80 Productivity Tips From Incredibly Busy Experts

In order to make sure I’m staying as productive as possible, and actually reaching my goals, I create 90 day plans for myself. I decide what 1-3 big goals I want to accomplish in the next 90 days, and then I tackle them by breaking up what I need to do into smaller goals.

I also only focus on two-four weeks at a time. So even though I know what goals I want to accomplish in the next 90 days, I only focus on what I need to do in the next two-four weeks in order to help make that goal happen. It’s less overwhelming that way and if I try to plan out the whole 90 days, things will inevitably change and I’d feel frustrated by having to start my plan all over. So I get to pivot and adjust as I go along by just focusing on a couple weeks at a time.

So say I had a goal to get 1,000 more subscribers on my email list in the next 90 days. I’d decide what I needed to do for the next two-four weeks to help make that happen. Then once I reach the end of those two-four weeks, I’d decide what I need to do for the next two-four weeks to help me reach my goal. And so on.

This helps me stay focused so I’m not jumping around trying a bunch of different things. I know what I want to accomplish, and I break it down into bite-size pieces that I know I can accomplish over the course of two-four weeks. And then, by the end of the 90 days, I’ve been able to reach my goals (or get pretty darn close) because I went about it in a strategic way and stayed focused instead of manically trying a bunch of random tactics and not really getting anywhere.

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Adrienne Smith from AdrienneSmith

I’m a very organized person plus I have a very high work ethic with attention to detail. When I’m working on something I’m very focused so I never really have any distractions unless someone decides to come over without calling, etc. I never keep any programs open while working that don’t have anything to do with what I’m trying to accomplish at the moment.

I write everything down that I need to do for the day in a notebook that I keep on my desk. I do it the old school way, I just find that works best for me. I don’t like everything stored online. I check everything off that I accomplish during the day and then I prepare the next day before I shut things down for the night.

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Sara Arrow from Sark e-Media

My best productivity tip is to time your activities so you know exactly how long it takes to do something. Most people underestimate the time when it comes to online activities and that makes it easier to run out of time! I know that replying to an email is roughly 3 minutes, writing a blog post is 60 minutes, checking Twitter is 15 minutes. This means I can do these tasks when I have enough time. I’d rather have 90 minutes and then start a blog post than try to write one in 30 minutes. Knowing how long it takes to do something is vital to being productive and planning your time accordingly.

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Primoz Bozic from Skyrocket Your Productivity

What helps me get the work done consistently, is making it fun and exciting. TO-DO lists and organizing systems are all great, but if you really want to get something done, you need to be excited about doing it. That’s why I often work from coffee shops and rooftop bars – I love sipping a caramel frappuccino while writing a blog post, and I always look forward to going there.

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Adam Binder from Creative Click Media

One of the best ways I’ve found to hit the ground running is to start by planning the night before. Before I go to bed every night I take ten minutes or so to look over the next day’s projects and other commitments. I ask myself questions like “What appointments can’t be missed?” and “What do I need to have with me for those appointments?” I also rehearse any talking points I may be unsure of and make sure I have all materials I will need ready to go so I’m not scrambling to get ready in the morning.

Next, I prioritize and delegate. I ask myself “What three to five tasks absolutely must get done today?” After deciding what I’ll do first I Look at my to-do list and decide whether any tasks on it can be delegated to someone else, or, even better, crossed off the list altogether.

The busier I anticipate my day will be, the more care and detail I put into the plan. By doing this I waste no time in the morning deciding where to start, or gathering materials. I also feel more confident in my meetings having slept on the plan all night.

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Marc Andre from Profit Blitz

I use a weekly and daily to-do list that helps me to stay on task and always know what I should be working on. At the end of each week I make a list of all the tasks I need to get done during the following week. Then at the end of each day I go through that list and set a to-do list for the next day. If something on my list doesn’t get finished I move it to the next day or the next week.

When I first left my full-time job and started working for myself full-time I found that one of my biggest challenges was knowing exactly what I should be working on and how I should be using my time. I wound up wasting a lot of time or working on things that weren’t important or urgent because I didn’t have a set plan. But once I started using my current system of a weekly and daily to-do list I found that I always knew what needed my attention and I get much more done.

