Smart goals: Examples and definition of the smart method

Definition and Origins of the SMART Method

SMART Goals: Definition

SMART is an acronym that represents the attributes a goal must possess to be effective in management.

A SMART goal is therefore specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound (with a clear deadline).

You might be surprised to see we're not talking about "realistic" goals—this is actually a mistranslation. The "A" for achievable corresponds to the realistic nature of a SMART goal, while the "R" comes from the English "relevant" and refers to the goal's pertinence.

The SMART method should enable you to define clear and easily understandable goals for teams. This allows projects to be completed faster and increases your chances of achieving company objectives.

The SMART method applies to all areas of business management, particularly for setting marketing or sales goals.

Origins of the SMART Method

This management concept of planning qualitative and quantitative objectives on a fixed deadline was described by Peter F. Drucker (management theorist) in 1945 in his work "The Practice of Management."

He also highlighted the importance of employee involvement in setting goals, making it possible to measure their performance.

It wasn't until an article by George T. Doran (management professor) "There is a SMART way to write management's goals and objectives" that the concept of SMART goals emerged. He emphasized the importance of objectives and the difficulty of setting them. He also specified that SMART goals should be used as a guideline.

The 5 attributes of SMART goals were then created! This allowed the method to be adapted to new domains like project management, human resources, and of course, marketing!

What's the Purpose of the SMART Method?

We all set goals, often "by instinct," and that's a terrible mistake. A goal's role isn't to look good on a PowerPoint but to set direction, motivate teams, and when necessary, identify underperformance.

The problem is that if you set an inadequate goal, none of that will be possible.

Formulating SMART goals addresses this issue by defining reliable and clear objectives.

For companies and managers, a SMART goal enables:

• ‍‍Better focus of team efforts
• More effective communication and better team buy-in
• Better alignment between strategy and implemented actions
• More objective performance measurement

For teams, SMART goals provide:‍

• Clear objectives to pursue along with assurance of their relevance
• Increased employee engagement because they know the goal is relevant and achievable
• A greater sense of fairness in individual performance evaluation

What Are the 5 Elements That Make Up a SMART Goal?

SMART Goal: S for Specific

When creating a SMART goal, it must be "specific"—clearly defined. The more precise you are, the better you can deploy the necessary efforts to achieve it. Let's face it, it's difficult to work with vague goals. The means used can be insufficient or excessive without clear objectives.

For example, if you're a marketing professional, your work involves numerous metrics. Therefore, you can choose a particular KPI you want to improve. Being specific is important because each metric requires different approaches.

You should also identify team members working on this goal, the resources available to them, and their action plan. This could be translated as: "Team A must increase website traffic by 20% this month." Precise goals enable clear task distribution. No one asks what they should do or accomplishes someone else's task.

However, if your purpose in setting goals is to motivate and energize your team, OKR objectives will be better suited to push innovation. Careful—don't use them to evaluate and penalize your employees!

Common mistake: Defining goals that are too vague.

Example of overly vague SMART goal: Improve team cohesion, or improve website performance.

SMART Goal: M for Measurable

The second criterion states that your goal must be "measurable"—meaning you can track and quantify your goal's progress. Without this, you can't know if you've achieved your goal, if results are insufficient, or exceed expectations.

To clarify further, let's take this goal example: "increase our brand awareness." This isn't a SMART goal because it's neither measurable nor specific. It's better written as: "increase our newsletter subscribers by 30%." You can clearly see whether you've achieved your goal or not.

You'll also know you need to deploy more effort and resources to reach the objective.

So if you want to evaluate your team's progress, you must quantify your goals, like achieving X percentage increase in visitor numbers.

Common error: The measurement indicator isn't quantitative

Everything is measurable. Taking the team cohesion example, we can absolutely measure it through employee surveys at the beginning and end of the period to measure progress. What's important is having an objective and irrefutable way to determine whether a goal has been achieved.

SMART Goal: A for Achievable

There's no point trying to reach the moon if you don't have the means to do it. An "achievable" SMART goal considers the employee's capacity to reach it and available resources. If you lack resources, it's better to define less ambitious goals or change them.

So ask yourself the right questions:

• Can I achieve this goal?
• Do I have sufficient financial and human resources?
• Do I have the necessary skills?
• Do I have enough time?

Final advice: it's essential to base your goals on your own analyses, not benchmarks, or you risk biting off more than you can chew.

Common mistake: Goals that are too ambitious and unrealistic

Yes, you should always aim to improve. But attempting to reach completely out-of-reach goals can make you lose your footing and make progress tracking difficult. This seems obvious, yet it's often the mistake we see.

