If you’ve listened to us before, you know that we are all about efficiency.  “Work smarter, not harder” is a motto we live by.

But recently we realized, that not everyone really knows what we mean when we say efficiency, and so today we thought we’d dive into why efficiency is all that matters.

To a business owner, efficiency means getting things done with the least amount of time, money, and energy possible, while still getting the desired results.

Efficiency In Business Strategy

How are you doing inside your business?  Are you following a plan or are you shooting from the hip?

If you set goals, do you usually fall short?

Do you have processes and workflows in place across the board?

• A great way to improve efficiency is by making improvements to your process and workflow.  Finding ways to save time and energy in your processes (like utilizing forms so that you can qualify your leads and spend less time talking on the phone to the wrong people) can save you in the long run.  Creating a better workflow means you are producing your product or service faster, without compromising the quality, therefore making it more efficient.

Efficiency is Ongoing

• If you do a project for a client and something goes wrong, find out why, and fix that particular issue in your workflow for your very next project.
• Over time you’ll craft a smooth process, system, or workflow.

Efficiency means more money

• We are saving money because something takes less time to do, or we are using fewer resources and therefore it is costing us less to do it.
• Overall we’re trading less time for more money.

Efficiency In Work-Life Balance

• Put yourself in situations that will lead to good outcomes
  • Don’t overbook your time – if you’re a person who always runs late, that’s a YOU problem. You’re just setting yourself up for failure. 

Finding Inefficiencies

Where do you see yourself being inefficient in your business?  Sometimes it helps to take a time audit and find where you are spending the most time.  Find where you are spending the most money or energy, and see if you can brainstorm ways to be more efficient.

Simple Process Change Example

We used to offer weddings, and we would constantly get emails or phone calls asking about our pricing or availability for weddings.  Then we made a form on our website to make the process more efficient…saving us the time of talking to people who couldn’t afford our services or were getting married on a day we were not available.  Then we noticed, we were typically responding to the form submissions in one of 2 ways:  we’re booked, or we’re available and let’s schedule a consult.  So to be more efficient, I drafted up two email templates that I could customize to save me time in replying.

Quick-Wins

1. Pay attention to what you’re doing and find the inefficiencies.  
2. Use templates, batching tasks, contractors, and software to help solve your problems.

Host Bio –  Rhi and Pete [Rhi-Pete – now you’ll remember] are a wife and husband team who have been in business together for over a decade.  They run a creative media agency [Do Something Different Media] that provides strategy and consulting, video production, website development, photography, graphic design, and content writing for small businesses.  

Recommended Resources 

Wrike Project Management

Less Annyoing CRM

The post Quick-Win Episode 9: What Does Efficiency Mean? appeared first on Learn It - Do It.

Episode Summary

If something triggers you to get into a funk or in a bad emotional space this gives you the opportunity to do a little bit of investigative work.

Hit the pause button and pinpoint the root of these bad emotions or experiences.

We hear a lot about business owners carrying a lot of stress around.  We get it, being a business owner is by no means a walk in the park and you’re going to have rough patches, but we’ve all got to realize that we’re not in business to cause ourselves stress.

Get to the core of the issue for any particular bad day. 

Are your clients causing you stress? If so, what’s it about?  A process that you control or something outside of your control.  

Are you stressed that you don’t have enough time? Do a time audit, figure out what’s sucking away your day.  Usually, it’s tied to a lot of inefficient processes that you can easily fix with a simple plan, automation or outsourcing.

Is money your main stress? If so, it’s going to be hard to become a successful business owner if you don’t have a good relationship with money.  Figure out the root of this – is it confidence based? Is your pricing an issue? Do you not have enough clients?

Is it something going on personally? Or your lack of self-confidence?  It’s easy to let your personal life bleed into your business when you are self-employed.  Sometimes when you really look at it, it’s personal stress of bills or a lack of time to spend with your family, or maybe even a lack of support or self-confidence that it’s eating away at you.  This is why personal development is so important for self-employed business owners like us…sometimes we are our own worst enemies!