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Ryan Biddulph from Blogging From Paradise

Spending 1 hour daily BEFORE I touch my laptop or tablet, working on my mindset, helps me move into productive, effective action. The old me ran around in paradise like a chicken with its head cut off, doing a bunch, but doing little effectively. The new me sharpens the ax for an hour, before I attempt to cut down the tree. Hone your tools; don’t use force to get the job done, use power.

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Enstine Muki from EnstineMuki

We have too much noise around and that definitely perturbs productivity. I think my best productivity tip is clearing away this noise. This will allow you to focus and the result is a great deal of boosted output.

I’m thinking of social media distraction, Television, mobile phones, friends and families, exposed office environment, etc. It’s quite easy for one to engage in some work with Social Media pages opened, the TV or Radio Set on, without realizing how far these distractions go to slow down progress. Once you create for yourself a more quite and entertainment-free environment, there is inevitably going to be an improvement in productivity.

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Jaime Buckley from Wanted Hero

People think I’m crazy–but the best productivity tip I can think of is having “me” time every morning.
As a father of 12, silence is a luxury – so from 3am to 7am the world and it’s elusive tranquility belongs to me. I use my time to focus, meditate, do some yoga, pray and relax in a hot shower before anyone else in the house wakes up. No rushing, no interruptions and best of all…I can plan my day stress free.

Ideas flow without compulsory means and that allows me to pinpoint the ‘most’ important things to accomplish each day. This habit has consistently helped me exceed my daily goals, while maintaining a happy and empowering work environment.

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Sylviane Nuccio from SylvianeNuccio

I have several productivity tips that I’m trying my best to apply to my day-to-day work, but if I had to give the best one of all, I would say that it’s scheduling tasks on paper.

It doesn’t matter if you use a hard copy notebook or a digital scheduler (use whatever works best for you), but it’s of vital importance that you write each and every task of the day, at least the previous evening.

I am still very much a hand writer, so I like to use hard copy notebooks, because I don’t have to go to a specific window of my computer to look at my notes. They are right there in front of me at all times, and I glance at them often.

This is how I use my schedule:

1) I write the items that need to be taken care of in order of importance.

For example, answering your question today was #2 on my list.

2) I make sure I complete each step before I move on to the next.

At times you’ll be tempted to move on to the next task before you’re finished with what you have on hand, but try not to do that, because it’s a time waster.

3) I check out each step as they are being completed, and make a point to have them all checked out before I go to bed that day.

Consider your day not over, until you’ve completed all your tasks. Once you’re done with your list, you feel great.

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Samar Owais from SamarOwais

Schedule more time for your tasks / projects / deadlines than you think you need. It’s a trick I learned from my iPhone and interestingly, it had nothing to do with my business.

I was saving the details of my daughter’s school concert on my calendar when it asked me how long it would take me to reach my destination. I thought, hey, that’s a useful reminder. But then – and this is where the epiphany happened – it asked me how long before I was scheduled to leave for the concert did I want to be reminded of it?

So not only did I need to plan for the travel time, but I also needed to plan for the time it would take me to get ready. I was shocked to realize that I’d blocked 90 minutes before the concert in all this. 30 minutes to get ready, 30 minutes of travel time, and I wanted to get their 30 minutes early to get decent seats.

I had very unrealistically scheduled client calls during those 90 minutes without realizing I’d run late if I took them. Ever since then, I give myself more time that I think I need for every task that’s on my to-do list.

We tend to fool ourselves into thinking we can do things on time. But life has a way of getting in the way. So do your business a favor and instead of crowding your day with tasks you think you’ll be able to accomplish – just give yourself more time and move a few things from your to-do list to some other day. Your business and clients will thank you for it.

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Andrea Beltrami from The Branded Solopreneur

BATCHING TASKS FOR EFFICIENCY

It’s not multi-tasking that increases productivity it’s planning. Planning is the ‘awesome’ in the secret sauce to success in the context of productivity. Your ability to maximize your time in a day, week, month and year in the most productive ways is directly correlated to your planning prowess.

One way to maximize the power of planning and cut down on the time a task takes is to group similar tasks together. Another words, to batch things up. For instance, I create 1 month worth of blog posts {that 4 posts for me} at a time, which usually takes me around 5 days.

It goes a little something like this:

-I outline all the topics
-I research the SEO
-I write all of the copy
-I schedule the post
-I create all of the visual content
-I create and schedule the blog posts in WordPress
-I setup and schedule the posts on social media
-I write and schedule the emails
-And so on and so forth

Instead of going through this process each week I batch things together and get a month worth of work done in less than a week. This frees up the rest of my month to promote that content, connect and engage with others and tackle the next project on my to do list. Productivity is all about efficiency!

