3 Ideas For Making Your Small Business Run More Efficiently

Any successful CEO will tell you that in the business industry, the key to success is efficiency. For your company to be successful, it needs to make the best use of the its resources. If you want your small business to grow and become a leading brand, you need to do everything possible to be productive and efficient. Your attention also needs to be focused on the 20% of tasks that matter, not the 80% of daily tasks that won’t help you achieve success.

Many small business owners forget just how precious time is when you’re running a new company. While being efficient is important for all businesses, for small businesses it’s crucial. This is because the smaller your business, the less money, and resources you’ll have.

To help you give your small business an efficiency boost, here are some ideas to take note of.

Outsource

The chances are that your company only has a couple of employees – or may just be run by you, which means that time is of the essence. Think about how you can save time, so that you can get all the important tasks, like building your customer base, done. You shouldn’t be focusing on those pesky daily tasks, like accounting and admin, your time should be spent on the important things.

For those time-consuming daily tasks, the best answer is to outsource. You don’t have the time to deal with all the little things, so the answer is to pay another company to do them. Yes, this may seem costly, but, in the long run, it will significantly improve the efficiency of your business, so it is worth doing. The more tasks you outsource, the better, as this will give you plenty of time to focus on growing your company.

Have supplies delivered to your door

Many small business owners opt to buy their office supplies from their local store. However, to save yourself time, as well as money, it’s a good idea to switch to online ordering. You’ll find that by buying your paper, ink cartridges, and pens online, you’ll save yourself a lot of time and money.

The good news is that today, you can pick up anything and everything online. So no matter what you need, from ink refills to stamps, you can order them online. For some fantastic deals on stamps, check out OnlineStamp.net. For other supplies, shop around online, until you find the cheapest place to buy from. Some online stores provide incentives for small businesses as well, such as a discount on frequently purchased items.

Use a planner to boost productivity

You’ll find that you’re more productive at work if you plan out your goals for each day in an organizer. While you could use a smartphone app, using a planner tends to be a better option. We tend to remember more too when writing things down with a pen on paper rather than entering it in an app as our brains process information differently when writing by hand.  Plus if your phone were lost or stolen,  or you were somewhere and lost battery power, you’d still have your to-do lists and daily tasks, noted in your planner.

As well as writing each task down in your planner, it’s also a good idea to pop in an allotted amount of time. That way, you know how long you should be spending on each task, and it will keep you focused on a particular task for a certain amount of time. This will help to boost your productivity levels and make your company more efficient. And don’t forget to allot yourself time for breaks. Taking some time to breath and get up and move around for a few minutes also helps with overall productivity and creativity.

To boost your company’s efficiency, look at where you can save time and money. If there are processes that can be done by someone else or with improved methods take advantage of it. As the business owner your time is better spent on things that will help you achieve your goals and vision.

Photo Credit: Getty Images