Need Help Getting Stuff Done? Try this technique!
By Pauline Martin-Brooks | Productivity , Systems
Do you ever wonder what on earth you should be focussing on next?
Which led me to explain the following concept to him last weekend and now to you, lucky you!
So here goes….
Many years ago I learned of a technique which I call Blueboard/Whiteboard…super technical name right?!
Well, I’m guessing you know what a whiteboard is, but what’s a Blueboard I hear you ask?
Use A Dumping Ground For Your Ideas
We all have a myriad of things we want to do. So when you think about all the things you want to do, that you haven’t even started on AND all the things you’ve started on but haven’t completed…
Well now you have yourself a pretty big list and you know what happens next – Nothing – well nothing productive at least because our brains go into overwhelm and all of a sudden it becomes much easier to pick up the remote and see what’s on the television or sit down and scroll through Facebook. I know… I’ve done it, so has my husband and I’m sure you’ve been guilty of it a time or two yourself.
Now please don’t misunderstand me. There is nothing ‘wrong’ with tuning out because your brain is fried – I get that too.
How about helping yourself so your brain gets fried less often?
Which brings me back to the Blueboard…
Let’s say we dump a whole lot of ideas on the Blueboard – they could include things like:
- Create an online course
- Build a landing page
- Launch a new product
- Hire a VA
- Use a support ticket system
- Build a chatbot
- Create a lead magnet
- Build a funnel
- set up a nurture sequence
- Do some youtube videos
- Publish a blog
If you work online like I do, the list is endless and there’s a ridiculous amount of software and tutorials that you could get lost in for years – believe me I’ve done that too.
Anyway as you can see there’s a whole lot of little projects on there.
Pick One Thing!
Now once you’ve done this for yourself you need to find the project that is the easiest to get done.
Let’s think of this as the low hanging fruit.
In this case, we’ll pick Publish a blog because that’s what I decided to do. Now we move Publish a blog over to the Whiteboard. So everything else sits on the blueboard and only Publish a Blog sits on the whiteboard ALONE…that becomes your One Thing!
Now we need to break up Publish a Blog as a project and think about what goes into it.
So we could either just write what we feel like writing about, which is what I’m doing right now. Or a better approach would be to do some keyword research first and write to the Key Phrases that people are searching for so they find your blog.
Do The Research!
If you write what you feel like writing, you should still do the research to see where you can add some keyword phrases to improve the rank!
Now we can also just write straight into WordPress, or we might create it in notepad or google docs or some other software and then if you’re lucky hand over to your virtual assistant:)
Then we need to spell check it and find images and upload it and format it and SEO it – so you can see how one little project becomes quite a big one.
This is why it’s key to drag the item onto the whiteboard and then map out what needs to happen with that project… simultaneously ignoring all other projects! I repeat DO NOT start to map out any of the other projects!
So Publish a Blog could include things like this…
- Do keyword research to find key phrases
- Decide on the journey you want the reader to take ie what’s the call to action at the end? If any..
- Write a blog post around Key Phrase
- Find/Create an image
- Brand the image for social
- Upload to WordPress or Blog Website
- Format with subheads and pull quotes etc
- Add feature image
- Add a call to action – this could include an external link (Make sure that works)
- Is there a download PDF/MP3/MP4 etc?
- Is there an opt-in page created for it?
- Is there a relevant email sequence?
- Ensure blog and images are SEO friendly
- Check readability
- Have someone proofread it
- Publish the blog
And Voila!
So there we have one project that we’ve taken from the Blueboard and added to the whiteboard and seen through until completion. Now we have to market the blog, but I hope you get the idea about how it works. In this instance, I’ve chosen to leave this blog without an opt-in but I may add one later..so watch this space.
Actually, do me a favour and let me know what would be useful to you?
– A Video on the Blueboard/Whiteboard technique
– A checklist of exactly what you need to do before you can publish your blog
– Something else you need help with around this topic
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