If you are anything like the rest of us, then you have been through your share of tools in your online business.

And you probably discovered that a lot of them were not only unnecessary in the end, but they drove up your expenses and added a lot more complexity to your life.

One of the major reasons why a lot of people don’t find success online is that in an effort to make their businesses better, they create complex systems which make it nearly impossible for them to not only do everything that has to be done every day to keep the operation going, but also find time to figure out ways to expand and grow the business.

They buy a lot of very nice, but usually unnecessary tools purely based on the hype around the product, and instead of helping to make things easier for themselves, they merely introduce even more complexity to their businesses, which ultimately results in failure.

As a savvy marketer, it’s important that you evaluate the way you do things, and start simplifying your online business so that you can start to see your profits soar.

Yes, it’s possible to make more money by doing (and buying) less. This post is going to outline a few effective methods that you can use to implement this concept in your own business.

After all, even if you get one tool today, the next day there’s going to be another newer, better one coming out with awesome unique features at cool prices… It never ends.

And while some of the tools can be great for your business, other tools actually do so much that they can be overwhelming.

And in a business where you already have a thousand and one decisions to make, why create more stress for yourself?

The point here is that there are easy ways to simplify the way you do things in your business while increasing your profits at the same time.

Get Started Simplifying Your Business

As a business owner, it’s always great to get new ideas, but also it’s important to realize that your business is a collection of systems.

Systems are just processes or procedures. This could be something that is automated using software or something human-powered – but either way, it’s still a system.

Business Owners Have To Do These Two Things:

• Periodically ask yourself if certain systems in your business are really necessary. If there is any system that isn’t routinely providing the desired results, then you need to analyze it and determine what the constraint is.
• So the next question to ask yourself is, ‘What is it that’s holding a particular system back?’

Put these to work in your business.

Look at the things you’re doing as well as the tools that you’re doing them with.

If a tool has a lot of moving parts but doesn’t give great results:

• Can you do without it?
• Or is there a simpler alternative?
• Are you using some ‘middleman’ services that can actually be cut out?
• Maybe you’re paying a monthly membership for things that you don’t even need?

Look at all these areas in your business and determine where a change might be needed.

Make a list of all the tools that you’re using in each and every aspect of your marketing, from content marketing to email marketing, and any other element of your overall digital marketing strategy.

For instance, take a look at your email host:

• Does it have all the features that are important to your business goals?
• Is it designed to be simple to use?
• Are there extra features that you’re paying for that you don’t want or need?
• Could you benefit from a different plan?

This process is something that you need to do on a regular basis in your business.

And after you’ve determined which tools are absolutely necessary to run and grow your business, then it’s time to determine when you might actually need to buy new tools.

Just because we’re simplifying doesn’t mean that you should never ever buy cool new tools if they can bring real results to your business.

It just means that you should not confuse buying new tools for your business with actually taking action ON your business. You need to know when to buy new tools, and when to ignore the hype.

Remember, tools are not success factors. They don’t do the heavy lifting – you do.

The tool is just there to help make everything a little easier for you, and it’s what you do with the tool that determines if it makes sense in your business or not.

The same tool in different hands will obviously produce vastly different results.

Your business’s fundamentals are what determines if the tool will do you any good, which means that when deciding whether to buy new business or marketing tools, you need to look INWARD at your own operation, and not at the tool’s marketing.

Ask Yourself These Questions:

• Will this tool solve an immediate problem in my business?
• Is this a tool I can use instantly, or am I just getting it for later?
• Are any other complexities going to be introduced by the use of this tool?

Getting a new tool simply because it’s better than the one you’re currently using isn’t always a good idea.

Ask yourself these questions before replacing any tools in your business:

• Is the existing setup broken?
• Is the transition from the old tool to the new one going to cost a lot in terms of time or money?
• Is the new tool making things more complex for you, or simpler?

If you cannot answer these three questions in a way that is definitive, then don’t buy the tool.

When it comes to your business and marketing, you need to stop listening to the gurus who are ever touting incredible new tools and become your own compass.

Never buy a tool based solely on its marketing.

You must ground yourself in your business’s own reality, and calmly determine whether you will be able to use that new tool in ways that make it worth your time and money.

