A good foundation is essential to your online success. Organization is the key to that foundation. By focusing early on in creating an organized business, you will be able to spend more time on the parts of your business that will actually bring you money - sales & marketing. The few minutes it will take you to set up your email, and create an accounting of your expenses will make a world of difference in your business.

Lots of people "ignore" such little things but the little things are ACTUALLY very important! I promise, if you organize first, your business will go much smoother and grow much faster.

ORGANIZE YOUR EMAIL

This is normally the first and primary tool that you will use to communicate with your Company, teammates, and prospects. This is what you will use to make your first impression. If you can't make your very first tool organized, then how can you make any of your other things organized?

Basically, all mail programs have the same folders, such as INBOX, SENT ITEMS, DELETED ITEMS, and JUNK MAIL. Now, when you go into business, those folders are NOT enough.

How many times have you read an email and thought "Ok, I know it's there.. I'll just reply to it later"

Now imagine you're in business and have twice as many emails. You go in, read a few, reply to a few, and then leave to do something else. You go back in later and now you have even more emails coming in and you can't remember who you replied to and who you haven't.

Make a new folder and give it a name such as "MAIL COMPLETE".

That way you know, the emails that are in your INBOX, are still waiting for a response. This is an easy way to separate the two, especially the ones that have already been read and cause the most confusion.

Also, make a folder in your mail titled: IMPORTANT MAIL/FILE

At times you will have mail that you will always want to keep, like billing info from your company, and you can put them in this folder. I would also print a copy and keep it in a binder or file cabinet.

Make a special folder for your business: MY ONLINE BUSINESS

You can put this folder in "My Documents" or in "Desktop" You will then need to make other folders to keep inside 'My Online Business' folder. They are:

1. PROMOTIONAL BRIEFCASE

2. SAMPLE EMAILS

3. INFO REQUESTER or PROSPECT

4. IMPORTANT URLs

5. IMPORTANT ARTICLES

6. DOWNLINE INFO

7. MISCELLANEOUS

There might be some other folders you want to add, it all depends on what you need.

I personally add 'Training' folder, and 'EZINE folder' to mine as it's appropriate for my situation, since I give online training for members, and need to prepare articles for my Ezine. You may want to create some for your website such as, Promoting Website or Marketing Advice.

ORGANIZE YOUR RECORDS

Set up an accounting file in Excel or buy an accounting book to record your business expenses and profit.

Create Files or get a shoebox and place all your business receipts inside. This will help you immensely at tax time.

Please don't ignore this step! Organization is essential in creating a well-run, successful business!