You’re on the go, ideas are coming to you, emails are flowing, you’ve got meetings and more to get to…so how can you possibly keep up with running your business when you’re all over the map? There’s an app for that. Several, actually. And we have some other great suggestions to help you stay on top of everything while maintaining a healthy mindset.
1. Use Mobile Apps to Manage Social Media & Emails
This simple but massive idea can make a world of difference. If you’re managing your business on the go, make sure you have the apps for your social media platforms and email downloaded on your mobile device.
While you’re waiting for a meeting, a cab, a flight (ie. any time you have a little extra time on your hands throughout the day), use your mobile apps to quickly and easily interact with your audience, answer messages and further your business online.
2. Utilize Mobile Apps to Edit Photos On Your Phone
One of the first things your audience, your potential customer, notices about your business online is your imagery. You need to make sure that imagery looks great by editing it.
One of our favourite editing apps for your mobile device is Snapseed from Google – it has tons of great tools and it’s free. Once you’ve edited your photo and it’s looking sharp, add your logo and any graphics or text using another great free app called Canva. This amazing app is available for both mobile and desktop. Canva is basically Photoshop for those who don’t know how to use Photoshop
3. Take the Stress Out of Social Media – Plan Ahead
The number one mistake we see businesses making with their social media is planning in the moment vs planning ahead. For many businesses, social media is often a last-minute idea—Tuesday rolls around and everyone panics, trying to get a post up for the day. This is super inefficient and stressful. We promise you will reduce your time, tell a more complete brand story, and get more engagement if you plan ahead.
The number one tool we use to plan ahead is a Trello content calendar. This is where we collaborate as a team to slot in all posts we would like to see going out. We always plan a month ahead and often plan up to 3 months ahead.
4. Schedule Your Social Media
Once your content is created, schedule it—you select the day and the time you want the post to go out, and you’re done. Gone are the days of having to post in the moment. If you’re on multiple platforms, Hootsuite is a great option for scheduling. If you’re on Facebook alone, you can schedule right within the platform.
Now, using a content calendar and scheduling posts, you can have a month’s worth of social posts ready to go within a day.
5. Build a Community – Learn to Network Online
Traditional face-to-face communication is the number one way to solidify your network, but the number one way to grow your network? Using online tools. Nurture relationships and further your audience using one of the top online tools: social media.
Within your platforms, make sure you’re engaging with all comments, messages and reviews. Respond to your community of followers, like their comments, thank them for their kind words. This interaction will help these relationships grow, and even better, the platforms reward you for this good behaviour so you will ultimately reach more people.
6. Utilize a Brain Dump App
Running a business on the go, you always have lots of ideas on the go. Whether an idea hits you at 3am in a hotel room shower or sitting in cab on your way to a lunch meeting, you need to log it somewhere.
A tool we really like is Asana. Available for both mobile and desktop, Asana allows you to log your idea, sort it into a project, assign related tasks to whoever needs to see it, and add a due date to that idea.
7. Use Cloud Storage
Cloud storage is essential to any business on the go. It allows you to access your files from wherever you are, on any device, and collaborate with anybody else involved with the project.
Cloud storage also provides peace of mind that your files are safe. We recommend having a redundant system where you have files backed up both to physical hard drives and a cloud storage application.
8. Always Have an Internet Backup
Time is our most valuable resource. Don’t lose time when a wi-fi connection drops out. Have a wi-fi hotspot available either through your phone or a wi-fi device. You’ll also want to make sure that you have a great data plan to support this.
9. Schedule Your Life: Use a Calendar
Working on the go, you can get pulled in a million directions. To live your best life, you need to live it on purpose. Some of the best advice we ever received from a mentor was, “I don’t care what you do, but schedule it”.
We schedule everything—from work, to time with friends, to nap time (a couple of us love naps). To optimize your use of calendars, make sure you’ve synced both on your desktop and mobile device
10. Learn to Disconnect
Easier said than done for some of us who feel we need to be constantly connected and staying on top of everything—but it’s necessary to put that phone down and turn that laptop off.
In order to truly relax, decompress, recharge and connect with your life and loved ones, unplug. The benefits will actually make you more effective when you return to work mode. All of us plan to set time aside each evening without devices; for our own sanity, we’ll turn our phones to airplane mode for a few hours and enjoy feeling present and peaceful.
With all these tools and suggestions at your fingertips, there is definitely a way that will work for you to manage your business on the go. It might take a little trial and error, but you will find your own favourites…and then you can share your tips with the world!
Like what you learned? We know more things!
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