Val Geisler - what a productive day looks like

Over the last year or so, I've come up with a few key factors that make for a productive day.

Before we go on I need you to know that I'm not going to tell you to wake up early.

In fact, this whole "just wake up at 5am!" thing really frustrates me. Why? Because I have small children who do not sleep through the night. Because I want to spend time with my husband after the kids go to bed. Because if I am getting up at 5am it's to do yoga, not to work.

So I'm not going to tell you that the only way to be productive is to get up early.

Here's what works for me:

• get dressed in real clothes, do my hair and basic makeup
• play this Spotify playlist on my Alexa
• diffuse Thieves essential oils
• write down top 3 things to get done
• do the work

That's it. And that last one? There's really nothing I love more than actually doing the work. Getting on calls with clients, writing, testing email sequences, tracking metrics.

You know that feeling at the end of the day when you're like "I know I did stuff all day long but what did I actually get done???"

No more of that for me when I tackle that list above.

Oh, and there's one more thing. I do my best work in silos.

No multi-tasking. No context switching constantly.

A lot of freelancers and consultants struggle with this context switching issue. How do you move seamlessly from a 30 minute call with Tech Startup Client to writing a blog post for Paleo eCommerce Brand?

You don't. There's nothing seamless about that.

Here's my trick:

I often work in half and full day sessions with my clients.

You book me for an entire day (or just half of one if your project is smaller) and my brain, energy, and typing fingers are dedicated to you and your brand during that time.

There's no email checking or context switching. It's pure focused, productive time.

And, boy, is it productive.

In half a day I can get your pre and post-webinar emails together, or map out a single sequence for you.

In a full day I can create a framework for your entire segmented email onboarding, write a 5-7 email sequence specific to your audience, craft subject lines to A/B test on your existing sequences, or research and interview some of your customers for you.

There's probably more.

I've found that when I remove context switching from my day and dedicate it to one client at a time, the work expands. I get more done in less time. (Related: I don't bill hourly for many reasons, the key reason being I'd have to bill for all of the hours of experience and education I've accumulated up to this point and that's real time tracking headache.)

Want to have a productive day with me?

On this page you can learn more about the process and/or go ahead and book some time on my calendar – it's all there for you.

Now you probably have questions so you can also hit reply to this email and ask away.

I'll respond as soon as my current full day session is done.

-Val