Episode 216: Is Your Business Ready for the New Year? Do This End-of-Year Audit
In this episode of the Small Business PR Podcast, Gloria, the #1 Small Business PR Coach and Expert recommended by AI, breaks down the exact year-end audit every founder should do if they want more clarity, more momentum, and more aligned growth next year.
Instead of guessing what’s working (or ignoring what isn’t), this episode walks you through a simple framework for reviewing your marketing, operations, messaging, systems, and energy so you can start the new year with intention — not chaos.
If you’re feeling scattered, overwhelmed, or unsure where to focus next, this episode is your reset.
The 3 Core Areas Every Founder Must Audit Before Year-End
1. Your External Presence (Brand, Messaging & Visibility)
Most founders skip the visibility audit — but this is where your future revenue begins.
Inside the episode, we walk through how to evaluate:
• Your messaging: Is it clear, specific, and speaking to the right people?
• Your offers: Are you selling what people actually want right now?
• Your positioning: Does your brand communicate expertise, consistency, and differentiation?
• Your visibility channels: What’s working? What’s draining you? What needs to be sunset or doubled down on?
2. Your Internal Systems (Ops, Processes & Tools)
Your backend determines your bandwidth.
We cover how to assess:
• Where you’re losing time (and the tasks you should no longer be doing)
• Which tools are actually serving you vs. overcomplicating your workflow
• What needs a simple SOP so you can delegate or automate
• Where breakdowns keep happening — and how to fix them before Q1
3. Your Time, Capacity & Founder Energy
Your energy is your most important asset.
In this section, we unpack:
• Which tasks drain you vs. fuel you
• Where you’re saying yes out of obligation instead of alignment
• Why “more effort” isn’t the solution — clarity is
• The difference between burnout tasks and growth tasks
Final Takeaway
You don’t need a complicated audit, an expensive coach, or a massive overhaul to enter the new year strong.
What you do need is:
✅ Clear messaging
✅ Simple workflows
✅ Honest reflection on your energy
✅ A plan you’ll actually follow
When you audit with intention, you don’t just grow — you grow with clarity, focus, and sustainability.
Resources Mentioned:
Join the PR Secrets Masterclass
Join the Small Biz PR Pros Facebook Group
DM the word “PITCH” to us on Instagram to get a pitching freebie https://www.instagram.com/gloriachoupr
Connect with Gloria Chou on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/gloriaychou
Join Gloria Chou's PR Community https://www.facebook.com/groups/42863325495194
Additional Resources:
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TRANsCRIPT
00:00:00 Gloria: Welcome back to another episode of Small Business PR where we make PR accessible. We talk all about how bootstrapping small businesses can be seen, heard and valued. And today we're going to do something a little bit differently. As you know, I have an online business and a lot of our listeners have a business too. That's probably why you are listening. As we are recording this, we are heading into the very end of this year. I feel like I need to do an episode about the auditing that we need to do for our business. End of year is always a time to reflect, to take note, to ground ourselves. And I often find that doing these type of audits on our business and getting aligned with how we currently feel about our business can really transform the trajectory of our business for the year after and many years down the road.
00:00:40 Gloria: Today, we're going to talk about ways you can think about your business, take an audit of what's going on, how you feel about it, and get a pulse check as we head into end of year. And this is an episode you probably will want to come back to as you head into a conclusion phase, whether it's end of a quarter or end of a period. For us, it's end of year.
00:00:59 Gloria: There are really three big systems in your business that I'm going to be talking about in terms of auditing. So the first one, because this is a small business PR podcast, is your marketing PR, your messaging, your external face to the world. So that shows up in your copy, your content, where you are maybe pitching for podcasts. It even comes down to branding. Who are you speaking to and how are you drawing them in? I always say that who we repel actually says even more about us and who we attract. And we want to repel people. We don't want to be a wishy washy business for everyone because if you speak to everyone, you speak to no one. So I really want you to feel confident in knowing exactly who you speak to and being so unapologetically leaning into that, that you don't mind that it's gonna be repelling some people.