By doing each task in batch mode it allows me to effortlessly stay in a zone (i.e. I need to be in a different mind space to write than I do when designing visual content) and not waste time fluttering between different tasks that require different grooves.

Batching my work and tasks has also helped me create systems and processes for my frequent and repetitive tasks. Systematizing tasks has dramatically decreased the hours it takes me to accomplish things, not to mention it’s quite a bit easier to outsource tasks to an assistant, as there’s now a proven framework to follow.

We all have 24 hours in our day no matter what we do. It’s not about trying to get more hours, it’s about using the ones we have wisely. Efficiency, baby!

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Anthony Metivier from Magnetic Memory Method

My go-to productivity process is time-tracking. It’s an inverse to-do list that shows when I started a task and when I ended it. At the end of the day, I have a clear picture of where my time went and where it needs to go. Without any fancy app and only a journal and a pen, time-tracking creates focus, metrics for analysis and self-accountability. It’s beautiful.

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Christian Karasiewicz from Christian K Online

When I first started blogging about my business, I used to spend a lot of time creating each new post. This led to a lot of wasted time because I would be writing the same sections over and over. Now I have a template that I use whenever I’m starting a new article. This template includes all of the items I normally need to fill in for each new piece of content – title ideas, SEO information, intro, body, conclusion and so on. By using a template this has saved me countless hours in productivity because I don’t have to start from scratch each time and I have more time I can devote to other parts of my business.

Bonus Tip: If you want to make this an even easier process, in addition to creating a template, I also use aText, a TextExpander alternative that let’s me create a keyboard shortcut that populates this information.

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Ankit Oberoi from AdPushup

Asking myself a simple question at the end of each day, every day: “What have I accomplished today?” You are your best critique. So I ask myself this question, put this in a daily log and rate my performance. This helps me in focusing on being more productive.

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Brandon Schaefer from 90 Day Entrepreneur

The best productivity tip that I use in my business is recycling my old content in a strategic manner. This doesn’t mean throwing spaghetti up against the wall… it means having a plan.

For example, when I publish an article on LinkedIn, I’ll share the LinkedIn post on Facebook, Google+, Twitter, and back on LinkedIn as an update. Then, a few weeks later, I’ll go back and share my initial corresponding Google+ post on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter… thus cross-promoting my social channels as well as my legacy content.

By doing this… my audience is constantly being exposed to my other social channels. Most people post on their social channels just looking to drive traffic back to their blog, while I get people to view my content, as well as follow me on my other social channels at the same time.

Think about it for a few minutes… what I’m talking about will sink in… and you’ll get a better understanding of how this strategy will directly benefit your productivity.

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Dennis Seymour from LeapFroggr

Like any entrepreneur, I’ve been experimenting with productivity styles for years! I’ve drowned myself in productivity blog posts, books about habits and even tested endless apps.

Today, I’m pretty much set with my Things app (which syncs to my Mac, iPad and iPhone) combined with a Pomodoro app.

It helps me focus on one thing and get that done!

It doesn’t stop there though, I found out that building a habit before the actual work takes place, makes me focus more and allows me to get more things done.

So I now wake up early and start my routine:
– Brushing my teeth
– Do a 5 Minute Journal entry
– Do a some kind of workout (or 75+ kettlebell swings)
– Brewing my cup of coffee (with blackstrap molasses)
– Meditation (using Headspace at the moment)
– Arrange my task list for the day
– Start the timer and GO!

I’ve come to accept over the years that certain tasks will take the whole day and often times, you won’t finish your task list EVEN if you “WANT” to finish it all.

Realistically, you will only get to finish a few major tasks a day that are directly dependent on your contribution and there’s no need to get depressed. This is why planning something realistic at the start of the day is so important.

Now, going back to the routine, the main reason for this is to condition my mind to get ready. If you do something over and over again, it becomes a habit. This habit basically tells my brain that “It’s time, let’s get it on!” and that helps me focus on the primary tasks for the day. On good days, you can finish the bulk of really important tasks before lunchtime!

PS. No emails until afternoon or night time unless your life depended on it (in most cases, it doesn’t.)

