Written on March 13, 2012 by admin
I just read “4 ways to stop being so busy” by Laura Vanderkam on CBSNews.com. She’s got some great examples of how we all waste time at work, and I wanted to expand upon her four examples for the small business world.
1. Don’t mistake things that look like work for actual work. For us small business owners, this comes down to working on billable and non-billable tasks. Billable for me would be writing a blog post for a client. Non-billable is reading articles and sharing them on Twitter. While the second will help with my overall branding and reach of my company, ultimately what I want more of is billable work. Sometimes I find myself engrossed in Pinterest LinkedIn and have to pull back to focus on what needs to be done so I can get paid.
2. Tune out. I find it hard to sit down and actually read blog posts on other sites. I’m always itching to get my day started, so I started putting “read” on my calendar. Sounds silly, but it blocks off my time so I don’t get distracted with email or projects, and simply spend it reading, learning and sharing. I also find that not checking your email obsessively makes you more productive, though I haven’t completely gotten a handle on that one.
3. Think long term. This one makes me think of Michael Gerber’s E-Myth. Rather than getting bogged down with updating your website, ordering checks and paying bills, dedicate time also to working on the bigger picture. Where do you see your business in five years? What do you have to do to get there? Make action items to achieve your goals, and add them to your daily tasks.
4. Ignore, minimize, outsource. I am SO all about outsourcing these days. It’s key to get a support staff you can rely on to take over tasks so you clear your plate for other things. Realize that not everything has to get done right now (or even today) and that leaving at 5:00 (or heck, even 2:00 sometimes) will not destroy your business.
What other tips do you have for focusing your time and doing the important stuff first?
Photo captainmcdan on Flickr.
Posted in Entrepreneurship | Comment Now!
Written on March 8, 2012 by admin
I’m super excited about the new look, since I love it for my personal page. Check out Egg’s new page here and enjoy the infographic.
Posted in Social Media, Marketing & Networking | Comment Now!
Written on March 1, 2012 by admin
This is from my post on BizLaunch.
If you’re contemplating starting a retail business, you may be on the fence about whether to make it a virtual store or a brick-and-mortar. Here are the pros and cons of each to help you in your decision.
Online Retail Benefits
The really wonderful thing about starting an online retail business is how easy and affordable it is. As long as you’ve got your inventory and an ecommerce website, you’re ready to go. You can operate from anywhere, and you don’t have to pay high-priced commercial rental rates.
Even if you don’t have a fancy ecommerce website, there are easy all-in-one options available for you, such as Amazon, Etsy and eBay. Each offers built in ecommerce solutions and credit card processing. All you have to do is plug in your product descriptions and upload a photo. The bonus is that these sites get a ton of traffic, so you’ll get more exposure than you would by starting from scratch with your own site.
Read the entire post here.
Posted in Entrepreneurship, Marketing | Comment Now!
Written on February 28, 2012 by admin
This is from my post on Small Biz Trends.
For many social media users, we read articles and blog posts first thing in the morning. Most of those we’d like to share with our networks, but we don’t want to bombard our contacts with all the content we’ve read. Companies have come up with tools that help us schedule our tweets and status updates, but many still require us choosing a time and date for a post to go live. There needs to be a simpler solution.
That’s what Buffer co-founder Joel Gascoigne (@JoelGascoigne) realized when he encountered this issue. And in 2011, he came up with a tool that allowed users to stagger their social media updates throughout the day in preselected time slots. To date, Buffer (@bufferapp) has about 120,000 users, and is growing by 30% monthly.
Read the entire post here.
Posted in Book & Product Review, Social Media, Marketing & Networking | Comment Now!
Written on February 22, 2012 by admin
Egg has been nominated for Startup Nation’s Leading Moms in Business, and we’d love your vote. You can vote daily until April 16, and it just takes a second to do.
If you qualify, you can also nominate your own company!
Posted in Announcements | Comment Now!
Written on February 21, 2012 by admin
If you don’t bother with data backup because it seems complicated, or if you’ve experienced a loss of data and are frustrated, please attend the free TwitterChat this week, Demystifying Data Backup.
Topic: Demystifying Data Backup
Date: Thursday, February 23, 2012
Time: 7 to 8 pm Eastern (New York time) – 4 to 5 pm Pacific ime
Speakers:
Where: On Twitter.com. Follow the hashtag #SMBchat
Posted in Announcements | Comment Now!
Written on February 21, 2012 by admin
This is from my post on Small Business Trends.
It’s hard enough to compete with big-box retailers without paying big-box prices for the things that make your brick-and-mortar run smoothly. But 14the great thing about being a small retail business is that you’re more nimble and able to experiment with more affordable products and services.
These tools will help you save money that you can put back into your business:
1. Cell Phone
We’re past needing complicated PBX phone systems, especially for stores. If you’re the only employee, a cell phone with a large minute plan should be enough to handle business calls. If you have other staff, set up a freeGoogle Voice number and route it to whoever’s working.
Money-Saving Tip: Set up your Google Voice to direct calls to the appropriate person. For example, you can record store hours and address, then callers can push 1 to speak to a sales associate, 2 for accounting, etc.
Read the entire post here.
Posted in Customer Service and Loyalty, Marketing | Comment Now!
Written on February 20, 2012 by admin
Egg has been nominated in Startup Nation’s Leading Moms in Business contest. We’d love your vote!
The contest will honor the top 200 moms who run their own businesses. Nominations will be accepted until April 16, so if you know a woman who runs bother her household and a business, consider nominating her. Winners will be announced April 30.
Please take a moment to vote for Egg. You can vote once daily, so please take the 3 seconds to do so! We appreciate it!
Posted in Announcements | Comment Now!