Moral of the Story – Bad days put a magnifying glass on things that are inefficient and stress-inducing.  Once you know the problem, you can work towards a solution.

Quick-Wins

1. Target the cause of your bad day.  If you can do something about it, do it.  
2. Implement changes to your workflow or processes if you’re seeing work or client related stress.
3. Always work on your personal development to stay balanced and level-headed.

Host Bio –  Rhi and Pete [Rhi-Pete – now you’ll remember] are a wife and husband team who have been in business together for over a decade.  They run a creative media agency [Do Something Different Media] that provides strategy and consulting, video production, website development, photography, graphic design, and content writing for small businesses.  

Recommended Resources 

Time Audit Worksheet

4 Ways to Use Your Phone to be More Productive Video

You’re A Badass At Making Money

The post Quick-Win Episode 6: Bad Days Are A Good Thing appeared first on Learn It - Do It.

We are in unprecedented times right now amidst the COVID-19 public health crisis, and a lot of us self-employed business owners are finding ourselves forced out of work, or waiting for the economy to pick up and the customers to flood back in.

It’s important to take a minute, take a deep breath and focus on what you CAN do right now, while you are staying inside to #flattenthecurve. In this video, I talk about how you can take advantage of the extra time in your business right now and get productive while you prepare for after the dust settles from all this.

Here’s what we discuss in this video:

• Audit Your Marketing: Website, Social Media, Emails, etc.
• Audit Your Messaging for Audience Focus
• Organize your Database and Prepare Email Marketing
• Do a SWOT Analysis on Your Business
• Create Helpful Content for Your Audience

Take advantage of this extra time you’ve always been waiting for. The world is sort of in a state of “PAUSE” right now and you can talk this as an opportunity to get organize, re-evaluate, and create some amazing content to take your business forward! Stay safe and good luck!

HERE’S MORE CONTENT FROM LEARN IT – DO IT:

FREE MINI-COURSE “How To Present A Proposal” : https://learnitdoit.teachable.com/p/how-to-present-a-proposal

LEARN IT – DO IT PODCAST: https://learnit-doit.com/podcast/

INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/learnit_doit/

FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/learnitdoitedu

The post What Should I Be Doing for My Business During COVID-19 Crisis? appeared first on Learn It - Do It.

In this video, I outline some content ideas you can be making right now, amidst all this COVID-19 chaos. Now is not necessarily the time to solicit business from your customers, but now is a great opportunity to build credibility, lend a helping hand, and stay memorable in the eyes of your clients.

Here’s what types of content we discuss in this video:

• DIY Video Content Ideas
• Email Content You Can Create
• Social Media Messaging

It’s important to avoid being tone-deaf and simply talking about yourself right now. Think of ways you can be helpful and inform or entertain your potential and current customers right now and you’ll stay top of mind in a positive way through this unprecedented time in our history. Stay in and Let’s DO IT!

HERE’S MORE CONTENT FROM LEARN IT – DO IT:

FREE MINI-COURSE “How To Present A Proposal” : https://learnitdoit.teachable.com/p/how-to-present-a-proposal

LEARN IT – DO IT PODCAST: https://learnit-doit.com/podcast/

INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/learnit_doit/

FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/learnitdoitedu

The post Content You Should Be Making Right Now appeared first on Learn It - Do It.

Episode Summary 

Brand value is a very important thing to understand, especially when you’re a SEBO who is on your own. 

It’s also very important to the business owner who is looking to revamp themselves due to inefficiencies in their pricing, marketing, and overall brand image.

We assume that you’re awesome at what you do.  There’s a ton of people who are really awesome at a lot of stuff. But what’s going to get you into the conversation with bigger markets, clients, affiliates and frankly more overall business — is how legitimate people feel you are — based on your branded marketing materials.

