• Inbox with 115 new e-mails.
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• Important customer with a difficult question about a big order.
• 10 a.m. conference call with a hot prospect.
• A new employee needing training.
• A meeting about updating one of our products.
• Someone tweeting me.
• A phone call to my accountant about taxes.
And my column is due this afternoon.
Wow! So much to do, so little time. Every small-business owner faces the same dilemma: How do we ever manage to get anything finished with so many things on our to-do list?
Small-business owners and entrepreneurs constantly are being tugged in many directions, so they need to make the most of almost every minute.
I've come up with 20 time-saving tips for your small business:
Taking the time to create a to-do list can save time in the long run.(Photo: Getty Images)
1. Create a to-do list, perhaps using an app like todoist, Any.do, Wunderlist or Carrot, which turns your to do list into a somewhat mean game.
2. Turn off your e-mail. Set times to deal with email; don't continually interrupt your day. Unsubscribe from newsletters you don't read.
3. Go to the cloud. Move key business processes to Internet-based services instead of running them on site. You can run payroll, arrange shipments, retrieve files, and much more from wherever you are, whenever you need. You'll also eliminate a lot of information technology maintenance and down time.
4. Don't micromanage. Hire people you trust and trust them. Train employees, encourage them to ask questions, provide! feedback, then get out of the way and let them do their jobs.
5. Tackle the most important thing first. Take care of your most critical item first thing in the morning. That not only gets it done while you're fresh, but you'll procrastinate less on other items.
6. Give yourself deadlines. Often your most important tasks don't have time-specific due dates. Prioritize them by setting hard deadlines.
7. Handle mail once. Whether snail mail or e-mail, deal with it as you read it: Respond, delete, file or delegate.
8. Limit social media. Is social media worthwhile for your business? If not, cut it out during the day. If yes, limit time on social media sites to 30 minutes or less daily. Use tools such as Hootsuite, TweetDeck and Buffer to schedule posts.
9. Stop surfing the Web. Don't kid yourself. It's not research; it's procrastination.
Make deadlines for yourself even if they aren't set in stone.(Photo: Sven Hoppe, Getty Images)
10. Close other browser windows and programs. Try to do one thing at a time until completion.
11. Get help. Just because it's your business, you don't have to do it all. Hire others to do your bookkeeping, administrative tasks, errand running, customer support. Check out services like TaskRabbit for local errand runners.
12. Make appointments with yourself. Set aside time to address important tasks and don't allow interruptions.
13. Create templates for forms or letters you use repeatedly, such as invoices, statements, proposals, product descriptions, letters of agreement.
14. Accept credit cards. And use mobile payment-processing apps like Square, Intuit's GoPayment and PayPal Here. Spend less time on invoices, deposits, collections.
15. Don't talk. In o! ur open o! ffice, a quick question can turn into a long conversation. We schedule "library hours," to be quiet and tend to our work.
16. Create operations manuals. Jot down the steps you or a staff member takes to complete critical tasks, so you don't have to re-invent each process every time.
17. Prepare standard responses. You probably receive many of the same questions from prospects or customers. Create cut-and-paste answers and phone scripts for you and your staff.
18. Clean off your desk. Focusing is easier when you have only the thing you're working on in front of you.
19. Be tough on meetings. Meetings can be useful, but they need structure. Be clear about what you need to accomplish, start and end on time, and cut off people who like to talk.
20. Use technology. You're still doing your accounting, payroll, invoices, timekeeping, expense reporting, orders — whatever — by hand? Really? Cut it out.
If this long list makes you feel even more overwhelmed, just start with three time-saving tips you think you can use immediately.
Once you've saved time, you can go back and try some more.
Rhonda Abrams is president of The Planning Shop and publisher of books for entrepreneurs. Her most recent book is Entrepreneurship: A Real-World Approach. Register for Rhonda's free newsletter at PlanningShop.com. Twitter: @RhondaAbrams. Facebook: facebook.com/RhondaAbramsSmallBusiness.Copyright Rhonda Abrams 2013.
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