Productivity Archives - Page 2 of 19

My Productivity Secret Weapon

February 9, 2017 by Rosemary 1 Comment

If your work involves spending any significant amount of time online, you’re always going to be vulnerable to distraction.

Ooh pictures of baby hedgehogs…

Every tab you keep open in your browser represents an opportunity to wander down the garden path. That’s fantastic if you need creative inspiration or you’re spending some downtime. It’s destructive if you’re working against a deadline or trying to “move the big rocks.”

Hey, a new recipe for enchiladas…

Today, I wanted to share my single most effective productivity secret weapon. (Full disclosure: my amazing husband kept telling me about this and I only recently downloaded and fell in love with it.)

It’s called Pocket and if you use it effectively, it can really keep you focused and organized.

Once you sign up for an account, you have a space where you can save articles or web pages of interest. There’s a browser-based interface and an app for your phone, so you can save things from anywhere.

The superpower comes in when you use the browser extension button (it’s available for Chrome, Safari, Opera, and MS Edge). With the extension, you get a tiny magic button in your browser bar. Any time you find yourself on a distracting website, just click the magic button and it’s saved for later.

Yes, you can save fun things like hedgehog pictures and recipes, but you can also use tagging to organize and separate the leisure items in the list from the business-related content. I’ve got tags set up for “research” and “marketing planning” as well as “recipes.”

Sometimes magic happens when the random content you’ve been reading collides with a real-world business requirement. Remember the scene in Working Girl where Melanie Griffith pulls out her “idea” folder and shows Mr. Trask how she put together Trask and radio?

Pocket is my “idea” folder and my distraction terminator. Did I mention that it’s free for most functions? There is also a premium option that adds advanced search, permanent saving of pages (protects against website changes), and other goodies.

I wasn’t asked to promote Pocket, and I’m not an official “ambassador,” but it’s made such a big difference to me that I had to share it!

How do you defend against distraction?

Author’s Bio: Rosemary O’Neill is an insightful spirit who works for Social Strata — makers of the Hoop.la community platform. Check out the Social Strata blog. You can find Rosemary on Google+ and on Twitter as @rhogroupee

Featured image via Flickr CC: Chief Trent

How to find freelance work

October 27, 2016 by Rosemary Leave a Comment

Are you looking for a “side hustle?”

Perhaps you want to have some cash buffer while your real business ramps up.
Perhaps you just want holiday spending money.

The good news is that it’s easy to find gigs that supplement your primary paycheck.

Some marketplaces are focused on writers, some are focused on design, and some are just for general life tasks, so you can choose the type of work you want to do.

Before you sign up with one of these marketplaces, be sure to investigate. Look at reviews from others who have done work for them, and find out their payment policies, be sure you understand who owns your work product.

Above all, be sure that you’re receiving adequate payment for the work you do. Consider the opportunity cost of accepting the gig vs working on your primary business before you proceed.

Upwork

Upwork offers all types of services, from marketing to IT to translation services. All you need is a computer, Internet access, and your mad skills.

Upwork provides a user-friendly platform to help you communicate with your client, share files and project-related documents, track your time, and get paid. It’s free to join Upwork. Once you begin doing freelance work with a client on the platform, they deduct a percentage fee from each payment. So, be sure to price your services accordingly. Upwork also offers premium membership plans for an additional cost.

The Gig Saloon

The Gig Saloon is an app for gig workers.

It’s one streamlined place where gig economy workers can go to find new jobs, stay up to date on gigs, and share their experiences.

The app aggregates jobs from across a wide array of sources, so it includes driving and delivery along with general marketplaces like TaskRabbit.

The cool thing is that you can share your experiences (and read about others’ experiences) in the discussion area. This app is still fairly new, but looks like a promising place to find and apply for jobs across a variety of employers.

Fiverr

Fiverr is a site where you create your ideal gig based on your own talents, time, and experience. Then people who need what you’re selling can come and hire you through the site.

Fiverr includes worker ratings, and provides a secure transaction service, so you don’t have to directly contact the person hiring you for payment.

99designs

99designs is a marketplace for design. Customers upload design briefs for potential projects, choose the “prize” (which is the price level offered for the work), and then designers can submit entries to win the work. Because of the contest format, 99designs could be a way to test the waters if you want to get some real-world feedback on the quality of your design work, or if you’re just getting started as a freelance designer and want to build your portfolio.

