My first year as a business coach, I succeeded by sheer luck. My income exceeded my expenses. I called that success, but I realized I would need a plan if I wanted to grow my business.

What's your business plan for 2010? Do you have one? Are you expecting to tighten your belt, to expand or both? Are you thinking of raising your rates? Are you introducing a new product or service? Are you looking for ways to give added value to your clients? Or will you be happy to maintain the status quo?

I hope you have already been asking yourself these questions. If not, here are my first five suggestions for re-assessing your business and making a plan that will work for you in 2010. Stay tuned next month for my second five suggestions.

1. Are you satisfied with your financial condition? Review your revenue and expenses. Where do you need to make adjustments? People tend to look at their financial situation when things are going badly, when revenue is down, when they need a loan, or when they have a meeting with their banker or accountant. That's like waiting to floss your teeth until the day before you go to the dentist. If you don't floss your teeth on a regular basis, it won't improve your dental health.
   
   So, as an entrepreneur, you should be able to answer the question, "How is your business doing?" at any given time during the year. I recommend that you buy and actually use a good accounting program so you can review your finances on a monthly basis and compare this year's revenue with the previous year's revenue. If you're not a do-it-yourselfer, hire a professional who can help you with this. Once you have one year's worth of financial records entered in your accounting program, you can easily set up a basic first-time budget for the next year by dividing your annual revenue and expenses by 12. Of course, that only works well if your revenue exceeds your expenses.
    
2. Is your schedule working for you? Are you working enough . . . or too much? You've heard of the "Bucket List." Entrepreneurs tend to put their life inside the bucket of their business. In other words, entrepreneurs do the business first and then live their lives with whatever time and energy remain. I maintain that your business needs to fit into the bucket of your life. Determine the best time of day for you to work, and plan your schedule around that. If you're a morning person, do your in-office work in the morning when you can concentrate best, and do your networking in the afternoon or evening. If you're a parent and you want to take part in your children's activities, mark the activities on your calendar at the beginning of the year or month, and work around them.
    
3. Is your networking effective? Are you connecting with the right people in the right places? Is it productive for you? Networking is about forming relationships. Business will naturally follow from those relationships. My caveat: Business will follow as long as you have a product or service that people desire, your business is good at that product or service, and you can connect with people. My advice to clients is to pick one or two places to network, and keep going back to those same places and people so you get to know each other. Help other people whenever you can. Give appropriate and effective referrals generously. This creates good karma. Form a close relationship with someone with whom you can share your "down and dirty." Everyone needs someone with whom to share her ups and downs.
    
4. What is your return on investment from your employees, outside contractors and vendors? Are you getting the results you need? Review your situation with employees, outside contractors and vendors on an annual basis. Are the people you hire doing what you need them to be doing? I use three independent contractors in my business. We have developed relationships over the years. I delegate to them, and I trust them. Having full-time employees is not the right model for my business. Have you reassessed your business model lately? What is working for you? What do you need to adjust?
    
5. Is your marketing working? Do you have a PR plan? Marketing is about customers. It's about how your customers can satisfy their wants and needs by buying your product or service. Your marketing message should tell customers what you can do for them and how you can do it better than anybody else. PR is about you. Your PR message tells who you are as a person and why the customer should work with you or buy from you.
   
   One of my early mentors told me to remember three words: "visibility," "credibility" and "profitability." Visibility and credibility lead to profitability. Keep your message simple. Keep repeating that message. Marketing research has shown that a prospect needs to see your message seven times before it penetrates the static and distractions of the marketplace and she makes a decision to do business with you.

The first part of this reassessment has been about processes: budgeting, scheduling, networking and marketing. Identify your strengths and weaknesses in each of these areas and work on improvement. Next month, I'll discuss your relationship with your customers and how you can increase your business by helping your customers meet their individual challenges. It's called up-selling.