Put a Post-It on your Monitor

Often, some of the simplest systems are the best. Have you ever had to remember to do something outside of your routine and, worried that you’d forget, stuck a post-it on your monitor, set a bag in front of the door, or tied a string around your wrist?

In today’s digital world it’s easy to rely on email notifications, reminders, and apps but a physical reminder is also good.

Here are 4 easy ways to incorporate physical reminders in your systems:

1. Embrace the Post-it Note

It should be no secret that I love post-it notes, and all office supplies in general. Back to School time is the most wonderful time of the year!

Although I use project management software, sometimes it’s just simpler to write down the task in 30 seconds on a post it, instead of navigating to the right page, project, to do list, and entering the task. Typically I use this system for any project that should take under 5 minutes to complete or needs a quick fix.

There’s a great strategy here too for clients who don’t require a lot of tasks. In short you create a notebook or page spread for each client and each post-it note is a task. You can label the pages “urgent” and “non-urgent” and move the post-it notes back and forth accordingly as needed.

If you have a really fast paced relationship with your clients and deal with a lot of tasks and details, I don’t recommend this strategy because it’ll easily overwhelm you and get cluttered.

2. Use a White Board for Metrics

One of the biggest problems with tracking metrics on a spreadsheet is that if you don’t keep it front and center that spreadsheet is not going to pop up and demand to be updated.

Instead, create a space in your office to write down the most important metrics in your business: email subscribers, website hits, sales, referrals, etc.

Having the physical list there to update is great but be sure to also write down the date it was updated. A white board and marker is great, or your can go old school with chalk board and chalk too.

3. Give Yourself a Gold Star

If you want to get more consistent in your business processes, then you don’t want to just track a task but do it regularly whether that’s daily, weekly, or monthly. A chart that details what you want to accomplish is a good start but make it fun with a literal gold star.

Writing down your goals is half the battle and tracking your success is helpful as well. It may seem a little childish but remember, whatever works to keep you on track!

4. Make a Paper Chain

One of my favorite craft projects as a kid was making a paper chain to countdown to Christmas, vacation, or my birthday. In business, you can build a paper chain for adding members to a mastermind program, counting sales or even retail accounts.

There’s an added benefit to this creative time is that it gives you some time to relax. For some people it’s a process of manifesting and setting their intention to fill a program as you build this physical system and reminder of your goals.

Don’t discount physical systems or reminders if it helps you in your business and think outside the app!