2017 was a great year for nluv Finish and Design Studio as we began our journey. And now… 2018 is here & we are ready to kick things off strong! Time for a little 2018 planning… and away we go.
2017 in a nutshell
1st social media plan to kick things off!
In a nutshell, 2017 was our birth year. We did a lot of not-so-fun tasks in setting up a business. But don’t worry, we were able to squeeze in some enjoyable projects too. We started off with a dream & ended up with a business plan, permits, business licenses and a studio to craft our magic. The shelves were stocked, sketch book filled with ideas & lots of amazing gifts were crafted, trying out new techniques and products.
With the help of Local Freshies®, we were able to get our website up along with a weekly blog and all social media accounts active. We had to keep learning, experimenting and writing so we could fill up our blog, The nluv Memos, and start to gather followers. It was a whirlwind and hasn’t stopped just because the calendar has turned to a new year!
A New Year – A New Plan
2018 is a new year and so it deserves a new plan. Our goal is to build upon our 1st year momentum and kick things into high gear. How will we do it? Well, here’s how we see it playing out…
2018 Planning in motion
A solid business plan will keep things on track!
Business Plan review: It’s always a good idea to pull out the business plan and review it. Is our Vision and Mission still on track? Do any Goals or Strategies need to be added or updated? What Objectives are most important for this new year? The nluv Business Plan is what drives our studio so anything and everything we do should ALIGN with the plan. And if it doesn’t, we aren’t working on it! A new copy of our business plan will be printed and hung next to our work space so we never lose sight of the end-game.
Focused Product Line: Now that we’re ready to bring our products to the marketplace, a focused product line is where we are starting. We’ll kick things off with a few select product types, each with several variations. We need to keep this list under control so our brand keeps true to its purpose and we can relate a name with our products. Of course, we will take custom orders and then expand our lines over time, but for now, we are keeping things simple for our offerings. We won’t disappoint our customers, I promise!
Sell online to expand your reach.
Online Sales: With our focused branding & a list of products, it’s time to start selling! Online sales are important to stretch our reach as far as we can. We love what we do and want to share our creations with as many people as possible. A few select outlets will be chosen as well as all descriptions, photos and shipping details put together. It will be so exciting for our first order to come in!
Community Events: I love our Lake Tahoe community so it’s time to get out there are share who we are & what we offer! Being a vacation destination, we have lots and I mean LOTS of festivals, craft fairs and outdoor events. With the product line set & online sales in the plan, the second sales prong will be sharing our designs at these events. We will carefully choose venues that best fit our products and start off with just a couple. By the end of 2018, we should be craft fair pros & ready to expand!
Blog advice: Post consistently!
Social Media 2.0: We took the social media plunge in 2017 & now it’s time to amp things up. It can take a lot of time managing all the different outlets from Twitter, IG, FB, Pinterest, not to mention other sites like StumbleUpon, Reddit, Hometalk and Houzz! Yikes, it is a full time job in itself. But… it is a necessity in today’s world. Our 2018 plan will take advantage of programs like Hootsuite and Crowdfire to help us be efficient with our time while tending to all social media outlets. We love sharing ideas, projects and now our products, so social media will continue to be a focus.