Regularly Stop And Analyze The Situation

Whenever things in your business start to get a bit complicated, you know it’s time to stop and analyze your assumptions.

When it comes to building and growing a successful online business, real power comes with simplicity. Diving into complex systems in business and marketing isn’t necessarily smarter.

It often leads to stalling in growth.

The way to fast-track your growth is to simplify your processes so that you can do more, do it quicker, and do it better.

Take Apple, for instance. This company has grown to such amazing heights today because they chose to focus on a few products, but they did those extremely well.

This is something that you should absolutely consider doing in your own business because it’s simple, and there are fewer decisions to make which means that you can really excel at your core mission.

Apply This Concept To Your Blogging Process

This concept of simplifying things doesn’t just apply to your tools, it’s also something that you can apply to your writing process.

As bloggers, we know that coming up with our best content takes lots of time, and sometimes we end up relegating things to the next day, week, or we simply throw together a quick article just to be able to post something to the blog.

This is not how you want to do things if you hope to succeed online.

You need a consistent blogging schedule that you will follow so that you don’t miss out on opportunities to build trust with your target audience, set yourself up as an authority in your niche, and to get those coveted social media shares and other marketing opportunities that come with the regular creation of great content.

Blogging is a vital aspect of your overall marketing strategy as it lets you build a community that is centered around your business and ideas.

This ultimately translates to even more attention to your work, and more profits in your pocket.

It’s possible to publish awesome content consistently, even on a busy schedule – all you need is the right system.

Here are 3 Ways In Which You Can Make Your Blogging Process Simpler:

1. Keep Your Post Writing Separate From Your Topic Brainstorming

If you have to start from scratch and brainstorm topics each and every time that you sit down to write, then you’re going to have a lot of problems.

That just invites a lot of frustration and results in writer’s block.

Instead of starting with a blank screen each time you need to craft a blog post, make things a lot easier for yourself by creating a list of possible future topics that you can write about.

This is something that you need to do separately because the structured process that you use to outline, write, and proofread your blog posts is very different from the free-flowing and creative nature of a topic brainstorming session.

So never do your brainstorming at the same time that you write as that is a sure recipe for disaster.

Schedule a recurring appointment with yourself each month or even once every quarter (depending on how often you post to your blog) where you can create your editorial calendar and brainstorm enough topic ideas for your blog posts and content themes for the entire month, etc.

Now when you sit to write your posts, your topics will be all cued up before you begin.

2. Create A Template To Help You Create Post Outlines Quickly

Taking the time to outline a post before writing it may seem like a whole lot of unnecessary extra time commitment, but unless you’re a professional writer who can craft spectacular blog posts in record time, then you will probably find that this helps you to create better content that is not only well-written and packed full of value, but that also takes a lot less time to edit later.

When creating your outline, begin with a blank document with these five headings:

• Introduction
• 2 or 3 main points
• Clarify Solution
• Examples or Evidence
• Conclusion (or call to action)

Check your editorial calendar and start writing down some ideas for each of those five sections to help you round out your ideas on the topic.

The main thing to focus on is ensuring that you provide valuable and useful information to your readers, and to craft a compelling call to action to increase conversions.

3. Keep The Blogging System Running By Creating Recurring Tasks

If you publish blog posts each Tuesday, Monday evening seems to come all too quickly, doesn’t it?

If you want to avoid all that last minute panic when it comes to creating your blog content, then you need a solid set of recurring blogging tasks that will help you solve that problem once and for all.

The first thing you need to do is to pick a day during the week where you check your editorial calendar and confirm the topic for the blog post that you are going to create and publish the following week.

Set this task to recur weekly by adding it to the software you use for managing your projects.

Do something similar for all your other blogging-related activities.

Select a time and set another recurring appointment so that you can do the following:

• Write your outline
• Create your final post
• Proofread your post
• Create or source images
• Upload the final blog post to your site
• Schedule your social media updates
• Contact the people mentioned in your post And so on…

In Conclusion

Another advantage of having a set blogging system is that you will be able to easily spot areas where you can outsource tasks or batch them together based on your time commitments and your preferences.

Use this post as a guide to help you create systems that are easy to implement and follow so that you can make every aspect of your blogging business a whole lot simpler starting right now.

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PlanetBizOp.com

->Steven

Updated: Originally published October 24th 2018