Happy New Year! Here’s my first tip of 2011.

Trying to get more organized? In my small business coaching, it seems that almost all of my clients are working on that! And one of my clients recently introduced me to a cool online service called FollowUpThen.com. As promised, it’s a “free and easy email reminder” system. All you have to do is on your next email just include time-interval@followupthen.com and the system will follow up after the time interval you specify.

I use gmail’s calendar to email me reminders for ongoing scheduled tasks, everything from daily reminders like “clean office for 30 minutes” to one time events weeks or months in the future like “contact Felicia about social media project.”

But what’s cool about FollowUpThe.com is that you can send an email to someone else so they automatically get an email reminder, too, perhaps about a project you are working on together or a proposal you are expecting. In sales there are obviously many applications, since so much of sales is professional and relentless follow up. You can also use the “bcc” field to send the reminder just to yourself. The system has a lot of flexibility.

Check it out and let me know what you think!

It’s in the news this week that Newsweek Magazine is for sale. Although I confess that I don’t read Newsweek with any regularity, the mention of it always catches my eye because my grandfather, Thomas John Cardell Martyn, originally founded the magazine in 1933. Clearly, I inherited his entrepreneurial instincts (and also his nose).

However, I don’t talk very often about my grandfather because while he was able to do impressive things in the business world, he failed at what I believe to be one of life’s biggest achievements, one that makes any business success look unimpressive in comparison: My grandfather was a lousy father.

After he left Newsweek, my grandfather for all intents and purposes abandoned his family and went to South America to pursue various business endeavors. My grandmother essentially raised my dad and his sister as a single parent. It was not that acceptable to divorce in those days, and raising her family by herself was not an easy task. My father’s sister, my aunt, never spoke to her father after she left home and refused to speak about him with anyone for the rest of her life.

My father dutifully kept up a letter writing campaign with his father as his father lived out his days in southern Brazil. But the impact on my dad was very deep and, in my view, essentially crippled him emotionally. Of course the result of this wounding affected the kind of parent he was to me and my siblings, as well the kind of husband he was to my mother.

So when you get down to it, I don’t care if you are Donald Trump or Bill Gates and have a ton of money in the bank and all sorts of business accomplishments in your “win” column. What does all that matter if you are a lousy parent, an absent spouse, or if your friendships run fast and shallow? It’s that old question about: what do you want them to write on your gravestone: “I wish I had spent more time at the office” ?

Fortunately, having good relationships is a lot more important for many people these days. Most people want to leave a legacy of healthy, positive relationships with partners, children and friends.

This is an especially hard challenge for entrepreneurs. We have to marshal all our strength, intelligence and heart, as well as tap all the help available in order to achieve a healthy balance and not let our business completely take over our lives. The price is too high. In fact, our businesses have a better chance of succeeding if we don’t become completely obsessed and unbalanced, and shortchange the personal relationships in our lives.

Newsweek may go the way of the dinosaur, but my grandfather has left his legacy. He could have done better.

What will your legacy be?

In delivering my small business consulting services, I find that my clients are always wanting to be more productive. Everyone feels like they don’t get enough done.

In a recent interview in Inc. Magazine, Tim Ferris, author of the best selling book, The Four Hour Work Week, said that while the title of his book was not meant literally, it was possible to dramatically increase your productivity by eliminating nonessentials and reestablishing strong boundaries.

He said: “You have to emotionally condition yourself to the point where you’re comfortable declining almost everything.” Being able to say “no” (diplomatically, hopefully, most of the time) is a true power tool that can radically change your work life.

Just like building a bicep, this “no” muscle requires heavy use and repetition to develop. But the rewards are huge – you’ll have the strength to protect your time and your focus.

In addition to being able to say “no” to the trivial, you have to focus relentlessly on your core areas of strength and focus on the 20% of activities and clients that produce 80% of your profit. Almost everyone has heard of the 80/20 rule, but when I really use it to analyze my time and productivity, I have always found that it is remarkably and consistently accurate.

So while a four hour work week is not remotely likely for most of the business people I know, a 40 hour one would be a great achievement.

I read a great article on tweaks you can make to your work environment to improve your happiness and productivity.

The article make suggestions about having plants, adding color, using good ergonomics and getting to a different locale sometimes.

