Recently I started re-designing our website. For me website design is easy since I designed my first website in 1996 and even owned a business designing websites for other companies. However, as the design started taking place I stopped and realized that I was not using my time correctly.
Just because I can design and build websites doesn’t mean I should. I get paid for producing apps and mobile marketing campaigns, not building websites and I like so many other small business owners thought that I was saving money by doing it myself. Yes I came down with an attack of Do It Yourself (DIY) and it could have proven fatal if it wasn’t caught in time.
I have several projects on my board in different stages of completion and 3 upcoming events and here I am working on a website because of DIY. DIY has robbed so many small business owners of their time, creativity and cash. The figures aren’t known but I’m certain that DIY has been the cause of thousands of small business deaths.
DIY is tricky and once you catch it the symptoms may not be recognizable for months. Here are some of the known symptoms of Do It Yourself (DIY).
- You don’t understand the true value of other people’s work so you make yourself believe that you can do it cheaper and better.
- You own several “_____ for DUMMIES” books. If you have more than 3 in your possession you are in the critical stages of DIY. The only cure is to recycle the books and locate professionals to take on those duties.
- You used to do this back in the day but it’s not what you do today, so you think that by still performing these tasks you are saving your business money.
- You constantly tell other professionals that their job is so easy a caveman can do it.
DIY is serious, it robs you from working on the tasks that actually makes money for your business by diverting your attention to tasks that are best suited for other professionals to handle. You can learn to avoid DIY by starting every day with a checklist of your tasks and list on top the ones that bring in income upon completion. Any task on your list that does make you money upon completion you should look to outsource it to someone else.
I beat DIY by outsourcing the re-design of the website and now I have more time to spend on those areas where I earn money. I have so much more energy and time since I beat DIY.
Here’s what you can do to beat DIY:
Be honest with yourself. How could you better spend your time if you had a professional working on projects that you don’t derive income from. If you believe you can’t afford a professional look to barter. Google barter for bartering organizations where you can exchange services and possibly gain new clients.
Stop wasting valuable time and energy on DIY projects, focus yourself 100 percent on the tasks that you really make money from. If all small business owners practice this every day we can beat DIY and stop it from killing another small business.
A public service announcement from RDZ Media Group, LLC.