As someone who works mostly solo, I’ve found that it’s easy to lose sight of details when you’re planning big things. Many of us have several projects going on at once, sometimes a dozen or more, and making sure you’re doing everything you need to for each can be difficult to say the least. This difficulty leads many to a point where they have a bunch of products launched, blogs up and running, PPC campaigns bring in traffic, etc. and we think we’re… done.
You’re never “done”. Never.
Entrepreneurship, especially online, can lead to scattered efforts. In searching for ways to make the most money with the least effort, we learn tons of different business models and techniques and we want to try them all. We dabble in a little of this and a little of that, rarely focusing our efforts on one thing long enough to refine it to a point where it could actually earn you a decent paycheck. Once you get to that point, the point of entrepreneurship overload, the point where everything is running, but nothing is running quite as well as you’d like… It’s time to stop and get honest with yourself. It’s time to ask yourself, “what haven’t I done?”
I don’t mean that you need to start planning your next income stream (you probably have too many of those laying around half-done already), I mean you need to look at projects that are “done” and figure out exactly why they aren’t. It might seem a bit overwhelming at first, but it doesn’t need to be. Let’s take it step by step:
1. Get Organized
Make a list of every revenue stream you own. Every info product, every blog, every e-store, etc. For me, I have a handful of ebooks, software, a half dozen or so blogs, and my consultancy.
2. Get The Big Picture
If you don’t already have one, I suggest downloading a mind mapping program. Both Mac and PC platforms have free, open-source versions that will do the trick. You’ll want to create a separate mind map for each of the revenue streams you made in step one. Do these one at a time and don’t start the next one until you finish.
For each revenue stream, make one node for the product and one for marketing. From there, start mapping out all the major components of the product and its marketing as separate sub-nodes. If you’re working on a mind map for an ebook, add the ebook, any bonus materials that come with it, customer support, etc. If it’s a blog, you might want to list your posts as one item, and then list out any guest writers, resources, special features, etc. Don’t forget to add how you’re monetizing your blog as well- ads is one node, affiliate links is another and so on.
List out all the marketing channels you’re using including SEM, SEO, email, affiliate programs, print ads, mailings, press releases, radio, tv, and anything else you’re doing. Don’t be vague about it though, list these channels by vendor. Working with Google Adwords is totally different than working with Yahoo! Search Marketing, so don’t lump them together.
3. Get Critical
Once you have this nice, detailed mind map of your revenue stream, it should be pretty easy to see everything you’ve done to get this thing going, and everything you haven’t. You’ll be able to see products with no bonuses, no customer support or no mailing list. You’ll see blogs not being properly monetized or promoted. Before you forget any of these things, start adding notes to the items that need improvement or adding new nodes for things you need to add. You can even print out the mind map and start writing notes on it if that works better for you.
4. Get Organized… Again.
Take all the notes and nodes you’ve made, and turn it into a to-do list. Take each item and split it into bite-sized tasks; creating a sub list of separate to-dos. If you need to add a mailing list, the item should be called “mailing list” with a list of tasks like “write follow up series”, “create opt-in form” and “automate lead segmentation”. Prioritize lists that have the highest potential upside over everything else.
5. Get to Work!
Start working your way through your lists! Do at least one thing every day. Don’t think about how much is left to do, just focus on checking off one task each day. Before you know it, you’ll have turned your once limping revenue stream into a well-oiled cash machine.
You might want to work on the list from one mind map at a time. You might want to create a list from each mind map and rotate lists each day. Hell, you might want to sit down and see how many of these tasks you can crank through in one sitting. The point is, until you sit down and analyze what you’ve done and what you still need to do, none of your revenue streams is going to do much for you.
Analyze, itemize, prioritize, execute… itize.