I’ve always had at least one big plant in my office because I agree it really does bring good energy and make me feel good. According to one study “more innovative thinking, generating more ideas and original solutions to problems in the office environment that included flowers and plants.” I believe it!

As for ergonomics the article talked about having good chairs and good posture. A couple years ago I switched to a desk that’s 41” high. I have a tall chair that I sit in, but some of the time I stand. This switching of positions is good for my back and helps channel my restless entrepreneurial energy! Providing small business consulting services to a wide variety of businesses requires a lot of energy and I find that standing up helps me maintain that level I need.

I’m going to be repainting my office this year and was already planning to paint at least one wall a vibrant color. You can use color to help put you in whatever you mood you prefer, whether that’s calm and creative, energized, focused etc.

Their last suggestion was to do some work in another location besides your office, whether a coffeehouse, a park (now that the weather is getting nice), or somewhere similar. Sometimes as I provide my small business consulting services I enjoy getting to another locale because it always seems to re-energize me and refresh me.

Try one or more of these tips to help you feel better and keep up with all the many responsibilities in your business.

Most of my life I’ve been blessed with excellent health. So when I ended up in the ER on New Year’s Day, it was a bit of a surprise. As was finding out I have an ulcer!

The good news is that I’ll be fine. But I know that things are rarely as simple as they appear. I am a firm believer that stress is the cause of most illness and I’m sure that is the case with my ulcer. My digestive system worked fine until I let my work/private life get out of balance.

It’s so easy to do, isn’t it? To check email or do a little work in the evenings or on the weekends.

I love that I truly enjoy my work, that it’s really not “work” to me. Remember the saying “It’s only work as long as you have to do it?” But even people who love their work must honor the need for oscillation – which is the ebb and flow of life.

This ebb and flow can be seen in nature – the cycle of day and night, the tide going in and out, as well as in our bodies with the waking/sleep cycle, our heart beating, resting, beating, resting, and our breath going in, out, in, out. In this 24/7 culture the pace is sped up, we can have “daylight” (thanks to electricity) all night if we want to. Not to mention that we can be constantly available by voice, email or text with cell phones.

But the price is high. Too high.

Over the years, I’ve gotten better at taking time off, relaxing and rejuvenating. Better at maintaining that boundary between work and play, downtime, rest, relaxation, social life.

But in 2009 I slipped. I moved from Colorado to North Carolina; I’m sure you know or can imagine the effort and energy involved in executing the hundreds of details required in the process of selling and buying homes and moving one’s home and business. And I also experienced for the first time the death of a parent when my dad died.

World renowned business consultant John Dudeck writes, “Studies show that revitalization plays a critical part in achievement. The average person can experience what’s called the revitalization effect. Every time we get totally away (and the key word is totally) from money-generating activities, the average person experiences 8 to 14 days of high clarity and achievement upon return.”

So a two day weekend that is free of any business, can give you a full work week or more of clarity and energy. A full week of true vacation (no work!), gives you two to three months of clarity, energy, productivity and creativity. Wow!

In 2009, I had months on end with no break.

So this month I’m blocking out my vacations for the whole year. If I don’t, it’s a lot harder to schedule them later.

Also, I am recommitting to revitalization days every weekend.

I invite you to do the same:

- Block out vacations now. One week per quarter is excellent. More is better, less if you have to. Just book them!

- Take at least one day a week that is totally free of business, including email. Two days is much better.

You’ll be amazed at how much better everything in your life goes – business, relationships, health. I’ve been successful at this in the past, and I’m looking forward to it again in 2010!

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Do you want to stop spinning your wheels and move forward with substantial, profitable business growth, personal satisfaction and bottom line control? Join clients from around the world by getting the best of Coach Anne’s small business consulting services for growing your business. Visit here for more info.

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I read a fascinating article recently in Inc. Magazine about diapers.com, a five year old online business that this year made the Inc. 500 of the top 500 fastest growing private U.S. companies.

Diapers.com CEO Marc Lore discussed his day to day life running the business and I gleaned three key lessons to share with you.

1. Superb customer service. The business spends about 10 percent of their marketing budget on flowers, gift certificates, massages and other goodies for their best customers. If a customer service rep sees that someone has been a really good customer and has referred other parents to them, they have the authority to send them a gift.

Do you empower your employees in this way? Or if you are a solo entrepreneur, do you consistently give gifts, rewards and other “thank you’s” to your best customers?

