My business in 2025: an honest review
2026 will be my sixth full year in business (I started partway through 2019), and so this is my sixth annual review blog post looking back on the year that’s just gone.
Writing these has become a bit of a tradition for me. Partly because I learn a lot by reflecting out loud, and partly because I think it’s important to be honest about what running a business actually looks like over time. Not just the highlights, but the decisions, the doubts, and the lessons that only really land once you’ve lived them.
So, here’s what 2025 taught me.
What went well in 2025
My word for 2025 was optimize.
After several years of building and experimenting, 2025 was about making better use of what I already had. No big new projects. Just asking, again and again: how can this work better, more smoothly, with less effort and more impact?
And for the most part, I think I stuck to that.
That hasn’t actually meant less effort right now… I’ve done a massive overhaul of my signature programme, Designed to Flourish, updating and re-recording almost all the content, adding new Custom-GPTs to help my clients get even better results (together with personal human feedback of course), front-weighting some of the coaching to ensure people can get clear about their niche and offer as quickly as possible…it’s been a LOT.
But now it’s all running like a well-oiled machine, I feel pretty smug 😉 because I can see how it’s leading to stronger outcomes for clients and a delivery model that feels much more sustainable for me.
Project Bloom has also really come into its own this year. It’s doing exactly what I hoped it would do: giving experienced business owners space to think strategically, zoom out, and build something more coherent and financially robust without needing more noise or pressure. Working at that level has been deeply satisfying, and many of the clients have been people who did Designed to Flourish some time ago, so it’s been wonderful to see them blooming even further.
Another big win has been continuing to optimise my content ecosystem.
I’ve kept going with YouTube, and I’ve leaned into long-form content that can do more of the heavy lifting. Fewer pieces of content, reused more intentionally, has saved me a huge amount of time and has brought in people who already understand how I think and work (about 30-40% of my clients now come to me through my YouTube channel, which is amazing.)
What have the challenges been?
Mostly recognising (not for the first time), that you can’t do everything perfectly all of the time… Recognising that any business has a lot of moving parts, and that by focusing on optimising and content creation (including a lot of new content for Project Bloom), other things have had to take a back seat.
My website SEO is an embarrassment. I had a call yesterday with an SEO specialist, who was lovely, but uncovered all sorts of gremlins under the bed…
I haven’t done a blog post since August (until this one), or a LinkedIn live since June. Oops.
Despite sticking to taking off pretty much the whole of August, and quite a few long weekends, I have also worked way too many long days or weekends.
The fact is that when you have a business, there is ALWAYS going to be stuff that you could be doing, and I do mostly really enjoy doing it, but the balance was out last year, and I don’t want that to keep happening going forward.
What am I planning or working towards next?
Going into 2026, I want to stay true to the spirit of optimisation, and continuing to strengthen what’s already working. I’ve already taken the first step by introducing a new light-touch 12 month container for people who’ve finished Designed to Flourish, to help them with continuing to implement that learning in the early stages of their business.
I know that the support I offer is one of the reasons people come to me, so it makes perfect sense to extend that support further beyond the end of the programme.
I’m also planning something totally new for 2026 (I can only resist this for so long) together with the amazing Laura Wilkes… watch this space.
Final words
My word of the year this year is Sovereignty. I hesitated over this, because it’s not that easy to explain without sounding like I have delusions of grandeur. But it IS the right word. For me, sovereignty is about self-trust and self-authority. It’s the ability to make decisions from a place of clarity rather than pressure, and to run a business that reflects my values rather than reacting to trends, expectations, or what I think I should be doing.
Over the years, I’ve learnt that it’s surprisingly easy to give bits of your sovereignty away. To algorithms. To clients. To comparing ourselves with others. To the constant background noise of “experts” telling you what a successful business is supposed to look like.
Choosing sovereignty means consciously taking that back. Deciding what matters, setting boundaries that protect both my work and my wellbeing, and standing behind those decisions.
I see the same thing with my clients. The biggest shifts don’t come from better tactics alone, but from people reclaiming a sense of ownership over their business decisions. When that happens, things get simpler, more intentional, and more sustainable very quickly.
If you’re at a point where you want your business to feel calmer, clearer, and more intentional, you can explore the ways I work with people elsewhere on this website. No rush. You’ll know if and when it’s the right fit.
And if you’re curious, here are my first five annual review blog posts.
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