Do you ever feel like you’re stuck doing menial tasks that take up most of the day? Or maybe you let them build up and procrastinate on them. I feel your pain!

Unfortunately, all business owners have them.

You feel like your time is being consumed with small tasks that take up all your energy when you’d rather be focusing on growing your client base. So, how do you climb out of the crazy trap of losing your valuable time? Or, how do you avoid this roadblock entirely?

This is where workflows and systems come into place.

Master your processes before hiring

I get a lot of questions on why this is necessary if you’re in a place to hire out. The thing is, outsourcing only works if you have everything in order first.

What happens if you get an assistant before doing these things? You’ll end up in disappointment, missed marks, or micromanaging. You’ll wonder why you even hired someone in the first place because certain goals aren’t being met.

I’m here to tell you, a lot of those problems can be easily solved with a little bit of “business housekeeping”.

Time Management

Where are you spending your time, and how are you spending your time each day?

One of the best exercises you can do for your business is to be intentional with investing your time. Do you find yourself endlessly surfing or online shopping when you’re trying to do research on an upcoming blog post?

Some of the best ways to stay focused on your tasks, especially when you’re online, is to avoid distractions.

How?

I’m loving that software developers are also understanding this problem. On your iPhone, you can see how much time you’re spending each day and the category of the apps. On Instagram, they have notifications that will let you set up an amount of time before it pops up (I set mine at one hour).

There are some amazing free and paid programs that will keep track of how you spend your time online, block certain social media sites, and provide an analysis report on your time habits so you can see firsthand where your time is being spent. Keep researching, because they come out with new ones all the time.

Some programs to check out, include:

• RescueTime
• StayFocusd

Next, have you set your office hours?

If not, you need to do this! And I don’t mean you necessarily have to follow it for yourself (but it would be great if you did). This is to set expectations for your clients and customers. You can remind them of your hours in your contracts, welcome packets, email signatures, and autoresponders.

If you’re working in the evening and catching up on emails, you can use the feature on Gmail or Boomerang to schedule your emails. That way your customers won’t think or get used to you working strange hours. I’ve definitely had some 2am catch-ups before and I’m so thankful for this!

Programs

Asana is honestly my lifesaving tool*. Here’s what I use it for:

• Client project workflow and communication
  • I set up the timeline of what we’re working on. And the client can send me the information and feedback I need all through the site.
  • They also know exactly what I’m working on
  • All the resources and links to important things like contracts are in here
• My weekly tasks
  • I set up boards by the day, and I’m able to drag and drop as necessary.
  • Bonus: I use Toggl to time myself on tasks so I take it seriously!
• Launches
  • I have projects dedicated to my content creation, promotions, and launches.
  • It helps me see where I am in the launch phase and what else is left to do.
• Assistants/People I hire
  • I include an SOP (Standard operation procedure) and other important info in here
  • I assign them tasks (with subtasks) and due dates
  • There are boards for progress like: To Do, In Progress, and Ready to Publish

I’ve used Trello in the past but I prefer the interface and features of Asana.

Dubsado helps with clients

You can actually automate quite a lot with Dubsado, however, I don’t do it as much. The reason? The higher-end my clients got, the more customizations I had. And it’s so worth it to do that in order to give them quality service. I was able to increase prices because I realized my strategy was so in-depth, no type of automation would be worth it for that.

But here’s what I do use it for:

• Proposals: I make a prettier PDF but put in the options through Dubsado so they can choose
• Contracts: If they accept a contract, they can go to the next tab and sign a contract right then and there!
• Invoice: And if they sign that contract, they can go to the last tab and pay their deposit. They’ll also be able to see the remaining balance for the rest of the project.
• Recurring invoices: Super helpful for retainers. I schedule them to go out the first of the month.
• Lead capture: The forms on my website go straight to the Dubsado CRM.
• Questionnaires: Client homework and other questionnaires can be stored in here under their project.
• (Currently, I don’t use their scheduling feature since it’s not their main thing. But they do have one if you only need something basic.)

The emails are synced to your business email, and everything you can possibly send including the invoices are branded (my dream come true)! They pay right on the program which connects to Stripe and Paypal. You can even automate the reminders so you’re not stressing over payments. This is hands down one of the best investments I’ve made.

It’s the best I’ve found and they have a 3-client trial instead of a timed trial which is really nice!

Hiring a VA/Outsourcing

One of the best investments you can make in your business is to hire a virtual assistant or outsource a project.

You can hire a VA to:

• manage your email and customer service
• create content for your blog and repurpose
• alleviate any other time-consuming activity

Make a list of tasks you don’t like to do but are essential to your business. This will help you narrow down what to hire out for.

If you’re nervous about hiring a VA, ask other biz friends who they recommend. Then, once you find someone you feel would be a good fit, do a trial period to make sure you’re good match for each other.

Setting Up Systems

If someone were to come into your business, would they know how to take over a certain job? Could they easily manage your social media accounts or create amazing quality content for your regular customers as a “thank you.”

When you take the time to set up specific systems for your business, you’re allowing others to be trained for certain areas in your company.

The more you educate your hires, the more they’ll be able to step up and take on the responsibility you shouldn’t have to worry about in the moment. You can easily set up these systems by creating a training manual for each position in your company.

Your Social Media

Ah, the dreaded social media. One of the most difficult things to nail down and be consistent with. Well, here’s my secret (though I don’t always do it perfectly.)

There are certain social media tools that will help you automate your business depending on what social media platform you want to grow. This is what I currently use because I’m only focused on Instagram and Pinterest:

• Tailwind is amazing to automate and grow your blog traffic. Get a month for free on me!*
• Planoly for scheduling and growing your Instagram account. My favorite features: auto-post and adding hashtags to the first comment, not the caption! (And if you have a virtual assistant, it would be easy for them to do it for you!)*

Your Email List

You want to engage and keep your readers happy. One of the ways to do this is by growing and automating your email list.

The first thing you want to do is decide on an email service provider such as Flodesk or Mailerlite. I use both for two of my businesses. Flodesk is gorgeous and simple to use. Mailerlite is comparable to Convertkit, if you need more settings for segmentation and advanced campaigns.

I highly recommend you start your list ASAP if you’re looking to scale your business.

Lofi Music for Concentration

If you’re looking to boost productivity and remove distractions, then it’s not always the best idea to play your vacation playlist on repeat. Music that tugs at the heartstrings and causes a flood of emotions is great–but not for work. Lofi music has been known to help you when you want to get into a deep concentration mode.

Two places I go for lofi music: Spotify playlists (search for focus, concentration and lofi music) or if you want a dedicated one, try Brain.fm.

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Phew! And that’s what I have for setting up systems for your business. It will take some time to set up, but it will be so worth it in the end! Let me know if I missed anything.

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* I have affiliate links in this post. It won’t cost you extra!