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Online entrepreneur and The Secret teacher Joe Vitale says, "Success is the sum of small efforts performed day in and day out." This means that success rarely comes from making grand resolutions. Instead, they come from consistent actions called habits.

Here's a five-step plan to help you maximize the power of habits:

1. Be CLEAR about your top three goals.
Be as specific as you can about your goals, what they mean to you, and how you would feel when you've achieved them. Be SO clear, in fact, that you can describe exactly what you'll be doing at this time of day when you've already achieved your goals.

This first step is extremely important, because when you're completely sure about the direction you're going, it's easier for you to come up with alternative ways to get there. You'll also quite easily recognize when you're already there.

2. Outline a clear STRATEGY that will help you achieve each goal.
Once you're sure that these are the goals you really want for yourself and your business, the next step is to set up the strategies that will naturally lead you towards attaining your goals. This might involve revising your marketing techniques, rethinking your target market, modifying your unique selling proposition, or even revising your business model.

This step requires you to plan backwards: Once you know what your goals look like, you can instruct your mind to retrace the steps to get to your goals as soon as possible.

3. Identify the 'foundation habits' that will support your strategies.
Remember how success is built on small, daily actions? Now that you have your goals and your strategies, find out what five basic action habits you need to implement in order to make sure you stick to your plan.

For example, here are two of the most basic habits of successful people:

• the habit of reviewing your goals daily, before you do anything else in your office. This habit will help keep you on track about what's really important to you and your life, not just what seems urgent at the moment
• the habit of committing at least one hour each day focused exclusively on moving closer towards your goals (both personal and professional).

Once you do a habit for 30 days straight, you'd have established another "small daily action that leads to success."

5. Finally, surround yourself with the right people.
The "right people" fall under three categories:

• Energizers: These are the people you can really talk to about your goals, and after each encounter with them you find that they have re-energized you with their enthusiasm and belief.

• Pressurizers: These are people who, like you, are also committed to turning their goals into reality, and every time you hear about their small successes they motivate you to try harder, hang in there longer, and generally surprise yourself by achieving more than you thought possible.

• Mentors: These are the people who are already living the kind of success you want, and hanging around them helps you learn faster about the business or industry than you would just by reading about them.

We all know that information and theory are great--which is why self-help and reference books are a staple in every entrepreneur's library --but nothing beats actually putting theory into practice while getting the support of people who will not allow you to give up.