It’s hard keeping yourself motivated when you work from home. When you don’t have a boss looking over your shoulder you’re more likely to check Facebook, play Netflix in the background, and make one too many trips to the fridge.
Technology might be your biggest distraction, but it can also be your greatest asset. Use one of the many apps out there to increase your productivity and help you meet your self-imposed deadlines.
Schedule your time effectively
Your solution to your Facebook addiction might be to set a limit on how much time you can browse during work hours. But who is going to enforce that limit? RescueTime allows you to set a productivity goal, and it will block Facebook if you spend too much time on it. This app tracks your time so you don’t have to, and also gives you weekly reports on your productivity so you know where you need to improve.
Communicate with business contacts
The problem with having most of your business contacts on social media sites is that you need to log onto those sites to chat with them, and get distracted on the site itself. Alternatively, you waste time waiting for them to reply to your emails. Slack is an internal messaging tool that is becoming increasingly popular with small businesses. It doesn’t have the distractions that Facebook has, it allows you to communicate with your contacts in real time, and makes it easy to share files.
Save time on phone calls
Sometimes it benefits you to contact your clients directly with a phone call if they don’t seem to be responding to urgent emails. But unlike emails, you don’t have a written record of what was said to refer to at a later time. TapeACall can provide a quick and convenient way to record cell phone calls so that they can be stored for future reference.
Send invoices on time
One of the downsides of working freelance is that there is no guarantee of a monthly paycheck. Invoice2Go enables you to send professional-looking invoices quickly, no matter where you are, ending overlooked billing and forgotten amounts due.
Keeping future employees productive
There will come a time, sooner or later, when you might want to expand your small business. But if your employees also work remotely, how do you keep them productive while they’re on your time? There are many phone monitoring apps for android that can help you track what your employees are doing on their phones while they’re supposed to be working. Apps like Shadow SPY can even track their WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger conversations. If this happens too often, you might have to make some tough decisions; you don’t want to pay someone to slack off.
Schedule some off-time
Since you’re using technology to keep you working, you should also use apps to make sure you have enough time off in the evenings. Overtime does not make you a productive worker, so make sure you finish your work and punch out punctually.
Nancy Baker
Admin
Vitaly Kuprenko