How to Determine if Your Auto-Responder is Working

Simple, just test it from time to time that is all. What should ideally worry you is not whether it works but whether it works as expected. Once you set up an auto-responder properly, it will respond to messages but if you do not program it very well, it will respond unsatisfactorily to messages.

In that case, it is not the fault of the auto-responder but that of the person who programmed the messages in the responder. An auto-responder by design will respond to inquiries put before it if it has the answers. It does not manufacture messages. Instead, it gives out only the messages it was programmed to give out. What matters most therefore is to ensure that the pre-programmed messages are adequate and concise enough to meet the expectations of the marketer. All these can be found out from regular testing and reprogramming until it responds perfectly.

How to Economize Your Time

Here is one credible and practicable way to economize your time. Since the time available to you and all of us is heavily limiting, you can best use it by simple economics the way you use money. Some people choose to call it “time-management” but I choose to call it “time-economics.” The reason is simple. You can manage money because when you run out of money, you can arrange to get more money. You can get more money by going to withdraw from your savings or by borrowing. When you run out of time, it is gone and gone forever. There is no time-lender anywhere in the world where you can go to borrow more time. All you have and are entitled to is only 24 hours a day. The best you can do within the 24 hours therefore is to manage yourself and your affairs within the available time. This is time economics. 

It is safe to assume that you know how to prioritize your activities. That you know how to choose what is urgent and what is important. That said, you may now want to know how you can maximize the use of the limited time available to you for your work. It is also assumed that you do only the things related to your work during working hours. I hope I am right on this assumption because a lot of people use working time to perform many activities not directly related to the work they do. The best way to maximize the use of your working time is to minimize or eliminate time wastage on the things you routinely do at work. Here is how. List all your daily activities and replace “time-wasters” with “time-savers.” Very simple and the results and impact on your productivity can be quite amazing. 

 

How to Work 13 Months a Year

Sounds incredible but true! It is possible to work more than one year in one year. Did I hear you sigh? Wait a minute; you will soon find out how you can work more than one year within one year. It is practicable to stretch your year to 13 months. Here is how. First, reconcile yourself with the fact that you are not a 9-5 Public Servant. As such you will not be expected to work as one. This category of workers statutorily work 8 hours a day, in a 5 day-work- week making 40 hours of work for 52 weeks in a year.

If you are a business person and your own boss, you are working for yourself. By simply taking a decision to work additional 1 hour per day, that can make a very big difference cumulatively. Here is how. With that extra hour of work, in one week, you will have 5 hours of additional work. In one year of 52 weeks, your additional hours of work will amount to 260 hours. In addition to your 40 hour work week, you will have put in extra 6 weeks of work. 

Just follow the math. If you work that way for one year, you will have collectively worked for 58 weeks instead of 52. This is more that 13 months of useful work. See! Imagine working for 2 or 3 additional hours a day or working for an additional day instead of only 5 days. That way you will actually be working in one year more than what most people do. That no doubt helps to increase your productivity many folds. The efforts you make by working extra hours are in direct proportion to your benefits. Your own discipline and work schedule help to drive your productivity. This is the major reason why you can always achieve more if you are your own boss.