4 Ways To Ensure A Successful Fourth Quarter

Can you believe it’s already the fourth quarter? Here in Colorado, the aspens are changing, and I’ve already busted out my puffy vest! Those two things plus the changeover of the Starbucks menu mark the start of fall to me, and that also means there are three months left in the year to hit your financial and impact targets. 

So, how are your numbers? Will you hit the goals you set at the beginning of the year?

Whether you’re on track to have your best year yet, or you feel a bit behind the curve, this is the time to focus and finish the year strong. 

For most business owners, the fourth quarter often takes one of two directions. Either you start panicking about hitting your goals and going into crisis mode, or you look at your goals, decide it’s too late, and push everything off until next year. 

10/10 do not recommend either approach. 

When we’re scattered and working from desperate energy and a hastily thrown together plan, it’s really hard to be effective. Crisis mode may bring in a few sales, but it also brings a lot of frustration, exhaustion, and overwhelm. 

Alternatively, closing up shop for the busy holiday months may seem appealing, especially if it’s been a particularly rough year, but this approach often has a lot of unintended consequences. As we’ve discussed many times over the years, your sales and marketing activities require consistency. Your results today are a function of what you’ve done for the last 90 days. Imagine, come January 1, what your business will look like if you simply put on your out of office notification and walk away. Not great. 

Here are the four steps I recommend taking to make this quarter your best. 

Step 1: Take stock and look for the patterns.

In an email I recently sent to my community, I shared how for years, I hated looking at my business finances. When my bank balance was lower than it "should" be, I felt ashamed. When things were booming, I felt proud. It was a constant roller coaster, and I was making decisions that dramatically affected my budget, time, and energy without the facts to know whether they were good ones.

I assumed I needed far more clients and far more revenue than I actually did. Then I worked with a financial coach who helped me take the emotion out of it and understand what I was actually looking at. The problem was never a lack of clients. It was that I wasn't looking at my numbers and making wildly uneducated guesses. Once I had the data, it was clear that one or two clients could close what I thought was a massive shortfall. That one shift, understanding my numbers, changed how I made decisions in my business.

That's what you're looking for as you take stock. Look back at the last three quarters. 

• Where did your revenue actually come from? 

• Where did your time and energy go? 

• Do those two match? 

• Were your business development and marketing activities actually contributing to new client acquisition? 

• What got in the way, and why? 

You're not making a list of everything that went wrong. You're looking for the one thing that, if it changed, would change everything else.

Step 2: Build a focused plan for the next 12 weeks.

The fourth quarter has a tendency to fly by, especially with the holidays, loads of parties, school performances, and all the obligations that somehow just appear on your calendar. This is your opportunity to take strategic, proactive action. 

Pick one offer. One buyer. Set a revenue target based on the insights you just got in Step 1. That tells you exactly how many sales you need and helps you determine when you need those clients to commit in order to serve them well. 

This level of specificity will shape exactly who you need to reach out to, who you should follow up with, and what you hope to accomplish. 

It’s easy to both overestimate and underestimate what can be done in the last 12 weeks of the year, so be honest about your capacity and what you can actually get done. Make sure you factor in what’s already on your calendar that’s non-negotiable and adjust accordingly. 

If you get stuck on how best to apply your time, go back to Step 1 and point your effort at where you had the most leverage. Don’t try to do everything at once. 

Step 3: Show up and be visible.

Many businesses pull back this time of year, believing their clients are too busy to buy or that all the big brands will take over the marketing ecosystem. They’re not totally wrong; people are busy and the ad space is heavily influenced by bigger, product-based companies. 

But you still need to make offers. You still need to show up and be visible.

Right now, when buyers are cautious, trust feels harder to earn, and buying cycles are taking longer, the people who keep showing up with a consistent message really stand out. Some of my best results have come in the fourth quarter while everyone else was taking a break.

In fact, last year, I opened the doors to the Built to Last Egypt Retreat in November. I was worried that no one would want to make that kind of investment in their business, especially at the busiest, most expensive time of year and when the retreat wasn’t until October 2026 (yes, it’s just a week away now). But 6 women joined right away, and it allowed me to have my best quarter of the year by far. 

Keep showing up and doing your thing. I promise it makes a massive difference.

Step 4: Keep doing your CEO Time.

CEO Time, the dedicated time you spend weekly looking at your business strategically, matters all the time, but especially so at this time of year. This focused block of time is where you reassess your progress, adjust your plans based on the results you’re getting, and where you can start to look toward next year. 

If you already have a CEO Time practice, I invite you to really track what you’re doing in Step 2. Get specific with reach outs, your pipeline activity, and other important metrics that help you see exactly what’s happening and allow for adjustments.

Ideally, the seeds you planted in the previous quarter are bearing fruit, just as the seeds you’re planting now will flourish in the new year. 

If you took stock and the pattern still isn't clear, that's normal. If you’re not sure where to focus your efforts, what the right offer is, or how to position it, I’d love to help! It's hard to see your own business clearly from the inside, and that’s exactly the support I am best known for. 

Together, we'll look at what's happening inside and outside your business, unpack what's really going on, and build a plan to move you forward. It's a way out of the guessing game, and I would love to help you have an awesome 4th quarter. You can snag a spot on my calendar by clicking here.