Recovering From a Non-Productive Day

Thursdays are usually blogging days for me, but not this week.  I know we all have them, but there are some days when getting things done seems like an impossibility.  If I could actually go BACKWARDS in working, yesterday was one of those days.  While I am frantically trying to pull together the launch of NetWebVideo, an unproductive day is not only useless, but it can be a real psychological monster.  Being an internet marketer, these days do occur.  In fact, they occur to all of us no matter what we do.  It is coping with days like yesterday that separates the success stories and the failures.

I won’t get into the details of what happened yesterday, but there are some realities like computer glitches, lost rankings in the search engines and over-running, under-performing and very expensive PPC campaign days that occur with many of us online marketers.  So what do you do?  Here are the tips that keep me from falling into the downward spiral of despair:

1)  If it is financially costing you money, fix it (meaning turn it off, pause it or stop it) immediately!  In my case, I paused my Google Adwords campaign that was killing me for the time being.
2)  If it is not costing you money, determine whether there is a simple fix or a major fix. Fix simple fixes.  Develop a plan for major fixes.  In my case, I had a major computer error which was not going to get fixed immediately.  I chose to backup my files, migrate what I needed to my laptop and chose to revisit the problem over the weekend.

3)  Don’t dwell on the problems.  In fact, days like these are ones which you should just pull back, accept your losses and focus on something else.  After my backing up of files and shutting down my PPC campaigns, I chose to go and mow the lawn and play with my kids for a few hours.

4)  When you return to work, return with a good game plan.  Instead of focusing on all of the things that went wrong and need fixing first, choose to do a few tasks that are guaranteed to succeed. Here I am (the next day) and my plan included writing in my blog, writing and submitting a few articles, and spend some time in the forums doing a little bit of social networking.  All of these tasks need to be done anyway and the risk of failure is virtually zero.  These are all very productive tasks as well and rebuilds your attitude for success.

As you can see, the main point here is to be able to pull away from the bad energy when it presents itself and force yourself into a winning position.  (Yes, this is very “The Secret” stuff, but it really does work).   If you choose to dwell on these problems and even try to solve them when you are already frustrated, you are usually setting yourself up for disaster (and more, consecutive unproductive days).

I am back to feeling great today!  It has been productive!  I have a plan to fix my computer on Saturday and indirectly (without freaking out and going into panic mode), the two articles that I wrote this morning are ultimately going to help get me back my rankings in the Google SERPs.

Online marketing, as with life, is about getting over hurdles.  Just like a sprinter, it takes practice!  But once you start to REALIZE where the hurdles are, then they become easier to jump.

Have a great weekend!

- Matthew Bredel