Working from home is a big move for many people, and there are many distractions. Also, for a majority of people that start running a online business, they are used to having a manager set their timetable, but find that they are often at a loss of what to do at some point during the week. Not for lack of work, but due to an overwhelming number of things that need to be done. So, if you are working from home, then having a rough weekly timetable can really help. Here is our suggested timetable for the week. Each day has a theme, but obviously if anything else more important comes up, then this will need to be done also.
Management Mondays
Monday is a good day to review the previous week. Morning tasks should include running off affiliate commission reports for the previous week and checking traffic on the logs. This helps to quickly identify the health of the business, and also to determine where more work needs to be done. Once the data is reviewed, you may need to make changes to affiliate ads, their placement, weighting etc. to increase conversion rates, click through rates and ultimately weekly revenue. Mondays are a good day to review the previous week.
Traffic Tuesdays
Start by taking a closer look at the logs for the previous week. Determine what parts of your site are on the up, and which parts are waning. Then look at ways to boosting the traffic. Do some SEO, review PPC campaigns, promote your site online and offline too if possible. SEO involves both improving internal site linking structure (funneling etc.) pluys building links to your site. Review content, write a new article, update a blog, request links. It is a good idea to have a template email for link requests – but always personalize the email.
Webmaster Wednesdays
Wednesday is the day to don your webmaster hat. For this the logs need to be reviewed again, but this time the error logs. Also log in to Google Webmaster tools. Check for 404 page not errors, crawling errors, redirect errors, sitemap errors, and look for anything else that may be suspicious. Also check for updates to CMS software, and update if need be. Security is very important, and keeping software up to date is essential. Also check that your back ups are in order, and if you have not done so already set up daily automated backups.
Thanks Thursdays
Go through your emails and ensure that you are thanking those that deserve your thanks. Reply to email queries, be polite and always say thank you. Hopefully you may have received some replies from the Tuesday SEO tasks. Thank people for responding to mails, as well as thanking people on social networking sites and clients for their business.
Friendly Fridays
Friendly, as in social networking. Fridays are a good day to hit the forums and check the social bookmarking sites to see what is hot, and join in the discussion. Dedicating a day to these tasks ensures that you do not let your forum presence slip, while also meaning that you do not waste too much time on the forums throughout the week. For some businesses a lot of traffic can be generated via the social networks, but many people make the mistake of concentrating too much effort into one site. Spread your efforts evenly, and ensure that you participate in the most popular discussions.
That is it really. Throughout the week you will need to preform a plethora of other tasks, which may include article writing, checking affiliate links, reviewing products, taking stock checks, redesigning and reconfiguring the site. All of this however can make your forget about the core tasks which need to be done to ensure that your web business remains secure and competitively placed.
