We all know that girl. The one who is two minutes late to the Zoom meeting, can't ever find the file she swears was right there and is running purely off of sheer willpower (I was that girl 🖐)
It all ends today.
Let me show you how I took my business from chaotic and messy to organized and successful. I promise it's not nearly as intimidating as it sounds, you just need the right systems in place.
Step One: Actually Start Working
Personally, I found myself in this weird loop of constantly planning. It took many months of rewriting my to do list and making plans to do things that I realized I was fooling myself into thinking I was getting anything productive done.
When I decided that enough was enough, one day I challenged myself to actually do something that would actively make me money. That was the day my first digital product was born. Don't be me, don't pretend you're getting work done when you're keeping yourself stuck in the planning stage.
Step Two: Close All the Damn Tabs
We need to address the elephant in the room: all the tabs open in your browser. Be real, your computer is barely keeping up. Just because you have the tabs in groups doesn't make you any more organized either.
The first thing I did to make my business feel less overwhelming and like I actually had manageable systems was create my Digital Dashboard, which sounds really fancy but is decidedly...not. I'd actually argue that setting this up was one of the most unsexy parts of being a business owner. I can't explain how humbling it was trying to follow a YouTube tutorial to create the interactive calendar.
The whole point of my dashboard was to give me an easier way to manage all of the files and links I need for different projects every day. Instead of keeping everyone in tab groups or separate windows, pushing me closer to the brink of insanity when a page needed to reload because it had been sitting open for three weeks, I found a better way.
Now, I'm being vulnerable here so be nice. This is what my actual dashboard looks like after I adapted it to my business needs. Not pictured is that I have separate pages in my Google Sheet for each client I work with. I change the colors to their branding and change all of the links to their stuff. For me, it's SO HELPFUL to not have to hunt down every social media handle and Canva link for all my social media clients.
In the actual template, I include instructions for using the document and customizing the colors, so don't worry, it's not that scary. However, I also offer support during my Office Hours if you need extra assistance.
This was the first and most time-consuming part of getting my business organized.
Step Three: Repeatable Systems
Your business will not be sustainable long-term if you're just doing things on a whim. Part of getting organized means understanding what you're doing so that you can keep doing it and improve how it's done to be more efficient.
What types of tasks does your business require? For example, I post on Pinterest daily. Do you think that means I make one pin every single day and post it? Absolutely not, I don't have time for that.
Instead, I schedule a day each month to create pins, write copy and schedule everything for the next 30 days.
Every Wednesday I have my business office hours, similar to the sessions I offer, but this is for myself. I force myself to do all the backend, numbers and boring tasks that are required if I want to keep having a business. It's not always fun, but it must be done.
Once you have systems in place, you can figure out what works best for you and how to make it better. The less time you have to spend on the process, the better.
In Summary
These are my biggest and best tips to keeping your business organized behind-the-scenes. Don't let the mundane stuff pile up, don't be me from six months ago. Especially because when you actually have to address the mundane stuff, it will take up an entire week (ask me how I know)
If you have more questions or want to check out more of my marketing templates, feel free to check out my storefront here or on a really cool platform I found called Mayhem Marketplace. It's like Etsy, but better. Seriously, go check it out, but that's a whole separate tangent.
Now. You've got this girlboss, so go out and be the smart, sexy, badass business owner that I know you are!