As a sole trader it can feel like you’re juggling a million different tasks at once. Traditional and digital marketing, SEO, sales, bookkeeping, networking, admin and then, when you get the chance, delivering your service or producing your product.
Many people setting up in business for the first time don’t consider how to manage their time until they are already snowed under. So how do you go about taking control of the chaos?
Identify the time wasters
This may seem a strange concept when applied to the running of your business. But you’ll be surprised at how much of the work can be done more efficiently or the extent of repetition when running a business.
If you write a detailed diary of the kind of work you do and the time you dedicate to each task you might start to see patterns. For instance, you might find that too much time is spent in the wrong areas of the business or not enough is spent in carrying out business critical tasks. You may identify a need to outsource work or a need to tackle procrastination. Or you may just need to implement a work schedule to help you in managing your time.
Typical observations of an analysis of your time spent on running your business might include the unnecessary repetition of a task. For instance, writing a quote and then creating the invoice at a later date when the same information could be transferred to create the invoice when creating the quote. Or if you need to contact clients in the course of your business and then later for market research purposes. If you gather customer feedback on their experience of the service or any comments about improving the product in the one call you could tick that task off the list.
Simple task automation is becoming the norm. There are bots that can generate leads or clean email lists. You could scrape the internet for competitor information which will help with marketing and sales. Or you could simply extract data and produce lists of information using a simple bot that could save you hours. Becoming IT savvy, or employing the skills of someone who is, may be worth considering.
Keep focused
If procrastination is the reason for the chaos, tackle it. If you don’t like working on your own and struggle to maintain focus consider joining an online co-working group or work from cafes. Or if your home office or desk is not ideal or your concentration is affected by others in your home, make changes or set up procedures to deal with the issues.
Prioritise tasks
Prioritising tasks is crucial if you want your business to be a success. There are various software packages on the market that can help you with managing your time such as Asana which offers a good free level and Taskade which offers a good free package including automation. Or you could just set up a schedule on an excel spread sheet.
However you decide to set out your schedule block time for each task and monitor and review the schedule regularly. For instance, you may find you’re spending too much time on some tasks that are dependent on information or work from a third party.
Know when to outsource
Most people have a clear idea of the kind of work they don’t enjoy and tend to take longer to get round to completing such tasks. In the early days of business people rarely have the funds to outsource. However, if you have the funds and you know the work is drawing your time away from more important aspects of the business, outsourcing the work to a freelancer is a great idea.
And finally…
Running a business as a sole trader comes with a learning curve. No matter how well you know your industry or how many contacts you have to start up in business. You may be able to hit the ground running, but there are always new things to learn. The good news is that through technology and the changing nature of the economy, the market for sole traders is improving. So get organised, get ahead of managing your time and take advantage.