AI for Time Management in Small Business

With artificial intelligence (AI) dominating the workforce, you've probably seen AI features spring up in your apps and software. Most people use AI for text and image generation. However, AI offers a variety of features that could streamline production, make meetings easier, and organize your calendar--and once you've learned how AI can improve time management, you'll have more time for customer service and lead generation.

What is Time Management?

Time management involves structuring your day to maximize productivity and reduce downtime while leaving space for the occasional break. If you start working without a schedule, you could spend too much time on one project, neglect the others, and accidentally waste time on the clock. This could lead to subpar work that doesn't meet your customers' standards.

Fortunately, it's easy to incorporate time management strategies into your routine. Common ways to increase productivity include:

• Setting goals and deadlines
• Scheduling time for each project
• Starting early instead of procrastinating
• Limiting distractions, such as apps and social media
• Setting aside time for "deep work" with no interruptions

In today's world, you don't have to do this alone. Learning how AI can improve time management could make your company more efficient than ever.

Why is Time Management Important?

Time management is important because it gives you time to plan, research, set goals, and produce quality work. This promotes a relaxed work environment where you don't feel rushed, increasing satisfaction and inspiring everyone to do their best. You could take a break or jump to the next activity when you have time left over before a deadline.

Likewise, time management helps you maintain a healthy work/life balance. You'll be able to set clear boundaries between projects and family time, making your job more enjoyable. Meeting deadlines ensures that your work stays at the office, and you won't have to come in early or late.

How to Manage Time with AI

Track Your Time

Before you start, you'll need to assess your current situation. While manual time trackers force you to clock in, AI-powered trackers quietly monitor your activities and use this information to generate reports. Essentially, you're getting a professional assessment with little effort.

AI trackers record your activity whenever you type, browse websites, use apps, work on projects, email coworkers, and complete other activities. They also note inactive periods. Once you read your report, you might be surprised by how many hours you spent sitting in virtual meetings, checking your email, or making presentations.

With this information, you'll determine which activities require more focus and where you should cut back. Some software even analyzes your activities and offers suggestions on working more efficiently.

Generate To-do Lists

When you're unsure where to begin, AI software can generate to-do lists prioritizing the most important activities. Some apps integrate with your company's software to pull information from the database. You could also use a free app, such as ChatGPT, but you'll have to provide information about your projects and schedule. In any case, AI might add essential tasks to your list that you never considered.

Organize Your Calendar

Sometimes, managing your calendar feels just as time-consuming as sending emails, attending events, and preparing for meetings. AI assistants have the power to manage your calendar by reviewing your schedule, projects, and email communications and fitting everything into neat, organized slots. The assistant automatically makes adjustments throughout the day and accounts for unexpected situations.

AI can make mistakes, so you should manually review your schedule. Still, these programs can turn an hour of scheduling into a quick ten-minute check. If you overextend yourself, the AI will tell you to take a break. This helps you work consistently without overloading your day with projects and meetings.

Generate Basic Text

As you learn how AI can improve time management, using text generation is essential. Free AI software invites you to save work hours by producing emails, reports, blogs, and web content in seconds. While this technology is fast, it's not infallible--and if you rely on it too heavily, you could accidentally share false information.

These projects usually require the human touch:

• Blog posts
• Reports and presentations
• Research projects
• Personalized emails
• Social media posts with personal stories

However, you could cut production times in half when you use AI as an assistant and a starting point instead of a human replacement. Here are a few ways to use text generation software efficiently:

• Suggesting tiles
• Getting ideas for blog posts
• Writing outlines and rough drafts
• Performing basic research
• Generating short texts and emails

This reduces the time your team spends brainstorming, researching, and drafting while ensuring that you provide reliable, human-reviewed content to your clients and shareholders. If you invest in paid software, you might get access to exclusive benefits, such as unlimited responses and faster response times.

Automate Your Inbox

If your inbox is overflowing with emails, AI offers a variety of organizational tools. AI could sort your emails into categories and prioritize the most important messages. Many programs also draft emails and generate suggestions as you write to help you make a strong impression. Large companies often use AI to review emails and send automatic responses.

When you receive an email, AI can add it to a category, extract important information, summarize the message, and add dates to your calendar in seconds. This allows you to breeze through your inbox without stressing over every response. If you'd prefer to respond yourself, some programs offer sentiment analysis so that you can reply in a friendly, serious, or somber way.