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Mandie Sanders from Rambling Mandie

Be self-aware. Know when your mind is at its sharpest and work on your hardest tasks then. Experts say you’re supposed to start your mornings slowly, but my brain wakes up at full-speed and turns to mush by mid-afternoon, so I’m usually at my computer working by 5am and done by 3.

Speaking of working at computers, there’s a huge correlation between physical activity and brainpower. I find that getting up every hour or two and doing some jumping jacks or crunches – anything to get the blood flowing – really helps with focus and energy.

I also think it’s important to be protective of your down time. I take at least one day a week off completely – no phone, no email and no work I don’t feel like doing. It’s way too easy these days to feel constantly plugged in and that leads to burnout faster than anything.

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Pooja Lohana from Damn Fine Writing

My best productivity tip is to use a simple notepad and follow what it says. Nothing fancy, the good old pen and paper notepad will do. Although I test and work with numerous productivity tools and understand they have their place, those two are the only things I really need. Each evening before I leave my desk for the day, I create a list of 4-6 items in my trusty notepad. I tackle these tasks the next day, in that order (or not). I’ve made this a ritual for my evenings because it saves me from a lot of foggy thinking and make the most of it when my brain is ready in “let’s get this done” mode. Allows me to dive straight into things that matter.

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Darren DeMatas from Intertwine Marketing

My best productivity tip has got to be setting a timer and focusing on a single task at a time.

For a long time, I suffered from Chronic Clicking, a symptom of multitasking. I paid too much attention to my to do list and tried to get it all done. Clicked here. Clicked there. Before I knew it, I spent most of my day clicking around, without accomplishing anything significant.

Looking at a long list of (past due) tasks was not the best way for me to start my day. It caused panic and a great deal of stress. I was micromanaging my tasks, but not managing my time at all.

Recently, I came to the conclusion that I needed to maximize my time. You can’t manage what you can’t track. So before I do anything, I estimate how long I think it will take. Then I use Tick to track my actual time. The next time I have a similar task, like writing a blog post – I try to do it a little faster.

When the timer is running, I only focus on what I am working on. I eliminate all distractions and multitasking temptations. It takes a while to get in the zone, and once I am there I don’t want to be distracted.

Once I hit a wall in productivity, I got serious about my time management. If you want to get more done, you have to figure out what works best for you.

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Harleena Singh from Aha-Now

I use a few productivity tips, so let me share the important ones with you 🙂

My usual workday starts early and I make use of the most creative time, which is early morning. This is also the time when my kids are away at their school and college. Being a mom and homemaker, this works in my favor.

I prioritize my tasks by taking up the ones that need utmost attention, and leave the rest for later. Creating a list the night before of the most important tasks to take up the next morning helps a lot here.

When I work, I block out all kinds of distractions. There are no other tabs open, except the ones I need, which means no social media, no emails – just nothing while I work. Just turn it all off and think, plan and write. You’re fully focused and see results this ways.

Avoid multi-tasking, and take up one task at a time. You’d be able to accomplish it more effectively and efficiently. Of course, this is for any online work! Offline work, being moms, we are known for multi-tasking. 🙂

Take frequent breaks to avoid being overwhelmed and feeling stressed out. Get up and move around, exercise, cook, listen to music – anything to give you a break!

You might like to read my post about how to stay focused.

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Carol Amato from CarolAmato

We’ve all been led to believe that multi-tasking was the way to achieve the most in any given day, and that developing this skill would ensure that we’d achieve higher productivity. Not so! There’s definitely a time and a place for multi-tasking, but not in growing an online business, in my opinion.

The best productivity tip that I use in my business is – doing ONE thing, focusing on that one PRIORITY so as to complete it successfully (with an emphasis on quality), and then going on to the next important task. I think reading “The ONE Thing” by Gary Keller and Jay Papasan is a must.

Bonus Tip: Taking more time off the computer to enjoy life and actually live out my ‘Why’ has been another reason my productivity has skyrocketed. I feel more alive when I come back to the computer, I’m more focused, and my senses are tuned into knocking out the next important task to achieve my goals. The result is a renewed clarity of mind, which only helps me achieve more – while working less.

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Sonia Thompson from TRY Business

My best productivity tip is super old school. It’s a simple, handwritten to-do list. When I have a to-do list that I write out at night, I’m laser focused, and super productive the following day. There’s just something about being able to check off tasks that brings me a sense of satisfaction.

