People always ask me, “how do you ‘Get It All Done’ every month?” or “how do you do so much and make it all look so easy?”.

What I’ve discovered in my 9 years of being an entrepreneur is that the productivity practices I’ve adopted or developed are some of the most important systems that help me achieve this and are why I am at the level I am in my business.

Using systems and consistent ways to market and follow up is entirely how I built my multiple six-figure business. It wasn’t always that easy however; I had to learn the hard way.

I am a recovering control freak myself and tried to do it all but got way burned out and even got divorced along the way. These days I find it much less stressful and more enjoyable to delegate, have systems in place, great functionality on my website so I can attract, talk to and help thousands more entrepreneurs than I ever could before with my old business model and practices.

In my marketing and on my free calls I refer a lot to the templates I use for my email marketing, follow up, direct mail, social media connecting and more; all of which play a big part in not only automatic lead generation but high-volume sales conversions within my business.

There is so much you can do online to market and promote your business but no ONE entrepreneur can ever do it all, at least not effectively of course.

Therefore it is crucial that you learn how to automate as much of your business and marketing tasks as humanly possible. You need to do this though without compromising your relationships or much needed personal touch.

Most entrepreneurs barely reach 5-10% of the potential number of prospects they could with what they attempt to accomplish in their marketing efforts. You can be in many more places and be much more well known if you learn some simple techniques for automating, delegating and systematizing much of what you do.

Common Mistakes I’ve seen over the years with start ups and established business owners:

• You’re trying to do it all yourself
• You think you ‘can’t afford it’ whatever IT is
• You don’t believe in yourself enough to truly charge what you’re worth
• You’re too busy to do ‘it’ whatever IT is
• You simply don’t see what’s possible for you, you don’t know what you don’t know
• You haven’t learned how to run your own successful business yet you think you will just figure it out. You haven’t gone to school to learn how to be a successful entrepreneur! (They don’t teach this in college you know.)

Why it’s important to automate more in your business, your marketing and even your life?

• To get more time back to do more money-making, client attraction tasks
• So your business runs, generates leads and income when you’re not there
• So you can stop working so hard and repeating yourself on things
• To streamline systems so you can manage more client flow and cash flow

4 Example Homework Exercises I use in my coaching programs that you can do now to start automating and delegating:

Take 2 minutes or so and write out the top 3-5 questions you get asked over and over and over again in your business before someone becomes a customer. Then take those and either put them and their answers onto an FAQ page on your website or on your voicemail or note on your voicemail or email signature where to get more information online.

You can also take those questions (and maybe some more) and put them into a pre-consultation questionnaire or intake form online so when someone wants to speak to you or have a free or initial consultation, you send them to that questionnaire first to give you more information before you speak. This will help qualify prospects more as well.

Take 2 minutes or so and write every single step and thing you do in order of how you would do after you go networking or in order to follow up with a new prospect or group of prospects. Determine what you would send them, say to them, write to them, how often and also develop templates that can be used with little alteration every time. This becomes your follow up system that you can then delegate.

Track your time for 7 days, 24/7. Keep track of everything you do from personal to business and more including housework, internet research, family time, cooking, errands, social media, etc. Then look over that list after the week is up and cross out things that don’t need to be done at all, find someone to take on the tasks you should not be doing or don’t like to do and find ways to automate or delegate many of the other tasks that you’re repeating or that are not necessarily revenue producing tasks.

Those exercises can get you started but if you understand that you can increase your business with more automating, delegating and systematizing then I highly recommend you look for resources or people who can show you what to do.

With more automating and delegating you can increase your income and productivity and reduce your stress about making money as you’ll free up your time to be able to make so much more!

Katrina Sawa is an Award-Winning Author, Speaker and International JumpStart Your Biz Coach who’s helped hundreds of small business owners take dramatic steps in their businesses to get them to the next level in business, revenues and their personal life. She offers one-on-one coaching, group coaching and do-it-yourself business-building products. She’s been featured on various news talk shows and radio shows including Oprah and Friends XM Radio. Go online now to get started with her Free Entrepreneur’s Success Kit and a complimentary Business Strategy Session here!