Day Well Made | Website Design + Business Strategy | Organize Your Small Business with These 18 Lists

If you’re a list maker like me, this round-up is for you!

Keeping your business organized is a challenge in itself; but going back to basics by organizing your information and ideas with the use of simple lists organized in one unified place is a brilliant way to stay on track with your goals, vision, content, sales, and more.

And the beauty of this method: You can go digital or physical, depending on your preference!

I will personally always have a special place in my heart for physical notebooks and planners. This was the product business I ran prior to moving over to the digital space, and there’s simply something about the magic of sitting down, screen-free, to handwrite out your schedule and lists that feels like its own form of self-care.

These days, my organizational and planning approach is a little bit more of a hybrid. But I still use — and LOVE — a grid notebook for holding master lists like these below. Here’s the notebook I’m currently obsessed with on Amazon.

Tip: Anytime you use a notebook or planner without tabs, do yourself a favor and pick up stick-on tabs, as well! This will allow you to beautifully create your own organizational system even in the most basic notebook.

To keep your notebook organized and methodical, I’ve divided the lists into Planning, Tracking, and Reflection categories so you can easily jump to the section you need at any given time.

Ready to dive into the eighteen essential lists you NEED for your small business? Let’s go!

Planning

01. Goals

Starting with an easy one — take time to detail out a few goals related to the business and life you’re creating! Housing this list in an obvious place is a great way to continually review and read through them with the intention of aligning your daily actions toward your future vision.

02. Ongoing Tasks

Tasks generally fall into one of two categories — ongoing and one-off. This list is a compilation ongoing daily, weekly, and monthly tasks that enable you to stay on top of things in your business without letting something fall through the cracks.

03. One-Off / Setup Tasks

In turn, this list refers to tasks you’d like to complete that are one-off situations — rather than a routine task, this is more of a brain dump of things you’d like to do or delegate that further the growth of your business.

04. Master Ideas List

This is one of my favorites — a master list of ideas, products, and projects you’d like to explore (or at least not forget about) in your business! In times of focus, this is a good list to keep open and easily accessible. It gives you a space to quickly jot down ideas that may pop into your brain so you can easily offload them and keep the focus on your task at hand.

05. Blog Content Ideas

I’m always thinking of new content ideas for the blog, and having a running list of these to refer back to is a brilliant way to essentially never run out of ideas when it comes time to plan the weeks ahead!

06. Social Media Content Ideas

Similar to the blog list, but this list is catered toward fun, bite-sized ideas for social media content. Jot down specific ideas or keep the list as more of a general overview of topics and ideas you can refer back to when planning your social content.

07. Marketing Strategies

Exploring marketing and promotional strategies for your business is a great way to keep things fresh and interesting for your audience — and is a great source of self-research to see what resonates! Keep a list of strategies to try, then highlight or transfer those that work well for your business to the Reflection section of your list book for reference.

08. Collaborations + Partnerships

This list is a great one to keep on hand for future collaboration ideas and desired partnerships. Include companies, influencers, etc. that you’d LOVE to work with, and use a system of highlighting + notes for those you’ve completed partnerships with already.

09. Books to Read + Takeaways

If you’re a reader like me, try keeping a list of relevant books you’d love to read! I have a system of organizing my book notes in Evernote, BUT I’m also a big proponent of taking away at least one lesson, strategy, or idea from each book that I can actually implement in my life or business. (Otherwise, what’s the point?) Alongside your list of books, jot down that one idea every time you finish a book that you can carry into your work and life going forward.

Tracking

10. Stats Tracker

Knowing your numbers is an important part of every business, and dedicating a list or grid system to tracking this info for your website, email list, and social media accounts is a great way to stay aware. While you *can* track follower counts, etc., I actually recommend tracking stats such as saves/shares and conversion rates for a clearer picture of how your content is performing over time.

11. Sales Tracker

This can be as simple as a weekly check-in documenting sales for the week or month in various categories — but tracking your sales means you can set more appropriate sales goals and start to mark trends in different launches, campaigns, and seasons.

12. Expense Tracker

I like to keep a list of ongoing, anticipated expenses (fixed costs) so I’m aware of my monthly cost to operate my business. Knowing this number against my revenue number also means I have a general idea of expense allowance at any given time and there are few surprises when it comes to the financial health of my company.

13. Income Stream Ideas

I LOVE this list. Here’s the thing: I fully believe in the approach of getting *really* good at your specific thing — being the best you can be at your number one offer. But beyond that, I also know that many entrepreneurs and businesses are built on multiple income streams; having a list of ideas for related streams of income to support your overall vision is a smart strategy for any business.

14. Press / Media Tracker

You know that list of Collaborations + Partnerships we talked about earlier? This additional list is a place to house those completed partnerships, articles, media coverage and more. You’ll find this information useful for future collaborations, in your media kit, and even for purposes like events and website use.

Reflection

15. Wins

“Celebrate your wins.” This advice was given to me early on in business and stuck with me. It’s so easy to forget the GREAT things that happened when you’re constantly looking forward, so keeping a documented list of wins is the perfect way to remind yourself of just how far you’ve come.

16. Lessons Learned

This might sound negative, but is far from it. This list is two-fold: documenting what worked well in the past for your business (think conversions, launches, campaigns, etc.), as well as what you now understand you could have done differently. This list is GOLD because it’s specific to your business and is essentially a list of proven go-to strategies you can build on going forward.

17. Valuable Tips

Read an article or watch an educational video with a golden nugget or two you don’t want to forget? This is the space to jot down those ideas and tips. It’s impossible to remember everything, so having a dedicated space for this info is a brilliant way to remember and review it on the regular.

18. Words to Remember

Ok, I know I’ve said this before, but *this* list might be my real favorite: documenting quotes and words and affirmations that resonate so deeply, I want to read and repeat them daily. The best of the best goes here, and it really is my favorite part of the notebook list system to review as often as possible.