2. Fanatical data tracking and analysis. Prior to launching the company, Marc and his co-founder Vinit Bharara did extensive analysis of all aspects of their business including what the optimal number of boxes should be in their warehouse and what size the boxes should be. They took action on the results of their analysis and bit by bit added margin points. Their gross margins started at 4.6% and now are in the teens!

I’ve seen too many entrepreneurs neglect to pay close enough attention to their margins and it either drove them out of business eventually or caused them to net much, much less profit than they should have and could have.

Do you analyze your operations and review expenses regularly, with an eye to improving your margins?

3. Planning, visualizing and not much TV watching. Of his ambitious five-year plan, Marc says he “visualizes the path over and over again.” In the evenings, between family responsibilities, Marc researches, analyzes and plans things like pay-per-click and other elements of his business. A typical entrepreneur, Marc said “I don’t really watch TV at all. I much prefer working.” And part of his daily work is focusing on those all so critical “important, not urgent” areas of the business.

If you’re stuck all the time in do-do-do with no time to think, research, study, plan and strategize, your business will fall short of its potential.

Do you schedule time daily or weekly to focus and do quality thinking about the vitally important areas of your business (not just always putting out fires)?

I invite you to see if you need to strengthen your business in one or more of these areas. There’s no time like the present. As always, let me know if I can help.

The New England Journal of Medicine recently reported that using a checklist to help doctors and nurses avoid errors reduced deaths from surgery by more than 40%. (This was from a study done at eight hospitals.)

40%? Yes!

Not some breakthrough drug. Not a brilliant new surgical technique. Not a multi-million dollar piece of equipment, but a simple 19 point checklist of basic safety measures that takes two minutes to use!

I’m sure you use checklists sometimes or at least have at some time in the past. But I want you to consider how you can harness this simple yet incredible tool.

Check lists can be used in any area of business including operations, accounting, quality control, purchasing, sales and marketing.

If you don’t already have one, how about a prospect follow up checklist? You could be looking at an increase of 20 – 40% just by following up more consistently and at least 7 – 9 times which is the average number of “touches” needed before someone buys your product or service.

One of my clients started creating checklists for producing each of his apparel items that his company makes. He designed it to help his employees reduce their errors and improve quality consistency.

One day he had to step in to help, and he used his own checklist. He realized it was a bit confusing and is working to improve it.

I use checklists in my business and personal life. I have one for creating this newsletter. I have a “new client” checklist for when a business owner first hires me. Although I’m a creative entrepreneur type, just like the hospitals, I have found that checklists save a ton of time and reduce errors.

See if there’s one single area of your business that could benefit from a new or improved checklist and create one. Try it for a month or so and let me know how it works for you! And if you need help to put checklists to work today, get more information here.

Last night my computer started making some strange noises, the likes of which I had never heard before – Merlin is generally very quiet. Within a short period of time, the hard drive crashed and I tried not to panic. You probably know the feeling. A computer person told me once that eventually your computer will be taken down either by a virus or the hard drive.

Part of being highly effective is having great systems, including safety systems within your business. I’ve been backing up my documents daily using Carbonite, so I knew I should have all my documents intact, other than in the last 24 hours since my last backup.

Also, earlier this year my computer guy (one of my “platinum” team members) suggested I get an external drive and do an image back up of my whole computer using Acronis software. I did. Last night, he installed a new hard drive and used my image back up to fully restore my computer – ALL programs, settings, software, operating system, the whole deal.

Since I had never tested my backup before, I was nervous. So when he called this morning saying all was working, I was immensely relieved.

In less than 12 hours, I had survived a hard drive crash. Life is back to normal. Amazing, isn’t it, how you can feel on Cloud Nine when things are back to normal? Like when someone almost crashes into your car, but you’re fine, or you think your investment portfolio might drop 25% because of a certain situation, but it doesn’t? Before the incident, you felt average, OK, but after – when everything was back to “normal” – you feel ecstatic.

In the case of my computer, however, prior planning prevented a humongous mess and significant challenges for my business. Working on small business marketing day and day out, I have a lot of files that would be hard to replicate.

So whether you’re in Fort Collins, Florida, Fiji or anywhere in between, make sure you’re prepared. Many of life’s challenges are preventable.