You’ve been there.  Someone refers you the name of a company for a cleaning service and you immediately google them.  First, I check their website to see if they’re “legit”…and that’s the key thing. We’re all looking for legitimacy.

Then, I might head to see if they’re active on social, check online reviews and etc. 

Have you ever looked up a business and found they had no logo? Or their logo looks like your nephew made it?  When you see a low-quality brand it tells you that the business didn’t invest a lot of money into the way they look.  And if a company doesn’t care enough about how they look to invest in it…I assume they aren’t a very profitable business…which probably means they aren’t very good.

Think of it like hiring a new employee.  Potential Employee A sends in a typed resume with a nice photo of themselves and a portfolio of their work.  They show up to the interview dressed professionally and present themselves well. Potential Employee B scribbled their past experience on a napkin and shows up in pajamas.  They could both be equally qualified and skilled, but there is no doubt one of them has a higher perceived value and THAT person is getting the job.

Is your business wearing pajamas?

Perception is everything!

Quick-Wins

• How would a stranger value your brand? Audit your brand and see where you can find any deficiencies. 

Host Bio –  Rhi and Pete [Rhi-Pete – now you’ll remember] are a wife and husband team who have been in business together for over a decade.  They run a creative media agency [Do Something Different Media] that provides strategy and consulting, video production, website development, photography, graphic design, and content writing for small businesses.

The post Quick-Win Episode 5: What Is Brand Value? & Why Do I Care? appeared first on Learn It - Do It.

In this video, I go over 4 habits for you to implement to save you from wasting over a day each week on your phone so you can be more productive. We know cell phones can be time suckers, but I’m here to help you change the way you use it!

When Apple created the new screen time app, I was horrified to learn how much time a day I spent on my phone. That’s when I implemented these tips on myself and now I want to share them with you!

For all you people who think there’s not enough time in the day, I’m going to help you save 10-20 hours each week with these tips. You’ll soon find that there is plenty of time in the day to be productive.

MY 4 TIPS FOR LESS SCREEN TIME & MORE PRODUCTIVITY

1. Set app restrictions using the apple screen time app.

2. Turn off unnecessary notifications.

3. Use “sleep mode” [do not disturb]

4. Schedule a window of time for “productive phone time”

By the end of this video you’ll have learned 4 ways to be more productive and spend less time on your phone. So the next time you think there’s not enough time in the day to get all the things done, remember this! Share this video with your procrastinator friends!

FOR MORE CONTENT FROM LEARN IT – DO IT FREE MINI-COURSE

“How To Present A Proposal” : https://learnitdoit.teachable.com/p/how-to-present-a-proposal

LEARN IT – DO IT PODCAST: https://learnit-doit.com/podcast/

INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/learnit_doit/

FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/LearnitDoitEdu/

The post 4 Ways To Use Your Phone To Be More Productive appeared first on Learn It - Do It.

Then we found out that we were expecting a baby girl and that slowed my progress a bit and it definitely changed the content of what I’d be reading.  Despite all the excitement, I was still able to read more books than I have any previous year, including a few pre-baby titles. And with every book, comes a whole lot of lessons to put into practice…

My Top 4 Must-Reads from 2019

1. A New Earth – Eckhart Tolle
2. How to be an Imperfectionist – Stephen Guise
3. Declutter Your Mind – S.J. Scott
4. Everybody Writes – Ann Handley

My number one must read from 2019 was A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle, in fact, we are only a few days into January and I just finished re-reading the book.  This is the kind of book that you can keep coming back to and get something out of every time. I think that’s something I really enjoy about personal development books; the lessons you learn while reading them are really dependent upon the moment you are in and what is going on for you personally at the time.

How to Be an Imperfectionist was one of the last books I read last year and it really hit home.  If you suffer from perfectionism and find yourself not finishing things – or worse, not starting things –  because you are waiting for perfection, then this is a MUST READ. This book details the root of perfectionism, how it manifests itself in your life, and step-by-step habits to put into practice so you can “become an imperfectionist.”

