Business Strategist for Solopreneurs
Earlier this year, I gave my email subscribers the chance to ask me anything about their business. In this video, I answer the first question, and I’ll be answering more over the coming weeks and months. The question has to do with time management systems and Timetrade.
If you want more information like this, including a chance to get your questions answered in the next “Ask Me Anything,” enter your name and email below for regular email updates from me.
I’ve just put the finishing touches on a brand new free report that will help you get more done every day and feel less overwhelm! Having to much to do, running in circles and feeling disorganized are all common problems for solopreneurs. One of the biggest single complaints I hear is that business owners are overwhelmed. When you wear all the hats in your business, you have to be super-efficient and super-organized to get done what you need to.
Most people understand the basic concept of keeping a to-do list, but they make mistakes in how they keep it that cost them time, well-being and productivity. The good news is that this report gives you 5 really easy tips for writing your daily to-do list that you can use right away to start feeling more on top of things.
Fill out the form below and get your report right away!
As a solopreneur, using your time well is one of the most important things you can do. Anywhere you can be more efficient while maintaining quality will help you have a more profitable and fulfilling business. When you wear all the hats in your business, every single thing you do has to have a purpose and somehow help your bottom line.
One of my favorite efficiency techniques is using templates. A template helps you to do tasks more quickly by giving you a place to start or often a complete version of the end result. You can create templates for a variety of purposes such as:
If you have a task you know you’ll be doing again and again, begin creating your template the very first time you do the task. Revise it each time until you have the best possible version you can create. Be sure to test your template to make sure it works. Here are a few ideas to test your templates and see how well they are working:
Templates can be stored in a variety of ways depending on how and where you use them. Social media tools such as Hootsuite let you save drafts right inside them. Anything written can be stored in a plain text editor or word processing document. Any initial contact can be done via a form designed for the specific person using it (e.g. a potential customer, a vendor, a strategic partner, etc).
Start using templates as soon as you can. They will save you time and allow you to do better quality work. The people you deal with will get more consistent action from you and you’ll have more time to do creative and innovative work.
Templates are just one of the bonus strategies I cover in my book The Solopreneur’s Success Strategy: Automate Your Grunt Work. In the book I teach you 9 automation strategies so you can spend less time doing repetitive boring tasks. I also give you 3 bonus strategies (including how to use templates) that are related to automation. Grab the book on Kindle at the link below (you don’t need a Kindle device, scroll below the link for more information):
The Solopreneur’s Success Strategy: Automate Your Grunt Work
Note: You do not need a Kindle device to read Kindle books. You can get a free tablet or phone app or use the Kindle desktop reader. Click the book link above and explore the options in the Kindle store.
One of the main skills you need to be an entrepreneur who works at home is how to schedule and block your time out. When you work for yourself on your own schedule, there is no natural start and stop time for anything. Creating your own start and stop times is the structure that you need to create in order to be successful at running your own business from your home.
It’s definitely great to work from home, but without the skill of being able to properly schedule and block out your time you may find yourself spending too much time in a grey area where you are trying to straddle your work and personal life and do both at the same time. You can end up with a lot of poorly used time where you aren’t really working and getting things done and you aren’t really enjoying yourself.
What are some examples of in-between behavior?
Any of these can be enough to cause you problems. You can end up with no time where you are really “off” work, and you end up with a lot of hours of poor-quality work because you weren’t fully into your work. Because you don’t take enough time off, this can lead to burnout, stress and lack of enthusiasm.
It’s super important to create time when you are 100% working and time when you are 100% not working. The grey area in between is not a good way to spend your time and needs to be minimized. There’s a Zen saying that comes to mind:
“When walking, just walk. When sitting, just sit. Above all, don’t wobble.”
In our entrepreneurial world, we could say “When working, just work. When off, just don’t work. Above all, don’t try to do both.”
Make sure every minute of your day is spent intentionally. Whether you are relaxing or working, what you are doing should be a conscious choice that represents the best thing you could be doing right now.
When I first started my business, I scheduled my clients via an email exchange. It usually took several emails to find a jointly acceptable time, and in the interim both of us were held up from booking something else that might interfere with a time we had already offered. This back-and-forth creates a spreading wave of inefficiency and is not a good use of time for a solopreneur or anyone for that matter. As a solopreneur, you have to be super efficient in how you use your time because you are juggling so many things. Appointment scheduling is one of the first areas I automated.
Now, I use an automated scheduler called Timetrade (timetrade.com) that links directly to my Google calendar and shows my guests available appointments in their time zone. They can book on the spot with no back and forth. We each receive a confirmation email and the appointment is put right on my Google calendar.
Using a scheduler like Timetrade is great, but it takes some getting used to. Here are a few tips to help you get going quickly with automating your appointment scheduling:
If you aren’t using an automated appointment scheduler, I suggest looking into getting one. This can free up time that you can use for better (and more profitable) things. I explore the use of an automated appointment scheduler in more detail in my #1 bestselling book The Solopreneur’s Success Strategy: Automate Your Grunt Work. The book has 9 other automation strategies plus 3 bonus automation-related strategies. Check the book out in the Kindle store here.
Don’t have a Kindle? You can still enjoy Kindle books by using a free tablet or phone app or free desktop reader.
It can be hard to get your day started when you are a solopreneur! There’s so much to do in so many different categories, and then there’s all your personal stuff too. If you don’t have enough structure, that wide-open schedule might be as much a curse as a blessing. One way I get started right is to have a kick-start that I do every day. No matter how overwhelmed and lost I might feel, I always know to go through this short list and then I will have at least gotten started.
