3 Sure Fire Ways to Increase Your Productivity

Over the past few days I have done three particular things that have increased my productivity. Let’s jump straight into them.

1. Stop wasting time at affiliate forums – “I am not a sheep waiting to be prodded by my shepherd. I am a lion and I refuse to talk, to walk, to sleep with the sheep. I will hear not those who weep and complain, for their disease is contagious. Let them join the sheep. The slaughterhouse of failure is not my destiny.”

That quote is from a book that I’m currently reading and will do a review on in a couple of days. The amount of time I waste waiting around for replies that aren’t even going to help me is just plain stupid. It even gets to the point where I site there clicking refresh. How the hell is that a smart business strategy? Sure, forums were great in the beginning, reading all the posts. But now they serve no purpose to me other than going to the market place or keeping in contact with people.

What do the forums actually help you with? Is the information you gain easily found on the Internet from a more reliable source? How much time do they take of yours? Is it worth it?

Today was the least I had visited the forums, it was also my most productive day in a month. Funny that.

2. Delete the parasites and non-friends off FaceBook – In the last couple of weeks I have gone from 451 friends to 135. The change has been a little weird but I am better for it. No longer do I have a busy FB where I aimlessly read and comment on stupid crap.

There are a few different types of people I deleted off my FB:

• The first group is all the people from my home town and my high school that I was never really friends with. You know all those people in the grade above or the grade below? How about the people from other schools that you know from a friend of a friend but if you saw them it would be awkward? I deleted all of those people.
• The next group of people I deleted from my FB really needed to go. The gambling parasites. Why do I want scammers, spammers and ethically challenged affiliates on my FB. I think FB is kind of personal so there is no need to have them on there. Do I really want a third invite to your stupid freaking gambling group? Do I need this scum person on my FB just because they are well known?When I sit down and think about why I have certain people on there I worked out it is because everyone else does. I guess it was a popularity thing. I don’t like the people, they offer no value and they are emotionally draining.
• Affiliates I have never talked to – Some affiliates and “regular” people add me and never even introduce themselves. I have never communicated with them before and I don’t know why they were on there. I’m cool with networking, that’s why I accept friend requests. But don’t just add me to inflate your friend total count or whatever you are trying to achieve.

I also wasn’t comfortable with some of my personal details that were available through FB. I did a number of security changes to accommodate this fact. When non-friends do a search for me they have to be logged in to view (I believe). When they do view my profile all they can see is my pic and a “add to friends” button. They can’t see who my friends are or any of my details.

Some of you might know about a topical article I wrote recently about data selling. I hunted a guy involved down via social sites. On the flip side, I was getting stalked by several different people. A lot of people were doing searches on my name to find out who I was, FB was a natural answer. Gambling companies even added me to chat to me.

• Clean up your IM – Do you have a shit load of people on MSN and Skype that you don’t chat to, don’t like or have no reason to have them on there? I know I did. I have cleaned up my MSN to get rid of stupid chicks from high school and other gambling scum and the like. I’ve gone from over 200 contacts on MSN to around 80. I feel so much better about it. I also cleaned up Skype to a lesser extent. Do you really need affiliate managers on there from programs you were once thinking about promoting?

  I guess the reason I wanted heaps of people on IM is to feel part of the crowd. IM makes you feel like you aren’t going to miss out on anything. My thinking was if I had all these people on IM then I would be the first to hear about some magical million dollar turn of events. Really? Maybe not to that extent, but you get my picture. I don’t want to be involved in affiliate politics. Gossip drains my energy.

This post probably makes me sound like a bit of a douche who thinks he’s too cool and smart to talk to anyone. I don’t want it to come across that way though. I’m always happy to help and network with like minded people. Steps just needed to be taken to eliminate the energy draining activities and people out of my life.

For those of you that want to feel the love with me you can add me to Facebook at facebook.com/GamblingAffiliate. Alternatively, my Skype name is nickhaslem.

Let me know what you think about my culling of these energy drainers.