productivity tips for entrepreneurs

  • Productivity

    8 Totally Fixable Reasons Why You Actually Never Have Enough Time

    Are you always wishing you had more time? Welcome to the club! Or maybe you’ve been a member for quite some time already. Having good time management isn’t necessarily a skill you’re born with.

    For those of us looking to either start or grow our online businesses, this feeling is compounded by the fact that we often have to do everything ourselves, at least until we can afford to hire out.

    The truth is, you probably have plenty of time to work on your business, even if it’s a side hustle. You just need to stay focused, practice better time management, and work on actions that truly make a difference.

    Yup, that’s means if you’re trying to drive traffic to your blog or sales page, you probably shouldn’t be focusing on growing your Instagram followers (especially since it’s probably the worst social platform for linking).

    Everyone has the same 24 hours in each day, so how is it possible that some people can accomplish much more than you do? How are they still able to be on time for all of their commitments?

    If you’re struggling to meet deadlines, complete projects, or actually gain traction in your business, here are a few reasons why you need to take a closer look at how you approach your time management.

    8 Reasons Why You Suck at Good Time Management

    Chances are, you do have the time to do what you need, you just need to take a closer look at how you approach your time management. It’s likely that you waste time in small periods throughout the day—5 minutes here and 3 minutes there—but these little moments really add up.

    Go through each item on this list and take note of which ones apply to you and how you can change your behavior. It’s worth paying attention to the ones that you think may not apply to you, too! You may get ideas for improving what you are good with.

    You fail to prioritize

    One of the most important parts of a good time management strategy is the ability to prioritize high impact tasks and things that must be done before you can start work on others.

    You should always have an idea of what’s the most important activity necessary to complete an objective. If you’re not, then it’s likely that you’re not truly working on tasks that have the most impact.

    Without prioritizing, it’s easy to stay busy but fail to accomplish anything.

    Ask yourself, “What is the most important thing I need to accomplish?”

    Then ask yourself, “What is the best way for me to accomplish that?”

    Sometimes, you’ll have to do a little bit of learning to find out what you should be prioritizing, but once you know, your focus should be on constantly moving forward instead of around in circles.

    Laptop and notepad - get organized for good time management
    Photographer: Nick Morrison | Source: Unsplash

    You waste time

    Wasting time is probably the most obvious way to improve your time management. It’s also the most common way we fail at managing our time. Everything else is just so tempting!

    You may waste time due to procrastination or inefficient work habits. Maybe you frequently get distracted by social media or Netflix.

    Whatever your vice is, make choices to avoid wasting time. Make quick decisions or put in the time to work when you’d otherwise be aimless browsing the web or watching your favorite show for the 5th time.

    You’re disorganized

    Becoming more organized is a good way to boost your time management skills, as well. Disorganized people never seem to have enough time, and they’re frequently late with their work.

    When you’re not organized, everything takes longer than it should. You spend time looking for a pair of clean socks, your car keys, searching for files you printed, and trying to pull off things at the last minute.

    The same is true for your digital workspace. If you don’t properly organize files on your computer, misplace or forget passwords, or forget where you saved that certain bookmark, looking for these things can slow you down.

    Make an effort to organize your life and yourself. There are many available resources that are dedicated to organizing your life. Use them!

    You have too many distractions in your life

    It could be low-quality social interactions, TV, hobbies, noisy kids, clutter, or your prize-winning rose bushes. Having too many things in your life takes up a lot of time.

    Remove the things from your life that are unnecessary. Minimize the distractions you can’t remove, like your children.

    Lock down apps or websites that distract you with apps like RescueTime and put your phone on silent or place it in another room so it’s not as easy to grab every 5 minutes.

    You don’t start your day early enough

    Most of us don’t get much done in the evening. You might spend this time relaxing, just lying around the house or staring at your phone.

    This is why so many highly successful people skip the evening hours by going to bed and waking up extra early. Your brain tends to shut down by the late afternoon, whether you started your day at 9:00 AM or 5:00 AM.

    Give yourself a few extra productive hours by getting up early and going to bed early.

    You don’t track your time

    It’s impossible to practice good time management without some form of time tracking, but for this, I want to talk about tracking how you spend your time now so you can find and eliminate time-wasters.

    Do you know how you actually spend each day? Are you aware of when you feel most energized and when your energy levels are low?

