When you run your own business, your sleep schedule can fall out all over the place! It can feel like you need to be available at all times, even in the middle of the night, in case the website has an issue or a customer needs to get in touch with you. But when the sleepless nights rack up, accompanied by super long and busy days, you’re going to burn out in a matter of weeks!
That’s why, if you’re an online business owner, you should try to set up your website and overall online presence so it looks after itself. And thankfully, there’s quite a few good ways to get this done. Check out our list of tips below and be sure to take them into account when you’re starting to feel the fatigue creeping up on you.
State Your Working Hours Very Clearly
Every business owner makes this one mistake when they first start out – do you know what it is? They don’t state their working hours on their website or social media profile! And if you’re worried that doing so would appear unprofessional or make your small business seem small and insignificant, we’re here to tell you about a different impression.
If you have clearly defined working hours, and you let customers know up front when and where you’ll be able to respond to their messages, you come across as someone who knows what they’re doing, and runs an exclusive (and therefore popular) business. Now that sounds like a great impression, doesn’t it?
You’ve got a good idea about your own working hours, you have a clear understanding of boundaries, and you make it apparent up front what someone can expect from you and your service. A customer really cannot ask for more!
Toggle Social Media Settings
If you’re active on social media, and you’re using business accounts to talk to your followers and/or customers, you should be able to toggle chat settings to make it easier to keep up with messages.
Indeed, you can let people know when you’re not around and when you’ll be able to get back to them. On some sites you can even set up a list of questions for people to enquire about; if questions get asked so much they turn into FAQs, cut out the noise and let people ask them as soon as they click through to engage with you.
You can also use this section to make it easy to gather information from this specific customer. Give them a starter to make use of and then you can answer the question from a pre-prepared script on the other side as well. Make things simpler for both sides and you’re going to get a lot more sleep at night!
Install a Website Chatbot
Chatbots are great for reducing the time you spend on your own website. When you’ve got a conversational marketing bot in place, taking questions no matter the time of day, and automatically directing your customers to the right place, you won’t be in your inbox all day. And seeing as people spend at least three hours in their emails every single day, there’s a lot of time on the table here!
That sounds like a recipe to success for us, so make sure you’ve got a reliable chatbot you can depend on in the source code of your site. Even if the person on the other end really does need to talk to you, you know they’ve exhausted every other option and you can get straight to the heart of their problem when you connect.
So, if you really want to save a couple of hours at the start or end of the day, get yourself a chatbot to help out.
Outsource Your Website Maintenance
Are you an IT expert? Most online business owners aren’t, but even if you are, it’s usually a good idea to outsource your IT maintenance to someone else. This way the pressure is taken straight out of your hands!
Someone else is taking care of the website, making sure it’s routinely patched and secure against being hacked, and you can focus on other things that require your attention. If you don’t do this, your website could eat up all of your time, and that’ll have you up until 3am every single night!
Keeping the website running requires a steady and experienced hand, and even if you use a pre-built option that has most of the code done for you, updating and keeping on the right side of the server can be a difficult thing.
Automate Email Updates
Your email newsletter isn’t the only communication you should have with your followers, customers, or clients. You should be regularly emailing them to check in, as well as update them on their own orders, the standing on their account, any privacy policy changes, and exclusive offers they can only get within their inbox.
Emails may be the easiest way to contact someone when you’re using an online medium, but they can take some time to tap out and send.
However, don’t take this charge on alone – automate your emails to make sure these messages go out on a regular basis and you don’t have to hand send each and every one. You could end up with over 100 people on that newsletter, so you’re definitely not going to get any sleep if you go through each address in turn!
Plan Your Content Calendar Six Months in Advance
Every business needs a content calendar, thanks to the nature of the online world we operate in. A content calendar makes it easier to get your posts in front of a relevant and engaged audience, as you make sure there’s a healthy content history behind you that people have already tuned in to enjoy. Keep the momentum going by planning in advance, instead of stressing about whether or not you’ve got something to post this week!
Give yourself at least six months here. If it’s currently January, make sure your summer content plan is listed out in full. If it’s currently June, make sure you’re ready for Christmas. Whatever time of year it is, count out six months ahead and get festive and targeted content planned, executed, and ready to upload. That way you won’t be rushed during fast trade seasons, and you can sit back and relax while you watch the queries and bookings roll in.
Set Social Media Campaigns to End Automatically
Any campaign you run through an inbuilt social media system can be set up to end automatically. This makes sure you’re never paying for advertising when you can’t afford it or have already used up your marketing budget for the month.
After all, it can be annoying to have to head into your Meta account to turn off a campaign manually, so only ever run them on a limited exposure period.
This way you won’t have to worry about money slipping out from under your feet, you won’t see an impact on your bottom line appear overnight, and you’ll find it much easier to keep up with the customer gains and engagement metrics you’re tracking. Some campaigns are more successful than we think they’ll be, some are less successful – keep up with it all by setting a limit from the moment you put the campaign into action.
Put Most of Your Time into Guaranteeing Good Customer Service
Good customer service doesn’t come naturally. It’s something you have to work at, even when you’re using a chatbot at the start of most customer interactions. After all, the responses it gives need to be written with the customer experience in mind!
But customers with questions, or angry customers who want an answer for why their order turned up damaged or partly missing, aren’t the only people you’re going to be servicing. People with innocent and curious questions, as well as those who have positive things to say, all need the same level of attention from you.
Reward a customer’s engagement with a share of the spotlight, whether that means answering their comment, sharing their content to your own pages, or signing them up to a loyalty program.
Being warm and welcoming in this manner takes some practice, and understanding the limits of your own business’ budget needs to factor in as well, but good customer service is the one thing that’ll keep people coming back without you needing to convince them. Invest time here to save time later!
If you’re an online business owner, don’t let the need to grind your success get on top of living a healthy lifestyle. You can get the sleep you need, take time for yourself, and still build the following you want – that’s the best deal to have when you’re running a business yourself! So make sure you follow the tips above to get your online presence to mostly regulate itself, and allow yourself the time and energy to focus on what really matters.
