Eeeek, you’ve SO many deadlines and your creative business feels like it is utter chaos and you’re really struggling to know what to do? Am I right? Well, I think that you need to add some time management into your creative business to ensure that you can focus your time appropriately. More time spent effectively within your business means less overwhelm altogether.

1: Get planning your weeks

Get yourself a weekly planner, diary, desk planner. Whatever works best for you. I personally love a paper desk planner that I can scribble off tasks that I’ve completed alongside ripping the page out week-by-week. Ensure that you set yourself a time on a weekend (I do a Sunday evening) to plan your week ahead. Not only will it ensure that you are prepared physically, but mentally too. There’s nothing worse than having work dread when it is within your own creative business.

2: Manage your Clients/Orders

This is a really important one because these are your bread and butter but you also don’t want to be spending too long on each project/order. Time yourself to see how long you’re taking for each client or order. If it’s taking too long then you need to streamline your processes. Furthermore, you also need to be able to clearly see what clients you have and when they’re due to start/finish/dispatch date. I use a whiteboard alongside Trello. My whiteboard allows me to visually see everyday as soon as I enter my work space what clients I have and when they’re due to complete. I also LOVE to swipe after I have finished working with them, it makes me feel a little accomplished!

On the other hand, Trello helps me to manage my workload WITH my clients. They can see where we are at and at what stage. They can also see dates and have their own timeline to go by as well. Overall, this helps both my clients and myself to work more efficiently.

3: Batching

One of the best things that I started to do was to batch my ‘admin’ – this includes social media marketing, blogging and emails. Why? Because actually, I don’t enjoy ‘some’ of the marketing strategies that I have and as there is only one of me it also means that I HAVE to sit down and get it done. Once its done… it’s done for the month. I spend one day a month just batch writing and designing everything for the month ahead. It feels like a chore but without that I simply wouldn’t have the motivation.

No motivation = no marketing. No marketing = no sales.

Do you see the vicious circle?

I hope that I have helped you to think of ways that could help you time manage effectively within your creative business. I know that it’s tough to sometimes find the oomph to get there but I promise you, once you have a set routine your business will begin to soar.