7 Time Saving Steps for Small Business Owners
In this article I give you 7 time-saving steps (and one bonus step) to help you grow your small business and make sure you are using your time as effectively as possible, enabling you to do what you do best.
Productivity is a buzzword that seems to have lost a bit of its buzz amid a raft of self-help books and blog posts giving you the magical answer to “20x your output” and such like. However, being productive (not just being busy) remains a linchpin of effectiveness for small business owners. There is only so much time in any given day and whilst you are boot-strapping, covering all bases - especially those that bring you the most ROI - is crucial. Here’s what is included in this article:
Do the hardest task first
Create an organised workspace
Outsource the repetitive
Organise your time well
Give yourself deadlines
Use software to help you
Have a "Check Email" Schedule
BONUS STEP… Shorten your workday!
Remember they are not all hard and fast rules, but guidelines to play with so you find what works for you. Now, without further ado…
Step 1 - Do the hardest task first
Do the hardest task first
Ever since we were kids, we have been putting things off. Now we have moved on from not tidying our rooms or delaying the hard homework to not tackling the biggest or (as is often the case) most emotionally difficult task in the work place.
It is time small business owners ditched this learned behaviour in the interests of saving time and being more productive.
To state the obvious, if you start off by doing the toughest task, you know things will only get easier. You may get some quick wins by accomplishing simpler tasks first up, but the anxiety of the “big job” will continue to hang over you like a dark cloud.
Furthermore, easy tasks are more likely to be the repetitive and therefore less likely to help grow you as an individual. They are also easier to outsource (see Step 3), but back t the big task.
The fear of non-completion is a genuine thing in work and this is a factor in doing the biggest or hardest task. We humans like to tick things off, to have them done, but often the biggest or hardest task is daunting because of its size.
We can get over this by breaking it down into its constituent parts; planning, research, brainstorming, writing, whatever these individual elements may be. This kind of planning creates micro-tasks thereby limiting work in progress which, run turn, allows for better concentration, higher quality and, ultimately, more tasks completed. Yay!
Step 2 - Create an organised workspace
Create an organised workspace
Have a space you use for work. It can be a distant corner of the bedroom, a desk in a work space or your own office. Whatever it is, make it about work. Keep it tidy, with everything you need and separated from your personal life.
Make your virtual workspace also clear and focussed. This means files, folders and emails should be organised to avoid unnecessary (and time-wasting) searches.
My top 3 tips are:
Use the likes of G Drive or DropBox to store files systematically so you don’t have to go searching on your laptop.
Create templates of emails, contracts, booking forms or any repeated “paperwork” so you can re-use and keep them all in one place.
Keep your inbox tidy by creating folders, labels and by regularly moving emails from your inbox to the right folder. A clean inbox helps to keep a clear mind and is representative of an efficient business.
Step 3 - Outsource the repetitive
Outsource the repetitive
Outsourcing is a really powerful way to lighten your load and save time. Anything you can get off your plate is going to free you up to concentrate on what you do best within your small business.
There is in fact no limit to what you outsource. Any process you can document can be outsourced simply to a colleague or (dare I say it) to a skilled virtual assistant. Any area in which you lack expertise can be outsourced to someone who knows more than you do and is better equipped both in skills and time, to handle it.
We find that for many small businesses support and social media are two areas in which outsourcing can create huge time savings opportunities. Our e-commerce support assistants can free up anything from 30 minutes to several hours per day to allow small business owners to grow their business.
If something is worth doing, it’s worth doing well. Never has this statement been truer than when talking about Social Media management. The time it takes to properly represent and showcase your business on social channels mean it is a perfect candidate for outsourcing. Again, you can choose how much time people spend on it depending on your budget and requirements – a social media virtual assistant can supplement or substitute your own work.
A good example is “social media engagement”. Engaging with people on social channels is crucial to a successful social media strategy, but is spending 30 minutes or 1 hour per day researching, following, commenting and liking really worth your valuable time as a small business owner? The answer is a big fat NO! So, outsource it.
Step 4 - Organise your time well
Organise your time well
There are so many ways of doing this and I will list a few I have tried. Now I say tried, not because I have tried and they failed but simply because I tend to mix them up. This is because I am human and sometimes making a change is a good way to re-focus.
You may land upon one method which works brilliantly for you and through your own exemplary discipline you never change. In which case you are almost certainly a cyborg, but no matter - the most important aspect is finding what works for you. Here are my top tips:
Try Time Blocking
When I am really busy this is crucial. I block out set times during the day / week to do certain things. For example; 9 to 9:30 - Social Media, 10 to 10:45 - Emails, 11 - 13 - Project A, 13:30 to 14:00 - Call with marketing team, and so and so forth.
Compile a To Do List
Easy one this but I do it almost every day. A good tip is to keep the short because they become more daunting otherwise. Also review the list from the day before and move your incomplete tasks from yesterday to today. The ones that keep reappearing day after day and never being done, can probably be struck off, unless… see Step 1.
Use Journaling
Different people do this differently and there is an argument for morning and evening journals. In the past I have had great success getting up early to write a few words (not always about work) and to create a task list for the day (see above) before breakfast. This works nicely on a few levels because:
it means you are getting stuck into your work early,
you start your working day with a clear picture of what you need to do,
you might cross off a couple of easy tasks before tucking into your cornflakes.
Put things in your calendar
I am constantly amazed how many people fail to use a function that is standard on every phone and every email platform. Apart from the fact that there is no excuse for missing a meeting these days (was there ever?) putting things in your calendar helps you organise your working day. It helps you know what you have to do and when. It stops you wasting time looking for phone numbers or Zoom links. It shows you what you have to prepare and it gives you deadlines (see Step 5). Purely from the perspective of professionalism it says a lot about you and your business.
