Start Strong in 2025: A Complete Checklist for Small Business Owners
You made it through 2024. You polished off your end-of-year task list in time to disconnect and take some true time off for the holidays (kidding, obviously). You successfully submitted the BOI after procrastinating about it for 11.5 months (just us?) and now it’s time to take a calm, strategic look at the year ahead (just as soon as you finish the 75 other things on your to-do list).
We recently forced ourselves to set aside client work for a couple of days so we could carve out the time to review our 2024 game tape, and make some necessary changes for the new year. It wasn’t easy to find the time, but we think it was a good investment, and now we feel (somewhat) prepared to begin working toward some big goals.
To help our fellow small business owners fast-track their own January reset, we put together this comprehensive checklist.
Brand Identity
As the new year begins, it’s the perfect opportunity to reflect on your brand identity to ensure it aligns with your current goals and resonates with your audience.
Your brand is the foundation of your business—it’s how customers recognize you, connect with you, and eventually, trust you enough to purchase your product or service. Consistency is so important to maintaining a strong brand presence, and neglecting this can lead to diluted messaging and confusion for your team members and your audience.
By taking the time now to review and possibly refresh your brand identity, messaging and touchpoints, you’re setting the stage for a year of growth.
The 2025 Brand Identity Checklist
Logo: Ensure your logo still aligns with your business values and consider updating or refreshing it if necessary. Ensure all team members have access to the most updated version of the logo in all the formats they need so that it’s easy to use it consistently across all materials.
Color Palette and Fonts: Make sure your color palettes and fonts are being used consistently across all platforms.
Tagline: If you have a tagline, confirm that it resonates with your current audience and will lead your business in the direction you want to go this year.
Mission, Vision and Purpose Statements: Reflect on whether these statements accurately represent where your business is now. Need help creating these statements? Download our FREE Brand DNA Worksheet to get started.
Tone and Voice: Evaluate whether your brand’s communication style is consistent across all channels and aligns with your target audience. Ensure all team members understand how they should be communicating with leads and customers.
Refresh Stationery, Business Cards, Marketing Materials and Social Media Templates: Update your print and digital materials to reflect any changes in branding, messaging or contact information.
Order New Swag
Update Packaging (if you sell products)
Update Signage: For brick-and-mortar businesses, assess the condition and relevance of physical signage.
Of course any changes to your branding should also be updated in your Brand Guide so all your team members are empowered to produce on-brand materials across all channels.
Don’t have a Brand Guide? Schedule a free 30-minute consultation with Cowbird to find out how a professionally created Brand Guide can help your business grow. BOOK NOW➔
Website
Your website is the digital face of your business, and outdated content can send the wrong message to potential customers. Keeping your site fresh and relevant is crucial for maintaining credibility, boosting SEO and driving engagement. January is a great time for small businesses to perform a comprehensive content review and make any necessary updates for the new year.
The 2025 Website Checklist
Refresh Homepage Header: Consider changing the content above the fold on your homepage. Refresh your banner image, create a custom background video, change your tagline or update the color of your buttons. This signals to your returning customers that something has changed and they should pay attention.
Review H1 headlines: Each page of your website should have an H1 headline that is both functional and strategic, designed to serve clarity to both users and search engines.
Check for Broken Links: Clicking on broken links frustrates users and disrupts potential sales.
Review URL Slugs: Make sure your URL slugs are aligned with your page content and keyworded for SEO.
Update Team Members and Bios: Have you had staff turnover in the past year? Did you get a new professional certification? Make sure all bios are up-to-date, and consider having new professional headshots taken as well.
Update Services and Packages: Do you have any new offerings, services, packages or pricing? Be sure you’re conveying the most up-to-date information to your customers to avoid any friction.
Review Main Navigation Menu: It’s a good idea to do an annual review of your main navigation and consider if there are any items that could be consolidated or eliminated, or any menu language that could be more concise or direct. If your menu is too long, consider moving some non-essential items may to a secondary “Quick Links” menu in your footer.
Check Buttons and Interactive Elements: We recommend testing interactive features quarterly to ensure they work as expected. It’s a huge miss if someone is ready to take action on your website but they can’t because of a broken pathway.
Update your FAQs: What questions have your customers or clients asked you in the past year that you can incorporate into your FAQs?
Update your Copyright: Make sure the copyright in your footer is up-to-date with the current year. If a site appears outdated it could hurt your credibility.
Visuals
Visuals are a cornerstone of your brand identity. From photos and videos to graphic design, high-quality, cohesive visuals help your business stand out, build trust, and communicate with your audience, often more quickly and efficiently than your copy.
As we kick off a new year, it’s the perfect time to review and refresh your visual assets to ensure they align with your brand and marketing goals for the year ahead.
The 2025 Visuals Checklist
Update Team Photos: Ensure headshots and team photos reflect your current staff and brand personality.
Audit Stock Images: Stock photos and video can only take you so far. Even good stock images can’t replace shots of the real people, spaces and processes that make your business unique. Replace overused or generic stock photos with unique, custom imagery. Not sure where to start? Book Cowbird for a Brand Shoot!
Organize Your Asset Library: Sort, label and archive your visual assets so you and everyone on your team has easy access. Make sure to organize your visuals in your Squarespace Asset Library to save time when making web edits.
Create New Content: Plan fresh video content such as testimonials, tutorials or event highlights.
Update Existing Videos: Add new branding elements, such as updated logos or CTAs, to older videos.
Create a Brand Kit in Canva: Set your team up to create branded materials in-house, by adding your Brand Kit to Canva.
Create Templates in Canva: Refresh presentation decks, email templates, and social media graphics and turn them into Canva templates to save time creating new materials all year long.
Update your Social Media Profile Pictures and banners/Covers: Update your visuals to reflect seasonal themes, new campaigns, or just to signal to your audience that something is new.
Refresh Your Instagram Profile: Archive posts that no longer align with your offerings or long-term goals, create new pinned posts and Reels, update your highlights and highlight covers and adjust posts for the new 4x5 Instagram Profile Grid.
Bonus 2025 Checklist
Here are a few additional items to consider in Q1 this year. These are things all of our clients.
Collect New Customer Testimonials: Fresh testimonials show that there is an active, engaged community around your business, which increases trust and drives higher conversion rates. Your Google Business profile also gets a boost from recent, positive reviews.
Plan marketing campaigns: Map out seasonal promotions, content themes and campaigns for the year.
Evaluate marketing channels and customer touchpoints: Look back at what worked and what didn’t in the past year and make strategic decisions about the year ahead. You’re a small business owner with already limited time and energy, so there’s no point in wasting your limited resources on tactics that didn’t perform.
Evaluate your tools: Ensure your software, apps and platforms are up-to-date and serving your needs efficiently. Cancel any subscriptions that are no longer needed.
Back Up Like a Boss: Ensure all your important files and assets are backed up. We recommend using SSD drives as well as a cloud backup system like Backblaze.
Train Your Team: Hold a training session with your team to ensure everyone knows how to access and use your brand guide and other assets accurately. Book a consultation with Cowbird if you need help organizing and planning a brand workshop or training session.
Need help with your branding, website or visuals this year?
Book a free 30-minute consultation with Cowbird Creative for professional guidance on how your small business can go big in 2025!