There is risk that your design won’t be selected, and you give copyright ownership to the customer, so read the fine print before you join.

TaskRabbit

TaskRabbit’s marketplace revolves more around local gigs, and you can do general errands, cleaning, and personal assistance among other specialties.

You decide what you want to do, you decide how much you want to be paid, and TaskRabbit finds you local tasks. Members of TaskRabbit are called “taskers.” There’s a mobile app, and on-boarding/orientation provided by the company.

Hubstaff Talent

Hubstaff Talent makes it easy for freelancers find quality work, simply create a profile and wait for businesses to start contacting you. It’s an easy to use platform with a clean, professional design. Potential employers are able to reach out to freelancers directly – no middlemen involved, and no fees for either freelancers or the businesses hiring. Hubstaff Talent also recently launched a “Jobs” section on their website where freelancers can search through hundreds of remote jobs to find the right one for them.

Bidvine (NEW)

Bidvine.com is a local services marketplace and covers over 800 services from photography to personal training and handyman services. While some of the services covered by Bidvine require professional qualifications, others, such as furniture assembly or dog walking are available anyone with some previous experience. It’s free to sign up, you can view client inquires for free and you pay a small fee when you want to submit a bid – no commission to pay and all repeat business is yours to keep.

Have you used any of these services to supplement your income? Did I miss any great resources?

Stop being productive, you will get more done

April 28, 2016 by Rosemary 2 Comments

Planners, calendars, bullet journals, Trello boards, post-it notes, Moleskines–are supposed to make you more productive.

Newsletters, books, podcasts, e-books, blogs, live events– are supposed to teach you how to use those things to become more productive.

You’re a busy little bee with your productivity studies.

Tell the truth.

How deep is your productivity “to read” pile right now?

How would you feel if you could purge all of that for a while and just do your work?

That article on “sleeping habits of super-successful people?” Delete it and get an extra half hour of sleep tomorrow.

That blog series about “becoming super-productive in seven days?” Unsubscribe and write some original content yourself.

Those five weeks of podcasts on “super-charging your morning” that are stacked up in your “unplayed episodes” stream? Get real and delete the old episodes.

In fact, stop reading this article right now and go write/create/do something important.

Then you’ll feel super.

Once you’re feeling all super, come back here and share what you accomplished!

Featured image via Flickr CC: Garry Knight

The most important thing you can focus on today

February 4, 2016 by Rosemary Leave a Comment

Have you ever heard the phrase, “all hat and no cattle?”

It’s a colorful description for someone who looks the part, dresses the part, but who actually has no substance.

If you spend all of your time on sales, marketing, PR, website, meetings, and accounting, you’re short-changing something extremely important: your actual product.

You will only achieve true business success when you maximize the time you spend improving your product or service.

All the rest is cowboy hat. Yes, it keeps the sun off your face, but it’s not the THING.

The THING is your service and the customers who buy it. (I’m not saying your customers are cattle…it’s just an analogy, folks!)

So prioritize, and focus on:

Customer ideation, getting actionable feedback
Adding features or services, actively innovating
Talking directly to your customers one-on-one
Re-looking at your offerings with fresh eyes, staying on top of market developments

Put these things in the back seat until the stuff above is done:

Reading Facebook posts
Coffee meetings (unless it’s with a customer)
Webinars on how to use Periscope
Fiddling with a new accounting software every week

If you keep your customer as your guiding star, it becomes simple to focus, and prioritize how you spend your day.

Another way to look at priorities is something I heard Becky McCray (of Small Biz Survival) say during a GeniusShared conference: “Do the things that generate actual revenue first.”

If you do that consistently, you are always building your business.

So stop worrying whether you need to get a SnapChat account, and go take a look at your product. Go get on the phone with one of your customers.

Featured image via Flickr CC: Dave Young

Four steps to your best day ever

February 5, 2015 by Rosemary Leave a Comment

“Make 2015 your best year ever!”

All of the confetti has landed on the ground. January is in the rear view mirror, and if you aren’t paying attention, the first week of February is almost done.

Did you have big planning sessions the week before New Years? Did you set up your new calendar, your new systems, new routines?

Many of us do that, and by the first week of February, some of it has begun to crumble already.

