Answer me this simple question, do you plan out your day or week in advance?
Most of the photographers who sign up for my mentoring program tell me they have just been far too busy to concentrate on any form of marketing but when we get deeper into it they are often just busy being busy.
As photographers a large chunk of our working day is spent in front of a computer with our mobile phones sitting on the desk next to us just waiting to distract us at any given moment. It’s just far too easy to get taken away from the job in hand by a text message or an email that really could have been dealt with later in the day.
When I work with photographers on my One 2 One training programs the first thing we cover together is goal setting and time management. You need to have goals because without them you’ll never reach your full potential and when you know your goals it’s essential that each week you do one task towards a goal each day.
It’s all too easy to write a big “to do list” then start by doing all the little jobs so it looks like you achieved a lot but in business our success is measured by the brand we create and income we build. Often we put off the bigger jobs because they look like a mammoth task but if you assess each and every job on your “to do list” by whether it will either bring you closer to your goal or generate more income then you’ll soon realise which jobs you need to start first.
Its better to complete one task that will bring you closer to your goals than 10 little tasks that really could of waited. No sooner are those little tasks crossed off then you’ll find more menial tasks to replace them and again these will stand in the way of you achieving your goals and making a lot more money.
Plan out your week every Sunday evening, make a point of putting your social media posting and income generating tasks or goal achieving task on your AM (Morning) “to do list”. These must be completed before lunch or before you go on to do any of the smaller “to do list” items, what I call non-essential jobs.
Get into a habit of posting to social media every morning before checking your emails or responding to messages. Then once you have posted and after following up on any enquiries, do just one of your goal achieving or income generating tasks. Don’t over load your “to do list”, break big goals down into smaller daily steps. For example, if you are building a new website, Monday just complete the Home Page, Tuesday the About Page, Wednesday the Weddings Page, Thursday the Contact Page and Friday your SEO.
When I started to write my first book, a job I’d put off for 2 years, I decided to just write about a side of A4 per day. An easy and achievable task, then in just 8 weeks I had a finished and published the book which is ranked on the Amazon best seller chart and earns me an income each month - all that from about 60 minutes a day.
If you have any questions on time management or goal setting for your business, then drop me a message I’d be only too happy to help you out.