What frog? You know, the biggest ugliest task on your desk… the one you keep putting off. Do it first and your day will become much easier.

As a business owner or self-employed freelancer, the growth and success of your business rests on your ability to plan and achieve the most important tasks first.

In his book, “Eat That Frog: 21 Ways to Stop Procrastination”, Brian Tracy recommends writing out your bigger goals monthly, and then every night before work write your task list for the next day. It doesn’t matter whether it’s in a diary, computer-based organiser or PDA, as long as you write it down in the one place.

Apparently, people who take 10-12 minutes to plan their day free up to two hours in wasted time ‘muddling around’ and getting distracted. How much time do you currently spend looking for files, looking at marketing email, or surfing the web – the world’s most distracting medium?

The division of priorities Mr Tracy suggests goes like this:

A task: Very important task, if you fail to do this you will be in trouble. Prioritise these if there are more than one.

B task: Slightly important tasks, with mild consequences. Never do a B task if there is an A task to do.

C task: Nice to do, but no consequences if you don’t do it. E.g. telephoning a friend.

D task: Something you could delegate to someone else. So free yourself up.

E task: Something you can eliminate, perhaps a habit you don’t need to have that just wastes time or energy.

Write up a list of tasks that you regularly do. Then place an a,b,c,d,e in front of your everyday tasks on the list.

If you are still thinking “all too hard”, remember that those who complete important tasks get a payoff… a burst of energy, enthusiasm and self-esteem. This ‘endorphin rush’ is also followed by a boost of confidence.

When you keep on conquering your most critical tasks (ones that you signed up for), the good feelings grow and results arrive. So you may even “get addicted” to the positive habit of starting and finishing important jobs. Wouldn’t that be something?

Hello and welcome to the first blog post for Infusionoz!  We’re in exciting times.  At least, we feel that we are!  And I hope you feel that way too.

I must share with you something that happened on the weekend that has got me thinking… and that has made me realise the ‘social media’ age that we are now living in and how important it is to be a part of it.

Last night I went to the Adam Hills live performance at the Powerhouse in Brisbane, seated just a few rows from the front (I love being up close so I can see expressions and the REAL person!!).  Adam came onto stage to a very excited crowd and within minutes he had discovered a man seated in the front row who looked a little like Santa.  Actually maybe a LOT like Santa! No kidding, and his name was Lex Cush.  Lex went along with Adam’s frivolity of wanting to take a picture of them both together and he then posted it on his blog page via his mobile phone, and then posted a tweet (on Twitter) to see who could come back with the funniest caption.

This might not sound that strange, however it was a live show and Adam was sitting on the edge of the stage with his mobile phone in hand, sending tweets and reading some back.  Not your usual stand-up comedy!  And it wasn’t just the photo of him and Lex that was posted either, as he found humour in some of the audience’s surnames (and admittedly it was VERY funny) so had to ID them and of course take more photos to post off.

After a little while Adam checked his mobile phone for responses and read out some tweets from around the world, with proposed captions for the picture of him and Lex, and we had a laugh.

What struck me as both funny and interesting is that one of the tweet replies came from a guy in the audience… who used his mobile to respond to Adam’s tweet.   As Adam remarked: “how funny that you’re communicating with me via a satellite and we’re about 15 metres apart”.

That is exactly the sign of our times:  tweeting, blog posting, re-tweeting, and using mobile phones to post comments and keep in contact with strangers all around the world, at any time, anywhere.

Not everyone is up with it though… it’s generally seen as a ‘young persons thing’.  Yet here was Adam Hills, an almost-40-yr-old sitting on stage with his blackberry taking photos, posting them and tweeting during his show.  Technology is available and accessible to anyone who wants it, and to anyone who chooses to get on board.

In business circles the traditional marketing channels are slowly being overtaken by our social media and technology advances in marketing automation such as Infusionsoft.  Those people who haven’t yet caught on are either looking in or choosing to let it go by.  I believe, to their detriment.

Regardless of what worked yesterday, we do know that things are always changing.  Traditional marketing of the past won’t bring the same results today or tomorrow, and with social media taking charge of the way we communicate – it’s something that simply can’t be ignored.

So with the memory of last night’s performance and Adam’s versatility with his tweeting and posting, I’m off to go tweeting myself.

Have a great week!

Aveline