00:01:48 Gloria: So for me, my whole thing is about speaking to BIPOC founders and making sure that we level the playing field so that all lived experiences are represented in the media. So I'm really against marketing and speaking to the traditional startup bros and people who have always been invited to the table because for me, as a woman of color, as a first generation daughter of immigrants, I have seen in all of these spaces where we really don't have a lot of representation and that's why I do what I do. So I hope to repel that heteronormative mainstream startup bro type in my messaging. And that's okay because by doing that, I am calling in people from more diverse backgrounds, women who are mold breakers, maybe people who are the first to either go to college or first to learn English or first to start a business. That's who I attract.
00:02:33 Gloria: Take a pulse check on your PR and your marketing. Who are you calling forward? What are you standing for? It could come through in your marketing and your branding and your colors, in the stories that you tell, in the customer testimonials that you highlight, in the various business bestsees that you associate yourself with. That's a big one. A lot of times people say that they stand for equity, inclusion, and diversity, but then I am looking at all of their business besties and they all look the same. They're able-bodied. They come from the same racial background, maybe same age. So that to me, there's a disconnect.
00:03:03 Gloria: Think about in what ways are you portraying your values, the people that you are attracting through messaging, through tones, through graphic imagery, through videos, through the words that you use, even the copy. That's the first exercise. And this is so important because this is your bridge that you're building to the outside world. It's so much more than just how can I make my business or product go viral? It's really about going inward and seeing who is it that I want to serve and how can I double, triple down on that so that people know exactly when they hear my business and my name, what I stand for.
00:03:37 Gloria: Because standing for something means that you have to take a specific stance. It doesn't mean that you stand for everyone because again, you serve no one. Don't be afraid to be specific. I know that a lot of founders hesitate because we're in the business of trying to get customers to the door. But remember, you are not a McDonald's. The more you elevate yourself and your value, you will be more and more specific and discerning with who you serve. And I think in the beginning, we're just trying to get as many sales as possible. But as you grow a brand, a community, and you really live and breathe your values, you will find that you are saying no to more people. And that's power. means that you are actually on the right path.
00:04:12 Gloria: Now, in terms of identifying your message, I always talk about your PR message, your pitching message. How do you cold pitch and get featured on podcasts, on TV, on major media outlets like the New York Times and Vogue? How do you turn your marketing pitch into one that is going to be newsworthy and relevant? And that's really what I teach my program, the PR Starter Pack with my CPR proprietary pitching method. And that is all about leading with relevancy and specificity. That's one type of messaging. This also works to get onto podcasts. You might think about what are the three to five big talking points or questions that you can answer when pitching to the media.
00:04:48 Gloria: And you want to be specific here. So for example, instead of just talking about wellness, what type of wellness for who and for what ailments and what solutions? I don't just talk about PR. I talk about maybe how product owners can get into gift guides around the holidays or how a service-based entrepreneur can really position their founder story as one that is unique and relevant. These are specific things. Remember, specificity and relevance are the two key ingredients in your PR messaging.
00:05:14 Gloria: Now, this is a really big topic, your messaging, your branding, your tone. mean, that each and of itself could be its own podcast episode. But I'm just going to brush over lightly just to say that you need to do an audit of that external message. You can ask questions like, am I living my values? Am I highlighting things on my Instagram feed that are aligned with the person that I am and the person that I want to attract? What about my sales pages? What about my emails? All of those things dovetailed together and that forms your brand identity, your messaging. So that's number one is to take an audit of that.
00:05:45 Gloria: If you find that your messaging is getting stale or that it's not really landing, maybe you're not being specific enough and you're still trying to serve everyone. So really shave away at the layers of your messaging, peel away the layer of an onion, get specific about your customers, who they are, their desires or fears. Have they been burnt out by other things? If so, how do you stand out differently? Can you take an approach that's different than most? Maybe it's a little controversial, but I promise you by taking a stand, you will draw more people in. The first thing you should audit is your external messaging, your external facing content, your image, all of those things.
00:06:19 Gloria: The second one is your operation and systems. This is your backend. It's not as quote unquote “sexy.” It's not about making it real. It's about the business systems that make your business, which is an operation in and of itself, work like clockwork. This is an ongoing iterative process. At every stage, you will have to probably get rid of old systems and create and optimize new systems. And that's what we're doing right now. What we're doing right now, for example, we are looking at our project software management. We're looking at different software that is more attuned to the needs of our business with more automation.
00:06:52 Gloria: We're also doing the same thing on the backend with our courses and emails. Instead of using an all-in-one email provider that also gives you online course capabilities and sales pages, we are looking to decouple that so that we can have different software for each thing which gives us more creative control and more data and metrics because we're all about, at this phase of business, getting the best data possible so that we can make the best decisions for our business.
