5 Ideas for Spring Cleaning Your Business

Spring is here. For a lot of us, that means de-cluttering around the house, clearing out the garage, and emptying the attic. But spring cleaning isn’t just for the home. Spring cleaning your business is the perfect way to look at it from a fresh perspective and reinvigorate your standard operating procedures.

Just like your home gets cluttered with unnecessary stuff and extraneous junk, your business can be overwhelmed by all manner of things just getting in your way. It could be physical junk, like paperwork that the hoarder in you just has a hard time tossing. But more likely, you’ve probably let all manner of inefficient processes and tiny to-dos pile up in your business. You know, the sort of thing that you’ve been saying “I’ll do that next week” to for the past six months.

In this post, we’ll take a look at several ways you can go about spring cleaning your business to help it run more efficiently, and to help you rest a little easier at night.

#1 – Tidy Up Your Workspace

This is probably the most traditional form of spring cleaning on our list. As we’ve discussed elsewhere, your physical workspace can influence your work efficiency. So this is the perfect opportunity to tidy up around the office.

Part of the process is getting rid of the paper junk that may have accumulated over the past year. Business mail, invoices, and any other non-digital trash that’s piling up. Just remember to shred anything that might contain sensitive information of your business or your clients. And, don’t accidentally trash paperwork that you might need when tax season rolls around (but don’t keep it piled on your desk either!).

Another piece of tidying up your workspace is exploring ways to make yourself work more efficiently. If you just cleared off two square feet of desk space, maybe it’s finally time to invest in a second (or third!) monitor. Maybe you could save on back pain this year with a more ergonomic office chair. Or maybe all you need is to turn your desk to face a different direction to get a fresh look on things.

#2 – Attend to Your “Do Later List”

Every business owner and entrepreneur has one of these. Your “do later list” is that running list of tasks that’s been nagging you in the back of your head for weeks, months, or maybe even years.

You know they’re important. But in the moment, they never seem quite important enough given the massive list of client orders you have to fulfill or the other day-to-day business activities that require your attention.

The possibilities are endless, but here are some of the things that might be on your do later list right now:

• Create an email series for new customers
• Update your website
• Launch that new service you’ve been thinking about
• Create an e-book or lead magnet
• Launch a new ad campaign
• Grow your social media presence
• Create a content marketing plan
• Clean out your inbox

And the list goes on.

When it comes to spring cleaning your business this year, don’t try to tackle your entire do later list at once. Choose one or two, write them down, and make a plan to get the ball rolling on them in the next week. Remember, too, that you don’t have to do everything yourself. If you need to refresh your website but don’t have the time, you can always hire a freelancer to do it for you.

#3 – Put Your Finances in Order

If you are just getting started, or if success caught you off guard, you may have been doing business for a while without really keeping up on finances.

Spring cleaning your business is the perfect chance to take a look at your revenue, expenses, and profit margin.

An easy way to start is to look at your accounts and calculate your earnings over just the last six months. This has a relatively low barrier to entry but will provide you with a clear picture of whether your profits are trending upward or downward, or if you’ve stalled out.

While we’re talking accounts, this is also a good time to ensure that you’ve separated your business and personal finances. If you haven’t done it yet, it’s probably been on your do later list for a while now. Having separate bank accounts for your business and your personal life will just make things so much easier next time tax season rolls around.

>> Don’t Miss: Financial Planning for Freelancers <<

#4 – Streamline Your Processes

Let’s face it, a lot of what we do is reactive rather than proactive. We find a way to do things when the need arises, which means they might not be as efficient or streamlined as they should be.

Maybe it’s how you intake orders. Maybe it’s your process for responding to customer inquiries. Maybe it’s your procedure for delegating work.

Whatever day-to-day activities aren’t running as smoothly as they should in your business, now is the perfect time to take a close, hard look at them. The more you are able to streamline your processes with detailed standard operating procedures, the easier time you will have training other people to do them for you.

Which brings us to our last idea for spring cleaning your business...

#5 – Build (or Grow) Your Team

If you’ve been flying solo for a while now and are starting to feel the weight of running the business yourself, it may finally be time to learn the importance of delegation.

As part of your spring cleaning, you can find one or two simple tasks that could be outsourced to a trustworthy freelancer. It might take time to train them to do exactly what you need, but the benefits of a freed up schedule in the long run will be well worth it for you.

If you’ve already got a team in place, this is a good opportunity to examine holes in your workflow. Maybe one of your employees is overworked and needs backup. Maybe you have a task or two that none of your existing team members are really equipped to handle. Whatever the case, spring is the perfect time to give new life to someone’s career and grow your team.

If you’re looking for quality freelancers who are eager to help you grow your business, Legiit is the perfect place to start your hunt. It’s a secure marketplace that matches awesome talent to the people who need it most on a daily basis.