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Running a business from home automatically invites several types of distractions. Aside from the normal distractions of running a household, you may also have a full time job that you must go to prior to working your business. If you want to have a successful business, you’ll need to create sacred time for your business.

Time that you treat as the most important and valuable in your day or week. This is time you don’t juggle around for anything but emergencies. Read the rest of this entry »

Stress prevents you to be from performing at your peak. Tackling stress is essential to ensuring the success and well-being of both you and your business. Learning to say no and to form a mental sanctuary are just 2 ways to get your stress under control. So let’s get down to the business of de-stressology and improve peak performance. Read the rest of this entry »

Are you feeling a bit squeamish about marketing? Maybe you’re feeling a bit like you are pushing instead of attracting. And if you are pushing… you’ll likely to have a shortage of clients. That adds up to more month then paying clients. Not a good position to be in.

So here’s a question only you can answer. What’s the fire behind your business?

Make marketing a priority? Read the rest of this entry »

When talking about their business, many professionals make the HUGE MISTAKE of describing exactly what they do, in mind-numbing detail. “My company has been in business for 100 years and I can do this for you or that for you.

We are the best, the smartest, the greatest and you really can’t go wrong if you select us … blah blah blah.” Zzzzzzz ….you’re putting me to sleep already.

Hate to say this, but… SO WHAT! Nobody cares Read the rest of this entry »

Did you know that even if you’ve had a particular hobby for years you may have the start of something big?  The bottom line is you may already have the skills and knowledge that can turn your fledgling fun hobby into a full time business.

You see your next money making opportunity could be right under your nose. You’re just may be too close to your own life to recognize it. The fact is anything that you have a lot of knowledge and passion about can be a way to make money; you just need to research it to be sure you want to do it. And if you don’t believe me just do a Google search on any topic.  I’ll bet you’ll find somebody that has had the keen thinking to make it a business.

The secret sauce it research who the target market is (probably people like you) and research how others are earning money in the niche.  Now here are a few ideas on how to begin. Read the rest of this entry »

When you work for yourself it’s very easy to get involved in Time Sucking Gremlins. I bet you can already guess some of what I’m about to say. You’re probably thinking I’ve heard this all before, but if you haven’t put it into practice it does bear repeating, because your time is the one commodity that you can’t get more of.

It’s so easy to get sucked into games like Farmville some make call it “networking”, but if you find yourself so engrossed in games you lose all track of time I’d call it a time vampire. It’s kinda like being in an office spending too much time at the proverbial water cooler gossiping when you really should be completing a project.

But before I give you any tips let me warn you, if you try to juggle 100 things a day you probably juggling 100 things badly and even more importantly you’re actually doing is juggling your life badly.

If you really want to make things happen, you’ve got to have an emotionally compelling reason that drives you. Without a compelling reason it’s a lot more difficult to keep focused on track and productive. Many people find it easy to confuse activity with productivity. Activity without focus is not likely to end in accomplishment.

Productivity turns into profit. Given enough time and consistency, it turns into even larger profits.

Here are your top 5 time management tips. Read the rest of this entry »

In business you have strategies which comprise goals, tactics and metrics. If you keep these ideas straight when you’re barnstorming plans for your business you’ll go far in achieving great success. The steps are:

1. Create a goal – A good goal is one that you can name, and achieve. Goals should be both achievable and realistic but also challenging. It should also be specific. “Increase newsletter sign ups by 80% in 30 days.” From that you can get an actual number.
2. Craft tactics – Once you know your specific goal, then you can develop tactics, and tasks to reach that goal. Such as: “I will run a PPC campaign for 15 days”. With that tactic you’ll have many tasks to accomplish such as: creating the sales page, creating the advertisement, choosing the keywords, setting up your newsletter and so forth.
3. Accomplish tasks – Tasks come from the tactics you choose. Schedule tasks each day with your goals in mind using the tactics you decided upon. You have 30 days to accomplish your goal, so on day one you will create a sales page, day two you will create the advertisement, day three you’ll send out some tweets and blogs, day four you’ll decide upon keywords based on keyword research, and so on, until finally you’re running the PPC campaign.
4. Evaluate Metrics — For instance let’s assume you have 30 newsletter subscribers when you start. This means that you must increase your newsletter subscribers to 54 (30 * .08 + 30 = 54 -30 = 24) in 30 days. This means that you need to get almost one new subscriber each day of your campaign.  If the tactics you’re using aren’t achieving that, then you need to adjust.
5. Repeat — If something works, do it again, and again. No need to recreate the wheel when it works. If you choose to change something change only one small piece at a time and give time to see the results of your efforts.

