The Empty Inbox – Email Nirvana for Small Business Communications

If you’re reading this, you are most likely a small business owner or employee and you feel that you have too many messages in your inbox. You’re feeling overwhelmed by it all, and you’re afraid that the sheer mass of your small business communications might be affecting your ability to do your job, which is probably not centered on email, or the productivity involved in answering it. Eventually, you actually need to do the things you talk about in your emails, the things that you started your small business to do. But at the same time, there are important things that come at you in your email, and you just can’t ignore them. There are customer orders, requests for support, business development requests, questions from your employees, and all manner of other necessary tasks. So, how do you manage this volume of email while still getting everything else done in the limited time you have every day?

Through the course of this article, you’ll learn some email productivity tips that should help you feel more in control of your small business communications, and you’ll feel less like there’s something lurking in your inbox that will ambush you later when it has gone undone for too long. Much of this information on email productivity comes from the David Allen’s “Getting Things Done” program, Merlin Mann’s “Inbox Zero” system, as well as the book Take Back Your Life! Using Microsoft Outlook 2007 to Get Organized and Stay Organized. If any of this article gives you hope on the future on your small business communications, I highly recommend you do further reading, and there are some links at the end of this to help you take the next steps on increasing your email productivity.

Better Email Productivity Equates to the Treasured Zero Inbox State

To be honest, if you get a lot of email, you probably won’t ever get to a Zero Inbox state, but it should be your goal. Email is merely a medium that enhances small business communications. It is the one place that people use to try to interact with you. But you can’t let it control your life or your small business. So, try to only check email every couple of hours or more. And when you do check email – make sure you have some time to give your email the appropriate attention. You don’t want your Inbox to become your filing system for all of your small business communications, orders, and whatnot because that is what leads to the feeling of being overwhelmed and out of control. When you have mastered your inbox (and subsequently your email productivity), you will be able to spend more time thinking about growing your small business with communications that streamline processes, or about taking that vacation with your family, or whatever else it is you haven’t had time to think about.

So, when you do open your Inbox – and you are faced with a bunch of new emails – what do you do? Everything in your inbox should be something you have not yet decided what action to take, and you should only have to read (and process) each email one time. You need to “Process to Zero,” or as closely as you can. What is “processing” in this context? It is the “so what” for each thread you open, where you convert each message into an action in order to reach greater email productivity. What does this email mean to you, and what is it ultimately asking of you? Based on the answer to that question, you need to do one of four things to each email you process:

1. Delete/archive
2. Delegate
3. Defer (i.e. read it later)
4. Do (response will take longer than two minutes, but you still need to do it)

So, how do you know which to do?

Taking Action to Streamline Small Business Communications

Delete/Archive: If there is no definable action (or you have already taken the necessary action on any small business communications you’ve received), you need to delete the email or archive it if the content is something you know you will need to refer to later on (I put them into an “@Archive” folder in Outlook 2007, because that keeps that folder at the top of my folders list and easy to see later). In any case, deleting the vast majority of emails that serve no future purpose will significantly boost your email productivity, allowing you to move on to other tasks.

Delegate: If there is a definable action that someone else needs to take, delegate the action to someone else by forwarding it to them and clearly spelling out what action you expect them to take. Then, you need to either delete or archive that email, because it no longer belongs in your Inbox.

Defer: If the email requires a task that will take longer than two minutes – you need to defer the action (and its associated email). I do this by moving the email into an “@Action” folder. The most important thing here is that you make sure that you get to the things in the “@Action” folder in a reasonable amount of time. You can’t forget about them and let them go undone, or you will stop trusting, and then stop using, the system and be right back where you started.

Do: If the email contains an action that requires LESS than two minutes to complete – you should just go ahead and do that action and delete or archive the email so you get the item off your plate. You’ll rack up a lot of “small victories” this way and feel more productive, because you will actually be more productive when dealing with your small business communications. Don’t say to yourself “I’ll just leave this in my inbox and get to it later;” take the action immediately to see your email productivity rise.

A couple of related email productivity tips from the Download Squad folks –

1. “If you don’t need to read it now, it shouldn’t be in your inbox.”
2. “If you’ve already responded to it, it shouldn’t be in your inbox.”

Remember, you want to minimize the number of times you have to read the same email. Make a decision about it the first time you read it, and just get it over with. It doesn’t help you at all to leave it in your inbox just so you have to come back and do the same thinking all over again. That’s a waste of your time and a serious drain on your overall email productivity.

Hopefully, these small business communications tips have gotten you started down the path of a cleaner inbox and a cleaner mind. The less stuff you have to keep track of in your head, the more you can use your head for productive thinking, like how to grow your small business.

Increasing Email Productivity References

The following links provide more information on small business communications.

