2012 Goals Revisited

I was checking on the number of email subscribers we received so far on our AlcatrazSeries.com site and that reminded me that I had a goal to get a certain number of email subscribers this year as part of a 2012 goal.  I couldn't remember the specifics of that goal or the others I setup, so I wanted to revisit my S.M.A.R.T goals for 2012 post and see how I've done so far and give myself a letter grade on each.

1)  Save $.  I'd give myself a C+ on this one.  I've recently gotten back on track having water at most places when eating out for lunch and I haven't really spent a bunch of $ on anything in particular and always try to utilize coupons, but we haven't gone out of our way to save $. 

2)  Continue with stock trading and earn SpikeTrade performance credits.  I'd give myself a B+ or A- on this one.  Each week I compete with others on SpikeTrade.com to pick one stock each week that will hopefully outperform the 3rd place pick of the whole group.  My goal was to triple the performance of last year, to achieve 12 winning picks or roughly one per month.  So far this year I have 3 winning picks so I'm off to a good start.  If I can win this week I'd be right on track. 

3)   Beat the overall stock market return by 2% in my trading account.  The stock market started the year on a huge run to the upside.  As of today, the S&P 500 is up 7.8% since Jan 1st.  That is a huge run and it was up even more about 3-4 weeks ago.  I had a few decent trades so far this year and my account is up 6.4% so far this year.  Not bad, but not quite at my goal, I'd give myself a B- there.  I need to spend a bit more time on this one.

4)  Create 3-5 niche sites/blogs.  I'd like to obtain an email subscriber list of 10 people by June 30th and 50 by Dec 31st.  My revenue goal is to bring in $100 by June 30th and $250 by Dec 31st.  This one is a work in progress.  So far I have the Alcatrazseries.com site, Nichesitetool.com, CravingTravel.com and one other one.  So as far as number of sites, I did setup 4, so that goal is met.  But I do need to work on creating more content for Niche Site Tool and Craving Travel.   

I've been trying to build email subscriber lists on this blog and my Niche Site Tool blog, but the funny thing is I haven't gained any new subscribers there, however I just checked and we have 10 email subscribers on our Alcatraz Series site!  So I hit the '10 email subscribers by June' goal already.  Still need to work on gaining subscribers on my Niche Site Tool site.  I have an idea of creating a short eBook on SEO optimization tips as a freebie to gain subscribers, will see how I do there.  

The next goal was bring in $100 by June 30th.  I have not collected any cash, since most sites have a $100 limit before payment is sent, but I did have my first affiliate sales in the last 3 months and I have to say I was pretty excited!  I had one sale of Market Samurai, one sale of the Optin Skin WordPress plugin and someone purchased the Drinkwell 360 Cat Fountain from Amazon based on my post/review.  If you happen to be one of those people, THANK YOU so much!  I truly appreciate it!  I also had a few other Amazon affiliate sales and some AdSense clicks.  So let's see where I stand on this goal:

Market Samurai $46.56
OptInSkin Plugin $21.24
Amazon Affiliates  $16.14
Google AdSense $ 26.41
Total:  $120.35

So technically I hit my goal already of $100 by April 22nd instead of June 30th.  I have not actually banked any $, but I consider that a win.  So overall, I'd give myself an A- there.  Good work, but I really would like to be publishing more content on a regular basis on all of the sites.  I like the results so far and as soon as I'm done with this post I will work on one of those sites.  

5)  Choose our vacation destination by the end of March.   That was complete on Jan 25th, we're heading to San Francisco.  A+

6)  Health/wellness goal.  I haven't had a real focus on the wellness goal.  So far I have 43.1 miles in my Runkeeper app, not too bad.  I give myself a C+ on this one. 

Overall, since we're only 4 months into the year, I'd give myself a B-.  Some of the goals are met already and some are on-track, while a few others aren't quite there.  It's always good to check your goals every few months, or at least at the 1/2 mark for the year, to be sure you remain focused and see where you're at. 

How have you done so far on your goals for the year?  I'd love to hear specifics and if you have a 2012 goal post on your blog, please include it below.  I'd enjoy checking it out!  Thanks and good luck!

Posted in: 2012 s.m.a.r.t. goals