Thanks to technology, two concepts were introduced known as “online business” and “work from home”. So these concepts could not have been possible without the internet. You must know the best productivity tips or growth hacks which can drive sales in your online business while doing work from home. According to a study the internet penetration rate in India increased from 4% in 2007 to 52% in 2017. 

Online business is a great way to start for those who wish to work from home. GST registration is mandatory to start any online business. It is also advisable to know about the taxation system or the tax rate on your products when you list the items on your own website or any other e-commerce marketplace.

Till now it was just a concept for most and a dream for me as my office is really far and the commute was killing me. But the outbreak of the corona has now forced many to work from home and has forced many businesses to go online.

As soon as people started working from home, they started looking for productivity tips to improve their productivity for their online business or work. I hope you are also staying at your home and if possible you are doing your work or conducting your business from there only.

A great person has said that a show must go on and so our work should also go on. But working from home and doing the business online comes with its fair share of advantages and disadvantages and therefore many need some productivity tips to be productive at home.

Students need productivity tips for students to study from home and business owners need productivity tips for work to make work from home successful. The advantages and disadvantages of work from home are as follows:

ADVANTAGES:

● Flexible work schedules

● Saves travel time

● Time for family emergencies

● Avoid office politics

● Perfectly plan all day routine

● No manager standing all day over your head

DISADVANTAGES:

● Sense of physical interaction with peers

● Time zone differences lead to odd work schedules

● Working alone is boring

● Network downtimes

● Distractions from family

But as I started writing this post, one question was stuck in my mind. From the day I started working from my home and started my online business, I feel that I have become more productive, so why aren’t businesses performing better and what is the need of this post?

Why do people want productivity tips?

I mean as I feel more productive, I thought other people should also feel the same.

As I was searching for the answer, I came across a study in which It was found that if a person is doing a creative task, like creating content, music, etc. they became 20% more productive and for people that were doing recurring tasks, they were 30% less productive. The reason is simple:

As you are not being forced to work as you were in the office, and if you get bored, you will get distracted as there are unlimited sources of distraction at your home.

Therefore, if you are doing some creative work, your productivity will definitely increase. But, if you think that you are less productive by working from home, you just need to find some inspiration for your work. You can also search for productivity at work to get some tips.

If your work is not based on creativity, and the disadvantages of online business are overtaking the advantages and are making you less productive, don’t worry, we have the simplest productivity tips and solutions for you.

You won’t believe how much you can achieve from your home-based online business, you just need to clear your project objectives and have proper scheduling.

Here is the list of top 10 productivity tips for home-based business owners:

Customize your home office:

The environment has a huge effect on your activity.

No one can be productive lying in their beds in their pajamas. Your environment has the biggest effect on your productivity. So why don’t we just change that?

Creating an inspiring work environment in your home is the first productivity tip. You can never achieve productivity by sitting anywhere in the room. A desk and a chair are two essentials along with your laptop/desktop and an uninterrupted internet connection.

Choose the quietest room in your home. Consider your business time as 11-7 therefore at 11you should lock yourself in your room and so not stop working till 7. Successful project execution requires your full attention and input and in this case your business work. As you prepare your schedule, consider the following points:

●  When your team members need you to be available

●  Time of the day when you are most productive

●  Communication with the customers or your co-workers

If you want to sell on amazon India, or any other marketplace then most of your work will involve order processing, packing, managing inventory, and shipping which can be carried out from home itself. Sometimes professionalism is compromised here. 

To overcome this, you can set up your home exactly like you want your office to be. Consider it as your office and work relentlessly until your target for the day is achieved.

Another point you should consider here is that you should keep your work time and personal time separate. Consider yourself as a phone, after you work, you need some time and rest to charge it.

If you start working at your personal time this will just bore you and it will increase your fatigue which will definitely lead to lower productivity the other day. After that, no productivity tip at work can help you. 

Dress like you are at work:

Your mind is a small child and you should treat it like one. You can easily fool it and this is what we will do in this trick.

At your work time, dress like you usually dress when you used to go to the office. Your comfortable clothes make you sleepy, sluggish, and unmotivated. This is also one of the best ways which will produce incredible results.

Get up from your bed, brush your teeth, give yourself a shower, and wear your formals. This will send signals to your brain that this is work time, not relaxation time, and you will feel more energized.

Please don’t act lazy on this advice as this will have a direct effect on your productivity. You can use it as a productivity tip for students also, as this will energize your body and this productivity tip will boost your mood. 

Collaborate to gather work requirements:

A simple office works by one rule that when the employee comes, they are paid and if they don’t their leave is deducted from their salary. But how can this be maintained if no one comes to the office, which is the case of working from home?

A freelance consultant can generally claim many of the same write-offs as a traditional employee, but they must use tax deductions and credits specific to their unique situation when filing taxes since they are not associated with a particular company or office.

You will pay your employees according to the work they do. Therefore to see or have an idea if the employees are working well or not, you should collaborate with each and every one of your employees. To maintain this in an even better way, you should prepare a proper project schedule. i.e you should define everyone’s goals for what they will do today, this week, and this month.

This is to create much-needed pressure on them that will ensure that you reach your daily target and that you are working productively. You should also prepare to schedule for yourself so that you can work according to your daily target. This will work as a factor that increases productivity for you and your team.