    Track how you spend your time each day. Keep a simple journal for at least a week and make a record each hour of how you spent the last 60 minutes.

    What did you do? How did you feel?

    After a week, you should be able to notice some patterns and see where you may have some extra time in each day to work on your business. Try to rearrange your free time so it’s later in the day or out of a time when you feel energized.

    Woman writing in planner - using a planner is a good time management practice
    Photographer: Marten Bjork | Source: Unsplash

    You don’t have a plan for your day

    Your day shouldn’t be random or determined on the fly. To get the most out of your time, you need to have a plan instead of trying to just wing it.

    It’s best to create a detailed plan before you go to bed each night. It could be the last thing you do before you stop working for the night or a part of a nighttime routine.

    Then, when you wake up in the morning, you won’t waste any of those precious daylight hours on figuring out what to do next. You’ll already know exactly what you want to do.

    All you’ll have to do is spend your day executing your plan as well as you can.

    You’re not focused

    You’ve probably been told to “focus” or “concentrate,” but do you really know how? If you sit down to work on something for an hour, how many minutes is your attention truly focused on that task?

    You can come up with plenty of time to accomplish everything you need to do each day if you focus on a higher level than you’re used to.

    Focus is built through practice. You need to get used to finding your “zone.” Getting into your own state of flow.

    If you struggle to stay focused, try using a timer to practice. Start with 5 or 10 minutes and work up from there. Use the tips throughout this ebook to minimize distractions to help you focus better on what you’re doing.

    Using the Pomodoro Technique is a great way to practice focusing while also working on planning ahead and prioritizing—many of the necessary components of a good time management strategy.

    Recap: Why You Fail at Good Time Management

    Let’s quickly go over those 8 reasons one more time:

    1. You fail to prioritize
    2. You waste time
    3. You’re disorganized
    4. You have too many distractions in your life
    5. You don’t start your day early enough
    6. You don’t track your time
    7. You don’t have a plan for your day
    8. You’re not focused

    Just like everybody else, you have 24 hours in each day. Be sure that you’re using those hours as wisely as possible. Go through each item on this list to evaluate your own time management skills.

    Make the most of your time by prioritizing, removing distractions, and learning how to focus. You have all the time you need to build your business—even if that’s just slow and steady—if you’re willing to make the necessary adjustments to yourself and your life.

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  • Productivity

    5 Top Productivity Tips for Online Entrepreneurs

    It’s not enough to dream of success. It’s not even enough to set goals.

    The only way to truly achieve your dreams and build the business you’re meant to build is to sit down and just do it. You have to take action!

    That’s where many of us “fail.” Fail is a strong word, but that’s the reality of it. If you don’t take action, you’ll never achieve your goals.

    And yet, it’s the whole “taking action” part that usually trips most of us up.

    • We overbook our calendars until today’s to-dos become next week’s past dues.
    • We procrastinate on the things that are most important while attending to things that are merely “nice to do.” (I’m super guilty of this one.)
    • And sometimes we simply take on too much—even when we know better.

    And then what do we say? That we “don’t have time” to grow our businesses, to find new clients, or to write new blog posts.

    The truth is, you do have the time. You have the same amount of time that other successful people have. You just need to learn how to be more productive.

    Table of Contents

    5 Quick Productivity Tips for Entrepreneurs

    The problem is that you’re bad at managing that time. You waste time in ways that you don’t even realize yet.

    So what do you do? Embrace these five productivity hacks that even top coaches use to get more done in less time.

    Create routines and habits

    Simply put, a ritual or habit is a consistent way of doing something. You may have:

    • a morning ritual—wake up, brush your teeth, work out, shower, and head to your office);
    • an evening ritual—check homework, tuck the kids in, watch the evening news, and hit the sack;
    • a weekend ritual—sleep late, mow the lawn, catch a movie, visit your mom;

    or many others for different types of situations.

    However, if you’re not careful with your rituals, they can turn into productivity killers. Is checking Facebook or email a part of your morning ritual? Is turning on Slack a part of your at-work ritual? Distractions such as these can turn even your best intentions into hours of wasted time.

    Take a good look at your rituals. What are you doing that you shouldn’t be or that should be moved to another part of your day? Make your rituals more efficient and you’ll automatically get more done.

    Manage your calendar

    Want to know how much time you really have available for that new project? Try blocking off time in your calendar or planner for all your existing projects.

