Entrepreneurs need all the help they can to get their startups up and running. Friends and family lend a helping hand, and an arsenals of tools make development possible. There’s one tool, in particular, you should be using as an entrepreneur, and that’s an online calendar.
Your time is your greatest asset when starting a business. The better you wield it, the more you’ll be able to accomplish. You’re already a step behind if you’re not utilizing an online calendar in the following ways:
Maximize Your Time
It’s easy to get sidetracked from one project to the next with so many things to do. Even if everything you’re doing is good, a concentrated effort will maximize the time you spend working on your startup. Focus on chopping down one tree at a time rather than hacking away at a dozen of them simultaneously.
Maximizing your time is especially difficult — but important in the early stages. Your startup will likely start as a side gig that needs to grow in order for you to justify making it a full-time occupation. Using your online calendar, schedule time to focus on your side hustle to help it grow. Otherwise, your startup will be left on the back burner and won’t get anywhere.
You can make the most of your time by setting goals and developing plans of action. To make your goals and plan actionable, lay them out in your online calendar with deadlines for completing tasks and gauging your progress.
Nail Your Meetings
You’ll go through a lot of meetings as a young entrepreneur. You’ll have meetings with new hires, investors, customers, employees, business partners, and more. Juggling all of these meetings along with all your other responsibilities is a tall order made much easier with an online calendar. Above all else, your organization makes a good first impression.
With Calendar, you can create personalized scheduling links that you can quickly send to those you wish to meet with. These links show your exact availability, and others can request scheduling events to meet with you that works with their own schedule. This feature eliminates the back and forth communication trying to organize meeting times, making your meetings more efficient and easier to plan.
Take a Break
The life of an entrepreneur is exhausting. To stay on top of your game, schedule some time here and there to get some well-deserved rest. Breaks help prevent stress caused by overworking yourself day in and day out, allowing you to keep a level head while tackling difficult tasks or making tough decisions.
Look for any opening in your online calendar and create an event that’s meant for nothing but some time off. Even a five-minute breather allows you to take a deep breath and refocus. Also, make sure to schedule a time for hobbies, family time, and other recreational activities.
Delegate Tasks
You don’t have to do everything on your own. You will accomplish so much more if you have a good partner or team put together and delegate tasks out to them. Using your Calendar, you can organize their efforts and hold them accountable for the tasks and projects you distribute.
If you haven’t already, create a Calendar dedicated to your startup. You can share this calendar with all of your hired help, giving them an inside look at your plans and processes. Assign tasks to them through events with deadlines to coordinate their efforts in an attempt to move your startup forward more quickly.
Stick to a Budget
While an online calendar is a known asset for the time-conscious, it is also a beneficial financial tool. A Calendar makes for a nifty budgeting helper when used correctly. Money will be in short supply for a startup, so a proper budget is essential for long-term survival.
Using your online calendar to budget, you can track your expenses, set reminders for payments, and schedule times to review your balance sheet to ensure everything is in order. Also, make a plan to save every week, as a good savings account can get your startup out of a pinch when unexpected events inevitably happen.
Set a Timetable
One of the biggest struggles for new businesses is knowing how to scale properly. Grow too quickly, and you can implode your operations. Move too slowly, and you might miss out on amazing growth opportunities. You can scale to perfection with the help of an online calendar.
Chart your growth as your company progresses, and set marks where you hope to be at a certain point. Your Calendar allows you to visualize where you hope to be, setting realistic expectations based on where you’re at now. Let’s say you want to hire a dozen workers by year’s end. Don’t start until you hit the growth mark in your Calendar, giving you the all-clear to begin the hiring process.
Leverage Your Marketing
What’s a startup without paying customers? To grab the attention of consumers to your new company, you’ll need a solid marketing campaign. Without one, growing your customer base will be a long and arduous process.
Use your Calendar to create a content schedule for your marketing campaign. Use social media posts, radio spots, and whatever local media you decide is best to draw in customers. Later, you can look back on your strategy to make needed adjustments.
Ready to actually get your start-up started? In the coming months, you’ll look back in awe at how much you’ve been able to accomplish since organizing your efforts with an online calendar. Entrepreneurship awaits.
Hunter Meine
Hunter Meine is a BYU-Idaho graduate, husband, father, and writer. When he's not writing, he's playing sports or enjoying the outdoors with his wife and daughter.