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As a small business owner or entrepreneur, you tend to wear many different hats (👋 hello operations and fulfillment! Wait, I’m in charge of marketing too?!). This is why saving yourself time however and whenever you can becomes so crucial. These are some of the best time-saving tips for busy entrepreneurs that will give you some time back in your day, week, or month (hell, your year). Let’s reinvent the hustle, ditch the “busy is not a badge of honor”. You need to be productive & efficient too (save time & money).

1. Email Templates

If you’re constantly getting emails with the same questions, it’s time to write an email template. I love creating a canned response in Gmail and I just fill in their name and personalize it, but the bones to the whole answer are there. This is also perfect for standardized customer service emails and client onboarding (if you don’t have an onboarding workflow built out in Dubsado yet), email templates can save you so much time. Gmail, in particular, makes it super easy to save templates and easily reuse them whenever you need them.

2. Project Management Templates

I talk a lot about project management tools, like ClickUp, and for a good reason. First, I’m obsessed with ClickUp and how much time it saves me (and my clients), but most of all, how customizable it truly is to fitting you and your business. Project Management tools are the best way to organize your business, your projects, and your tasks. Some use Trello or Asana. Overall, one of the best things about a project management system like ClickUp is creating templates for your most common or recurring projects.

Here are a couple of examples of when these templates really work:

• Publish a new podcast episode every week? Make your subtasks into a template!
• Regularly publish new blog posts? Create a template for your subtasks!
• Have a team you need to keep track of their time and their projects! Create a template and workflow! (A Dashboard to keep everything in one easy to reach spot).

You can then even create automations within ClickUp to attach that template! Hello, timesaver!

3. Batch Your Work

If you do a variety of different tasks, like most entrepreneurs, batching your work will not only help you become more productive but will keep you sane. It’s hard to jump from task to task, and batching will help you accomplish so much more in less time.

Think social media content (I like doing two-week batches of content and copy), Reels or TikToks (record one day, spread out over your desired timeframe), Pinterest (batch your blogs and Pins for the month and schedule it out).

What else can you batch? 🤔

Move all of your tasks that involve the same client or system into one batch of time. Opening and closing different systems can make you break focus, whereas if you get them all done at once, it’ll save you tons of time.

4. Scheduling Meetings and Appointments

If you feel like your days are constantly broken up with meetings or appointments, try only allowing them to be scheduled on certain days, like only Wednesdays and Thursdays. I keep client meetings to one day per week, and I schedule team meetings & discovery calls on a different day. This leaves me with 3 days that I can focus on client work, the backend of my business, and playing hooky if I want (it’s your business enjoy your time).

5. Automations

Pretty much anything that is recurring can be automated. One automation might save you a few seconds, but that number can grow quite a bit over time. I love using Zapier (which is a bridge that links two different apps together), but you can use Automate.io with great results too.

6. Take Breaks Throughout the Day

Make sure you take breaks throughout the day, especially if you work from home on a computer. I was 100% full steam when I first started my business. I didn’t want to take breaks (I usually didn’t eat until dinner and then I went back to work. I became burnt the f*ck out). Set a timer to remind yourself to stretch your legs and take breaks. I schedule my breaks and lunch right into my Google Calendar with reminders sent to my phone so I stick to them. Breaks lead to productivity. Remember to rest. Sitting at a computer all day can take its toll, so you should also make sure you have a good ergonomic chair.

7. Get Rid of Interruptions

If you get distracted easily, it’s time to minimize distractions. Close out any unneeded browser tabs (or hide them) and shut off your phone notifications. When it comes to browser tabs, I love Google Chrome’s tab feature to move several tabs into one and label it. It’s incredible how much more productive you can be when you aren’t constantly distracted by your phone going off.

8. Figure Out When You Are Most Productive

Most people are more productive at a specific part of the day. You might be a morning person, or maybe you get your second burst of energy in the mid-afternoon. Perhaps your brain won’t quit when you hit 10 PM and the house is quiet. Knowing when you are most productive can help you tackle your biggest or most important tasks during that timeframe. (If you get really into it, check out cycle syncing your work with your flow. Game Changer.)

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