How to Set Aside Time to Do Your Bookkeeping

So I’ll letcha in on a little secret. I’ve never launched anything. Like, ever.

I’ve always been the 1:1 service provider, selling on the ‘gram, and gaining leads from referrals.

Until now.

I’m polishing and shaping up the last few pieces to my content strategy and in a few weeks, my monthly bookkeeping membership will open its doors!

But to be honest, I had no clue what I was doing. Again, I’ve ever launched anything.

As the queen Ashli Pollard always says, “It’s not hard. It’s new.”

And I spent a looooot of time dragging my feet. Wondering whether I should hire a launch strategist or a launch copywriter or both, or just “pull up my own bootstraps” and rewatch Ashlyn Carter’s Primed to Launch course.

Which I did. Because she’s the best.

But wanna know the true reasons for why it got done? I set aside time to do it. (Well, most of it. Launching is a heavy lift, yo.)

So when it comes to your bookkeeping, especially if it feels like something you have no idea how to do, read on for a few of my tips on how to actually get your bookkeeping done!

1. Pamper Yourself!

I’ve heard somewhere that, instead of rewarding yourself once you’ve completed the task, you should reward yourself while you’re doing it. This tells your brain that you actually enjoy the task because you’re sending little feel-good rewards up to it as you’re getting it done.

This jives for me because I’m a romanticizing girlie.

So when I sat down to map out strategy for my launch, adding stories, sprinkling in my personality, choosing which topics to go where to help add to the impact of opening the cart…

… I did it right 🕶️

I took a hot, relaxing bath, washed and exfoliated my face, filled up my Stanley with ice cold water, tucked myself into the world’s coziest bed, popped my Airpods in with the Nutcracker soundtrack blaring into my ears (yes that’s my hype music when I need to focus) and just did it. 

(The only thing that would’ve made it even better would have been hot tea. I love hot tea before bed or oooooh a tart cherry juice mocktail.)

Then I spent the entire next day at a local coffee shop, then shifted to Panera for lunch, then a different coffee shop before I snuck into my favorite indie bookstore for my copy of Iron Flame as a reward for getting it all done.

Pampering yourself and romanticizing the hard things can be extremely helpful to actually get your bookkeeping done. Yes, this might be more difficult for moms (hi, it’s me, full-time homeschool business owner mom), but even if you do it after the chaotic circus of bedtime – from bed – it can still send happy signals to your brain. 

Make it a point once a month to do something like this for yourself if you’re really not getting your bookkeeping done. If you’re a mama, ask for help with the kids (easier said than done, I myself can be extremely stubborn when it comes to admitting I need help), and knock it all out in a few hours on a Saturday.

Here’s my list of things I like to keep in my arsenal for tough tasks (although it’s definitely not an exhaustive list):

• Take a hot bath
• Drink some ice cold water
• Play my favorite playlist
• Wash yo’ face
• Get a fancy drink (coffee, tea, (m)cocktail)
• Eat dark chocolate
• Put on your emotional support fuzzy socks
• Work at a local coffee shop

You’ll look forward to your bookkeeping now if you know it includes a whole bunch of pampering 😉

2. Buddy Up

That’s right. Find yourself an accountability partner. The tried and true method of holding yourself accountable is to, well, outsource to someone other than yourself to hold you accountable.

Grab your OBM, your VA, your business bestie, your business coach, your spouse or partner and set them on speed dial. (Or make them set you on speed dial? Idk.)

Ask them explicitly to check-in with you once a month to ask if you’ve done your bookkeeping. Sign a small contract together if you need to. If you’re really struggling, throw in some $$$ incentives, like you pay for her Starbucks for a week, or you send her $50 each month if it’s not done.

Those are extreme, but sometimes working with an accountability partner doesn’t work. So if THEY have incentive to hold YOU accountable, they’ll be working even harder to make sure you get it done.

Bonus points if you knock it out in a coworking session together! (This is really fun if you can get a band of your business besties together who also need to do their bookkeeping. OR you can join The Business Book(keeping) Club where we have twice monthly dedicated Study Hall calls to knock out our bookkeeping together.)

3: Make a Date

Add it to the calendar and don’t skip it. Just don’t.

Bookkeeping is an extremely important function of your business that you need to take seriously.

(Maybe I should’ve started this blog with the importance of doing your bookkeeping, but let’s talk about it now.)

If you don’t know what happened in the past, it is so much more difficult to predict what will happen in the future. 

Bookkeeping in its simplest form is shaping up reports from the past to answer questions like, “Did I make more than I spent? How much did I spend? How much did I pay myself? Can I afford to hire someone?”

And if we know what happened in the past, we can either change it or replicate it moving forward.

Which brings me back to my point – set a date. Get it done, so you can actually have a set of financial reports to analyze, look over and use to make big business decisions like paying yourself more, hiring someone or taking time off.

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Once you lean into bookkeeping and embrace it as a regular part of your business routine, it becomes more than just numbers.

It’s a dynamic way of celebrating what you’ve done in business and giving yourself reports as tools to be the best business owner you can be.

If you’re doing it all yourself (go YOU!), but would love to lean on me and my team for questions, we’ve got our monthly bookkeeping membership – The Business Book(keeping) Club – ready for you! This is a place where you can ask questions, have 1:1 calls with professional bookkeepers for troubleshooting help and access to a huge library of (actually) helpful resource videos on how to do your bookkeeping. We would love to welcome you to the club!

Check out the membership here!

OR if you find yourself setting this all up and you want to bang your head against a wall, take a deep breath and give it over to us. We love this stuff and we will take good care of it FOR you 😉 

Check out this page for our DFY services!

Whatever you choose, know that we are here for you – kinda like a bookkeeping big sis. Let us know how we can help!