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Bloggers and Site Owners – - Get Organized!
By Deb Gallardo
My friend, the ever-prolific Dr. Jeanette Cates, has practical advice for how to manage any online business. We all know we ought to get organized, but for those of us who are “organizationally challenged,” that’s not enough information.
Once you see the useful systems Jeanette suggests, you’ll see how essential this kind of organization can be for you. Even if you cringe every time the word “organize” is mentioned, you’ll see the value in Jeanette’s tips. I claim title to “THE WORLD’S LEAST ORGANIZED PERSON,” but I’m going to implement – at the very least – the Web Owner’s Manual. Now, why didn’t I think of that?
Organize Your Online Business
By Dr. Jeanette Cates
People often talk about the importance of setting goals for your business. But they rarely go beyond that to the action steps required to make those goals a reality.
One of the most important action steps is to get organized. This is never more true than in an Online Business. What starts as a simple website with a few articles can quickly mushroom to 15 websites with 500 articles, 7 products, multiple audios – and you’ve lost control of all of it!
That’s why organization is so important to an Online Business. It provides the systems that allow the business to grow, quickly and painlessly. Here are five ways you can start to organize your Online Business.
1. Keep a Web Owner’s Manual. This physical notebook should have a page dedicated to each website with the passwords, registrar and other pertinent information. Plus you’ll want a master list of all the URLs you own.
It’s amazing how quickly you can accumulate a long list of domains. Early in my business I lost an important URL because I had forgotten I owned it and failed to renew it on time. This was a costly error and one that could have been corrected with a Web Owner’s Manual.
2. Inventory Your Assets. Not just your physical items like your computers and printers, but also your intellectual assets. I found that I was spending too much time looking for “that video” that I knew I had created – but forgotten which domain I put it on. With more than 75 active domains it sometimes took hours to find the one I needed. Now with a single list of all of my videos (and another for audios) I can find anything with a simple electronic search.
3. Set Up A Dashboard. You have a choice of how you start your browser. Why go to MSN or Yahoo or AOL and immediately get distracted by the latest news? Instead, set up your own web page with links to all of the sites that you use regularly. Then set this page as your Home page.
It’s much faster to click on the Home button, then on the name of the site than it is to type it in. And even faster than using favorites or bookmarks, if your list is as long as most peoples’!
4. Create a Productivity Folder. Even though my most frequently used documents are organized in various folders inside My Documents, I find it very helpful to have links to them in a single folder on my desktop. That way I can open that folder and immediately click to open the documents I’m likely to use daily. That saves having to navigate through multiple layers to find them.
Why not put them into the same folder to start? Because it makes more sense to have them spread out. For example, my profitability analyses are with the web documents for each site. The daily activity report is with Business Planning Reports, etc. Having the productivity folder provides quick access to the things I am most likely to update frequently.
5. Track Your Success. Once you’ve determined your revenue-generating activities, then you need to find a way to measure your revenue as well as those activities. I use a Success Factors report which is updated daily. It includes all the sources of revenue for the day, as well as the revenue producing activities completed such as articles written, newsletters sent, teleseminars delivered, and sites built. It’s a one-page summary of daily revenue so you can see exactly where you are every day of the month. No surprises here!
With just a few tools and some consistent attention, you can get – and keep – your Online Business organized.
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Dr. Jeanette Cates is an Internet strategist who works with consultants and other experts to help them leverage their expertise into Online Success. Dr. Cates reveals more productivity secrets at OrganizeYourOnlineBusiness
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5 Comments »
December 23rd, 2007 at 7:41 pm
Hi Deb,
I know I’m on a roll with commenting on your posts.
However, I read one and #3 just popped out.
I’ve been thinking about dashboards, because I want to have a better overview and control of my own operations. There’s so much web 2.0 property and other things that need to be handled and it’s easy to get lost and waste valuable time, because of a lack of overview.
Here’s something I plan to do:
Create a Mind map (with Free Mind or Mind Manager) that holds all important categories>topics>descriptions>hyperlinks
to manage my websites. Then export it as an HTML file. Make this HTML file my home page and
voíla, a dashboard a la Mind Map style in my browser.
What do you think?
Michael Roeten
December 24th, 2007 at 4:27 am
Michael,
Relevant comments are always welcome. It doesn’t matter how often. And the fact that you’ve commented on three of my posts means you’re READING my blog. How could I possibly discourage that?!
Thanks for this great idea of creating our own dashboards. You’re so right. It’s easy to get lost and waste time. Terrific suggestion! And one I could actually do myself. Now why didn’t I think of that? Thank you.
Deb
December 24th, 2007 at 7:30 am
Hi Deb,
I’m glad you and hopefully your readers will like this idea and you’re welcome.
Another thing related to the mind map as homepage I just thought of:
The exported HTML file can be local on your computer, but in addition you can upload it to a server+location only you know of. This way you can access your mind map homepage from any computer.
Maybe you want to share it with your network and put a password on it so only you and your group can access it.
I just uploaded a mind map on Rich Schefren’s Internet Business Manifesto yesterday. The map can be downloaded and adjusted to meet your needs like adding links, categories, topics etc.
http://mappio.com/mindmap/unitedholland/internet-business-manifesto-from-rich-schefren
What’s Mappio? It’s a place (I just found it yesterday) where you can share mind maps with the community. It’s Fr*e.
Michael
December 25th, 2007 at 12:08 pm
Michael, that is a brilliant idea to put a dashboard on a secret web page (maybe pass-coded?) that you could access from any computer in the world. While you’re on a roll, don’t stop now! Thanks again for reading lots of posts on my site, and for commenting. What a guy! Thank you!
Deb
August 12th, 2008 at 1:27 pm
Thanks to the article, Now there is more reason to comment than ever before! Good post… I found it via Google. They most love you!