Tips & Tricks for More Efficiency

When running an online business, there are so many important details to remember to take care of. Between the website maintenance, answering emails, writing articles, organizing ad swaps, searching for ezine content, etc., etc., we tend to get a little overwhelmed sometimes. I would like to share some of my timesaving tips & tricks that I use to help me get things done more efficiently. *Ezine Publishing Save each issue of your ezine and just change what is necessary for each issue. When you come across a resource you would like to share with your readers, you can then just open up the template and slap the resource in place. Print out all your ad swaps and write the date that each ad will run as you finalize each swap. Keep them all in their own file folder, so each week (or when your ezine is published) when you go through them, the dates will be easily seen and the ads will be organized. I find that this way of organizing my swaps is much easier than searching through email folders and floppies for the correct ads to run for each issue. I also use this method with my ad sales. Keep all your past issues on floppy or CD, so when you reuse some of your ads or promotions you can just copy and paste into the current issue. *Writing & Submitting Articles You definitely want to have an idea notebook. Each time you get an idea for an article, write it down in the notebook. I usually get my ideas as I am getting Web Success ready to send out, but when I do get an idea between issues, I will write it down. As you are writing the article, think to yourself, what information did I need and/or want to know about this subject when I was first starting. Just start writing as if you were telling a friend or family member about it. For me, it flows more naturally that way. Have all your editor emails and article list addresses saved in their own email file. Also, save your "Dear Editor" email. When you finish each article, paste it into the saved email, copy and paste your editor addresses into the Bcc line and click send. Next open your saved article list email, paste the current article into it, paste the list addresses into the Bcc line and click send. What could take an hour or more now takes about 10 minutes. *Answering Emails If you are in affiliate programs, write and save a welcome email for each program. As you are notified of new members, go to your saved welcome messages, change the name and email address and click send. This is much more efficient than writing a new message for each new member. Have email folders for organizing your emails. If they do not require an answer you can then just put each one into it's proper folder. If they do require an answer, then drag them over to their folder after you answer each one. Of course, you want to save them to floppy or CD before distributing in folders. I have folders, for ad swaps, ad sales, subscribers, new affiliate members, affiliate sales, contacts, feedback, resources, sales made from my website, etc., etc. Each of these folders also has a floppy or CD backup. *Website Additions If your webpages are uniform, it is easy to make a new page. I just go to an existing page, copy the whole page, paste it into the new page, change the wording that needs to be changed and the page is finished. I also use this method with sections of pages that I need. Copy the part of the code that you need and just paste it into place. This saves countless minutes of typing!! These are just a few of the things that work for me. I realize that they might not work for everyone. If you have your own method that works for you, that is great! One method definitely does not work for all, but if you are looking for ways to get your business organized, these ideas might work for you!