Let’s face it, when you are sitting at your computer for 12 hours it’s easy to think that you have been working all day. But 12 hours of computer time does not necessarily mean that you’ve been productive with your time.If you are only working for three hours, but spending the rest of your time surfing the web, chatting, and managing household tasks; you aren’t being productive.
You can probably get away with that schedule for awhile, but sooner or later your bank account will tap you on the shoulder and give you a dose of reality. If you aren’t spending time on activities that directly relate to maintaining and increasing your income, then how can you expect results?
For example, checking your email is a necessary task, but spending 3 hours on email isn’t going to increase your income.Sites like Twitter and Facebook are wonderful for making connections, but you have to be careful because it’s easy to spend too much time chatting. Chatting is not going to grow your business in the ways that you need it to. Besides, a lot of the time you end up chatting with people who aren’t even your target market so if you are spending hours a day doing that, you are doing yourself a disservice.
Sometimes it’s hard to directly measure results; but you have to ask yourself, “how much is being on Twitter and Facebook going to make me?” Once you keep that it mind, it will be easier to keep yourself on track.
The key to this is so simple, but often overlooked- make a list.
- Make a list of each and every task you need to complete each week. What client commitments do you have? What websites do you need to update? What phone calls need to be made? What marketing activities need to be completed?
- Now make a calendar, but don’t use days or dates; label it as Day 1-Day 5. Despite if you plan on working seven days a week, only use five days because you’ll need that extra wiggle room.
- Next divide up your tasks between those five days.
If you have a day where something comes up and you can’t finish all of your tasks, then make note and add it to days six and seven. If by the end of the week you don’t have any extra tasks then that is your cue to enjoy the time off. You don’t have to work around the clock to be productive and successful.
If you have time sensitive activities you might need to tweak this to include days, dates, and times. But if your work schedule is flexible, this may work for you. You’ll find that not only are you accomplishing everything you need to accomplish, but you are getting it done much more quickly because when a list is in front of you it’s hard to fiddle around; and less fiddling around equals more productivity and a greater growth in income.
