With a new year upon us, you may be tempted to start an agency overhaul. However, all good things come in moderation, and you need to make sure you aren’t making changes just for the sake of doing something new. While a fresh start is nice, be careful about throwing the baby out with the bathwater. In order to make your agency better, you’ll first need to know what you’re doing right.
It can be a challenge to target and evaluate your successes. Here are a few simple tips to help you see what you’re doing right, so you can focus on the positive for a change.
Ask Questions. Survey your employees and clients, to find out what they think is going well. It’s always important to get outside perspectives. Chances are you’re too hard on yourself and are missing the things that are going well. Remember you still have the final say in what to do with what you hear.
Check Your Stats. Take a look at past data to see where business has grown. Pay attention to increases in profit, new clients and referral volume and see what happened around these times (i.e. hired new staff, marketing changes, updating processes). Pay attention to consistency. Short spikes can be flukes – real improvement is long lasting.
Assess Against Your Values. What defines or differentiates your agency? What do you and your clients value most? The answers to these questions point to what makes you successful. Be sure to hold fast to these values as you think about making changes in your agency.
Give Change Some Time. Once you know what works and what doesn’t, make one change at a time. If you change too much at once, you’ll never know what it was that made you better. By making one small change at a time, you can more easily track your growth or stagnation and know exactly what you need to tweak.
Your agency management system is the best tool for gathering and processing data, and your system provider can offer trainings in how to track and read this data. Our Partner XE has a host of ways to gather and synthesize information and our committed service representatives are able offer one on one consultation on how Partner XE can work best for you.
To find out more about Partner XE, and to talk with our amazing staff, contact us today at 800.747.9273 or [email protected].
