Reflecting on the past year doesn’t need to be daunting or overly formal. A meaningful review focuses less on collecting hard facts and more on recognizing patterns and noting important insights. Conducting this review early in the new quarter helps you understand overall business trends and sets a clear direction for actions to boost success this year. We have created a simple guide to help you reflect on 2025 and set goals to strengthen your small business in 2026.

Sales

Sales performance is one of the best windows into what made your business successful this year, making sales a great place to start your reflection. Take a few minutes to review your numbers from the previous year and identify your best sellers, slow movers, and unexpected successes. You do not need to create a complex report; a simple list of best- and worst-selling items can reveal many patterns. By noting which products or services consistently sold well, which struggled, and any that surprised you, you can make smarter decisions about pricing, promotions, and products in the new year.

Customer Relations

Your customers can provide valuable insights. By observing customer behavior or seeking feedback, you can more easily identify consistent themes. Review the most frequently asked customer questions, their feedback, and any shifts in buying behavior. Look for patterns in complaints and praise to better understand what is benefiting or negatively affecting your customers’ experience. Using these themes, identify opportunities to address pain points or strengthen areas customers already value.

Employee Management

Your employees are one of your most important assets as a small business owner. They play a major role in ensuring your business runs smoothly, so it is important to reflect on their experience. What have you heard from staff through conversation, formal feedback, or observations? Using staff feedback, identify impactful changes you could implement to increase employee success and morale. This could take the form of adjusted schedules, improved training, or small gestures such as occasionally taking your team out for lunch. These changes have the opportunity to create a meaningful impact on your team’s performance.

Workflows

An efficient small business is a successful small business. Managing your workflow is essential to achieving success for your business. Take a moment to reflect on which processes were easy and smooth, and which were slow or frustrating. Identify points in your workflows that consistently break down or lack communication and note points that worked well and saved you time. Using these observations, create a list of improvements that you can implement to simplify procedures and increase productivity. By optimizing your workflows to run smoothly, you are likely to increase your business’s overall efficiency.

Marketing

Marketing not only promotes your small business but also helps customers discover and connect with it. Reflect on the platforms you used, the campaigns you ran, and the engagement you received in the previous year. Note which marketing efforts drove traffic, sales, or online conversation, and then plan ways to update and replicate these tactics and results in 2026. Use InUnison resources to plan simple yet effective marketing strategies that drive growth with minimal effort and stress.

Upcoming Marketing Events: https://inunison.circle.so/events

Inventory

Understanding customer demand can be achieved by analyzing your inventory trends—review where you experienced shortages, overstock, or last-minute scrambling throughout the previous year. By noting which items ran out quickly or lasted longer than anticipated, you can forecast what purchases you should adjust in the new year. This will help you make smarter purchasing decisions, reduce waste, and potentially save money in 2026.

Finances

While in-depth reflections on your finances are extremely beneficial for your business, quick analysis of spikes and dips can be equally impactful. Take a quick look back at your expenditures and see if you need to adjust your operational budget for this year (for example, if your HVAC went out last year, you may want to consider an upgrade this year as a long-term solution). Consider whether any factors contributed to these trends, such as holidays or global events. By analyzing these patterns, you can better plan for future staffing, budget decisions, and inventory. A basic understanding of your company’s finances will help you make more confident financial decisions in the coming months. Looking for more support to better forecast your finances in 2026? Check out this tracking and forecasting toolkit created by local small businesses, Farell Financial.

Next Steps

Once you’ve reflected on the most important aspects of your business, create a list of actionable priorities to implement at the beginning of the year. These action items should be informed by the trends you identified and directly support your goals for growth, efficiency, and long-term success. Reflecting on your business creates clarity that helps you make informed decisions, setting you up for long-term success beyond 2026. For additional insights, see the list of quick reflection questions below.

• Sales: List your top 5 and bottom 5 sellers. Why do you think these items performed as they did, and how can you use these trends to guide your sales in 2026?

• Customer Relations: What did customers praise or complain about most? How can you use this feedback to make changes to the customer experience?

• Employee Management: Based on employee feedback, what are 3 small tweaks you can implement that will increase employee success and morale?

• Workflows: What slowed you down, and what saved you time? How can you adjust any workflows that slowed you down?

• Marketing: What marketing tactics performed well? How can you replicate and improve these in the new year?

• Inventory: What were your most common shortages and overstocked goods? How can these insights inform your future purchasing decisions?

• Finances: When did your profit spike and when did it dip? What led to these incidents?

Don’t lose your reflection results…

Comparing them with the upcoming State of Local report will provide valuable insights into how your business compares with others in the local landscape.