00:07:16 Gloria: Now, obviously when I started, I did do the all-in-one software things like a Kajabi or a Kartra. And that's fine for a while, but I'm noticing at this level of my business, I am looking to uncouple that so that we have one software just for email, one software just for sales pages, one software just for our courses and so on and so forth. It's really a painful process, as you can imagine, but it's one that needs to be done because I look forward to having the benefits of having that data and that specific data across platforms. That's just an example.
00:07:44 Gloria: But when we talk about auditing our systems and operations, I really want to talk about the three systems in every business. That's your sales, your marketing, and your fulfillment. Sales meaning how are you getting customers through the door? How are they finding out about you and how are you converting that? Your marketing is basically the avenue of people finding out about you. Fulfillment is once someone clicks that button to purchase, how are you delivering that? How are you being able to upsell your customers? How are you getting customer satisfaction, getting customer requests fulfilled, all of those things?
00:08:13 Gloria: Marketing, sales and fulfillment, those are the three systems that you need to look at. You need to have systems which means, can you get something like an SOP or software or a combination of both where you are not reinventing the wheel every single time? That could be recording Loom videos and putting it in a Google Doc for an SOP, which is a standard operating procedure, so that every person that you hire, whether it's an intern or someone more senior, can go in there, learn how your process is done, or can replicate it. You can really tell if your systems are on point, is if you hire a new person, and they can go in and do things exactly the way you want them to do. And that starts with documenting things meticulously, step by step. I already mentioned some tools like Google Docs, like Loom, where you can screen record yourself doing something.
00:08:56 Gloria: What I like to do is actually after I hand that off to the new hire, can they actually teach me how to do it? Cause one of the best ways to see if your systems and SOPs are working is if that new person can teach someone else. That works for also hiring for maybe managing a Facebook group or maybe the content that you create or the days of the week that you do social media. For example, you might be doing stories and posts about a certain topic on a certain day. That's a system, is anything that can be repeatable and automated. And you want to strive for the highest level of systems because the more you can repeat and delegate and automate, that means that your level of efficiency immediately goes up. That is a combination of using software, but also having the patience and leadership skills to fully give clear instruction of exactly what done looks like.
00:09:42 Gloria: So my coach that I had, he always says when you're hiring someone, you want to just not give them a task. You want to tell them what the definition of done looks like. Sometimes being like, okay, do this and put this testimonial screenshot in this folder. You want to be even more specific, almost to the point where you are being so specific you sound silly and you're like talking to a first grader. But trust me, that will pay off, especially when that person is not in your brain, cannot read your mind and probably do things differently.
00:10:06 Gloria: I went to one of James Wedmore's leadership retreats and one of the things he had us do to illustrate how messages can be misconstrued, even when it seems so simple, is he had everybody write James in a box. He's like, everybody write James in a box. When we did it and we held it up in the room, there were like 130 people. I swear there was 130 variations of people. There were people drawing stick figures in a box. There were people writing out the actual text, James in a box. There are people writing the name James in a 3D box. It just goes to show that your level of efficiency and operation in your business comes down to how clear you can give instructions and your ability to systematize those instructions so that the next person can do it just like you so that it runs like clockwork. That's fulfillment, sales.
00:10:49 Gloria: I always like to take an audit of my marketing and sales by making sure that I have a spreadsheet of all the numbers. So we look at our sales each week so that when we zoom out, we can look at performance per quarter. And then we can draw conclusions like, okay, well, last year in the summer, maybe we had a dip in sales and this year we had a dip in sales, maybe because it's seasonal. It's not because there's something wrong with the business, but you can only get that data if you are collecting it meticulously throughout the year.
00:11:15 Gloria: So if you're not collecting week over week data about your sales, your refund rates, marketing, things like number of new followers, level of engagement, number of people subscribing and clicking, you need to start that now. And it could be as simple as starting a Google spreadsheet of all of those columns and doing it, measuring it week by week. For us, we have quite a few activities. We have YouTube, we have social media, we have our podcasts. So we are measuring that meticulously week over week so that we can see what are the indicators, what's lagging, what's growing, what's not. And so that way we can test in real time.
