Top Tasks Entrepreneurs Forget About (& how to automate them)
It’s easy to get so busy with the day-to-day of running your business that you forget the CEO things you need to do as an online entrepreneur. And no one likely told you just how many tasks would be involved in running your online business.
All of those tasks that are outside your normal workday start to add up like a big blob of “I have so much stuff to do” — causing anxiety and overwhelm.
What kind of tasks am I referring to?
Tasks like:
support inquiries
reviewing SEO research
testing opt-in forms
updating your copyright notice
updating plugins
…and on and on
All those little things that add up to BIG things if you ignore them long enough.
As the leader of your business (even if you’re leading yourself right now), you need to make sure you’re keeping the admin of your online business tidy so little issues don’t become big problems.
I’m speaking from experience - having gone down the path of barely getting things done many times over.
I knew I needed to come up with a master checklist of these kinds of recurring tasks that are essential and necessary, but not always urgent.
Once I came up with the master list of what I needed to not forget to do, I put all those tasks into my Google Calendar as recurring appointments.
Putting these tasks in my calendar “closes the loop” in my head of all the things I have to make time for. And the less I have to think about my systems, the more brain space and time I have to love on my clients and customers.
Here’s how I accomplish this, step-by-step:
Step 1: Print Out The Checklist
Grab the free Online Business Admin Checklist and print it out. Follow the directions for how to use it and take notes.
Tasks are broken down into weekly, monthly, quarterly, and yearly tasks that you want to make sure and remember.
This checklist includes 43 common (and often forgotten) tasks, but there’s space to add more that are particular to your business.
Step 2: Carve Out Time
I’m a firm believer in “what gets scheduled gets managed”.
Every week I carve out time for admin tasks that are essential to keeping my business running smoothly.
I do this on Fridays, as my “theme” for Fridays is financials and back office (admin) work in my Ideal Work Week.
By having a dedicated workday, I can focus on completing the task and staying focused.
For larger admin tasks that take more than a few hours, I typically pick one of the projects per month or per quarter (depending on how much time it’ll take).
For more on how I use an Ideal Work Week as part of my Theme Day Planning Method, watch the free MAP Process video (it’s only 20 minutes).
Step 3: Automate
To truly systematize and automate these tasks, you can set them up as recurring appointments in your online project management tool and/or your Google Calendar.
Have notifications set up to ping you when those tasks are a week or so out, so you have lead time to schedule them into your week.
If you’re working with a team, those recurring tasks can be automatically assigned (I use Notion for this), so you don’t have to think about them at all.
If you like to know when your team has accomplished those recurring admin tasks, have them notify you or make it part of your regular meetings to update you on those tasks.