For the self-marketers out there, I think Everybody Writes is a must-read.  And in reading the book, you’ll realize that these days, we are ALL writers whether we consider ourselves writers or not.  This book is full of tips, concepts, and insights that will make you a better writer. As someone who is constantly creating content and marketing materials for my audience to consume, this book was incredibly insightful and immediately applicable.

Declutter Your Mind was another book with immediately applicable concepts.  If you are looking for a book to read to kick off the new year with a bang, this book is an easy read and loaded with advice and activities you can start to implement right away that will improve your productivity and peace of mind.  I read this at the start of 2019 and you’ll find that we talk about a ton of these concepts in our blogs and podcasts because they are super helpful for the self-employed business owner.

In Summation…

These books definitely taught me a lot of lessons to implement in the new year and I look forward to diving into my 2020 reading goals.  This year, I’m sticking with the 30 book challenge because I really want to hit it and know that I can make it happen if I put my mind to it.  I may have a few re-reads on my list, like “How to Win Friends and Influence People,” a classic that I try to read every couple of years to refresh myself on the age-old concepts that book shares on relationships and success in life. 

For those of you who’ve been meaning to read more, challenge yourself to read a certain number of books this year and let’s hold each other accountable.  The key to getting your reading done is to make time for it regularly and to have a list of books that you want to read so that you always are a few books ahead of yourself on what is coming next.  There were a few times this year when I finished a book and a few weeks would go by before I realized I didn’t have another book on deck to read. So I recommend planning a few books ahead and always looking for new books to add to the list.  Reading is a great way to take a break throughout the day, clear your thoughts, learn and grow. Let’s make it happen in 2020!

And I’m also always looking for recommendations and would love to hear what personal development and business books you might recommend. Share in the comments your favorites and I will be sure to check them out! And as always, I’ll be sure to share my book reviews throughout the year as I find titles that really speak to me which I think you might enjoy.

Happy reading, DOers!!

The post A Year Of Reading In Review – 2019 appeared first on Learn It - Do It.

1. Understand that tasks take time

We’ve all made the mistake of saying “give me 10 minutes,” only to realize an hour later that you totally lost track of time.  When we used to photograph weddings, we’d have brides tell us that the church was “5 minutes away,” and on the day of the wedding, we’d be scrambling into the ceremony with seconds to spare because NOTHING takes 5 minutes. Remember that things DO take time and even writing a short email takes longer than 2 minutes, so be sure to schedule your time accordingly ; )

If you have a To-Do list sitting on your desk, do yourself a favor and write a number next to each task so you can be realistic about your day.  Resist the urge to underestimate the length of time you need. In fact, OVERestimate. No one has ever been upset that they completed something earlier than they anticipated and I assume you aren’t the first one out there who would be.

2. Be reasonable about your To-Do lists

It’s also important to break down your tasks into “accomplishable” chunks.  For example, rather than putting a giant task on our list like “edit John Smith’s video,” which could take days of work, we learned to break things down into manageable tasks that take less than 2 hours. For example, instead of:

• Edit Video A 

We’d break that major task down to:

• Load Footage (30 min)
• Organize Footage into folders (20 min)
• Make a Project file and sync footage (20 min)
• Create Markers and label favorite takes (1 hr)
• Cut the video (2 hrs)
• Edit the Audio (1 hr)
• Color the footage (2 hrs)
• Add Graphics and Text (1 hr)
• Export Draft for Review (20 min)

Not only will you be more organized about where you are in the project, you’ve now created clear start and stop points that will allow you to come back to your project, which helps you schedule realistic timeframes to get things done. 

You’ll find that once you start checking tasks off your list, you’ll be more motivated to keep going, rather than staring at the same task on your list for 3 days while you’ve been continuously working on it.  Break your TO DO list down into tasks that take 20 minutes to an hour (2 hours max) and you’ll find yourself becoming more productive and more aware of what you can handle on a normal workday, rather than totally overcommitting and coming up short and stressing out. 