    Fill in all your client calls, your business administrative tasks, time for meals and breaks, outside appointments, and everything else you’re committed to.

    The time that’s left might just shock you.

    Make it a habit to block time in your calendar for every commitment, and you’ll never again over-promise or over-commit.

    Overhead view of three coworkers with laptops - increase your productivity by delegating tasks

    Learn to let go

    This just in: you do not have to do everything in your business. You can (and should) hand off those low-level tasks to someone else.

    • Hire a VA to create your documents and manage your calendar.
    • Let your tech support person manage your blog and email.
    • Turn over your bookkeeping to an accountant.

    Business productivity is all about delegating the tasks you don’t have to do or simply don’t want to do. The time you free up will allow you to work on what’s truly important—and that only you can do.

    Work hard, play harder

    You are not a machine.

    You can’t work all day every day and hope to be at your best all the time. Take a day off! You need it.

    Get some rest, or relax on a long, slow hike. Take a friend out to lunch. Go shopping with your kids. See a movie or a play. Do something—anything—other than work.

    Not only will you return to your home office feeling much more refreshed, but you’ll find yourself more creative and productive than before as well.

    Feeling stuck? Take a break. You know the saying: fresh eyes help, and all.

    Build your focus

    True multi-tasking is impossible. You cannot efficiently create a new product while you’re simultaneously surfing Facebook, keeping an eye on the kids, and answering the phone every time it rings.

    Instead, use your calendar to block time off for important tasks, then turn everything else off so you can focus.

    Let people know that you have set work hours, even if you are at home. The benefit of working at home is that you get to set when those hours are and that you’re available for emergencies.

    Other than that, no phone, no Facebook, no kids or husbands or neighbors or pets demanding “just a minute” of your time. Tune everything out, and you’ll find your work getting done much faster, which in turn means more time to actually focus on those things and people that you love.

    Recap: Top Productivity Tips for Entrepreneurs

    Managing your time and turning up your productivity isn’t something that comes naturally to most people but you can always get more practice. When you learn to master this skill, you’ll find your business grows right along with you.

    Remember these 5 productivity tips…

    1. Create routines and habits
    2. Calendar management
    3. Learn to let go
    4. Work hard, play harder
    5. Build your focus

    …and you’ll be on your way to getting more done and living the life you dream of building with your business.

  • Productivity

    Figuring Out What Your Business Needs You to Actually Work On

    Are you ready to take your online business to the next level and watch some explosive growth unfold over the coming months?

    Of course you are!

    But before you start to plot and plan what you want to do to make that happen, it’s important to stop and look at where you are right now so you know what you need to work on.

    For example, let’s say you want to increase your income. If you know your offer is converting at a high rate, but see that you don’t get much traffic to that offer, you’ll know you should focus on building traffic rather than trying to create more products.

    Business planning for future success is all about data. You can work most efficiently and spend your time and money most effectively if you know exactly where you’re starting from.

    By recording data, you can start to see what’s working, what isn’t, and what trends are starting to play out. It all starts with keeping a record of where you are right now.

    Table of Contents

    Choose a Recording Method

    Before you dive in, you should decide how you want to record this information. You can write it down by hand in a notebook, open up a Word document to do it digitally, or use a spreadsheet.

    I like to use a spreadsheet I created in Airtable because I have the option to have it calculate fun additional information like weekly and monthly averages and even map it all out in graphics to help me get a clearer picture.

    Pick a method that you can stick to and that what feels best for you. While I love spreadsheets, you may prefer to write everything down on planner pages.

    Whatever you choose, remember to keep your records organized so you can easily go back to them and check your numbers.

    What to Track

    Let’s take a look at some of the things you’ll want to keep track of.

    While I realize that you could just look at most of this data in various different places like Google Analytics, your shopping cart, and your autoresponder service, it’s important to have it all in one place.

    This makes it much easier to connect the dots and see the relationships between the different sets of numbers. Plus you don’t have to log in to 50 different services just to see your numbers. Keeping everything in a single place creates a nice overview.

    Traffic

    To grow you need to expand your reach. That means getting more traffic but also engaging the people that come to your site by encouraging them to click around and read more.

    Good things to keep track of are the total visitors, unique visitors, bounce rate, and of course where the traffic is coming from.

    Email List / Subscribers

    Once you get people to your site, your next goal is always to get these people on your list.

    Here you want to track the total number of subscribers, conversion rates for each of your opt-in forms and pages, open rates for your emails, and also unsubscribes.