But let’s not sit around being depressed. Let’s switch our thinking up a bit.

What if we applied the “best year ever” thought process to a single day?

What if we decided to wake up tomorrow and focus on making it a success?

Here are some typical planning steps for an “annual planning” session:

Set aside time to dream and visualize.
Decide what you intend to do and why you intend to do it.
Break the goal down into manageable steps with a timeframe.
Take action immediately.

That looks a lot like a perfect day, doesn’t it? Let’s re-frame:

Use your first 30 minutes to visualize the day and let creative juices flow, without external interruption.
Decide what you intend to accomplish that day, and think about why you intend to do it.
Choose which steps you want to advance on that day, and schedule them in.
Take action immediately.

It’s still necessary to do the annual and quarterly planning. However, those longer-term plans are much more likely to happen if you get in the habit of a daily refocus.

Don’t forget to include all aspects of your day in the plan.

When you set your intentions for the day, you should incorporate your afternoon run, your manicure, your visit with a sick friend alongside the business luncheon, the copywriting, and the pitch meeting.

How do you make sure that your days are moving you toward a successful year?

Author’s Bio: Rosemary OÂNeill is an insightful spirit who works for social strata — a top ten company to work for on the Internet . Check out the Social Strata blog. You can find Rosemary on Google+ and on Twitter as @rhogroupee

Photo Credit: AndrewButl3r via Compfight cc

5 Productivity Hacks for Bloggers

November 13, 2014 by Rosemary Leave a Comment

By Abby Perkins

A bloggerÂs time is one of the most important aspects of their profession. The slightest distraction can be incredibly costly to their productivity Â especially if those distractions are persistent. ThereÂs no question about it – wasting time prevents bloggers from performing at their highest level.

However, there are productivity hacks that can help bloggers manage their time more effectively.

1. De-clutter your workspace

The best thing any blogger can do is set up a dedicated work space that is free from any possible distractions. An untidy work environment can leave you preoccupied and unfocused.

When you establish a place of order and structure, your thoughts become clearer and your mind becomes more focused, allowing you to be more creative and stay on task. Keep the area you work in clean and uncluttered Â and, if you can, make it completely separate from communal areas like the living room or kitchen.

2. Disconnect from distractions

Bloggers can be a lot more productive without the distraction of a cell phone or the constant buzz of incoming emails. Though these things donÂt seem like a big deal, theyÂre often a bigger distraction than we realize. Download a service like Pocket to help you stay focused, especially if you find yourself frequently distracted by articles and videos when you really should be working.

There are also services like Inbox Pause and StayFocusd to turn off email notifications or block certain distracting websites during certain periods of time.

3. Take notes and plan ahead

Journaling is an effective way to get unstructured thoughts and ideas down on paper. Once youÂve written out your thoughts, you can more easily organize them into actual blog posts and articles.

It doesnÂt require much of your time, but organizing ideas by developing a schedule will also help you become a more successful blogger by allowing you to plan your time more accurately. If you write ideas down as they come to mind, youÂll be less likely to forget them later, and planning ahead will help you be more productive the following day.

4. Outsource research and writing assignments

A bloggerÂs work can get overwhelming. If you find yourself with a backlog of writing and not enough time to do it, it can be beneficial to consider paying someone to do research or write blog posts on your behalf. Outsourcing your work helps you save time, while letting you maintain control and consistency over your work. You can relax or complete other duties while other people deliver results for your blog.

One thing to keep in mind Â if youÂre outsourcing content, make sure you and the freelancers you work with have a clear understanding about things like pay, author credit, content ownership and more.

5. Switch up your location

The human mind craves stimulation. Working in the same area every day can lead to burnout and stress. If itÂs possible, make an attempt to work in a different location once a week or every other week. You could go work in the park, in the local library or in the corner of a coffee shop. Changing your location is an great way to gain a new perspective and regain your focus on writing.

Whether you blog for fun or itÂs your main source of income, everyone can agree that there are never enough hours in the day. These productivity hacks will save you time and increase your efficiency.

What are your favorite blogging productivity tips?

Author’s Bio: Abby Perkins is Editor in Chief at Talent Tribune, where she writes about jobs, workplace culture, and HR technology.

Photo Credit: Alsterstar via Compfight cc