–http://www.43folders.com/2007/07/25/merlins-inbox-zero-talk
–http://www.davidco.com/coaches_corner/Kelly_Forrister/article81.html
–http://www.davidco.com/blogs/kelly/archives/2007/11/digging_out_fro.html
–http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/05/technology/personaltech/05basics.html?_r=2&pagewanted=1
–http://www.downloadsquad.com/2006/11/15/five-simple-rules-for-keeping-an-empty-inbox/

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How International Shipping Companies Work

International Shipping companies work professionally, and why not, with lot of competition happening out there in the market, many of cargo and freight companies have devised effective ways to carry out shipping activities in an appropriate manner. When overseas moving is on your mind and you are moving with all your goods and items custom brokers play significant role altogether. These brokers need to be in the country where you are planning to move. Usually, the international shipping companies have tied up with customs broker of the designation country, and this will help you in overseas moving of household goods and commercial cargo from one port to another.

The international shipping companies will work with brokers and customs so that the goods declared in commercial invoice are not overestimated by the customs company. International shipping companies will also make a check on the fee charged as per the custom policies of designated country and also by the broker. International shipping companies will ensure that the goods are safely transported to the target destination without having any custom problems during the entry and exit. A professional international container shipping and freight forward company will provide high quality and professional freight and cargo shipping services as well as minimizing the costs on duties and taxes. The freight and cargo shipping company will deal with all issues pertaining to the costs levied on duties and taxes. But when you are hiring the services of any international freight and cargo movement company, it is very important that you check the details of services provided and also the port fee and container charges which are charged by them.

There are many types of cargo and freight service providers on Internet, and you have to be extremely vigilant enough to check the services offered by them. Do not show extreme hurry when selecting a freight and forward company for your means as this may not turn beneficial for you.
Again, while availing container shipping services, you need to make sure how much quantity of household or commercial goods do you want to transport to designated destination. Keep in your mind that the price of container matches with the size of a container. If you are hiring a huge container, it is quite natural that you will be paying high charges for it. It will be a better option if you hire container shipping services rather than buying complete container. Overseas moving is not an easy task. International moving requires synch of many small tasks and hiring international freight and cargo movement carrier will solve your purpose completely.

International cargo and international moving company company will offer you safe storage and safe transit of your perishable and non perishable cargo and freight goods. The company looks into your specific needs and arranges overseas movement of cargo and goods in a professional and organized manner. The company can provide you door to door, door to port and port to port delivery of cargo and household goods from one country to another.

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Do Your Own Business Valuation – Part 1: Introduction to Business Valuation

As a business owner, you know more about your business than any one, but there is one thing you are not too sure about – how much it is worth. This is the first in a series of articles designed to help you learn about business valuation and, if you choose, do your own business valuation.

Defining Value

Before we begin discussing business valuation it is important to define what value is. When asked, most people will struggle to define it then end up using an example like a one dollar bill is worth more than a quarter. Value is difficult to define without comparing at least two items. The comparisons must be well defined to have any meaning. For example a rare quarter may be worth more than a common dollar bill. The first step in any valuation is to accurately and completely define the property that is being valued.

Value is also subjective. Someone who needs a quarter to plug a parking meter in order to avoid a parking ticket would gladly pay a dollar or more for a quarter. Similarly, one business may have a number of values. A strategic buyer that can plug the customers of the business into its existing system may perceive more value than a person who is going to run the business day-to-day. The second step in valuation is defining for whom the property is being valued.

What is a Business Valuation?

A business valuation is simply an estimate of what a business is worth based its hypothetical sale. It may also be called a business appraisal and has some similarities with real estate appraisals. A big difference is that much of business value is in the form of intangible assets, or goodwill. Valuing intangible assets involves a process of using various accepted valuation approaches and methods. The goal is to determine a value that can be explained and justified to others.

How Much is a Business Worth?

In theory a business is worth the present value of all the future benefits of owning the business. Present value is the process of discounting the value of cash or other property to be received in the future to its current value. There are many benefits (cash and non-cash) to owning a business. Valuation focuses on the financial benefits defined as earnings or cash flow. The rate at which the future benefits are discounted must account for all the risks associated with owning and operating the business. Basically the value of a business comes down to the classic investment paradox – risk vs. return.

Basic Valuation Methods

There are 3 primary approaches to valuing a business – market, income and asset. The market approach uses data from actual sales of similar businesses or from publicly traded companies to value a business. The market approach is the preferred method. The biggest problem is that good quality, comparable data is seldom available. The income approach looks at the earnings or cash flow of a business as the primary driver of its value. It is the most commonly used method and works well unless a business has little or no earnings. The asset approach tries to value each part (asset) of the business separately. The sum of the parts is the value of the business. This method works well with tangible assets, but not for the intangible ones. The methods of identifying and valuing individual intangible assets are highly theoretical and often produce unrealistic results. The asset approach is often used when a business has few intangible assets, or little or no earnings.

Conclusion

Knowing how much your business is worth is a critical piece of information that every business owner should know. The remaining parts of this series will explore and explain the business valuation process so you can do your own business valuation.

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