5 Ways To Start Organizing The Backend Of Your Small Business

5 Ways To Start Organizing The Backend Of Your Small Business

Running a successful small business goes beyond the front-facing aspects; having a streamlined backend fuels growth and efficiency. In this YouTube video, I share my top five strategies for organizing the back end of my small business. Discover how utilizing these strategies can revolutionize your operations and enhance overall efficiency. Yes, even as a solo business owner!

Organization Tip #1: Have A Digital Hub For Your Business With A Project Management Tool

I cannot emphasize the transformative power of a project management tool enough. Learn how to turn it into your digital hub, a centralized space for organizing tasks, deadlines, and collaborations. By harnessing the capabilities of a project management tool, you can streamline pretty much ALL aspects of your business and increase productivity. My go-to project management tool is Trello, but you can also use tools like Asana, ClickUp, and even Google Drive.

My advice? Find one that fits your personality well, and stick with it! You don’t have to use what “so and so” is using just because they are using it. Use what works best for your brain (and business); sometimes, that may mean the FREE version (like Google Drive)! But stay organized! 

Organization Tip #2 Impact your business with an intentional and organized marketing plan

Centralize your marketing early on in our business. There is so much temptation to put this off until you feel like a more “legitimate” business. Still, I want to encourage you to create an intentional promotional (aka marketing) strategy for your small business. Don’t just market yourself based on your feelings and when you feel like “you are allowed to post.” “If you want to grow your” business, you need clients to find you at different phases of their client journey. It all comes down to having a marketing strategy to meet them at various customer journey phases.

A centralized hub that houses your marketing plans (even if it’s a straightforward marketing plan of posting to social media, it’s a week) should be recorded in a standard operating procedure. The great thing about marketing is that it is not a one-size-fits-all strategy. So this means you can find what works best for you and your business, but you still need to be comfortable promoting yourself!

Consistency is critical to marketing your business, and having a centralized marketing plan ensures that your brand message remains coherent and establishes you as an authority.

Me personally? I use ENJI as my go-to platform to keep all my marketing streamlined and intentional. You can click on the banner below to find out more information⬇️

Organization Tip #3 Be Intentional With Mapping Out All of Your SOPS In Your Business

When you document your SOPS (Standard Operating Procedures), you prepare your business for intentional growth. Your processes should be mapped out and recorded, so transfer your knowledge to any VAs, contractors, or new employees you may hire as you scale your business. It can seem impossible to you now, especially in the early years of your business, but you are genuinely limiting yourself by keeping your main operating procedures in your head. You should not ONLY depend on your memory to help you run your business. You have worked too hard to forget pivotal steps in your client workflows. Take the time to map everything out. This action will not happen overnight; I encourage you to create time at least once a week to map out 1 to 2 SOPS to help you run your business. This will eventually become your company handbook.

Remember, you are laying the foundation for scalability with well-documented procedures.

Organization Tip #4 Prioritize Your Email List Growth Early In Your Business

Growing your email list should be one of your top weekly priorities within your business. This may seem daunting, but you must remember that you do not own social media (it is constantly changing, and the algorithm doesn’t care about your feelings)!

Your email list is a goldmine, and it should be a priority to focus on growing it (nurturing your audience). Learn how to manage your subscribers effectively, have a plan of action for weekly (or bi-weekly) emails, and ensure that you are taking proactive steps to engage your list.

You can organize your email marketing efforts in a centralized way that works for you and your small business. Remember, keep this as simple as possible, but be intentional. Do not forget that email marketing and your marketing can go hand in hand (because your marketing can drive traffic to grow your email list, for example)!

Organization Tip #5 Organize Past Courses And Resources Efficiently

Avoid the chaos of forgotten or duplicated purchases by centralizing past courses and resources. Create a structured system within your digital hub, ensuring easy access to valuable assets and preventing unnecessary expenses.

No joke. At least once a week, I go into my centralized hub (Trello) and look up usernames and passwords for courses I have purchased because I like referring back to specific courses and templates that help me tremendously. Do you know what I think every time I go into this part of my Trello board? “I am SO happy I organized this because otherwise, I would never find the username and password buried in my inbox” (every time)! 

In” addition to organizing all of your courses, templates, and downloads that are helping the backend of your business, don’t forget to have a streamlined way to organize your branding for your business. When I talk about branding, I am talking about organizing your:

-fonts

-logos

-donates

-brand colors

-brand photos

-swipe files about your business

-aka this is  all considered your media kit

Keep it all in a centralized hub so it doesn’t get lost doesn’t inbox!

Consistency is the cornerstone of branding success. Learn how to maintain brand integrity by housing all branding assets and guidelines in your digital hub. Ensure that every aspect of your business, from visuals to messaging, aligns seamlessly with your brand identity.

This is only the tip of the iceberg for organizing the backend of your business. Overall, I want to encourage you to take the necessary steps to be more streamlined, organized, and intentional about running your business. You started our company for many reasons, and I can bet you did not start your business to feel like a frazzled mess. So take the first step with these five tips for organization!

Want To Be Organized For The Backend Of Your Own Business?

Meet Your Friendly Systems & Workflow Educator For Business Owners

Dolly DeLong is a Nashville-based family photographer and a creative business owner who educates other creative business owners on systems, SOPs, and workflows.  Dolly loves serving families with bold, elevated, and radiant photography and loves teaching other creative business owners how to set up systems and workflows to help them save time in their businesses. She produces weekly blog posts, podcast episodes on The Systems & Workflow Magic Podcast, and YouTube Episodes. 

She has a heart for serving the larger business community. Dolly shares her knowledge of Launching, Dubsado, Email Marketing, and Business systems with new creative business owners and family photographers in an encouraging and supportive way because she believes that anyone can find joy in systems, workflows, and SOPS! Plus, BONUS: Systems are where the magic happens! You can streamline and automate the backend of your creative business with ease!

 Olly’s love for her family motivates her to help other business owners find the joy and freedom she’s seen running a successful small business.

Whenever she has a spare moment, she enjoys watching TV (i.e., Survivor), loves eating way too many sweets, and listens to podcasts while running or walking. Fill out her contact form to work with Dolly DeLong Education.