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Maybe you think your business is organized but is it really a bastion of order and productivity? While it may seem that way on the surface, the reality is often a little different. Once you start to dig a little deeper than what you can see in and around your office, you’ll realize that there is a multitude of ways that you want to improve your company’s organization and boost productivity at the same time.
Of course, all businesses are a little different, but this doesn’t mean there are not fundamental issues that all companies – whether large or small – must address. To help you get started, here are six crucial steps to take to organize your business and boost your productivity.
Know Your Content Schedule
For many businesses, content is the most important marketing element. Whether you post pictures or infographics to Instagram, musings on Twitter, or blog posts detailing your thoughts on this-or-that, you can achieve a lot of success through quality content. However, coming up with a steady stream of unique content is tricky, which is why a content calendar is so useful. This prevents duplicate content that can affect SEO ranking, and it ensures you are always prepared to write or post something. You can plan for holidays and industry events and have content ready to post, which will save you rushing to create a post the day of.
Make Your Business Reachable
You can’t expect to gain new customers and increase your reach. Your business itself is not reachable. Even if your company operates entirely online, virtual office services can give you a place for people to contact you. This should go alongside business emails, search engine profiles (like Google My Business), and social media accounts. Your company website should also be well maintained and easy to navigate, as this could be the first interaction potential customers have with your brand.
Look At Your Client List
If you’ve been running your business for a few years, you’ve likely generated a respectably sized client list. This is a collection of people you have worked with in the past, and it’s a good way to show how successful you have been over the years. However, depending on what you do, your client list may be cluttering up your business. There could be phone numbers, names, and email addresses that you haven’t touched since your first year, and if enough time has passed, there’s not much use in keeping them. Going through your contact list and deleting (or at least archiving) old contact details will give your list some breathing space. You can also get in touch with everyone and update information where necessary.
Evaluate Your Finances
It’s also important to take a look at your business’ financial health. Like your contact list, you may have numbers and even subscriptions that don’t mean anything to you. Although it may not seem too significant, it can be a substantial drain on your finances over time, and this will impact your growth potential. Going through your expenses and clearing away any charges you don’t need will immediately improve your productivity as you will have more funds to spend on other areas of your business, which could be crucial for achieving the growth you need.
Declutter Your Workspace
It doesn’t matter if you’re working from home or are running a full-sized office; workspaces get cluttered quicker than most places. You should start at your desk by removing papers and notes that you don’t need and putting them in order. From there, you can consider how to reduce the clutter. Digitizing documents is a useful way to do so, and it’s environmentally friendly, too.
Train Your Staff
You are not the only one responsible for keeping your business organized. The responsibility should also fall to your staff, and one of the most common ways a business loses productivity through a lack of organization is sub[-par training. Take the time to teach your staff how to recognize phishing attempts to keep them on task and keep your business safe. This will ensure all sensitive information remains protected and prevents malicious threats from breaching your systems. The last thing your company wants is downtime and a loss of trust from customers and investors, so make sure your cybersecurity protocols are up to scratch.
Organized
Organizing your business is not something that will happen overnight. But don’t let this put you off taking the first steps. The more dedicated you are to transforming your company’s organization, the more efficient and productive your company will be, and this will reflect in profits, reviews, and satisfaction from your employees to your customers.