    As you start to collect and review this data regularly, you’ll get a much better picture of your subscribers.

    Customers

    Subscribers are great, customers are better!

    Start by keeping track of how many total customers you have and how many purchases per day, week, and month. Other good numbers to look at are the total lifetime value of your average customer, repeat purchases, and refund rates.

    Income & Expenses

    Last but not least, take a look at your bottom line. This is your typical accounting data.

    You want to keep track of your income as well as your expenses. With those two sets of numbers, you can easily calculate your overall profit. I find it helpful to look at your profit for the month, but track income on a daily basis.

    Update Regularly

    Now that you have your initial data collection set up, make it a habit to update the numbers regularly. This makes it easy to see what’s working, what isn’t, and how much you’re growing as you move through the coming months and years.

    Whether your business experiences growth, stagnation, or a regression, make a note of what happened that month to cause that result. You’ll be able to track why you had this experience so you can plan appropriately for future attempts.

    For example, if you see a dip in website traffic, it will be easy to attribute to how you spent less time promoting your content than you did the month before. That should be motivation enough to get you to work harder on promotion for the next month.

    Or on the other hand, maybe you have a huge boost in email subscribers during one month, but only half as many the next month. Rather than feel like you’re failing to continue to grow, you’ll know that spike in growth was due to a contest you held and you won’t see that level of growth continuously.

    At least not yet! You’ll get there if you keep it up. Good luck!

    Business Needs Pinterest graphic - woman holding tablet with print outs of business analytics
  • Productivity

    The Secret to Achieving Massive Success in Your Business

    Do you set aside time regularly to plan what you want to do in your business?

    Or do you just kind of go with the flow and do things as you feel like it?

    If making a plan isn’t something you regularly do, I strongly encourage you to embrace it!

    Setting aside time to plan out what you want to do and what growth you want to achieve is crucial to your success. This is something you should do for each month, each quarter, and each year.

    Over the next seven days, I want to share some of what I’ve learned and what I’ve found helpful with you.

    Why planning is essential for success in business

    Table of Contents

    Let’s start off by taking a look at why business planning is “the secret” to success. There are a few different factors that come into play here.

    You may already experience some of these and not even realize they’re a product of good planning, but the more you plan, the more you’ll see these occurring in your life.

    Efficiency

    The first is efficiency. When you go in with a clear plan, you can focus on what’s most important.

    Instead of spending time trying to figure out what you should be working on, think about what pieces of the puzzle are missing from your product funnel or what you need to do to break through to the next income level.

    You know exactly what needs to come next.

    As we’ll explore in a future post, with a clear goal in mind and a plan for the year, it becomes easy to walk backward to create effective and efficient daily to-do lists. Work on what needs to get done each day and you’ll be able to reach your goals.

    Creative Thinking

    Next, setting a big goal for yourself inspires out-of-the-box thinking. If you don’t believe me, just try it!

    Decide on a big income goal for the coming month. Write it down. Keep it in front of you. Then get to work and start to notice what happens next.

    • You start to think of things that didn’t occur to you before.
    • You come up with creative ways to get more traffic.
    • You decide to run a fun promo that adds dollars to your bank account.

    The same happens when an important deadline comes up unexpectedly.

    Think back on that time in college when finals rolled around, or the last time your in-laws told you they would stop by later in the day. You got very creative about studying or cleaning respectively.

    Stimulating Your Subconscious

    Last but not least, let’s talk about your subconscious. So far, we’ve been focused on what we’re actively doing to make progress by making a plan, setting goals, and following through.

    There’s another dimension to all this and that’s what’s going on in our subconscious mind. While we are busy plowing through our to-do list, cooking dinner for the family, and even sleeping, our subconscious mind is working towards those goals as well.

    For example, you may come to a particular part of your plan and can’t think of a good solution right away. However, you just might have a spark of inspiration while you’re in the shower the next day while you’re subconsciously running through your plans for the day.

    I’m sure you’ve heard someone mention that they come up with their best ideas in the shower before. Maybe you have yourself!

    So what’s next?

    Planning and setting goals is important because it helps your business grow faster. That means you end up with more money for yourself and your loved ones while spending less time slaving away at your desk.

    Try making a simple daily plan for a week and see how it affects your productivity. Once you’re comfortable with that, you can start getting more detailed with your plans.

    Good luck!

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