Bonus Tip: Make sure to [especially if you work at a desk or workstation] get up between tasks, have a stretch, drink some water, have a snack and give yourself some credit for what you’ve just accomplished.  It’ll help keep the positive energy flowing right into your next task.

3. Control your own schedule

We used to think that we had to work around our clients’ schedules in order to be a quality and accommodating service provider.  In a lot of ways, this is true. If you are trying to win someone’s business, you want to be able to meet them where they are and work around their needs.  However, don’t let this hurt you and your business. Sometimes we feel like adjusting our schedules to help others is the only option, but the reality is, you can totally set reasonable boundaries that allow you to be more efficient without compromising your ability to accommodate the requests of your clients.

For your client, there is a very slight difference between you saying, “I’m going to be in your area on Tuesday and Friday this week, would there be a time those days that would work for you?” and saying “Whenever you are available this week, I’ll be there.”  On the flip side, there is a HUGE difference between those two scenarios for your schedule and sanity.

Do yourself a solid and resist the urge to make open-ended scheduling for your clients, partners, and colleagues.  When it’s time to schedule a meeting, always lead by providing a few options and asking if either of those options work for the person you’re meeting with.  Worst case scenario: they say those don’t work and give you some options or ask you for some more options. In both cases, YOU are in control of your schedule and still providing an awesome service.  

Bonus Tip:  We actually found that by giving the options it was actually easier to schedule with our customers and potential clients.  Giving them an open-ended option provided too many choices and proved overwhelming and easier to put off. Giving a few choices makes it an easier decision for them and a more efficient way for you to manage your days for productivity!  Win-Win!

4.  Start to automate or simplify repetitive tasks

Think about the things you do over and over again and find ways to automate them.  How could you use a software, template, process, or video to make your repetitive tasks take less time?

We work with an awesome graphic designer that sends us videos of her recorded screen while she explains her design work rather than scheduling a meeting with us to review over the phone or in-person.  This is such an efficient way to manage all of our time. We are able to move projects forward without meeting and getting distracted with side conversations, plus we can refer back to these videos at any point.

Another way we’ve improved our productivity is to create templates for emails we have to send regularly.  You may customize these messages each time depending on the details, but if there is a large chunk of what you say that is the same every time, create an email template that you can start from and save yourself a ton of time doing things over and over again.

Lastly, see what you can do to avoid wasting time on travel and unproductive meetings.  When we first started our business, we were more comfortable in person and every time we had to talk with a client or a subcontractor/team member, we’d schedule an in-person meeting.  This meant preparing for the meeting, packing up our stuff, driving to another location (dealing with traffic, etc), arriving early, conducting the meeting and then often letting things get off-topic or letting a meeting take a full hour or more even though we accomplished the goal in the first few minutes, etc.

Think about meetings you schedule that could be more productive through video, email, over the phone, or through Skype/video chat.  A meeting that could take up 2 hours of your day could be shortened to 1 hour or less if you don’t have to leave your office!

Now that we’ve shared a few ways to improve your productivity (and sanity) let’s put this stuff to good use.  Start to use these tactics in your business and let us know how they work for you! Or, if you have any other tips you’ve implemented that have worked well for you, we want to hear about them.  

Let’s get more done in less time!

The post 4 Simple Tips to Be More Productive! appeared first on Learn It - Do It.

In our maiden voyage of the Learn It – Do It Podcast we introduce ourselves and give you a little insight on what this show will be about.  We’re a husband and wife team who’ve been in business for ourselves since the fall of 2008. We share our story of how we jumped feet first into being self-employed entrepreneurs and discuss how we navigated the challenging task of creating our own opportunities in business.  Over the last 10+ years, we’ve worked with hundreds of clients and we noticed that almost everyone struggles with similar challenges. We decided to focus this podcast on the topics of Content & Marketing, Business Strategy and Personal Development, because no matter what industry you are in or what your business is, these topics play a crucial role in running a successful business.

