The best tip I heard today- What's yours?

To true John.....

I must say, nothing makes me less likely to answer somebody's call if they have their caller ID blocked. If I do not know who is calling, whatever they have to say can wait, or be ignored if they do not leave a message.

My biggest tip - organize your business as if you were going to outsource, then do it!

Organizing your business as if you will outsource forces you to do a few very important things....

1. Think about the processes you have in place for doing things. You can't consider outsourcing something until you first think about how you do it now (or would do it first). For example, if you want to outsource some blog posting - it forces you to think about what the optimal blog posting strategy would be...that's valuable in itself.

2. In order to outsource effectively, you need to write a clear, simple game plan for your outsource contractor to follow. Anyone who has outsourced before knows that if you are NOT clear or do not lay the actual steps out in detail, you won't get results. By developing clear, concise procedures for your business, you will not only get maximum benefit from your outsourcing, but you will also be developing a set of guidelines around which you can measure and improve how your business is operating. For example, if you have a system that outlines a series of steps on how to find blog topics and write 4 blog posts each day, and you discover that certain blog posts are working better than others in attracting visitors, subscribers and customers, then you quickly adjust your business to build on that feedback.

3. You will get control of your business back. So many people lose control of their business after just a few months of building their site, developing a list, driving traffic and monetizing - that's where their efficiency goes way down and sales flatline (or climb much slower than they may otherwise)

4. Having a complete set of documented processes around your business buys you FREEDOM - you can bring on employees or contractors anytime you need to and free up your time while still improving your sales

5. Well documented processes will attract BETTER freelancers and employees. The better, more experienced outsourcers will flock to people who have clearly defined objectives - it takes risk out of the project for them - they know what is expected and see that you have your act together. In fact, outsourcers will often give you much better prices if you are clear since they don't have to price in a 'fudge factor' for re-do's and other arguments that uncertain projects so often lead to.

6. If your business processes are clearly defined you have proven that your entire business is duplicatable, that will increase the value of your business considerably. Think about it, if you were to buy a $10,000/month business that was based on activity that was inside the head of one person versus buying a $10,000/month business that was based on a fully outlined system you could plug you and your employees into immediately - which one is worth more to you?

Sorry, turned out to be a long tip, but a very important one I have focused on this past year.

Jeff