Streamline Your Finances

AI can automate financial tasks, including paying bills, sending invoices, tracking employees' hours, and generating reports. This could lead to unexpected bills and expenses, so you'll need a human employee to review the AI's work. Still, once you've adjusted to the new technology, your HR manager will have more time to build a positive work environment.

Create Project Roadmaps

Project roadmaps include steps, goals, and deadlines that keep your team on track. Unfortunately, it can be difficult to plan months in advance when you're just starting out. When you give AI some information about your project, the software could generate a roadmap with tools, expectations, deadlines, instructions, and more.

You might need to tweak the roadmap to suit your needs, but AI's version still provides a great starting point. Plus, if you want to take it a step further, many project management tools use AI to track your progress, gather analytics, communicate with team members, and summarize your work. This shaves even more time off your schedule, allowing you to focus on the outcome.

Utilize Chatbots

How much time does your customer service team spend answering basic questions? If you install an AI-powered chatbot on your website, you could potentially save hours of time and effort. Chatbots pull information from your FAQ to respond instantly to simple queries, such as "Do you offer free shipping?" and "How do I use coupons?" Some bots can even look up orders, assist with account issues, and provide other personalized services.

Bots can also encourage visitors to linger on your website and potentially close a sale. When a guest visits your website, the bot could greet them with a friendly notification that invites them to reach out if they have questions. This grabs potential customers who wanted help but didn't know where to look. Better yet, your bot could let them know about sales and exclusive discounts.

However, before you fire your team, remember that chatbots don't replace human employees. You'll still need customer service experts to help guests with complex issues. Working with a reputable company that provides high-quality software is also essential. Otherwise, your company could become the victim of a bizarre AI mishap.

On your end, in-house chatbots make it easy for employees to ask questions, troubleshoot problems, and perform research without contacting HR. These bots may pull information from your company's databases to give your employees quick, accurate answers. You can contact a company with pre-made bots or talk to a business about developing a custom program for your team.

Hold AI-powered Meetings

Meetings can be challenging, especially when listening and taking notes simultaneously. Afterward, you might find yourself scrolling through the chat, searching for slides, digging for important information, and asking coworkers for help. Without AI, an hour or two of your workday might quickly disappear.

For this reason, many businesses are investing in AI-powered meeting software. While the AI records the meeting, it also takes notes, summarizes findings, answers questions in the chat, inserts images, and highlights key details. AI can even generate transcripts for the whole team to review.

This eliminates the need to transcribe meetings by hand or try to summarize the discussion on your own. You could even send the AI's work to your entire team to keep everyone on the same page, including employees who missed the meeting.

Generate Images

AI generates a variety of images ranging from hyperrealistic pictures to quick mock-ups. The software often generates images with strange artifacts, bizarre text, or creepy mutations, so you don't want to rely on AI for everything. However, AI is great for creating quick graphics you'll use in the office.

For example, if you're hosting a company picnic for Easter, AI could produce a basic flyer with illustrations and information about the event. You could also use AI to generate presentation images, charts and diagrams, product ideas, and social media stickers. Just ensure you clarify that the images are AI-generated, and never try to pass off a synthetic image as a real drawing or photo.

Seek Inspiration

When you're stuck, you could spend a few hours performing online searches and brainstorming on your own--or you could turn to AI for quick suggestions. Ask the program for ideas, and you'll get a list of possibilities that might change your thoughts about the project. If one response doesn't help, you could adjust your question or ask for a new list of ideas.

If you're using a bot available to the public, avoid discussing sensitive information about your business. Keep the question as generic as possible to protect your company from theft. Additionally, if the AI provides links, review the sources to ensure that they're reputable and up to date.

Monitor Your Reputation Across the Web

AI isn't just for time management. You can use AI for various tasks, including content generation, productivity analysis, and reputation management. E-Marketing Associates offers AI-powered reputation monitoring software that gathers reviews from multiple sites, creates professional responses, sends review requests, and highlights the top reviews on your website.

To learn more, reach out today to schedule a 15-minute discovery call. We'll talk about your business's needs and how reputation management could generate leads, enhance your reputation, and increase your search engine rankings. In the meantime, sign up for our newsletters to get free small business and hospitality news delivered to your inbox.