Common Mistakes in Running a Small Business
Well, we had such a fantastic response from the previous podcast that we’ve decided to do another one expanding on common mistakes in small business. So we already know remove repetition, step one. Document, step two. Remove objections from your customers, step three. How are you going to have time to do all that? You’re already pretty busy.
Time Management
The answer is, time management. Make sure you’re better at managing your time. Use different things in your life when you’re able to make sure that you’re aware of how long you’re spending on things. Work for 25 minutes, break for five minutes. You might have heard of it before, The Pomodoro. Now, The Pomodoro timer or tomato timer gives you an indication of how long you should be working on something and how long you should breaking for something.
It’s what they have found to be a very productive way of running your business. This goes especially well for things that are very time-intensive and complex in nature, so you want to make sure that you’re doing things like that.
I’ve said this also before and I’ll say it again, being aware of where your time is going. Your time is the most valuable thing you’ve got. Spend it with your family, spend it with your friends, don’t spend it on things that you shouldn’t be spending things on.
Don’t start automating tasks that don’t need to be automated, and I know I am guilty of this. I’m in the process of making a cocktail machine that goes along, and you can order the app off your phone, that goes along and pours the drinks out of each of the different things, and mixes it all up for you, and bang, presto, you’ve got yourself a cocktail.
What I’m saying is automate on things that you want to learn about and spend your time on things that you want to spend your time on that may increase the value of your life or increase your knowledge. Don’t spend your time on useless things.
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You Should Be Aware of Your Time
Being aware of where you’re spending your time is the most important thing. If you download things such as Rescue Time or ManicTime or any of the other different time tools that are out there you can see how much you’re spending your time on, and then put a dollar figure on it. If you think that your time is worth 10 dollars an hour, which you’d be surprised at how many business owners are sitting at around 2.50 to 10 dollars an hour, work out all the math for that. If you want to be earning 200 dollars an hour or 500 dollars an hour, work out the math around that and then break it down and have a look at how much it costs you to spend the time that you spend on Facebook.
You might think, ‘Oh, I don’t spend that much time on Facebook. It’s okay, it’s only when I’m doing something else. It’s only when I’m in an elevator I just on Facebook.’
Well, it’s not really downtime for your body and it’s not really downtime for your mind. It’s releasing some small hits of dopamine and a bunch of depression, so you need to be aware of where you are spending your time and if it is valuable. It’s not if you’re going to be spending it on things like Facebook, but put a quantity next to it and see if you’d be comfortable spending that money to use Facebook, and then think would you rather be spending that money to do something else?
Look at the Big Picture
I look at every task that I do throughout my entire week, month and year and think ‘How much is this worth to me?’ That could be a relationship that I have with a friend, them coming over for a sneaky beer on a Friday afternoon and I’m sitting there for two or three hours, or four hours chatting about stuff, and I have already pre-thought, ‘Okay, I’m here for four hours having this beer. Is this worthwhile for me?’
And you have to be around, you have to be living, you have to be around for a reason to be do something, and I know that if I quantify the relationship with that person and think ‘If I want to be earning 400 dollars an hour and I’m spending four hours with that person, is this time worth 1600 dollars?’
It’s very easy to quantify if you then look at other things that you do throughout your day, such as jumping on Facebook, or playing Angry Birds or something else. If you’re doing those activities and that was to amount to two or three hours, and then you think ‘I’m spending four hours drinking beer,’ 100% building a relationship with a real person face-to-face is a significantly better thing to be doing than sitting in an isolated room with a piece of glass and plastic in your hand, flicking things around on a cancer stick.
It’s much, much better to be doing something that is building a relationship and forming something, in my opinion. Obviously, each to their own, but you want to make sure that you’re productive in your business.
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Lists, Lists and More Lists
Time management is massive. Make sure you’re managing your time. Lists are huge to me. I make lists of everything that needs to be done in the business, everything that needs to be done around the house, everything that needs to be done everywhere. I’ve got lists and I know if I was called to go overseas next week, if I was called to go overseas in two hours time, I’ve got a list of exactly what needs to be packed depending on how long I need to go overseas for.
I’ve got a list to know exactly what tasks need to be done around the house from cleaning pool filters to washing windows and shampooing carpets. The whole lot is in there, anything and everything that needs to be done around the house has been documented. Any of the tasks that need to be done that are maintenance things have been documented. I know exactly the status and health check of where my time is going over the next day, month and year.
Make People Aware of Your Way of Doing Things
People need to be aware of what you’re doing because there are always mishaps, things that come up, those annoyances that occur: a friend gets sick, you get sick, your car breaks down, you get a smashed windscreen. Whatever the case is, that is something that you can’t predict and it just happens, so you need to be able to be aware of where you want your time to go for when those things do happen so that you can be aware of how you can shift everything along and organise your life around the model of a Gantt chart.
The Final Word
Time management is super, crazy important. So is documenting everything down so that you can have people starting to do the work that you should be doing.
Ultimately, what we’d love to hear from you guys is how would you like to see your business time improved? Do you think you are the most productive person out there? Is your business up to the test? We’re giving away a special deal here where I’d love to come in and personally help you and your business out.
I’d love to come in and see how we can go about improving your time and improving your bottom line. If that’s of interest to you email [email protected] and I’ll personally respond and jump onto it and see what I can do. And when I say personally, I mean I personally wrote the automation that will respond to you and then we’ll go from there. It’ll be automated. It’ll be amazing! We’re going to make your business profitable and it’s going to be so cool. Let’s go along the journey together.
All right, if you have enjoyed this jump across to iTunes and leave us some love, give us some reviews, and stay good.
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