The nightly to-do list works even better when it’s linked to my monthly, and subsequent weekly goals. That way, the tasks that I focus on each day aren’t done in isolation. I do them, knowing how they fit into the bigger picture of what I need to accomplish over the long-term.

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Sarah Peterson from Unsettle

Since I started working for myself, I have found it quite difficult to stay productive all day. But I recently began to use the Pomodoro technique to organize my day and increase my productivity and it really, really works. I’ve found myself more focused in 25 minutes than I ever have been and the amount I get done in a day has increased significantly.

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Brent Jones from Brent Jones Online

The answer for me is simple: write down everything.

Between balancing my freelancing business, blogging, and Internet marketing, many of my days extend well into the morning. There’s a lot to balance, including different projects, deadlines, daily tasks, follow-ups, and more.

While there are a number of digital tools that make many of these to-dos simpler to automate, such as AWeber, Hootsuite, and Google Calendar, there is still much that requires my attention. Without having a notebook to track and prioritize everything that must be done, day-by-day, I would be lost.

I also have a large whiteboard mounted on my home office wall that tracks invoice dates, projects in queue, upcoming deadlines, possible blog topics, etc.

I dedicate a portion of every morning, plus a full hour each week, plus a half-day each month, to carefully plan and write down everything that I have upcoming.

This is my best productivity tip because it frees up mental resources. When you write down everything – and I mean everything, including when to eat, sleep, and exercise – you never have to wonder what to do next, or end up with a deadline sneaking up on you. You simply refer to your plan each day, and then execute. That is it.

There’s no time for thinking when you’re deep in the trenches.

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Kevin Duncan from Be A Better Blogger

It sounds overly simplistic, but the best productivity tip I can give someone is to identify “procrastination” as the enemy, and treat it as such. Or, to put it another way, don’t put off the important things. Do them first. Make them priorities.

If you want to get in shape, exercise right after waking up each day. If you’re creating a product, work on it while drinking your morning cup of coffee. When you do the important things first, when you prioritize them, you strip procrastination of its power.

Procrastination wants you to put off those important things until the next day. And then the next day. And then the next.

Don’t let it. Show procrastination who’s the boss. Roundhouse kick it in the face. Do the important things first each day.

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Paul Back from Earn A Living Blogging

My favorite productivity tips are to use Google Calendar to schedule things to do, as it forces you to keep a schedule. I also like to prepare my social media accounts ahead of time so using postcron.com is a big help.

In my niche it’s pretty smart to use a lot of landing pages, and LeadPages is a tool that I use often. It not only saves me quite a lot of time, but it also gives me a good return on investment. I guess my advice is to find the tools that help you achieve what you need to do, often they are available for free, all it takes is a bit of research and experimentation to find something that will be really useful.

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Peter Banerjea from FreeMind PitStop

Being ‘busy’ and productive are two different things. Therefore, the most important productivity principle I am following right now is the Pareto Principle. To focus on doing only those 20% of activities that add 80% of the value to my business goals.

I make a list of every activity that my business does. If an activity doesn’t add compelling value to my goals, I minimize or eliminate it – not just outsource or delegate. When you actually measure the correct metrics, it’s actually amazing to see how much of your to-do list you can eliminate!

I believe that it`s a lot more meaningful to spend more time with people who matter and do other things we love rather than hang around at work being ‘busy’ over things that don’t add value.

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Matthew Loomis from Build Your Own Blog 

Putting a deadline on everything I do. Then doing everything I can to meet the deadline.

This applies to even the most routine things in my day. For example, when I check email, I’ll set a time deadline, and use a timer to make sure I stick to it.

Setting a self-imposed deadline is really important to productivity. The deadline becomes a goal to achieve. This helps me avoid distractions. Like when it’s time to do something social media related, I’ll have my task and the purpose of the task down on paper, and then I set a deadline to get it done, which helps me stay away from the social media rabbit trails that so easily waste our time.

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Fabrizio Van Marciano from Magnet4Blogging

The best thing I started doing this year was to stop trying to multitask! Multitasking sucks and if anyone has read The One Thing by Gary Keller, they’ll appreciate why. This was what was happening to me, I was trying to focus on 5 or 6 goals throughout the week and you know what? I was lucky if I accomplished anyone of them.

When your attention is divided on multiple objectives, you not only make mistakes, but you also lose interest and enthusiasm.Your focus and clarity is on too many things. The result is that your productivity goes out of the window, and after a while of doing this you can become stagnant.

