It’s completely understandable. It can feel like you’re pulling numbers out of thin air. And while you may have excellent intuition, if you’re not picking numbers based on data, you may be picking the wrong numbers.

And if you’re like me, when you don’t make a goal, you can be hard on yourself – even if your quantitative goal was based on an arbitrary number.

Goals shouldn’t be a mindset killer! Instead, let’s look at a new way to create goals, using a three-tier approach that I will explain in this blog post.

The next time you create a marketing goal, try this three-tier approach and see if it feels easier to come up with the numbers.

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Marketing experts and business coaches (including me) often tell our clients: Set goals for your marketing!

Goals can be helpful in determining if your marketing plan was a success. Think of goals as mileposts on your marketing road map.

However, setting goals, especially quantitative ones, can be challenging. What’s the magical number you should pick?

You see, corporations have mounds of data to help them with goal setting. When I worked in healthcare marketing, I could pull years’ worth of data to help me determine a quantitative goal.

As solopreneurs, we don’t have access to this information. So picking a number for a goal feels arbitrary, like you’re picking a number from thin air.

Personally, I have gotten away from assigning numbers to my goals – for now. I am collecting data in a spreadsheet from my marketing campaigns. As the data grows, I can be more confident in selecting numerical marketing goals. Until then, I skip quantitative marketing goals.

(Not to mention, when I “miss” a goal, I get crushed. I am really hard on myself, which seems silly if I am just picking arbitrary numbers, right?)

However, you may be wired for numbers – or just like to have numerical milestones to aim for in your marketing. That’s okay! You can absolutely create quantitative marketing goals if that feels right for you.

Picking the right quantitative goal

Which leads to this question: How do you pick the magical number for your goal without data to help you?

It’s a bit of moving target, right? If you want to sell a new product – and this is your first time selling a product – you may not know what’s a realistic number of products sold.

That’s why I recommend that you set a set of three goals. Let me break down what this looks like:

• Threshold goal: The “no brainer” number you know you’ll hit
• Target goal: A goal that you have about a 60 percent chance of attaining
• Stretch goal: A goal that you have about a 20 percent chance of attaining

Let’s say you created a new group coaching program and want to set quantitative goals. If you use this three-tier approach, your goals might look like this:

Threshold: Selling two slots in the coaching program (you already have two people interested, so this feels like a “no brainer”)

Target: Selling six slots in the coaching program (this would be the perfect income for you, and it’s a stretch but still realistic)

Stretch: Selling 10 slots in the coaching program (this is definitely a stretch; it would be fantastic to obtain but feels a little “out there”)

Goals and your mindset

Now here’s the sweet thing about this three-tier approach…

As you hit your threshold goal, you are excited. You just smashed a goal! Imagine how awesome you will feel. Remember, it’s all about emotions with your mindset, and if you are feeling great, you are vibrating at a higher frequency, which means more good stuff coming your way.

And if you make your target goal, your excitement level will be through the roof! But even if you don’t quite make your target goal, you’ll still be excited to have hit your threshold.

Then, as you finish this campaign, archive your data (a spreadsheet works great). That way, when you sell the next group coaching program, you can see how many slots you sold, and use that data to make future goals. (Keep accumulating data, too. It doesn’t have to be fancy – just accessible and easy to understand).

Now you have an effective system for creating quantitative goals! You’ll love the feeling of assigning a range of numbers through threshold, target, and stretch goals. It won’t feel as arbitrary, and you can celebrate as you hit each goal.