Here’s my kick-start list:
Once I tackled this list, I have a sense of accomplishment and my day is off to a good start. It’s often enough to get my momentum rolling and I can dig into everything else I want to get done. As with so many things, once you get your work day started it’s much easier to keep going than it was to get started.
If the idea of having a set way to start the day doesn’t appeal to you, an alternate approach is to set up the start to your day the night before. As your last task of the day, get yourself organized and set up for the morning so you can jump right in. Either way, make sure you give yourself an easy way to get your day going or you might waste a lot of time just trying to get started.
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When I worked for a big corporation, we had a budget department. It was not a big department, but there were 4-6 people whose sole function was to create and manage the company budget. Because it was a big company, the budget filled a 5-inch binder and there pages and pages documentation to go with it. The budget itself went from a big, broad picture to minute detail about each department within the company. The budget was drafted before the year started, and as the year progressed we measured how well we did in revenue and expenses against the budget.
In this setting, the budget served a lot of purposes and most of them aren’t relevant to solopreneurs. However, one of the vital functions of the budget was to justify every expense and make sure someone had the responsibility of deciding how to spend limited dollars. Nobody could just go off and autonomously decide to start some brand new promotion or create a brand new, untested product with no way of knowing if it would sell. While that does make for some slow implementation, it also makes sure that any new idea goes through some sort of review process.
As a solopreneur, you don’t have a budget department. In fact, you don’t have any departments or anyone to report to. This is a fun, phenomenal benefit of a one-person business, but it also means you can grab any half-baked idea you want and run with it. That can be a big problem!
Way too often, I see solopreneurs randomly adding project after project into their business with no planning and no way to measure what’s working. What they end up with is an overwhelming mash-up of disjointed tasks that aren’t working and no way to determine why.
So what’s the alternative? You don’t need a full department to help you stay on track, but you do need to perform the function of the budget department in your business. What if you did have to justify each new expenditure? What if you had to explain all the person-hours you needed? How would that change the way you work?
Here are a few tips to get your “budget department” started:
In short, one helpful way to look at any new project you are thinking of taking on is to pretend you have to justify it to a budget committee. How will it help your bottom line? How will it contribute to sales? If you are thinking of trying something new, and want to set it up properly from the start, I invite you to schedule a coaching session with me. I can help you make sure you are heading in the right direction and that you’ll be able to tell if your project is successful.
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As I’ve increased the reach of my business, I’ve had an increasing number of people attempt to pitch me something in the guise of a Trojan Horse. It’s usually something like “Can I share your {whatever} with my audience?” or one particularly blatant one “I have a speaking gig for you, let’s talk (turned out to be a long sales pitch for something that was completely inappropriate for me.)
Just to be clear, it’s totally appropriate to pitch and sell when you are in business. Without selling, there would be no business. My objection to the Trojan Horse approach is that it is sneaky and often untargeted. In each case, I didn’t know I was going to be pitched to and the product or service being offered was not something I needed or wanted. The person pitching me occupied my time under false pretenses and I felt burned at the end.
What I want to share with you is to be on the lookout for these sales pitches. They will waste your time and if your experience is like mine, the people that do this don’t even try to target the right potential customers. Here are a few warning signs to look out for:
One of the really vexing parts of the Trojan Horse sales pitch is that it is usually flattering! I admit, the first few times it happened I was thrilled that a stranger recognized my genius. I’ve now gotten pretty good at sniffing out legitimate admiration vs. insincere and generic compliments designed to woo me into a meeting. I’ve also come to recognize just how valuable my time is, so I place a higher bar on any meeting and very low value on ego-boosting.
Another problem with ducking these sales pitches is that if you get too broad with your criteria for declining, you may miss legitimate and valuable opportunities to collaborate and have a sales conversation about something that may actually be useful to you.
It goes without saying that you should not be using this to sell your own products or services. It makes a very bad impression and wastes both your time and your unqualified prospect’s time. The big question is how do you avoid the time-wasting Trojan Horses and accept the right appointments?
Here are a few ideas:
First, don’t jump to schedule an appointment just because someone asks. Check them out by visiting their website, social media sites and doing a Google search.
Second, make sure you understand why you are having a meeting rather than some other form of communication such as exchanging emails. Ask them some questions about why a meeting makes sense. Often, this drives away people who you probably don’t want to meet with and people who are a good fit appreciate your thoughtfulness.
Third, don’t schedule right away. I generally schedule everything a week ahead of time anyway, but a side benefit of this is that it wards off people who don’t have a legitimate purpose for talking to you. They don’t want to work that hard or plan ahead!
Fourth, pay attention to your feelings. If you feel pressured, unsure, weird, etc. it may be because the meeting isn’t right for you.
As a solopreneur, you have to guard your time or you won’t be able to do everything you need to do. Don’t plan a meeting simply because someone asks. Make sure you know the value of the meeting for both you and the person who wants to meet with you.
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I’m pleased to announce that my new book “The Solopreneur’s Sucess Strategy: Automate Your Grunt Work” is available on Kindle!
This book contains complete instructions for automating 9 key areas of your business as well as 3 automation-related bonus strategies. Some of the areas covered include:
Head over to the Kindle store today and grab your copy! You don’t need a Kindle device to read this book – you can get a free app for your smartphone or tablet and you can also use the free Kindle desktop reader. I’d love it if you would help me share the news! Use the Pin it and social sharing buttons below to share this with your friends and connections. Thanks!