My productivity tip is to focus on nothing each week but one goal, one aim, one objective, one mission. Whether your goal is to create an amazing blog post, or record an awesome video, or start writing an eBook, or to prepare for a product launch, it doesn’t matter what it is, do nothing but work on completing that one goal, that one thing!

With no other obstacles or tasks to clutter your mind, you’ll feel a lot more focused and motivated for being productive and reaching your one goal each week, I truly believe that’s how I’m able to make ‘real’ progress in my business.

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Deborah Tutnauer from DeborahTutnauer

Have you ever noticed that there is never even the thought of procrastination in a life or death situation? In emergencies, we act. We don’t sit and contemplate, nor do we shy away from the tasks at hand by filling the time with more mundane activities. We focus and we do what must be done, or at least the best that we can do. A dear friend of mine and his daughter were trekking in Nepal, just one stop away from their final destination of the Everest Base Camp, when the earthquake and subsequent EBC avalanche occurred. My friend is one of the medical tour guides for a US based adventure company. You can bet that there was no procrastination – no “just a moment while I enjoy these glacier lily’s” – no “I’d like to finish cleaning my toenails before we hike down”. There was only intensely focused deliberation on the best and safest course of action and then engagement.

I teach that procrastination is an outcome that develops from lack of purpose and passion, or from fear. When you take the time to look at the seeds of your own procrastinating behavior, you will notice that it does not occur in times of passion, joy, or engagement in the intense experience of psychological peak flow. Procrastination instead occurs when we are faced with tasks that hold low interest, or that trigger emotions of fear, dread or boredom. When the activity in front of you opens a channel to old stories– when it elicits fears, whether conscious or sub-conscious – it is easy to stall and justify it!

Thus, you can learn all types of techniques for preventing or breaking through habits of procrastination, but the reality is that those are just Band-Aids for the truth of the issue. The real cure for procrastination is to live a life of clarity and purpose and to break through old stories and fears that result in stalling behavior. Once that is your foundation, even mundane related tasks can be approached and accomplished without delay. It is that simple and yet that challenging and profound!

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Brandon Yanofsky from WP Radius

I find I am most productive in my business when I am comfortable. For me, that means moving around all day. I’ll work a few hours at a coffee shop, then go home and work, then go to my mother`s house for a bit.

I also wake up at 4:30 every morning and go to the gym, eat breakfast, and start the morning with something fun. For me that is doing some coding. Those few extra hours each morning really start adding up.

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Lauren Tharp from LittleZotz Writing

What’s my best productivity tip? This might sound like I’m dishing out advice on Opposite Day, but I’ve honestly found that the best thing I’ve ever done for my productivity is taking days off. Each week, I try to take at least one full day off. And it’s done wonders for my productivity, and my health in general.

As a freelancer, it can be all too easy to fall into a pattern of non-stop work. After all, when we don’t work, we don’t get paid – so why wouldn’t we work as much as possible? And, believe me, I’ve been there! I’ve gone up to three months without a single day off several times. And, in 2013, I went the full year without socializing with anyone offline!

For a while, it’s pretty awesome. You feel productive and like you’re really making strides forward in your career. But, you will get burned out. It took me a long time to reach that point, but, when I did, I realized that not only was I feeling terrible (mentally and physically), the quality of my work had also taken a hit.

Starting in September 2014, I made it a mandatory part of my workweek to take a day off. And you know what? I’m more productive than ever! I get more done for more money with less actual work and way less stress. And if that’s not living the freelance dream, I don’t know what is!

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Codrut Turcanu from CodrutTurcanu

Expert roundup blog posts play a key role in my Internet activity.

I use them to connect with top bloggers, niche experts and key influencers in the field.

This type of content is great for leveraging other people’s traffic, connections and more importantly, their know-how and insights.

For me to keep up with the hundreds of daily emails I manage, and constant read of responses, I have to manage my energy levels — not just time.

It hurts the eyes to stay up till the midnight (and sometimes by 3 a.m.)

That’s why I make an effort to wake up at 5 a.m. no matter what — when I’m the freshest for this type of work.

This is my productivity secret, it’s what works for me, and it may work for you too.

Enjoy and follow me on Twitter if you like what I’m doing.

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Nathan Ambrose from NathanAmbrose

A great productivity tip that I’ve been using for several years is mind mapping, often referred to as brainstorming.

