3 Tips to Improve Your Productivity to Get you Working on Your Website or Membership Site.

This blog post has been inspired by this Instagram post I saw from the awesome Jodie at The Business Allotment. The post is about how sitting at the same desk everyday to work may be limiting our inspiration. You will see if you look at the post that I commented saying that we try to work from our camper van one day a week to improve our productivity and to inspire us and that is where I am right now, writing this blog post.

Let me paint the scene for you. The sun is shining. The camper van door is wide open. I can see sand, the sun glistening on the calm sea and it’s such a clear day I can see the detail of the tress on the Isle of Wight the other side of the Solent. The sound of the waves lapping at the shore is calming, the sound of the grumpy toddlers screaming is less so but as parents we’ve been there!

Being out and about with different sights and sounds and breathing fresh air definitely makes us more productive and motivates us to think of new ideas, embrace challenges and get on with those little tasks we would really rather not do.

So, that is the first tip to improve your productivity so you work on your website or membership site…

1. Change your work setting every so often to work on your website

You don’t have to have a camper van to turn into a mobile office. You could work from a picnic blanket at the park for an hour and write a blog post. You could go for a walk with a business friend and have a brainstorming session to get ideas for your membership site content for the next three months. You could go and work from someone else’s office for a day and return the favour. Or you could do the working from a coffee shop thing.

You could even just go for a walk or a picnic with no set task to get done and because you’re giving yourself time to switch off, I bet your brain decides to switch on and actually the ideas for content start flowing.

2. Set non-negotiable time aside to work on set tasks

I don’t have a problem with working on our website content. If I did I would be in the wrong job. What I do have a problem with is doing any tasks related to money. Even though we have an accountant there are still come elements of keeping FreeAgent up to date and keeping receipts in the right place that I have to do and I do not like it.

So, I write it in my planner that it has to be done. I block the time out in my calendar so nobody can book calls. I knew I didn’t want to ruin a day at the beach by having any kind of spreadsheet on my screen and so this week I made sure all of those tasks were done by the end of the day yesterday so I could enjoy the beach today. Now the beach day feels like a treat for doing well yesterday!

If you’re like this with creating your content or checking your website over to make sure everything is accurate and up to date every so often, then get set times to do it in your calendar. Also, I definitely think writing content is much easier outside of the office so use tip one for your content creation days as well.

When we created our last batch of video content we booked a room at a co-working space we are members of so we were in a more inspirational setting and we had a set time frame we had to get our videos recorded in and that really kept us inspired, focused and on track and we created months worth of content in two hours! So, combine tips one and two and you’re definitely onto a winner.

3. Stay accountable to increase your productivity

Now, if you have a membership site you are automatically accountable to your members. They are paying you, you have a contract with them that you will provide content for them in return for their money so you have to do it. If you don’t you’re going to see a decline in members, income and possibly reputation if those members talk, so that should be enough to keep you accountable.

If it’s your website you’re struggling to get motivated to work on think about the ways you are still accountable and I’m not talking about getting an accountability partner and telling them when you’re going to get something done by. You can do that but I find once you get comfortable with that person it’s very easy to make excuses to them and still not get things done.

Think about who you are creating the content for and whether they’re expecting it. If you’re reading this you may already know that we put a blog post out every week. It gets sent out in our weekly email at the same time, 10am (UK time) every Monday morning. That email has a pretty good open rate (actually, it’s very good compared to average open rates) and so that keeps me accountable. I know people are reading my content every week and so I make sure I create it.

When it comes to website updates we want to maintain our reputation. Now, obviously, with what we do it’s important that we practice what we preach. But with any business you want to look good and build or maintain your reputation and so that should be keeping you accountable.

If you’re reading this and it’s not website related tasks you’re struggling to stay to stay on track with then I’m sure all of them have a business reason to keep you accountable to doing them. With my dislike of numbers tasks it’s my accountants’ and HMRC’s deadlines that keep me accountable! But with all my other business tasks it’s the wanting to do the best job possible and wanting provide as well as we can for our family that keep us focused and on top of everything.

So, if you’re having a day where you’re putting something off again, you’re putting the website to the bottom of your list for the umpteenth time, then think about whether you need to just get a bit of headspace, go and sit somewhere else for an hour or two and get focused to get it done. I bet you’ll feel awesome once it is.

If you’re determined to get your website done but you need some content or design inspiration, check out our other blog posts or take a look at our free resources and The Website Handbook.

Photo Credit to The Black Business Vault