Many marketers run two different campaigns at a time with two different sales pages that are only slightly different to see which words, colors, and style works best. This can work for you too, and it is a good way to test and evaluate if your work is effective or not. So let’s repeat here the steps:

1. Create a goal
2. Craft tactics
3. Accomplish tasks
4. Evaluate metrics
5. Repeat

As you can see, breaking things down to steps and scheduling each day to achieve each step will eventually lead you to achieving your goals. Keeping track of the results of each task will further encourage you to keep going, or to change tactics.

Does your productivity ever get hindered by your desire to be perfect?  As you seek the easiest or fastest route to your goal, you may find yourself stopped entirely. Sometimes you may even do this on purpose, to keep from having to make a decision.

However, there’s a work-around. Maybe you’ve heard of the term, “heuristic.” Heuristics are rules that allow a solution to be found more quickly. With a heuristic, a resolution can be found even when the entire path isn’t clear from the onset.

For example, if there were no roads, but you lived in New York and wanted to make your way to California, you might try to:

1. Walk west as far as you can.
2. Walk around any obstacle, if possible.
3. If faced with a mountain range, walk toward the space between 2 small peaks.
4. Repeat until reaching California.

Does this experiment give you the most efficient solution? No; however, it will get you where you want to go as long as you know travel west.

Try these strategies to increase your productivity:

1. Choose the right time. Nearly everyone has times of the day when they are most effective and times when they tend to drag. It’s smart to schedule the most critical tasks for your most effective time of the day.
2. Toss it. If a task doesn’t really need to be done, just get rid of it altogether.
3. Get the bad stuff out of the way. Do the unpleasant items quickly and as early in the day as possible.
4. Set a goal each day (or night). In the morning, decide what you want to accomplish that day. This can be even more effective when planned the night before. Once you have a sense of direction, you can spend all your time getting things done!
5. Eliminate all communication. While you’re working, turn off the phone / cell phone, and don’t check your email. Hang a sign that says, “Do not disturb,” if necessary. You don’t have to do this for all your tasks, but at least do it during the more difficult items.
6. Batch similar tasks together. Do all your emailing at one time. Make all your phone calls at another. Open your snail mail during a set block of time. You’ll waste less time by doing your work in this fashion.
7. Set a timer. Even if a task might take hours, starting will seem easier if you simply give yourself 30 minutes to get as much done as you can. A time limit seems to help many people concentrate and work better, too.
8. Set targets. For example, if you have to make cold-calls for your sales job, tell yourself that you’re not getting up for any reason until you’ve made at least 100 calls. Regardless of what happens, refuse to stop until you hit your target
9. Use the Pareto Principle. This principle states that 20% of the actions you could take will provide you with 80% of the benefits. So focus on the tasks that will accomplish the most. Unfortunately, these are frequently the tasks that are not enjoyable. You might be surprised how little you really have to do if you focus on the critical 20%.
10. Delegate some of your work. Is there anyone else who can help you? The people around you are resources. When appropriate, use their time and talents wisely to get things done more quickly.
11. Set a deadline. Having a specific endpoint will really help to focus your time and energy. If a task doesn’t feel necessary, chances are that it won’t get done.
12. Increase your speed. It sounds silly, but this can really help. Try doing everything a little faster. Walk faster, talk faster, type faster, and read faster.

Implement these strategies into your daily life and you’ll find yourself getting more done in less time. The ultimate secret is to stay on task and not waste any time. These rules will help you do ju