Data! Something that we use, we talk about, and we NEED. But do we really know what it is or how it can hep us in our businesses? I know I use it on my phone, and when I used to run out I would be super sad because I wouldn’t be able to access the internet. That is not the type of data I am talking about today But I will say it was super annoying because I had to go in to the phone bill online and give my kids a data “allowance” so I could even have any. Then we went to an unlimited data pan and that solved ALL the problems. Now we use as much data as we want and don’t pay any overage charges. That sure comes in handy!

But that isn’t the data I want to talk about today. The data I want to talk about today is the data that can help you grow your business and find more customers and clients. That is what we want and need to grow our businesses and have them thrive. We need people who want what we have to offer and then utilize our services, products or information. And don’t assume your business isn’t big enough for data to be useful. ALL businesses no matter how big or small can utilize data to grow, or improve their businesses.

Even a small one person business generates data.  If you have a website or are on social media or accept electronic payments, you are gathering data about customers, user experiences, traffic to your sites and more. All of this data is filled with information that can be used to improve your company f you ca learn to access and utilize it effectively.

According to Chron.com, “The pace of change requires companies to be able to react quickly to changing demands from customers and environmental conditions. Although prompt action may be required, decisions are increasingly complex as companies compete in a global marketplace.” The best way to make these changes and react quickly requires being able to access, understand, and manage your business data correctly!

Additionally an article on Grow.com states that “Tracking and reviewing data from business processes helps you pinpoint performance breakdowns so you can better understand each part of the process and know which steps need to be optimized and which are performing well.”

Properly accessing and utilizing your company’s data is imperative to growth and keeping up with demanding markets and consumers desires and whims. We live in a world where people commonly have short attention spans and if we can’t keep up with the ever changing business market our companies can fail.

Enter Profisee. Profisee MDM “is a next generation master data management (MDM) company with a mission of innovating data management strategies by providing an easy to use, easy to deploy enterprise MDM platform.”  To aid you in your data management needs, they have compiled a list of 35 of the best MDM tools available on the market today. They have even done comparisons based on many different factors to give business owners a complete and compelling report to whittle through the exhaustive information of data management. They make it easy to quickly assess which MDM will fit the needs of your company to provide you with the best results.

Managing your data doesn’t have to stress you out! Utilizing strategies to best assess your data and making it work for you is mostly about finding the right fit of software and useful MDM tools. Profisee can help with that and take one thing off your ever growing list of things to do as a business owner!

Working from home can be a great way to squeeze more from your life outside of work as it can be a great time saver.  Compare the commute from your bedroom to your home office to what the average person has to endure each day; which is a 45 minute commute; equating to 7.5 hours a week or 390 hours a year.  This is a full 48 working days a year spent on the way to and from work.

While there are clear convenience benefits in working from home there’s also one specific challenge that plagues everyone; that of focus, discipline and concentration.  Just like you require discipline to save money and invest it rather than spend it, this is true for time too. Similarly, to how you might want to check out acorn reviews on the financial front you might want to look into time management app reviews that can assist you in the area of productivity when working from home.

Here are five tips to help you focus when working from home:

1. SET UP THE SPACE

It’s essential to set up a good space to work in that will allow you to feel comfortable and relaxed yet focused and productive.  You’ll want a distraction free environment that allows you to focus on the task at hand, and ideally, a feeling that differentiates your ‘home’ from your ‘home office’, but you don’t want it to be so relaxed it’s conducive to a state of lucid dreaming, as this really should be a place to work rather than relax.

This space should be your private area where you won’t be disturbed.  It should feel almost like an annex to your home rather than part of it, as this way, you’ll feel less distracted and tempted to watch Netflix in your comfy ergonomic chair and more focused on the task at hand.

2. FOCUS

It’s all too tempting for your attention to drift anywhere other than on work; particularly with the advent of social media notifications, YouTube and Netflix.  You might have to parent yourself and set up your own ‘parental controls’ that allow you to restrict the content you’re able to access in order to remain focused.

ROUTINE

Working from home can be both a blessing and a curse; on the one hand your commute is now limited to going from your bedroom to your home office, which has huge benefits in terms of convenience, but it can create a less focused emotional state if you’re used to a morning ritual of getting dressed in business attire (rather than sweatpants or your robe) and being around colleagues in a similar state of ‘working’.

The most important thing in terms of having a routine, is that it provides structure and keeps you focused – set yourself a lunch hour between a set time each day, or adopt the approach that many successful people take which is to get dressed for work, as if you were going to the office, rather than sitting around in your pajamas.