What to Do In The Meantime: 15 Business Tasks Worth Doing Now

Sometimes the business world as we know it grinds to a halt, because something BIG is going on that capture’s the lion’s share of people’s attention.

When this happens, engaging in business-as-usual isn’t an easy thing to do – what, are you going to launch a new course with fanfare when everyone’s reeling from That Thing That Just Happened?

No, you’re not.

You’re in “the meantime” – that stretch of space where the streaming TV series we call life is on pause.

So, rather than sit on your thumbs waiting for things to go back to normal (ha!), here are a ton of worthwhile (and potentially profitable) activities you can engage in that can make a meaningful impact on your business right now.

1. Brand your blog images

If you’ve created specific branding for blog post images, but you haven’t gotten around to updating all of your old posts, now’s a great time to do it. You’ll make your blog look more consistent – as well as making your brand more memorable.

(If you haven’t set up a brand yet, take a look at Plug & Play Branding – it’s available on Pay-What-You-Want pricing in the Karma Store.)

2. Batch social media posts

You’ve got time on your hands, so batching is a perfect activity for when you don’t have other things to do. Set up a week or a month of social media posts in one sitting – and if you’re still looking for something else to do, do it again. :)

3. Interlink existing content

You can boost your overall traffic stats considerably by interlinking your existing blog content, and it’s ridiculously easy. Make a list of your current blog posts, then look at your existing content to see where good linking opportunities exist. And if there aren’t many, add a sentence or two to your post to support a link or two.

4. Outline new content

Even if you’re not in the mood to write new content right now, you can start planning out new pieces. Take a sit-down session to develop two or three new ideas, or a series of posts. Later, when you’re ready to write, you’ll have something to work from.

(If you’re stuck on ideas, take a look at Plug & Play Blog Posts and The 1-Hour Content Plan, also available at Pay-What-You-Want pricing.)

5. Make transcripts / show notes for audio or video content

It’s often not a good time to stop what you’re doing to get around to making those transcripts or show notes for spoken content. So in the meantime, there’s nothing to conflict with finally taking care of these. You can build your transcripts from scratch or use a transcription service like Otter to get you started, and pretty them up from there.

6. Make some lists

There are probably a fair number of things in your business that could benefit from a dedicated list. Specific improvements to your sales pages, specific people to ask for testimonials, specific loose ends you need to tie up. Making a workable list is the first step in getting these things to completion – and now’s a good time to step back and decide what needs to be on those lists.

7. Improve your back-end pages

There’s a lot you can do with back-end pages (your 404 page, your “thank-you” page and your “email address confirmed” page, etc,) to make them work harder for you. Update these pages to link to other content, products, or calls-to-action that could give your business a boost. (Perhaps even make a list of all of these pages as your starting point to help you get momentum once you start.)

8. Google those nagging things you don’t know

There’s a lot of stuff we don’t do because we have an information block, and we don’t always realize how long we’ve let ourselves stay stuck. Doing a quick Google search for “How do I use segmenting in ConvertKit” or “How do I ask for a testimonial” can get you unstuck mighty fast.

9. Unsubscribe from email lists

It’s always a good idea to keep your list subscriptions to a minimum, and an easy way to gauge whether or not to stay on a list is to imagine the last year without it. If you’re on a list and it hasn’t been VERY worthwhile over the last year to receive those emails, unsubscribe. It’s a distraction that contributes to overwhelm, and it needs to go, pronto.

10. Get better at something highly specific

The “meantime” is a great time to put a little bit of laser focus on improving something specific in your business. For example, if you took an afternoon to look at 20 people’s opt-in boxes, you could find a lot of ways to improve and refine your own. Pick one tiny thing, study it for an afternoon, and take your game up a level.

11. Update your bio

Having a little bit of downtime means you have the opportunity to think about something and get proper perspective. Your bio is one of those things that needs revisiting from time to time – every quarter perhaps – to see if it’s reflective of who you are now. Take a little bit of time to reflect on what’s in your bio now, and change it up if you need to. (Tips for your bio can be found here.)

12. Update your about page

If you haven’t updated your About page in the last 6-12 months, then it could stand a revisit too – especially if you were self-conscious about it when it was created. Give you page a read through and make a list of changes you want to make, and spend your “meantime” setting up improvements. (Or, if you don’t like your page at all, use one of the About Page templates in The Ultimate Digital Marketing Template Pack to make it easy.)

13. Clear digital clutter

File under “never seems like a good time to deal with it”: digital clutter. Clear out your Downloads folder and put files you want in places that you can find them later, and you’ll experience a surprising amount of satisfaction. (I just did this last week and it blew my mind how much of a weight lifted off my shoulders.)

14. Set up email filters

Every morning you open up your inbox to a slew of emails you didn’t really want to receive, and you archive them out of habit. Some might be from lists that don’t process your unsubscribes, others are ones that you want for reference, but don’t need to see now. Set up some filters to bypass your inbox and reduce the daily overwhelm of checking email in the morning.

15. Dream up a few new products

You probably have a few product ideas floating around in your head that you haven’t developed yet – and now’s a wonderful opportunity to play around with what you might create next. And you might decide to start working on one now, which makes waiting out the meantime a whole lot easier.

(Note: If you want to develop new products quickly and easily, take a look at Product in a Weekend, also available at Pay-What-You-Want pricing in the Karma Store.)

When you’re stuck in the “meantime”, your business doesn’t have to sit around waiting.

Just because the world around you may be “on hold pending further developments”, that doesn’t mean you have to sit on your thumbs. There’s plenty of things to do that will build up the foundations of your business as well as move important needles forward.

The “meantime” is a perfect opportunity to give attention to things that otherwise wouldn’t get done. So when the world has presented you with a window like this, choose some of these activities to work on, and you’ll keep your momentum going strong.

Take care,