For example, in a sales team, setting a 50% revenue increase goal through an UNTESTED new market is completely unrealistic. You might discover this market isn't as promising as expected, or that it's actually much better. The goal therefore isn't SMART—it's a gamble.

SMART Goal: R for Relevant

Often confused with the previous criterion due to clumsy translation from English to French, this is about evaluating your goals' relevance.

You have the resources and time, but is the goal profitable for your business? Is this the right time to achieve it?

Analyze your situation and ask yourself if your goal is relevant. Is it relevant for your company to increase newsletter subscriptions? Ask yourself if this makes sense for you and your business. What will this increase bring you?

Common mistake: setting goals just to set goals

We all tend to want to do more when working on strategies, adding goals to demonstrate our ambition. Really ask yourself about relevance—will this move my team forward in the direction necessary for the company?

SMART Goal: T for Time-bound

Improving on a goal is good, but if you don't have limited time to do it, you won't profit from anything. As Cyril N. Parkinson so aptly puts it, all tasks "expand to fill the time available for completion." Setting a key date for accomplishing a goal prevents you from exhausting your time or money.

Attaching a precise deadline to your goals will generate greater commitment and avoid procrastination from daily activities that will always be more urgent than a goal without a date. This will help you make consistent and significant long-term progress.

The faster a goal is achieved, the more profitable it will be. Be careful though—take the time needed to avoid neglecting your work.

Common mistake: too vague a deadline or no deadline

Not having a timeline will lead to priority redefinition, effort shifts, or prevent you from seeing if your team is on track.

How to Define a SMART Goal in 5 Steps

Now that we know exactly what characterizes a SMART goal, how do we apply this method concretely? We'll describe 5 simple steps to implement. Also consider drawing inspiration from agile methods like speed boat to facilitate goal-setting brainstorming—it's very useful.

Step 1: State Your Goals

Be careful—this isn't an intention, but a SPECIFIC and RELEVANT goal. The more time you spend clarifying your need, the better equipped you'll be to achieve it quickly with adequate means.

Step 2: Set a Deadline

Setting a date will help you and your team stay focused. All your efforts will be directed toward the same goal. This can be weekly, monthly, or yearly dates—it's up to you to decide (example: end of 2024).

Step 3: Identify Your Obstacles

These can be external obstacles (competitors, markets, targets) or internal ones (lack of resources, management issues, lack of employee engagement). This step is important for judging whether a goal is achievable.

Step 4: Determine How to Evaluate Goal Achievement

When and how will you irrefutably know you've achieved your goal? It's important to understand that if you can't objectively measure your progress, your goal has no value.

Step 5: Develop a Plan

At this step, you normally have a good SMART goal, but you're not finished. A good manager will not only set a good goal but also propose a precise action plan for their team to achieve the set objectives.

How to Create SMART Goals: Three Marketing Examples

You now know how to define SMART goals and why it's important to do so. It's time to provide some inspiration so you can apply this method.

SMART Goal Example 1: Reach 80,000 Unique Monthly Visitors

For 2025, the company wants to reach 80,000 unique monthly visitors to fuel its marketing funnel with leads.

• Specific: Increase unique visitors to reach 80,000 per month

• Measurable: Using our audience measurement tool, the company can precisely track unique visitor numbers

• Achievable: This goal is achievable since current levels are 50,000 unique visitors and an ambitious content strategy is being deployed across social media and the brand blog

• Relevant: By increasing unique visitors, the company will gain more clients and therefore sell more. Today the website is already responsible for acquiring over 50% of new clients

• Time-bound: Over the next 12 months

SMART Goal Example 2: Increase Prospect-to-Customer Conversion Rate

For 2025, the company wants to increase its prospect-to-customer conversion rate by 50%. This goal will require overhauling the sales process and training teams on new products.

• Specific: Increase prospect-to-customer conversion rate by 50%

• Measurable: It's possible to calculate prospect-to-customer conversion rate by dividing signed quotes by sent quotes

• Achievable: This goal will be achievable through sales process overhaul. It will also require training teams on the new CRM and new products

• Relevant: The higher the conversion rate, the less time wasted by the sales team. Acquisition costs will be lower

• Time-bound: Throughout 2025

SMART Goal Example 3: Increase Website Conversion Rate to 4%

Over the next six months, the company wants to increase its website conversion rate to 4% through creating lead magnets.

• Specific: Increase the number of people who identify themselves on the site via newsletter signup, content downloads, appointment booking, etc.

• Measurable: This goal will be measured using the company's marketing automation tool

• Achievable: It's achievable because currently the company is at 2.5% conversion rate while lead magnet integration is very limited. It has little downloadable content but still manages to convert

• Relevant: Through identifying potential clients (via newsletter signup, content downloads, etc.), the company can convert these prospects into customers and sell more

• Time-bound: Over the next 12 months