Category Archives: Become a More Productive Business Owner

5 Quick Sales Pipeline Wins For Small Business Owners You Absolutely Must Do Today!

4 min read 1. Answer the phone, qualify the lead, and ask for the $$$ on the first call. My phone script looks like this: Hi!  Nice to meet you! Give me the high level overview of what you need. Oh, that makes sense.  I talk to people all the time who have that same problem, so are in […]

Request For Proposals (RFPs) Are Awesome! (But NEVER Respond to One!)

2 min read “Toby, I just spent the last week responding to an RFP, and when they received my reply, they said they already chose someone else!” Eee Gads!!! Here’s a Table of Contents from a real RFP I received in my inbox today: Freelancers hate RFPs. HATE them. By my non-scientific estimates, RFPs cause freelancers over 10 […]

A Simple & Awesome Tweak To My Sales Process

< 1 min read I owe this brilliant idea to Barbara. (Thanks!) The Old Process (3 Steps) For the past year or so, my sales process for new web leads looked like this: Lead comes in via my contact form. I reply to the email with some times/dates via assistant.to requesting a quick phone call. The person clicks a […]

My Biggest Success Yet! (I Took a Week Vacation!)

2 min read I have a personal success story I’d like to share quick. For the past 6 years, I’ve been taking action to better-integrate The Mighty Mo! into my non-work life. One pain point for me over the years has been taking calm vacation time away from my business and with my family. Previously… A common vacation […]

Why I Say “No”​ Most Of The Time

< 1 min read Productivity Starts With “No”. Some questions deserve an immediate “yes”. Like when my daughter asks me to send her invisible parrot on a superhero mission. Or when my wife asks me to go on solo-daddy-duty tonight while she binge-watches Parks & Rec. I always say, “Yes” in those situations. For everything else, I start with “no”. […]

The Stupidest Thing I Ever Did As a Business Owner.

2 min read In 2007, I worked as a freelancer at the biggest, baddest¹ agency in town building Flash websites. I would show up every morning, sit in my cubicle, write code, and make big bucks.² And I was miserable.³ The illustrious views from the 25th floor of that downtown highrise were stunning, yet I felt trapped behind […]

Perhaps the Nicest Thing You Can Do To Your Desktop Today (and it only takes 30 seconds)

2 min read Did you open up your computer to this? Photo by: saaby, Creative Commons V2 Ugh! Me, too. The solution to a clean computer desktop is so super duper simple and has been staring at you since…forever! Here’s my before: And here’s my after: And I didn’t even have to delete anything! I use a folder called, […]

1 Simple Tactic That Has Doubled My Productivity

3 min read Every now and then, I learn something that changes things in a big way for me. I like to share those life-changing things in the hopes that you might find them helpful, too. Back in June, I made a basic change to my daily routine that has resulted in a doubling+ in the value of […]