There are many small-scale industries that provide freelancing work to people who can work from home and produce productive results for the organization. For productive outcomes, you have to collaborate with them on a daily basis, plan the work and create milestones to achieve it. In this scenario, productivity tools play a crucial role in assigning tasks and monitoring them. 

Tune in to inspiration:

The next productivity tip is a bit unusual. But, according to studies, the biggest enemy of productivity is boredom and in this case, the best friend is some music.

In my case, I cannot work if I am not listening to some music. The biggest advantage that you have while you are working from home is that anything that you do will not distract your co-workers. Now you can even listen to music at full volume on your headphones. You can go loud and proud and no one will bother you, other than your family of course.

Spotify does have some playlists that are great for listening while working. Try some soothing soundtrack, instrumental music, or just open your windows and let nature sing to you. Do whatever makes you feel motivated to stay on your track. It is among the most common factors that increase productivity.

PS: Avoid music that has lyrics as you will end up singing it and your work will suffer.

Stay away from social media:

Well, there are some do’s and there are some don’ts and this is a don’t of the productivity tips list. Avoid your phone and especially social media and in many cases PUBG too. Instead, consider using a reliable landline service to stay connected with important calls and minimize distractions. This tip also lies under the productivity tips for the work category.

Exploring a little is of no harm, but the charm of social media is so great that you will end up wasting many working hours surfing the internet. If you use it a lot, this is the biggest roadblock that you have to overcome. You should understand that working from home requires you to separate your personal and work time and by using social media, you are doing exactly the opposite.

One more thing that I have noticed is the lunch break. You can go and watch TV while you are on your lunch break, but you should get up as soon as your lunch is finished. Don’t be seated there to complete the episode or wait till your food is digested.

Enjoy your work:

When you handle your business from home, you are the one that is managing you. You can never achieve your full productivity unless you are enjoying what you are doing. And why should you do something that you don’t enjoy? Give this question a thought.

This productivity tip is about enjoying what you do. Love your work and stay disciplined and you will see results that you would have never imagined that you will get from yourself. 

Make use of the time that you save:

A benefit of work from home is that you are saved from the time that was wasted on commuting to the workplace. Now that you have that extra time, why don’t you utilize this to do what you wanted to do for a long time or exercise, or improve your skills?

If you would have worked from an office, your office could have been 30-45 minutes away and therefore a lot of time would have been wasted in commuting. Instead, you can use this time to your advantage, do something healthy or relax. You can play games, listen to music, exercise or even earn money by buying crypto (BTC, BNB, LTC, etc.) at this time. So in this way, you switch off from work and put the time to good use.

You should see this saved time as a benefit and you should use this wisely. Use this time to improve yourself or your skills. Don’t waste your time on chatting and social media as this is just a distraction and temporary thing, but the skills that you will gain in this time will stay with you forever.

Productivity tips don’t include multi-tasking:

According to a study by Harvard Business Review, multitasking is impossible and you should probably stop trying to do it. Multitasking leads to as much as a 40% drop in productivity, increased stress, and a 10% drop in IQ.

Believing that you can do more work if you do multitasking is just like believing that you should be a good child if you want Santa Claus to give you a gift on Christmas, you know what I mean.

A task needs your focus and skills to be completed, and when you are doing more than one task at a time, you are focusing on none of the tasks.

When a task is done with 100% focus, it can be completed faster than when you try to multitask. While multitasking, you are doing nothing other than just quickly shifting between incomplete tasks.

To avoid multitasking try the following tips listed below:

● Don’t look at your phone while working

● Eliminate outside distractions

● Provide yourself some time for outside distractions

● List your priorities and work according to your schedule

● Be mindful (Be physically and mentally present)

● Don’t be afraid to say NO

● Keep your desk area/office clean

● Strengthen your focus

● Uni-task for your most important work during your prime time

● Use multitasking apps to avoid distractions.

Work in 90-minute sprints:

This is a very old productivity tip. Human alertness is limited to 90-120 minutes at a time before it needs a break and if you will keep working, then you are just losing your productivity. After 90 minutes, your mind needs rest and for it, your mind will start distracting you and you won’t be able to work with full concentration. This is called “Ultradian Rhythm”.

After 90-minutes of an intensive working session, give yourself a 10-minute break to recharge and to keep your mind fresh during a day.

Use Task and Project Management Tools:

Remember as a child we were told to create and work according to a time-table to make better use of our time and day.

Well the IT sector has improvised that time-table and has created a better time table as a work management tool for us adult children.

A well-planned work, project, or day is always more productive. Therefore, plan your to-do list and work accordingly. “Email isn’t an ideal method of communication or collaboration on teams,” says Dave Nevogt of Hubstaff.

You can utilize project management tools, or you can choose from n number of software available, according to your workflow.

By choosing the right software you are buying accountability and proper workflow for your business.

By using such software, you can be clear on the timelines, objectives, role wise tasks, critical assessment areas, priorities, and other material essential to the smooth progress of the project or your work.

Conclusion:

If you follow all of the above-mentioned productivity tips, they can help you in improving your productivity easily. Make sure that you love what you do as if you are not doing your work wholeheartedly, you can never be the best at it.