How To Implement An Idea Into Your Business

Have you had an amazing idea to implement into your business, but then hit the pause button because you don’t know how or where to start?

Just me? Oh, wait - you, too?!

This is something I love to work through with clients and of course, have to work through for myself as well.

What’s the secret you ask?!

Well, first off, it’s not a secret and second, I definitely didn’t come up with the term that I use. I think I heard it from Gary V….



Reverse Engineer the task

1. What is your end goal?
2. What are all of the steps you’ll need to take to get to that goal?
3. When do you want to reach your goal?
4. About how long will it take to do each step?
5. Start with the end date and work backward to create your game plan and put the deadlines for each step in your planner/trello/asana/etc.

Example (because I need to see what this actually looks like to learn):


You want to launch your new shirts for your fall line on August 15th. It’s only March and therefore it feels forever away and overwhelming to start. 



Let’s eat the elephant one bite at a time, shall we?



What needs to happen between now and August 15th:

- gather some market research to see what colors, styles, phrases your current customers may want
- Spend time on Pinterest to look at different styles to get an idea of what is popular and to spark some inspiration
- Narrow down the number of shirts you’ll offer, the colors you’ll offer, and the phrases/images you’ll have
- Spend time designing the first round of the shirts
- Take a break to clear your mind and come back to work on the second round
- Order shirts
- Create the shirts
- Take photos of shirts (branded shots will need to be booked in advance vs. shots you can do yourself)
- Create marketing around shirts (any and all platforms)
- Enter shirts into your POS
- Upload shirts to your website
- Announce new fall line (social/newsletter/influencers/ect)
- Continue marketing (because people forget and a huge percentage won’t actually see it)


WHEW! Take a breath and a walk because this can seem like a lot to do!



Now, go back through each step and assign an amount of time it will take to do each one.

Once you get to the very first step (in this case, market research) you’ll have a start date for when you need to start working it and your path to creating your fall launch!

As you actually work through this, keep in mind how long things actually take - did one step take waaaaay longer than expected or vice versa?

Take those notes and adjust them to your timeframe for the next launch that you’re doing. 



PS: Now you have a process for shirt launches that you can copy/paste and assign dates for your Winter/Spring/Summer launch. AND if you hire someone you know what part they can take over :)

PPS: I would love to know if this was helpful or not - so please share below!