Melanie
Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm afraid it's just me, Melanie, today. Esther wasn't able to join me today. Too many things going on. But today we're going to be talking about time management. Now, I know we normally talk about marketing in general, but actually time management is an incredibly important skill that we all need to have in order to do our marketing. It doesn't matter whether you are a sole trader or a large agency. Somehow, all of you, or all by yourself, you need to master this so that you can accomplish everything you need to do for your own business and, of course, for your clients. Now, this is to do with a blog that I wrote last month. And so Whenever you're listening to this, it can be referred to back on my website. But I'd like to remind you that many, many moons ago, Benjamin Franklin said, time is money. And it's still true today when he said that way back when. In fact, if anything, we're probably spending more money on people's time than ever before. Now, I know that all of you are thinking, well, actually, maybe we're not. We're all being helped with AI these days.
But then there's prompt engineering and expertise where people have made enormous mistakes and learnt from them that you're also paying for. So it's not just time, it's experience that we're paying for. And that is why time management has become so important. Now, I appreciate that every single business is being pulled in every direction with everything that we need to know. And not that long ago, I came back from social media marketing world with Esther, and my co-host. And honestly, the skills that we have to get our head around right now is just exhausting. So time management has become even more important. I think it should start with setting clear goals, though. Goals and objectives. Now, I'm sure, like the rest of us, you worked on those at the beginning of the year, but they are things that you need to work through every week, every month, and every quarter. When did you last look at your goals and objectives? If you can categorize the tasks by urgency and importance, and one of the best methods to do this is the Eisenhower matrix. So it sorts tasks into four categories: urgent and important, important but not urgent, urgent but not important, and neither urgent nor important.
And it's like swotting your time management plans. Look up the Eisenhower matrix, and that may be a tool or a technique that you could implement within your business. Then it's planning and scheduling. Now, this is a course where I can help you enormously. And lots and lots of tools will help you as planning and scheduling. So ChatGPT is obviously a big go-to, especially the paid-for plan. But over in the social media marketing world, we were hearing about lots and lots of other tools like Claude, Magai, Gemini, of course, Copilot. There's so many out there. So you got to find out what fits you and your brand and your business and your budget, of course. So the next step for me when it comes to planning and scheduling is Google Calendar. It's been one of my favorite tools for many, many years now. And I find that it gives me the agility to make sure I don't miss family appointments, holidays. If I want to take a day off, I can because I've got it already crossed out and marked out on my my Google calendar. And it It means that people can immediately book me in when it's convenient to them as well.
There's also all different types of technology that we've got to get our head around, as already previously mentioned. I'm currently trying to get my head around Notion. I'm probably very late to the game there. I apologize. But we can't be on top of all tools all the time. Now, I've been a big fan of Asana for a long time. I know a few people who I've collaborated with in the past love Monday, others love Trello. So you've got to try and work out How many people you need to coordinate with in the first place? So I've got a couple of people on my Asana. I've got my Virtual Assistant, I've got my Website Developer, and I've got my accountant actually on my Asana as well, which is handy. And in the past, when I've worked or collaborated with other partners, I've added them on for short term projects, like a website developer that wasn't my own for a little while, and a graphic designer I also worked with as well. So These gifts, these tools are there. You just need to find the one that suits you and your payment plans. Some people also use these tools for client campaigns as well.
So if you're going to be collaborating with a larger agency, you might have to get familiar with these tools anyway. So a bit of practice probably wouldn't hurt. The other thing that we're all guilty of, and I've done a fair bit of it myself today. Does anybody know what I'm going to say next? Time wasting. Yes, the old doom scrolling. And it's not just TikTok that people doom scroll on. I lost myself in Instagram for a little while there, and Instagram reels. I'm going to have to get over that. So we've got to try and understand Where we're wasting time. And a good friend of mine, Amanda Webb, she mentioned Toggle long time ago now. And over the years, I've moved between Toggle and Clockify, just depending on the mood I'm in. They You do have free packages and it does take a fair bit of... Yeah, you do need to be very disciplined to use it. But once you've understood where you are actually wasting your time, is it because Is it because you're waiting for people to get back to you and you haven't allowed enough time? Is it because you are opening things like TikTok and Instagram?
Even LinkedIn these days is getting interesting with the old scrolls and carousels as well. So You got to understand where you're putting all of your time. Each of these tools also provide you with reports. I think they are on the paid version. Not sure if they're on the free version, but you do get a basic analytics that gives you some understanding of how it works as well. Another thing is, whether you are a part of a small agency or a sole trader, even as a sole trader, you are going to have communications with other suppliers or other tenders, perhaps. Having good in-team communication, ideally in one place. Now, I am sure that all of you who are listening to this right now have Slack, WhatsApp, maybe Messenger, your emails and DMs all open at the same time. I am sure in the past, you've seen a notification fly up on your phone as you've been moving around doing something and you go, right, I must respond to that. For the life of you, you I cannot remember where that notification came from. This has been happening to me a lot recently as well. So I'm going to have to start disciplining myself a little bit and moving away from some of these platforms because I'm on too many.
So a bit of good, solid, in-time communication and where your go-tos are going to be is probably another really good place to meet people. Don't forget the likes of Microsoft Teams as well. Is that something somewhere else you may end up having to look. Now, a lot of what we've been discussing so far, if you're within a small team or a large team, can be delegated, can be handed out to other people who are more committed or enjoy these platforms and tools more than you do. But again, if you're on your own, it's a lot harder to delegate, or is it? Well, remember earlier on, I mentioned I've got a Virtual Assistant. It was tough, initially, to outsource some of this stuff. But you know, there's some really, really competent virtual assistants out there, locally, nationally, and internationally, who can help you. Some of it is down to the fact that you need to create processes that will help you train and communicate with your virtual assistant. Now, I've worked with some overseas ones before, and all of our communication was only in one place. WhatsApp. Or if needed, we communicated through Asana, specifically about a particular project, which really, really helped because then I knew what we were talking about.
