3 Simple Productivity Hacks Worth Reading About

Let's face it. 

We're surrounded by productivity killers.

Any time you sit down to accomplish something your phone is buzzing, your email inbox is growing more and more unruly, and you're certain that the water cooler is actually calling your name. Needless to say, some days it's just really hard to stay focused. 

However, it's no secret that low productivity can easily snowball into a decline in overall business performance.

Honestly, who has time to deal with that?

So if you're ready to get your focus back, keep reading.

Limit meetings

Let's face it, meetings are major time-suckers. In fact, 15% of an organization's collective time is spent in meetings. 

I wouldn't normally pin this as a bad thing if each and every meeting was groundbreaking and uber productive, but truth be told, most of them are not. 

According to an infographic from visual.ly and fuse, executives consider 67% of meetings to be failures. Not to state the obvious, but that's a lot. 

If you're looking to get back some time, consider the benefits of cutting back on the number of meetings you call. While frequent communication and collaboration are critical to the success of any business, there are small consideration that can be made to improve the outcome of your meetings.

For example, setting expectations through an agenda that is sent out in advance will help to ensure that people come prepared with actionable input and a clear understanding of what is to be accomplished. 

Leverage data

The awesome thing about modern marketing initiatives is that they're measurable. The ability to trace a closed deal back to the original tweet is entirely possible with the help of a marketing automation software. 

Having access to these types of insights not only makes it easier for businesses to make quicker decisions, but it also enables them to make smarter decisions. 

Let's say you're tasked with creating blog content to attract and engage your ideal audience. Sound time consuming, huh? 

Rather than spend 3 days writing 3 separate blog posts that generate a collective 500 views, use your analytics to uncover what topics have seen the greatest return in the past. You can then use this information to write one post that is capable of turning up 500 views itself. 

Extracting this type of actionable information also helps to eliminate the time it takes to effectively distribute content. Rather than take the time to post an article to 5 different platforms and only see engagement on two, dig into your analytics to gain a better understanding of which sources are performing best. 

Employ the right tools

The right tools can make all the difference. 

If it feels like you're struggling to keep your head above water at work, there are a number of tools out there designed to help you accomplish more without sacrificing quality. 

Here's a few of our personal favorites...

Trello:

Trello is a project management app that employs interactive "boards" and "cards" to organize any task. 

From a marketing standpoint, we use Trello to host our blog editorial calendar. In an effort to streamline our content creation process, we've organized our calender into 3 boards named after our 3 personas (Holly, Maggie, and Charlie.)

Whenever we turn to the calender to input ideas, we're focused to assign the idea to a persona in an effort to ensure that all of the content we're producing is worth our time.

HubSpot's Sidekick:

Formally known as Signals, HubSpot's Sidekick provides marketers and salespeople with the context they need to carry out more meaningful conversations. For more on how to tool works, check out this video:

Slack:

Slack is an internal communication app that serves as the main platform for all team communication and collaboration in our office.

If someone "misses a memo", it can a substantial impact on the time it takes to get a particular task accomplished. This tool helps us ensure that everyone is on the same page and up to speed in terms of company announcements, events, and responsibilities.