The objective is to have the key idea on paper (or on a screen) with sub-ideas etc. extending from it. It’s a very quick and efficient way of taking and organizing notes. Points can be moved about easily, and everything can be seen simultaneously in context.

An example of how I used one recently is in my post How to Write Quality Targeted Content to Win Better Clients.

Mind maps are not only great for organizing ideas for myself or clients. They make all sorts of presentations much easier, and for public speaking they promote extemporaneous speaking instead of being tied to notes. As a result, audience contact is much improved. Their flexibility also enables me to leave points out or vary the time I spend on each, due to the whole context being seen at once.

As a productivity tip, I recommend mind mapping very highly. It has benefitted me for years, some clients that I’ve created them for, and friends that I’ve taught.

Use them to save time and improve presentation.

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Andrew Warner from Shade Of Info

I have several productivity tips but I’ll share two with you today. The first tip I have is that I work on multiple blog posts at once. The reason for this is that I don’t get fatigued on any one particular topic and can interchange them whenever I feel as though I can’t write any more about it at the moment. At times, I may be working on 5 posts at once in a day. And even though it may seem counterproductive, it actually works for me and helps my creativity.

The second productivity tip I have, and that compliments the first tip I shared, is that I time myself. I know a lot of people have talked about working in allotted time slots. Meaning, setting a specific amount of time to do something and don’t stop doing it until that allotted time is up. For example, I might spend 30 minutes working exclusively on a blog post then when that time expires, I may spend 60 minutes on promotion. Then 25 minutes visiting other blog and then another 60 minutes on blog posts.

But rather than any online tools, I just use a regular stopwatch.

This is something I do on a daily basis — and it works for me.

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Ash Read from GetNudge

Plan your day. As an entrepreneur you always have an ever-growing to do list, bouncing between tasks can be a huge issue when it comes to productivity. In order to remain productive throughout the day I plan out my tasks using my calendar in advance – allowing allotted periods of time for each job on my list and small amounts of time for unscheduled work like answering emails or tweets.

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Barry Moore from The Active Marketer

Know your personal rhythm. There are certain hours of the day when you are the most productive, Golden Hours, I call them. A golden hour is worth two or three of your less productive hours. Make sure you aren’t wasting them with non-productive tasks like email. Mine are in the morning so I block those out and make sure I am using them on the most important tasks, like content creation. I don’t even look at my email before 11:00 am, because I know it is a time thief, do the most important things first.

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Jason Will from ZipKick

Minimize the number of meetings you accept by asking qualifying questions. For example:
– What’s the purpose of this meeting?
– Who will be involved?
– Can we handle this via email?

Also, ask yourself if the timing is appropriate based on the company’s direction. Time is something you cannot replace so make the most of it.

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David Amerland from DavidAmerland

In my kind of work everything appears to be priority. Analysis reports need to be written to guide large investment initiatives, books need to be finished, book proposals need to be started, articles have deadlines and client strategy sessions require my attention. In the meantime research papers continue to pile up, waiting to be read and content for my own website needs to be written. It is easy to become overwhelmed, lose focus and let things spin out of control. The only way I manage to remain on top of everything is by making sure I start the day by completing on thing on my list. It creates the right frame of mind in terms of retaining control and being productive and it rubs off on the rest of the day and helps me maintain my focus.

It’s a strategy that’s evolved with trial and error over the years as my workload has increased, what I do has become more and more fragmented and yet the hours available in each day have perversely remained the same. I’ve found that creating the mindset that gives you a total sense of control is more important than putting in place complex strategies or using a long list of productivity tools. The day is likely to become challenging, unexpected issues will come up and distraction on my time and attention will happen. No tool is really prepared to help you deal with all that. A prepared mid however, that feels that it is in control, takes all of this in its stride.”

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Matthew Capala from Search Decoder

My number one productivity hack involves decluttering. To me being productive doesn’t mean working faster, rather it’s about your ability to slow down (especially when you get busy), intensifying your focus around a couple of key objectives. First, I identify the 20% of my business ventures that generate 80% of my revenue and then emphasize these activities out of all proportions. Second, I invest in new ventures. Not the other way around. Ultimately, you will need to say ‘no’ to a lot of things to be able to say ‘yes’ to the projects that will maximize your efforts. Saying ‘no’ and ‘tune off’ often to declutter your day to make room for the couple things you want to accomplish that day is both art and science; it’s where productivity flourishes.

