Home is the new office. Your morning coffee, the little chats with co-workers, settling in for your daily tasks; all this is something of the past for the unforeseeable future. According to Chicago SEO consultant, Jordan Whelan, these types of tips can help you structure a productive day at home to work on SEO.
Take Care of the Distractions
The distractions at the office don’t go away; the distractions change shape. Co-workers who kept you from focussing on your work are now replaced by all the personal tasks that are typically done in your own time at home – doing laundry, taking care of the kids, cleaning the kitchen, and quickly going to the grocery store.
All these little things add up to a lot of time spent not being productive with your work. Be aware of the things that will cause you to procrastinate and waste your time.
Use Your Commute Time
Block out this time for personal development and family time. Start your day centered with a basic yoga routine. Use this time to settle your kids into their activities for the morning. Get your coffee fix before you settle in.
Work-life Vs. Personal-life
Keeping healthy boundaries around your work-life and your personal life will be vital to making a success. Look at your tasks for the day and decide on the time you will allocate to get it done. Once it’s done, it’s done. Find a specific action or activity to end your office day to make the mental switch to home time.
Get Your Priorities Straight
Take 5 minutes to schedule your day. Emails can quickly eat up all your time. Work out an email management strategy and stick to it. Next, you need to plan your SEO tasks: keyword research, optimization, link building, URL building, analytics, mobile optimizations, current trends, and coordinating with your client’s marketing teams. Make sure you have sound project planning in place for each of your clients to use your time wisely.
Have a Break
Office culture includes coffee and lunch breaks, as well as chats with co-workers. Taking a break improves productivity and creativity. Stepping away allows you to come back to the task with fresh eyes and a new perspective or a different answer to the task at hand.
Don’t Be Lonely
One of the most significant changes from office to home is loneliness. You have to interact with your co-workers. Show your face by having meetings with co-workers and clients using FaceTime or Zoom. Take part in group chats and allow a little fun in these chats to lift everyone’s spirit.
Move Around
Don’t sit down the whole day. When taking your breaks, make sure you move your body. One smart idea is to use doing the laundry as a timer. Get up and hang out the washing and start the next load. When you break for a cup of coffee, don’t just stand around, take a walk around the house and stretch those legs.
Embrace This Time
It all comes down to finding a new, healthy routine for yourself and your family to keep yourself protected, but still productive. Don’t be too hard on yourself if it takes a couple of days or some hits and misses to find the best rhythm for yourself.