But if we were talking about anything on a more general basis, Then we talked in WhatsApp. So having a really good plan for delegating the work that you can, I know may sound bizarre thinking, okay, well, you've got to spend time training these people and how they speak about my brand and how they communicate my posts and that stuff. Absolutely, you do. But the conversation doesn't just end there. Just like if you had a member of staff in the office, there's a two-way conversation going on all the time. And once you've got that familiarity with each other, you can pretty much let them add it, especially these really well-experienced Virtual Assistants. Now, I'm sure there are some horror stories out there, but it's the same with employees as well. We can't always get it right all the time. But I would definitely ask you to reach out and get some help because my business really, really improved. My time management really, really improved, and I became more available for my family and for my friends, and for my clients. And doing all of this helps you establish a much better work-life balance. Now, I don't know if you're watching the video right now.
If you are, hi. I'm really struggling to get the lighting right because it is glorious sunshine behind me right now. And again, it doesn't matter what time of the year that you're listening to this. Now that I know that it's much brighter outside, I can go out and do things I can go for hikes, I can go shopping if I want to, I can see my family after work and over the weekends. And I want to do that. I want to self-improve and be in a better headspace for myself. And being online, as I'm sure all of you are aware, is exhausting. We all need to take some downtime, but we also need to remain present. So getting that work-life balance is really important. And it helps with your long term productivity as well. So what are you doing that gives you some space and some scope? Now, another person I've worked with in the past, she said, we don't save lives. And she's absolutely right. We don't save lives. If we did, I suppose what we do would be more important, but it isn't. So take some space for yourself, because then you'll be a much better person for the people that you're working with or for.
Now, right at the very top of today's podcast, I mentioned about upskilling. Continuous learning and adaptation, especially in this space, is really, really important. You want to stay as leading, cutting edge as you can. And by being the person that people want to trust and go to, that definitely builds your authority as well. But don't And as you get, if you are the team lead, you need to look after your staff as well, because they'll seek elsewhere if they're not getting their ongoing training and upskilling. It doesn't always have to be massively expensive. It depends on if you recognized courses or not. Now, I've met clients in the past who've gone to Coursera courses, which are free or very, very small amounts of money spent. Others have done Open University or UCD, Depending on what results you want from your exams or from your course. But please do consider updating and upskilling and maybe exploring other areas. Because it keeps you motivated if you can keep yourself leading edge. But you also do need to set some really realistic deadlines. And this is, again, going back to the planning and your goals and objectives. By setting achievable deadlines, it helps you maintain project momentum and time management momentum.
And if you're creating unrealistic deadlines for you and your staff, it will definitely lead to high stress and high burnout. Now, over the last couple of years, I've noticed that I'm getting less burnout coming in to the office because there are a lot more tools. But there's still some people coming in just overwhelmed with everything they need to learn. They take on a new role or they've downsized a team and now they have to take on somebody else's role. And it's It's quite a big jump from doing occasional social media to managing all of the social media. So make sure that you're setting realistic deadlines for yourself and for your team when it comes to doing time management. Allow a bit of wiggle room in case there are some deliverables that you haven't been able to get hold of. Again, back to the work-life balance, look to celebrate your achievements. Have you to put your team or your company into an awards? Is there somebody you need to personally recognize for all the extra effort and special consideration that they've done in supporting a team member who's been off long term sick, perhaps? Make people feel special.
Isn't it nice when somebody says something nice about you, when you get a nice testimonial? Even if you are a sole trader, maybe there is a supplier or even a customer who's referred I've had other customers to you that you need to celebrate publicly. We need to support and rise each other as often as possible. So if you can find a way to celebrate them with a short video, with a testimonial, with just mentioning them in passing at an event. That would be really, really helpful as well. Now, everything I've discussed here today, like I said, is in a blog that I've written on my website on stomp. Ie, and it's called Time Management Skills Every SME Needs to Master. I don't have all the answers, but I have been using all of these techniques to improve my own time management. I do I source work where I can, and I get help in-house as well. And I do collaborate a lot with people as well. We're not islands, and we do need to ask for help and ask for guidance when we can. No matter which country you're in, there will be places where you can go for mentoring or reach out for help with local small business services or mentorship.
Don't be afraid to approach people and ask for that guidance and that help. Sometimes a fresh pair of eyes is all you need and somebody to bounce ideas off. If you are stuck, you're welcome to contact myself or Esther, because we both do the same thing. And we can find somebody who can help you in your country if we can't help you ourselves. That's all for now from me this week, but we'll be back and hopefully with Esther next week. Have a great week. Bye-bye for now.
Hello and welcome to the Monday Morning Marketing podcast. Good morning, it's me, Melanie Esther's not here, I'm afraid, today, so it's just me fluffing up the intro as usual, which is why I get her to do it. But where it all starts with everybody is setting clear goals and priorities. Without that, you are literally messing around with your own time. So what is your current goals? No matter what time of year you're listening to this, what is your current goals and objectives? Have you written them down somewhere? Is it something that you can actually peer open and try deep into your goals and objectives and see what you need to do this week, this month, or even this quarter?
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