Module 42 - Running an online business while working full time. How to structure your week for ultimate efficiency

Leadership and Personal Development Blog Series

I am sure that many of you who are reading the blog are working full time job and are looking for ways to grow your passive income, or to start a new passive income stream. I was in exactly same situation few months ago. I was searching for a way to start my own business online, following my passion in the field of leadership and personal development, while working full time and continuing developing personally and professionally. Sounds like a very difficult task to accomplish, right? Well, the truth is - yes, it is very difficult at first, especially at the beginning stages, first few weeks and months. However, it is an achievable task if you truly want to build a successful online business, and if you are very passionate about your goal or dream in life, in the niche you are interested in getting into. If you are simply interested in creating another stream of income, but you have low interest in helping others through your work, then you may stop reading this blog post now to save you some time. The structure that I am about to share with you is designed for people who are very passionate about helping others through their work, by sharing their lifetime passion represented in their business and everything they do every day.

My weekly business structure is designed for ultimate efficiency, and is fueled by your strong desire to succeed, while doing what you love. Additionally, my structure is designed for individuals who are working full time jobs and have very limited time remaining at the end of the day. It does not matter whether you have two days off during the week of on the weekend. What’s required is strong will and desire to follow your dream every day.

You are probably thinking why I keep repeating what is required, and keep reiterating strong will, desire, passion, drive to success and goal of helping others? The reason why these items or ingredients are important and critical, because, without them many people their pursuit of their goals or lifetime dreams after just few weeks of hard work, on top of your 40+ hours per week at your full time job. So, if you are still interested, which I hope you are, let me share my weekly structure that I use to run my online business while working full time.

My weekly online business operations structure

Reserve one of your days off, for me it’s Saturday, to focus on writing, typing, recording your blog posts and podcast episodes.

If you have an office at home where you can spend 4-5 hours without any interruptions, then you would not even need to leave your house

In my situation, I do not have a home office, therefore, I make a weekly trip to a library where it’s nice and quiet, and focus on spending 4-5 hours writing the content for my website. I also have two young children, which make it difficult to focus and gather your thoughts while they are playing.
In most libraries you should be able to find study rooms where you can write behind a closed door in complete silence

Use these 4-5 hours that you have to write or type, not spending this time browsing internet on your phone or laptop. I prefer to write using notebook and pen or pencil versus typing on my laptop. I find it easier to reflect all of my thoughts when I have pen in my hand and paper to write on, not the laptop keyboard. However, if you prefer to type while you are thinking and you can do so comfortably, then you can save yourself about 30-45 minutes, since you would not have to type everything you just wrote, like I do.

Once I am done writing, I head back home and begin adding the content that I just wrote to my website. I use Weebly (Weebly.com) as my website building tool and hosting service. What I like about Weebly is its ease of use and drag-and-drop website building and editing functionality. This helps me to save a lot of time, since I don’t have to write any codes, but simply adding the content desired and schedule it to publish.

At this time I publish all of my blog posts every Monday morning. Once the content is added to my website builder, I schedule it to publish at the time and day that I want, all automated and simple.
Podcasts I record while kids are asleep or playing with my wife outside, and schedule to publish them the same way I do for blog posts

Keep in mind that if I need to run some errands or go watch a movie, I can absolutely do so, as long as I have completed and scheduled both blog post and podcast to publish.

I use my other day off, for it’s Sunday, to add content to my social media posting/scheduling tool – Buffer (Buffer.com). Buffer allows me to add content that I want to publish throughout the week on various social media platforms, and publish the content at the specific time and day of the week automatically.

The process of adding the content to Buffer takes me approximately 2-3 hours each week
I take another 1-2 hours on Sunday to add my content to other platforms and services I use to publish my podcasts (ex. Stitcher.com, Libsyn.com, Podbean.com iTunes, and Google Play Music)
Rest of the day on Sunday I spend with my family and kids. I also dedicate any available time I have each evening to spend with them as well

This weekly process enables me to work full time, while running my online business during the two days off that I have during the week. It is not easy, and very demanding process and schedule, that is why if you are missing passion and desire to reach your lifetime goal and dream, while doing what it takes to get there, you will find very difficult to follow through and stick to the plan.

Passion, strong desire to succeed, and helping others, are your essential ingredients to fuel your progress towards success and dream fulfillment.