NB: Don’t forget to use tools to help you (see Step 6).
Step 5 - Set yourself deadlines
Set yourself deadlines
Would it cross your mind to not set deadlines for employees or contractors? Accountability is a crucial part of any job. You should therefore make yourself accountable by setting deadlines you need to adhere to and, if it helps, spread the word; inform others about these deadlines. Once something is public knowledge it has an extraordinary power to motivate. It’s funny what pride will do!
Deadlines ensure you deliver what you need to for your business to grow and they also mean you set examples for others working or collaborating with you.
It is important to remember that the idea behind deadlines is to help you succeed. This means they ought to be strategic and coupled with smaller tasks. Setting these manageable and realistic deadlines also enables you to tick off more things in the pursuit of motivation and success. In other words a big project or big task should be made up of multiple deadlines in order to make those same deadlines are strategically worthwhile.
Deadlines also help you to prioritise and organise your time well (see Step 4) as they directly impact it. Milestones are crucial and the addition (and pressure) of deadlines can also help you to say no to many of those time-wasting tasks that you can either outsource or stick on the back burner because they are not so important. A great way of setting deadlines is by implementing the SMART business goals model.
Read an in-depth guide to SMART goal setting here.
Step 6 - Use software to help you
Use software to help you
Software applications can help to automate tasks and many can be integrated with one and other to communicate and further increase efficiency. Here are a few we use at bizee.co
Taking Notes, Writing Journals and Making Lists
I use Evernote for work and for my personal life. Syncing with my mobile and other devices means that the Evernote app has everything I want, when I want it, wherever I am. My to do list is always with me, my meeting notes are always at hand and so is my shopping list for that matter.
Automating Emails
Think about the emails you are going to be sending (lead gen, asking for services, follow up emails, declining someone etc..) and create templates that you can send in just 1 click. Also, potential leads as well as current clients will probably have a lot of questions about the product/service you are providing, so you can prepare answers to those questions already prepared, but to save time even further you could create a FAQ page on your website (or if your website is still not operational, create a FAQ sheet) and put the link in one of your email templates.
You can even set up auto-responses to certain emails. If you look at emails only once per day, consider an auto-response that acknowledges receipt and manages expectations.
Managing your Calendar
Here is a tip to further save time: start using Calendly. You can simply share a Calendly link in an email or embed your calendar in your website so people can choose a time slot that suits them the most. Not only does this integrate with Google calendar, office 365 and iCloud, meaning it automatically schedules that appointment in your calendar, but it also gets rid of the back and forth of time-wasting emails and can send out links to Zoom (see below) so the whole call is set up and everyone is informed automatically.
Collaborating with Colleagues and Contractors
Slack - If you have not already used Slack you will find it high on the list of many remote teams for it’s ease and flexibility when it comes to chat, groups, channel, sharing and keeping track of work. You can integrate many other applications to help you and it saves Tim heaving resource sin one place, your contacts in one place and access to other apps you use in your business.
Zoom for video conferencing. Whether your meetings are one the spur of the moment or scheduled in advance Zoom gives you good quality video, easy screen and resource sharing so you can speak and present quickly and efficiently.
Time-tracking
Here at bizee.co we have used a few different apps for tracking time and the best are Harvest or Toggl. We exclusively use Harvest now (also integrates in Slack) but try out for yourself. Time tracking means time-saving as you can work out clearly where your time is spent; enabling you to be more efficient, identify what you can outsource to someone else and keep track of what gives you the best ROI of your time.
Invoicing & Payments
By using invoicing and accounting solutions such as Quickbooks or Xero you can save time by automatically issuing recurring invoices. You can also set multiple reminders so you avoid checking bank accounts then manually writing emails in order to chase up payments. Because your bank is connected you will also have access to all your transactions so you don’t need to compare statements and excel sheets in order to reconcile.
Step 7 - Have a "Check Email" Schedule
Have a "Check Email" Schedule
Don’t keep hitting refresh in the hope your business will grow but spend the time doing things that will make your business grow. Waiting on emails or feeling the reassure of answering emails immediately is a drain on energy and time.
If there is a (metaphorical) fire that needs your attention someone will call you. I don't think I get any emails that need to be answered immediately and yet… how often do I find myself falling into the trap of refreshing or reacting to that ping on the phone which snaps me out of whatever it is I am concentrating on just to type, “Ok” or “thanks” and satisfy that demon inside that cons you into thinking you are being productive by answering an email. You are not.
Here at bizee.co we switched our virtual assistant business to largely shift work for our team. Sure, it doesn’t suit all clients but it ensures that when one of our assistants is working for you, they are working for you. That means no interruptions from emails or WhatsApp messages from other clients. You would want someone working for you to be so concentrated so it’s time to expect it of yourself.
Checking and answering emails, let’s say, twice a day will ensure increased concentration and a growth in productivity.
Bonus Step - Shorten your workday
Shorten your workday
Sounds scary doesn’t it? This one is a bit of a curve ball.
I have tried it (a bit) and I think it works. But it takes courage and I am not going to sit here and pretend that I have managed to commit to doing this regularly or that I have met many people who espouse it (Gary Vaynerchuk probably doesn't agree on this one for sure).
Shortening your work day is a legitimate way to concentrate your mind and force you into greater efficiency and less procrastination. If it is hard to vet your head round, then maybe it's one to set yourself every now and then as a means of re-focussing.
Author: Thomas Smallwood is an outsourcing specialist. Having worked in companies around Europe, from the support desk to the boardroom, he founded bizee.co to help small businesses grow through efficient delegation to skilled virtual assistants. He is an award-winning blogger and a passionate advocate for mental health awareness.
Connect with Tom on LinkedIn.