You’ve got a lot on your plate at work. When there are so many things that demand your time, it’s easy to let some of that other stuff fall to the bottom of your list. That’s not good.
Those things are on your list for a reason. If you put them off for too long, your business will end up suffering.
The solution is to automate as many tasks as you can so you don’t have to spend time doing them yourself. Here are five tasks you should automate right now so they never fall to the bottom of your to-do list again.
GRC Software
Governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) is extremely important. It not only ensures your company is operating at peak efficiency, it also ensures you are following regulatory requirements. Without it, your business is going to shut its doors a lot sooner than you ever imagined.
A lot goes into making sure your business is compliant. It involves cross-departmental communication, the implementation of risk mitigation, and much more. You could hire a full-time person to keep track of it all and they still wouldn’t have enough time!
The solution is an automated GRC program. You’ll still have to hold regular meetings to ensure everything is going as it should, but automating the process can help you manage work paper, scheduled tasks, reporting, and much more without taking any extra time out of your day.
Online Marketing
There are many ways to market your business. In the old days, it was all about newspaper and radio ads. Those are still options today, but if you really want to reach your target audience, you have to do online marketing.
The trouble is, there are so many marketing strategies that take up so much time! For example, a good online marketing strategy includes:
- Content marketing
- Social media marketing
- Email marketing
- Pay per click advertising
- Search engine optimization
Fortunately, you don’t have to do it all manually. If you did, that’s all you’d end up doing all day long! There are plenty of marketing automation tools that will help you get it all done in less time than you think.
Website Form Autofill
If you spend a lot of time at the computer, you probably spend a lot of time filling out forms. It can get really repetitive to fill in the same information over and over again, not to mention, it can waste a lot of time.
Instead, enable the autofill function on your computer or mobile device. That way, all the fields populate automatically.
Even if you don’t fill out lots of forms online, you can still benefit from this technique. That’s because you can also enable the autofill function for website logins. You’ll won’t have to enter your username or try and remember your password every time you log in to important sites you need for work.
Computer Backups and Maintenance
You’re just asking for trouble if you don’t backup your computer. When your hard drive fails, and it will eventually, everything that’s on your computer will go with it.
Backing up your computer can be a lengthy process if you do it manually. It can slow down your computer or it might require you not to use your computer at all during the backup process.
Instead, automate the backup process to be done when you aren’t at your computer. You can also save a lot of time and prevent yourself from forgetting to run maintenance and antivirus software by automating it as well.
Accounting and Invoicing
Accounting and invoicing used to be the bane of every business owner’s existence. It meant storing receipts, cataloguing, and organizing payments by hand. Computer programs today make all that unnecessary.
By using a program like QuickBooks, you never have to enter information manually again. These programs can automatically keep track of money going out, money coming in, and they can even include automated invoicing services. Many of these programs also make it possible for small businesses to keep track of payroll information without the need to hire a payroll professional.
Chances are, you didn’t get into business because you were excited at the idea of backing up your computer every weekend and organizing third-party vendor receipts. If you want to spend more time on the things that are most important to your business, and less time on all the nitty gritty stuff, follow these five tips that will have you automating business tasks like a pro.
