So I hope it helps you as you are growing your business too!

Want more help on achieving your goals? Check out our Goal Setting and Achieving course designed to help you blast your goals out of the water!

About the Author: 

Stephanie Scheller is a TED speaker, a two-time best-selling author and the founder of Grow Disrupt. In just under a decade, Stephanie has been behind the scenes with nearly 2500 small businesses. She has worked in groups and one-on-one to create total business transformation & help business owners live the life they got into business to create!