Are you a sales professional that is trying to reach small businesses? Constantly on-the-go and feeling overwhelmed by all you are balancing?
Here are 12 quick tips from productivity expert, Elizabeth Bowman, President of Innovatively Organized based in Seattle, WA, where she shares ways to be efficient while staying on top of marketing ideas effectively.
- Schedule buffer time to manage your email inbox efficiently so it doesn’t get overwhelming.
- Pick a single task management app that will work for you.
- Start your day by spending 15 minutes planning your to-do list.
- Track the numbers. Pay attention to reports on a regular schedule such as daily reports, weekly reports, and monthly reports. Invest a little time upfront to set up the reports you are bound to need regularly so they are easy to find and have the needed information when you are ready for it.
- Spend less time scheduling meetings with online appointment scheduling solutions like TimeTrade that automatically syncs with your calendar.
- Stay on top of social media. Use apps like Hootsuite or Tweetdeck to see an easy dashboard-like view of your social media conversations throughout the day. Tools like these will enable you to manage all of your social media accounts from a single source. You’ll be amazed by how much time you save now that you won’t have to log into 6 different sites each day to see who has messaged you.
- Turn off notification emails from social media sites. Instead of adding more clutter to your inbox, set a time each day that you will review your social media marketing tools and take back control.
- Schedule blocks of time to return phone calls, read email, and be interrupted by co-workers. If you pre-plan for these activities, you will be less likely to be annoyed by them sneaking up on you.
- Organize your desk so that everything you need is within easy reach. This will cut down on all the time you may be spending walking back and forth or in circles trying to find things in your office.
- Eliminate excuses of running late by making sure you are scheduling travel time onto your calendar. When you are a sales professional that is constantly on-the-go, you need to make sure you plan for the unexpected traffic or congestion on the roads or in the airports.
- Be consistent in how you track your marketing efforts through standard naming conventions and defined process flows to ensure efforts are easily trained and repeatable.
- Schedule your marketing meetings for 45 minutes instead of the traditional one-hour. The 15-minute difference will force you to stay on task during the meeting and provide you with a buffer going into your next meeting.
To read more email and productivity tips from productivity expert, Elizabeth Bowman, check out her blog where new tips and tricks are posted often.
You can also attend one of her upcoming webinars on topics such as Email Management 201: Manage Your Email so It Doesn’t Manage You on Thursday, January 26, 2012. Click here to register.