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Erlend Bakke from You Will Never Work Again

It´s the daily update!

Get your key people to send you a daily update every day. This holds them accountable to themselves and yourself.

At the end of the day they need to send you the date + hours worked,
and then answer three questions:
1. What I did today
2. Challenges I encountered
3. Questions I have for you

This strategy saved me 20 hours a week!

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Jomer Gregorio from CJG Digital Marketing

Here’s what I personally do and have my staffs follow it as well.

1. Create categories for each tasks you must do, i.e accounting, operation, sales, marketing, etc.
2. Jot down each tasks for each categories and number them according to their importance
3. Do the most important tasks and prioritize them until it’s done. Proceed to the other lesser important tasks and so on.

I want to be very clear that this method is not mine. I developed it overtime by listening to self-development leaders like Earl Nightingale, Brian Tracy, Napoleon hill, etc.

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Drew Briney from A New Breed Of Dragon

I’m an attorney by profession, an author by passion, and a juggler by moonlight.  And I have a very large family.  Keeping myself at optimal efficiency is probably the most challenging part of my life.  I’m sold on Stephen Covey’s “First Things First” principle but Tony Robbins recently shifted how I apply that principle at work.  Tony encourages us spend an hour every day sharpening our saws by feeding our mind, body, and soul.  This “Hour of Power” is similar to Covey’s first things first principle – but Tony places personal fulfillment as the first priority of the day.  That is the opposite of what I once understood from Covey’s teaching.

Shockingly, I make more money as an attorney than I do as an author.  In light of that fact, pragmatic considerations suggested that a first things first strategy required putting my legal practice before my writing passion.  For years, I wrote books only after my attorney work was finished for the day.  Recently, I converted to Tony’s methodology by writing first thing in the morning (because it fills my soul) and then working on legal work afterwards (a la John Grisham).  That decision massively impacted my productivity.  Not only did I write an entire sci-fi-fantasy novel in roughly four months, I found that I was getting more work done at the office as well.  Why?

There were some pragmatic reasons: it is difficult to be creative after dealing with disgruntled clients suffering through some of life’s greatest challenges and it isn’t exactly easy to write fluid, happy prose after drafting argumentative, aggressive legalese.  But there was something more primeval at play: by first filling my happiness cup through writing, I was better able to plow through the difficult challenges of my law practice.  I’ve increased productivity at the law office.  But now I’m writing more and I’m happier.

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Luke Jordan from Intergeek

My favorite productivity tip is one that has born out of my own hatred for losing – be jealous of your competition.

In blogging, everyone is friendly with one another, regardless of the fact we’re competing. I love making friends with new bloggers online, and I’m always super happy when I see them doing well…but it doesn’t mean I’m not envious of their success, because I really am. I use this envy to consistently motivate me to do better.

By monitoring metrics like backlinks and social followings of my competitors, along with looking at any other stats they talk about in their posts such as subscriber counts or Analytics data, I can set myself targets to overtake people.

Each time I reach the goals that I’ve set, I feel a little bit smug for about 5 minutes…before sighting my next targets. There’ll always be someone outperforming you, so make sure you’re doing all that you can to catch up and overtake them.

 

Conclusion

If you are here, you have probably not read the whole list of productivity tips from the experts.

And I totally understand, because that is a HUGE collection of productivity tips, right?

I would strongly advice you to bookmark this page for future reference. Because these productivity tips can help you to create more time and money in your life and business.

However, as Napoleon Hill said: “Knowledge is not power. Application of knowledge is power.”

It doesn`t matter if you know all the best productivity tips, if you don`t IMPLEMENT them.

I know that this post includes a truckload of productivity tips and it may seem a bit overwhelming.

Relax and breathe.

I will suggest that you pick 1 productivity tip that you aren`t already using in your life, and implement it today.

Apply the new tip for a week and then come back here and let me know how that worked out. I would love to know.

What is your experience with creating more time in your life?

What did you do with the extra time?

 

Here`s what to do next…

Do you want this post with the 80 awesome experts as a PDF file?

Clicking on the image below to get the PDF file + my free eBook “Insane Productivity Hacks” showing you a step-by-step system to DOUBLE your productivity in 7 days.

About Tor Refsland
I help online entrepreneurs NETWORK with influencers and position their BRAND so they can attract the right CLIENTS fast. Award-winning blogger.

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