Focus to Boost Business

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How many times have you wished you had more time to promote the business? We can always find the time, provided that promotion is the top priority. But is it just a case of prioritising? Trouble is, whenever you prioritise, something else is demoted. So how can we make more time for key tasks?

One solution I've heard suggested is to tap into that "just before holiday" frenzy.

We all work like crazy before a holiday to clear the desk - all we need is to do that every day to increase our output... And when you're tired? Just imagine someone pointing a gun at your head - if that was real, all tiredness would vanish. Well yes. That's great in the short term. But how long would most people's health last, piling on the stress like that?

We can do a prodigious amount of work when we have a powerful motivating reason - saving lives, helping charities, going on hols, turning the business around, moving office or house etc. But we know it's for a finite period.

Sure, build a bit of rush time into a week, but there is another way: work smarter. And I'm not thinking about rushing out to buy the latest gadget. I had a harsh but valuable experience that taught me to focus on the important stuff only.

Recently I lost the use of my right arm for 8 weeks - a frozen shoulder. Agony. And I'm right-handed. Painkillers and a good physio sorted it out. I now use the free program called WorkRave to enforce breaks so I don't get another frozen shoulder. But boy, did I get a really good set of lessons in how to work efficiently. I didn't have any choice.

I addressed emails twice a day. I only looked at ones from clients, friends and family. And I painstakingly typed one line answers to clients. Anything else was done by phone. Guess what? I slashed my email time by half and still had time to cancel or block a load of email that was not immediately useful, saving more time in future.

Speeches, case studies, articles and releases were handled with speech to text software (Dragon-Dictate) and took less time to write than direct keystrokes as speech is generally more concise than the written word (I'd previously trained the software to recognise my voice).

And I rigorously recycled text to ensure our online marketing remained on course by questioning everything I created - how can I use it again for maximum impact? A blog headline becomes a tweet and a Facebook posting via Tweetdeck pointing back to the blog. Or use Ping.fm to cover lots of social media and bookmarking sites with one post. And if the subject is strong enough, it could edited into a e-newsletter and pushed to your permission-based e-mailing list.

I expect you can suggest more ways to streamline your working day: let's hear them!

Social Media at Work

If you employ people, do you allow them access to Facebook at work? For many readers, the question will seem quite silly. Most sensible businesses have an online policy that indicates the acceptable limits of online behaviour, understanding that it's good for business if staff network with their peers.

But a survey of Australian employees found that 55% claimed their boss had banned social networking sites like Facebook and My Space. This compares with similar bans on 20 per cent of workers in Britain, 12 per cent in France, 11 per cent in Spain, 10 per cent in Germany and 6 per cent in Italy. That's a lot of people affected.

There is never a perfect answer to this in PR terms. PR is defined as the art of managing reputation. Reputation in PR terms is made up of the sum total of everything that you say and do, and everything that is said and done about you. Including social media activity.

Some might see blocking social media postings as a PR necessity, but I'm inclined to think that a sensible policy for social networking brings rewards. After all, the classic 6 degrees of separation that indicates we are all connected applies to staff too. They often have great contacts.

Before you reach for a blanket ban, or if want to know how to achieve a sensible policy, you could do worse than check out this posting at AcidLabs http://www.acidlabs.org/2009/02/20/blocking-never-works/