Hey. Welcome back to the podcast. It is all around the reality of quarter one in New Zealand businesses. And I just thought we would talk some truths, some home truths together.

It’s mid February in New Zealand, 2026. Hopefully you’re not listening to this when it’s too late. But the kids are finally back at school, the traffic is a nightmare again and that lovely summer high that you had at the bach, well, it kind of sizzled and snizzled because of the bloody rain, but actually it’s been replaced by a massive year ahead panic.

I know that some of you feel on the back foot, you feel like you’ve missed the proverbial planning boat for some crazy reason. I get it. I can sometimes feel like that.

You can feel like you’re running behind. You can open your phone and you can see people on LinkedIn who are already crushing their goals and you’re actually still trying to remember your login passwords and did your kid remember lunch for the first two weeks of school? Right. It’s actually a real thing.

But I want you to take a breath. You’re not behind. And if we actually looked at it factually, who – behind who? Like who are you behind? Your business doesn’t have a racetrack, you’re on the race to nowhere.

You’ve actually been living in a country that actually knows how to take a holiday. And a lot of New Zealand businesses that I work with, we actually B2B. We’re business to business. Right. So everyone usually is on holiday or our business consumer. In New Zealand, everyone’s still trying to come back too. So not just you is feeling that way.

Now that doesn’t mean you get out of selling and that doesn’t mean that you get out of growing your businesses. There’s definitely ways to mitigate that.

So a successful quarter one isn’t actually built in January, it’s actually built in quarter four. Now you might be thinking, thanks, Nat, I already thought I was behind. Now I’m like way behind. But remember, behind who?

So in New Zealand we tend to hit October and think, oh, it’s going to be Christmas, I’ll just kind of sort Christmas out and then worry about next year in January. where actually I want you to start about, think about the next year while you’re worrying about Christmas because the quarter four actually is your engine room.

It’s where I get a lot of my clients to plant, plant seeds, start reaching out.

It’s when you have these conversations and bring them down your funnel, kind of warm everyone up and what can happen is if you don’t do this kind of nurturing or tilling the soil, I call it so not planting in quarter four, then your February and March, of course it’s going to feel a little bit empty.

Don’t panic, don’t burn it all down, don’t go drop your prices or change your whole business model. It’s just because those sprouts haven’t come up yet. And if you’re like, well Nat, nothing’s going to germinate because I didn’t do any of that in quarter four. You will have done something throughout the year, gone past that we can bring through to fruition.

So I actually saw this coming for me for quarter for quarter one particularly. January can be a little bit thin on the ground if I let it because a lot of people are still away at the beach.

So I try and get people to pre book in a call before. You’ll see it with my activate sessions. I might put out some express sessions and one off session. So I get people to plant that at the end of January the cash flow is already there for me and my lead fund flow is already set up.

So when I come back in January, I’ve kind of already got that groundwork that I did in October, November.

And it’s just about trusting that process that having each year. Which is why I want to talk to you about it in quarter one.

So when you’re coming to plan quarter four and we’re not far off that, I mean all jokes aside, it’s going to be the end of quarter one in about six weeks.

So if I can get you to zoom out and start thinking about your business in a more zoomed out context in your quarters, you’re going to understand that what you do in your quarter four actually comes in dominoes.

Quarter one, what you do in quarter one hits quarter two. So you’ve got to respect the timeline and actually the time and the buying time and the buying behaviour and the time it can take for people to buy from you.

So the real work in quarter one is actually the follow up.

So I spent a lot of February following people up. And if you are feeling behind, it’s probably because you’ve actually stopped following up on the seeds that you planted last year, not just quarter four.

So some of you might also be thinking that I just don’t follow up. That’s okay, you can start from today, right in the new year.

Maybe you’re scared to reach out because it’s been too long, but actually circling back around to someone a year later is actually and can be the most perfect timing.

So follow up in February is a gift because your clients are coming in overwhelmed too. So actually being that person who helps them get their ducks in a row, you’re not bothering them, you’re finishing the job or the conversation you had three, six, 12 months ago.

And for me, customer service, particularly in service businesses in New Zealand, is lacking. Following up is customer service. Checking back in is customer service. And that essentially is what sales is.

So I would love for you to take action today. So I want you to look back at your quarter four leads today. And I want you to pick five people who said, let’s chat in the new year. And I want them to send you, how’s your summer?

Big message. Let’s just get in there, get a conversation going. The sales is just a conversation. Remember, remember? It’s just customer service and having a conversation.

So re establishing that relationship and remembering and reminding yourself, your brain, that you’ve actually got value to provide. And you’re not being annoying. You’re just following up. And good customer service is amazing.

I want you to remember you have 10 months of the year left, okay? So whatever maybe anxious energy you may have right now, I don’t want you to burn out in February trying to make up for January that was actually meant for resting because that’s our summer break.

That’s the time we sit around with the kids or sit around with our family.

So start planting today. Start following up on the work that you did last year. All is not lost, and you’ve got this. And if you do want some help, you know where to come. Come and have a chat with me. Catch you on the next episode.