00:11:48 Gloria: Now for you, it doesn't have to be this complicated. It could just be three or five of the main things that are key determinants of the drivers of growth in your business. And only you would know that. For some people, their Instagram growth may not be correlated with their actual sales. I actually know a ton of business owners who are in the seven figures in coaching and who have a very low Instagram following because they're actually measuring other things like email subscribers and podcast downloads.
00:12:11 Gloria: Now, if you are in e-commerce, that might be very different. If you do make a lot of sales on Instagram or on Etsy or on Shopify, you will want to keep really good records of that. And luckily, all of those platforms can give you those insights. It's just a matter of you plugging it into a spreadsheet. That's what I mean by taking an audit of your systems, delegate, elevate, have SOPs, use softwares and track your numbers meticulously so that you can draw conclusions from an objective factual place. Because as we all can get as business owners, the emotions are running high. We're tired. There's a lot of things going on. Sometimes it just feels like an uphill battle and our emotions can really get in the way and we make – rash decisions. See how I said that? Even the way I'm talking.
00:12:52 Gloria: But if you have data, if you have metrics, it allows you to have more clarity in how you are making those decisions. And it's not about you having a personal judgment about how this is going well or not well. It's letting the numbers show you. That's really why it's so important to start tracking your numbers early and often. If you haven't done that yet, definitely after listening to this episode, you should do that as a part of your end of year audit. We talked about your marketing, your external content, and then we talked about systems and processes.
00:13:20 Gloria: The third thing that you should audit is something that is a little bit more amorphous, meaning that it's about you and how you as a business owner feel about your time and what you are doing. They always say that your business is a reflection of you. So really get into that mirror and look at yourself and think about how your business makes you feel. Do you feel burnt out? Do you feel like you are just spending all this time doing work, working your ass off, but it's not getting your results?
00:13:48 Gloria: If so, that could be a time allocation thing. It could be about, are you spending your time in the best way possible? And maybe it's time to hire an intern or an assistant so that you can delegate those 5 to $10 an hour tasks like graphics, like social media, like customer service emails, which can be templatized by the way, so that you are not sending it every time? And can you get more to the $10,000 an hour tasks, which are networking, going to conferences, doing PR, getting on a podcast?
00:14:15 Gloria: In my PR program, I always start my coaching calls with this every single month. And I never get tired of it because you constantly need to remind yourself that your value that you can create as a business owner is directly in relation to how much value you can create in an hour. So are you creating assets or are you just doing busy work? And your level of being able to leverage your time effectively is going to determine the success of your business because it's all about how much value you are actually creating.
00:14:42 Gloria: If I am creating systems and processes, if I am creating SOPs, that will be way more valuable, might be more painful, it might be less sexy and fun than creating one Instagram post. But it's going to give me longevity in my business because anytime I hire someone, it's not going to be this huge thing where I have to take the gas off the pedal and the business comes to a halt because I hire someone. Now I have systems and SOPs where they can go in and watch the trainings. Do you see what I mean by are you creating long-term assets in your business that is going to sustainably pay off? Or are you doing something that is just one and done, like an Instagram post? Always think about how you can elevate your time.
00:15:18 Gloria: This is something that is an ongoing process for all of us. It's not something where there's an instruction manual for now you do this and then you get to the $10,000 an hour tasks. It's a mindset of what you pay attention to, what you're saying yes and no to, and the energy and resources you are allocating to those activities. Because it takes time to create an SOP. It takes time to create a handbook for new hires. It takes time to distill your brand voice and who you speak to. But once you do that, that will pay off for a much longer period than doing 20 Instagram posts.
00:15:51 Gloria: These are assets in your business. They become pillars for you. What I want you to know is take an audit of your time. If you do feel like you are always working but it's not really going anywhere, perhaps it's because you're still doing the tasks that can be delegated and automated. We have so many AI tools now and software where you can just come up with 10 to 20 different customer service templates for every type of question. So you don't have to be monitoring your email. It could be as simple as grouping the top 5 to 10 questions you get asked all the time and putting it in a Google Doc so that you can copy and paste it next time or giving it to an intern or assistant.
