Automate

After you’ve eliminated everything you can eliminate, it’s time to look at automating as much of the remaining tasks as you can. Set up your email with filters to get any regular emails (newsletters, google alerts, non-urgent email from friends and family) out of your inbox, so that it is uncluttered. Half of our wasted time in the inbox is spent wading through and deleting unimportant messages.

Create four or five different “project brief” questionnaires you can send to clients at the beginning of each job to avoid long, drawn-out phone calls and discovery sessions. When they contact you about a new job, send them the appropriate questionnaire with all possible pertinent questions, and only talk to them when they’ve returned it with the information you need to start talking intelligently about the job.

Look for repetitive things that you do on a daily or weekly basis and see if there is a hands-free alternative you can use to save that time.

4HWW for Writers | Automate