Marketing is critical for a business’s growth, but with all the challenges of running everyday operations, most businesses find it difficult to concentrate on marketing alone. Effective time management will not add more hours, but it will help you stay focused on growing your business.

The biggest time burners for many people are unscheduled meetings and calls, which need a lot of practice to be cut short. Sometimes, your business marketing needs will fall by the wayside when clients’ needs crop up. It happens…

Below are some tips that might help you get a handle on your marketing.

Prioritise your tasks.

Having a zillion tasks to do on a daily basis and trying to prioritise these according to importance can get overwhelming.

Firstly, list important tasks that require strategic thinking and will help your company move forward. Then, make a list of activities that must be done on a routine basis like getting reports, making courtesy calls to customers and troubleshooting problems.

Get up early.

You can get many more things done in the early morning without distractions. Mornings are a great time for creative thinking and for completing tasks much faster.

Experiment with different work schedules and track your progress to see which is appropriate. This will result in maximum work being done in minimal time.

Have a contingency plan.

If you find that completing work according to your regular schedule is not possible and you are constantly shuffling tasks, try to have a contingency plan in place that can manage unscheduled tasks that can play havoc with daily tasks.

Contingency plans like these will help you become a good manager and complete all your important tasks on time.

Take time to complete the priority tasks.

When you are busy completing priority tasks, try to keep other things at bay, which will help you concentrate on the task at hand.

Once these are complete, move on to tasks with lesser priority and seek the assistance of others wherever required. This period is most appropriate for multitasking and interacting with others in the office.

Understand your limitations.

In your excitement to manage multiple tasks, do not overextend yourself so that you do not have any energy left at the end of the day.

Begin paying attention to activities that energise you and the ones that pull you down so you can mix both and not exhaust yourself unnecessarily. When you feel that unscheduled activities are reducing your regular tasks, learn to avoid them instead of regretting when they are not accomplished.

Keeping customers happy is important, but not looking for new ones will leave you with limited markets, which may dry up over time.

Time management is essential to getting more productivity out of your daily activities, as it will help you assign appropriate time for each task.