Episode 0 Summary

• We introduce ourselves as business owners and podcast hosts
• We talk about our qualifications and experience in this space
• We share why we wanted to start this podcast
• We tell you what this podcast will be about and talk about who it’s for
• We describe the show format and episode details

Recommended Resources 

Check out our creative media agency: 

Do Something Different Media – www.dosomethingdifferentmedia.com

If you want to apply to be a guest on the podcast head over to www.learnit-doit.com/podcast

The post Episode 0 – Who are Rhi & Pete and What’s this Podcast All About? appeared first on Learn It - Do It.

Why did we decide to read this book?  What prompted us to pick it up?

In February 2019, Rhi and I attended a conference called “Think Better, Live Better,” hosted by Marc and Angel Chernoff [of marcandangel.com].  One of the distinguished keynote speakers was Humble the Poet, who is an author, rapper and spoken word artist. Humble, or Mr. Poet (we’re basically besties by now), presented on how to overcome fear and adversity to stay creative.  Most notably, how to overcome failure, which is bound to happen at some point.

During his presentation, he discussed his upcoming book Unlearn and shared a few chapters with the audience and we knew immediately that this was definitely something we’d be interested in reading.

During the break after the afternoon speaking sessions were completed, we got to meet Humble and talk to him briefly about creativity and pushing forward even when you think you’ve hit a dead end.  He was extremely eloquent, helpful and insightful [and we thank him again for taking the time to meet with us!. 

We waited until the US release of his book and immediately snatched it up and read it in a day and a half.

Who would get a lot out of this book?

This book is a collection of his social media posts and they can be read as daily lessons.  I chose to read it cover to cover, but you can literally pick it up and open to a random page and get some great life knowledge. Humble The Poet doesn’t spout off puffy cliches, instead, he tells it straight and lets you know that you’re not alone in whatever pain or suffering that you endure.

I think that anyone in the trenches of a creative career will absolutely get a lot out of this book.  The author is extremely transparent about the battles that we face internally and externally as we continue our creative journey.  Through both the ups and downs, his lessons ring true and they serve as a great daily reminder to stay on the level and to remember what we’re actually doing here.

What are our takeaways and how will we apply them?

I’ve paraphrased my favorite takeaways, but really, each of the 101 lessons are true takeaways.

1. The only truth to life is death – everything else is what you decide to make of it. This message is incredibly helpful, especially when you find yourself in a distracting cloud of stress and fear.  It allows you to center yourself and remember the big picture.
2. Our minds are the cause of our unhappiness – not the actual world around us.  We can’t expect life to be the fairytale that our brain feeds us. We’ve got to cut the cord of the rom-com expectations that we’ve created for ourselves and actually take a good look at how fortunate we are in our own lives out here in reality.
3. We all experience pain – it’s how we grow, push our boundaries and do extraordinary things. If we spend our time building barriers of protection we are just setting ourselves up for catastrophic failure.  We only learn from stumbling and falling here and there. In addition, the happiness and sense of accomplishment that we’re all striving for only comes when we step out of our comfort zones, experience new things [good and bad], and notice that this journey is exactly what we’ve been looking for all along.
4. Don’t allow the opinions, expectations or narratives of others to affect you and your day to day life. You have to remember that each person lives their lives inside their own head and they’re only concerned about themselves.  When you view it from this perspective, the weight of opinions and expectations of others is lessened. It is up to you to live your own life and make it what you want.
5. You are the only thing or person that can make you happy.  This is a big one.  Our reaction is to look outward for happiness, but the truth is that it can only come from within.  So in order to get a head start on your own happiness, immediately stop looking to any person, product, or vacation to create happiness.

Uncover your favorite takeaways by visiting Humble’s website and/or ordering the book Unlearn here.

The post Book Review: “Unlearn” by Humble The Poet appeared first on Learn It - Do It.