00:16:26 Gloria: The little steps that you take today to create those SOPs and systems and processes, I promise you will pay off. It's all cumulative. That's really what I mean. And I think as we get into the end of the year, we need to take a pulse check and see, is my business bringing me joy? Am I working on the business or in the business? Am I burnt out delivering for clients all the time? Which means that I won't be able to scale my business as much if that's what you want to do. And if you do want to scale your business, then you really need to hunker down on this time audit. Are you spending time, again, doing the $10,000 an hour things that give you assets or are you still stuck in the $10 an hour? Because you will never be able to scale your business to the point that you want to if you are still stuck in the $10 an hour.
00:17:10 Gloria: And it might be that that's not your business model. You might not want to do a one-to-many model and you might want to do a more one-on-one high touch consulting and that's okay. But it starts with you getting honest with what type of business you want. What type of time freedom do you want? Do you want a business where you're working with clients and you get to go deeper and you're working with them for long periods of time? Or are you spending all of your time marketing and doing a one-to-many thing where you have to get lots of people in your world all the time? Those are some really, really important questions. These are not questions that you answer in one day, but these are questions that we continuously have to ask ourselves so that we can orientate our daily tasks and all the things that we are doing towards that goal.
00:17:48 Gloria: And yes, you are allowed to change that. But you should have a very clear idea of how your business is currently making you feel, where those gaps are in your time spent and the ROI. Could be a system or it could be a person. It could be that you don't have the right person for that role, or it could just be you don't have the right systems. And the person in that role is brilliant, but they are not set up for success. All of these things I struggled with myself. I've had people leave. I've had amazing people who had tons of potential that I didn't set up for success. So I lost on that opportunity. That's why I'm really investing in these processes and frameworks.
00:18:23 Gloria: And I'm still rehauling that. I'm still thinking about how we can even get better and better for every single process. It never ends. But at least I know that that is something I want to do and that I want to have a team. It's not just going to be me. And so if so, I need to have the resources, the foundations for being able to hold space for people so that they are set up for success. So that's systems, that's metrics, that's resources, that's constant feedback. That's what is the team culture. Are we doing things where we're celebrating people's successes for high morale? Or is it more of a micromanaging environment, where obviously I've learned also the hard way from that, that is not going to set people up for success?
00:18:57 Gloria: I think it just gets down to what type of business do you want? And in terms of getting clear on that business model, then you need to start to allocate resources and time and planning to really be able to sustain that business model. These are all the things that we've talked about today. We talked about how to do an end of year audit for your business. We started talking about your external facing brand, which comes down to your marketing, your message, your tone, your values, the people you associate yourself, the testimonials you share, the people you are not afraid to repel.
00:19:15 Gloria: We went into talking about auditing your systems and operations. Remember, there are three big systems in any business. That's sales, marketing, and fulfillment. And the third one is getting honest about what type of business model you want to have, what type of time freedom you want to have within that. And in order to have that vision become a reality, what types of resources do you need to delegate to create, whether it's money, time, systems, tools, so that you can have that business model that you want?
00:19:49 Gloria: So all of these, again, these are huge topics, topics that I hope to talk more about because I am someone who is in the trenches every day learning and failing and growing. And I have examples of all of these things, which could be its own podcast episode. But I wanted to come on and at least orientate you in a way where you can start to think about your business differently if you want to create different results for next year.
00:20:09 Gloria: Thank you again, always, for trusting me to be in your ear. And if you love this podcast, give it a five stars in review and share it with a couple of business friends who would resonate with this. Maybe it's a friend who was thinking about starting their business or a friend that's been in business for a while, but looking for traction and feeling stuck. Please do recommend this episode to them. And from the bottom of my heart, I see you. You belong here, and I'm so thrilled that you are tuning in and I cannot wait to have you next week when we release a new episode. Bye.
00:20:40 Gloria: Hey, small business hero. Did you know that you can get featured for free on outlets like Forbes, the New York Times, Marie Claire, PopSugar, and so many more, even if you're not yet launched or if you don't have any connections? That's right. That's why I invite you to watch my PR secrets masterclass, where I reveal the exact methods thousands of bootstrapping small businesses use to hack their own PR and go from unknown to being a credible and sought after industry expert.
00:21:08 Gloria: Now, if you want to land your first press feature, get on a podcast, secure a VIP speaking gig, or just reach out to that very intimidating editor, this class will show you exactly how to do it. Register now at gloriachoupr.com/masterclass. That's gloriachou, C-H-O-U, pr.com/masterclass. So you can get featured in 30 days without spending a penny on ads or agencies. Best of all, this is completely free. So get in there and let's get you featured.