3 Lesser Known Tools to Stay Focused, Productive, and Organized

I know from this title your interest is piqued. But! Has this been your experience with past articles like this:

“Yes, I would love to be more productive, let’s find out what this writer has to say. OH GOOGLE DOCS? RREALLLYYY? How ‘innovative.’ I haven’t thought of that before.”

This isn’t that article. I limited my selection to just 3 tools.

Time management is the forever issue, and I’ve found tools that work really well for me. Hopefully they’ll work for you too!

1. Focusmate

The way I describe Focusmate to people who have never heard of it is that it’s like if Chat Roulette (remember that weird internet moment?) met the Pomodoro technique, and had an accountability baby.

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How it works: You pick a time slot for 55 mins and Focusmate matches you with a partner. When your session starts you both introduce yourselves and say what you’re working on and then you go on mute. So it goes a little something like this:

“Hi, I’m doing well! Thanks for asking. I’m going to spend this time chipping away at the 78 emails I have in my inbox. I hope to get it down to at least half during this session. How about you?”

“I’m working on my thesis and I want to get a paragraph written during this session.”

“Wonderful! Good luck, I”m going on mute and I’ll see you at the end.”

“Same!”

Then you mute each other but are still visible for the whole session.

For whatever reason I’m able to attack my inbox with precision and focus like no other. HOW DOES THIS WORK? I have no idea why this particular combination of accountability and timed sessions works for me when nothing else did.

But Focusmate was my number one favorite thing I discovered during covid lockdown times and I’ve been using it ever since.

The second best part, next to getting more work done, sometimes you’re paired with artists and musicians who are practicing. So I get to see a piece of work getting created, or at the end I often ask the musician to play something for me. So far they have all agreed. Live music! During work! Last month I had a feeling my partner was Brazilian, at the end he figured out I spoke Portuguese and kindly allowed me to practice with him.

Introverts don’t worry, 19 out 20 sessions I just thank them and move on, and you would never have to have further engagement. But there is the option if you want it.

I often start my Monday but throwing Focusmate sessions into my calendar for the week, planning it around my phone calls. Having something on my calendar generally means I’m showing up for it. And it also provides some boundaries for my next tip:

2. Calendly

Oh mannnnn do I love Calendly! I also started using it during the pandemi.

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How it works: You create links that folks can use to set up time with you in your calendar. And you can also create rules around those time chunks.

I know if I have an hour call on the books, I don’t want anything after for at least 20 minutes to decompress or write out my notes. So, I made that a rule for my 60-minute Calendly.

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You can also have it include a phone number or a zoom link (or whatever you want) so you don’t have to do anything but send someone the link! Once the invitee chooses a time slot, it goes on both your calendars, and badda bing, badda boom- you’re ready to rock and roll.

This one thing has saved me so many back and forth emails. So much time. I cannot recommend this enough.

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3. Boomerang

This is the holy grail of PR tools. It came out a few years before Google introduced their snooze function, and while I use Google’s snooze, I still mostly rely on Boomerang.

How it works: You can make an email return to your inbox. You can choose it to return in an hour, two hours, two days, two years… you choose the time interval. You can also choose for it to return ONLY if no one responds to it.

While other folks are going around building out custom CMSes (which can be a really good idea) I just use Boomerang. Let me explain.

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I know that if I send a pitch or a proposal out, I want to follow up between 4 days and a week depending on the person receiving it.

So, before I press send, I tell Boomerang to put this email back in my inbox in a week if no one responds to it. That means if my pitch goes unanswered, in a week I’ll know to follow up because it will be in my inbox waiting for me to take action with it.

I use it to follow up on my employees as a backup— we all let things fall through the cracks, but now with me also Boomeranging anything she puts me on cc for, I catch what she doesn’t. What an incredible asset to our clients.

I like this better than a CMS because I don’t click out of my one program (gmail) to enter info into another one. I Boomerang something back, and then I use a canned response with a little personalization. So much time saved, no relying on my unreliable memory, no clicking away from my most productive tool (email).

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My NUMBER ONE Boomerang use that is not work related?

You know when you sign up for a service and after the trial you start paying? I Boomerang those emails back into my inbox a day or two before the trial ends, and that reminds me to unsubscribe (assuming I didn’t like it). I don’t get charged for things I didn’t want, saving me (probably) $100’s a year.

So, what lesser known tools do you use to stay focused? I’d love to know! Share with me at hello@wolf-craft.com. If you do, we’ll share your favorite tool and a link to your business in our newsletter!