It’s the start of another year, and around this time, we see lot’s of people setting new targets, new goals and creating new vision boards.

And interestingly, a lot of the data we used to make these targets is based on what we did last year. We look at the sales figures, and aim to increase it by 10, 20% etc. Or we look at the number of clients we had, and make a guess about how many more we can get.

But all of this is on the supposition that our client in 2017 looks the same as they did in 2016. But is that really true?

Let’s look at some facts, about what changed in 2016:

• The world lost some major icons in the acting, sporting and music world
• North Korea launched a satellite into space against UN warnings
• We saw images of Jupiter for the first time
• The first solar powered plane completed a trip around the earth
• Donald Trump become President of America
• Creepy Clowns took over the streets
• Cars went on Autopilot
• A snag carrying drone landed the pilot in hot water
• Virtual Reality made leaps forward
• Pokemon Go took the world by storm, showing the true potential of augmented reality

And this is but a small slice of the things that your clients were exposed to in 2016.

So how does this impact their buying decisions, their motivation, their own goals in 2017.

Well, the good news is that our analogue brains have been around 200,000 years, and we still process information the same way. The technology, goals and customs may have changed, but many things remain the same.

Indeed, Maslow’s hierarchy of needs still rings true in how us humans think about things. If your service and values match ones needs, you are likely to resonate with them. How you do that might change, but the message need not.

So when you are thinking about how 2017 is going to be bigger and better, think about what your clients have dealt with in 2016, and how you need to adjust your message, so that it still aligns with their core values.