Information Junkie Chronicles: Exercises for Less Internet Time
I’ve written several times about my ongoing quest to spend less time on the internet, despite running an internet-based business.
It’s pretty tough at times and it’s something I struggle with. I’ve been working on this over the past week or so as a specific goal, and this article is a list of things I’ve come up with.
An Exercise For Those Who Work Online
If you don’t make money online, then it’s very easy to quit browsing the internet. You simply stick your laptop in the back of a cupboard, block the Wifi/Data on your phone and that’s that.
Most of the people reading this site aren’t in that category though. This obviously includes me.
It’s hard to quit the internet when you rely on it to make money. Here are two things I’ve been trying recently to great effect:
- One day a week – no internet. Make it Saturday, Sunday or whenever; but take a day off. For what it’s worth, I usually take Sunday off. I don’t answer emails. I don’t check anything and I don’t even put the computer on or browse the net on any other devices.
If you have to write daily (this blog is an example) then write more on another day. Most people don’t write every day, so it’s not a problem.
This will get you into the habit of getting out of the habit of starting your day.
Here’s the second thing that’s having a major effect:
Write sales letters first thing… and do it on paper.
This is a modified idea I got from Rob of 30DaystoX. His idea was to write a to-do list of the six most important things to get done in the day, and do those before you do anything else. I added the “no computer” rule to that, and it’s been fantastic.
I wake up relatively early. An interesting side effect of this project is that I’m waking up earlier, though the jury is out on why. Today, for instance, I woke up at about 4:30am. I went and got a glass of water, and started writing.
By 8:00am when I went to get something to eat, I’d written two sales letters and the cliff notes version of four articles; everything I’d planned to do today writing-wise. After eating, I went on my daily walk, showered and some other stuff, and then started work again.
In short, I feel like I’ve worked two days for the price of one.
The key here is to do the writing before you go online. It’s a lot easier to become distracted when you have research to do, browsing to do and all those other things that involve you ending up on YouTube for three hours and Facebook for another four.
Even if you make money online, most of your work can be done offline and off the computer entirely. I recommend this.
How To Handle The “Must Do Online Things”
If you’re an info-junkie and in denial like I’ve been in the past, you’ll say things like, “Yeah… but what about research?! What about this? How about that?”
Do it last thing in the day. If you finish work at 5pm, then leave your research until the last minute. Here’s a timeline:
9 a.m. Start writing on paper.
12 a.m. Finish that; break for lunch
1 p.m. Back. Type everything up.
4 p.m. Start research for the next day and get everything in bullet point form
5 p.m. Finish for the day.
If you’re going to use automation in your business… use it. Let’s say you’re doing keyword research or using affiliate spy software or something. A lot of those things run in the background when they’re collecting data.
Let them run while you type stuff up or otherwise doing other things. There’s absolutely no need to sit and watch a program that runs automatically do so.
What else? Social media and analytics and all that; you don’t need to check them as often as you think you do. Instead, use the export function that a lot of platforms have and read the Excel once a week or whatever. If you’re a big social media fan, then schedule your posts.
This brings me onto my next point, and it’ll affect people more than me because I’m not a social media kind of guy.
Social Media Is Screwing With Your Brain (AND A Litmus Test For Awesomeness)
I read some news article that showed that Instagram is the worst social media platform for your self-esteem. Add that to the fact that every internet marketer and their pet cat had a meltdown earlier on in the week about a big Instagram bot being shut down, and you can see that social media in general is warping and moulding society.
Now, plenty of things do this. Social media isn’t inherently evil. It is inherently addictive though, as a billion teenagers (and old people too) will tell you.
Now, you can sit around and wait for a backlash or for the government to try and turn back the clock unsuccessfully, but it’s unlikely to happen.
Instead, accept things as they are; social media is here to stay for the foreseeable future.
It’s a tool that you can use or you can let it consume you and turn into a blubbering wreck of insecurity and anxiousness.
Assuming you want the former, here’s a litmus test for being awesome: Have you done anything today worth sharing?
People get insecure over social media because they see some hot girl getting a free trip to the Maldives or a guy getting a new Mercedes for his 21st Birthday. The fact is if you see that then you’ve lost already. You’re busy looking at social media which means you are a consumer and a product.
Just like writing or online business, if you’re not producing, you’re consuming.
Switch from consumer to producer.
Do this by spending 90% of your time on creating new content and the remaining 10% on uploading and admin.
Spend no time on mindless consuming.
Do this, you’ll find you have less and less outcome dependence from your social media, and yet you’ll loo busier and your analytics will improve.
Final Thoughts
Let me wrap it up here because I’ve touched on a basic formula for online stuff and if we’re all going to spend less time online, then the last thing you need is me keeping you here longer than necessary.
- 90% production, 10% admin, 0% mindless consumption
- Of that 90%, the online portion – research, customer support – comes last in your day
- Writing/Content Creation/Product development happens offline and first thing in the day
- If possible; make the above point outside of a computer entirely. (this won’t work for programmers and coders, but writers, photographers and similar will be fine)
That about covers it. This is an ongoing experiment, so no doubt I’ll come up with other stuff in future updates.