How Are You Measuring Your Time? Skip Blankley Shares His Secrets for Getting Organized

From playing in a band by night to sprinkling some social media magic in the restaurant industry by day, Skip Blankley began his journey as an entrepreneur in 2007. But it was only when he found a mentor and widened his net that his new business — an online marketing and web design agency — took off. 

We got in touch with Skip to talk about his favorite apps, how he learned to measure the value of his time and why he loves a good challenge. 

Name: Skip Blankley

Business: NoBox Creatives

Started: August 2013

How did you create your awesome job? 

It started as another venture called Social Relish, an online marketing and web design business for the restaurant industry. I chose that field because I spent a decade working in it in various capacities. 

I started the business while I was in a band and playing four or five nights a week, because my days were wide open. But I soon realized it wasn’t just restaurants I wanted to tackle, because they didn’t have the budget or the option to set up a large retainer. So, I launched NoBox Creatives, which provides the same services but for all other industries as well.

To be honest, it was a slow and painful transition! I was uncomfortable venturing into other industries and tackling issues for bigger companies with bigger problems. But stepping out of your comfort zone is important, and moving out of the service industry opened up a ton more opportunities for me.

When did you know your business was going to work? 

I knew it was going to work all along, but I still had that devil on my shoulder saying, “Get a full-time job, keep up with the Jones', get health insurance and play it safe.” 

I really knew it was going to work when I kept pursuing it and got a mentor. He helped me get a few clients, and once I knew the first few months were taken care of, I could visualize the business taking off.

What have been the biggest surprises so far?

The amount of challenges I’m still facing 3 1/2 years into it being a full-time gig! They don’t go away. 

I thought it might get a bit easier, but it got more challenging — in the best way. As soon as you realize you’re not just growing a business but growing yourself, and that the challenges are why you’re in it, the obstacle becomes the way.

How do you price your services?

I charge for website design as an upfront value, not an hourly rate. I offer mostly project-based pricing structures by estimating how long something is going to take. Then, I decrease the time I have to spend by fine-tuning my craft so I can increase my margin. 

All my maintenance packages are based on an hourly rate, though.

What does a typical day look like for you?

A lot of people recommend not looking at emails first thing. I do, although typically I don’t reply — I just make sure there are no fires to put out. I flag the ones that need attention and then dive into general maintenance. 

Every morning I look at what’s in my sales pipeline right now. I use Pipedrive to manage that, which costs $12 a month but is hands down the best tool I’ve worked with. It tells me whether I have to whip up a proposal, perform some research for a client or follow a lead. 

I use the project management software Asana to tackle my to-do list, review anything done by my developers and check they’re not waiting on anything from me. After that, I manage my own website and dive back into my email. 

I’ve also started to work on a lot more business development stuff late in the evenings. I’m building a new website for the company and revamping our entire online infrastructure. 

What is your most effective means of getting new customers? 

There’s a really good book called The Referral Engine which says that if your product is awesome and you make your customers scream about it from the mountaintops, then they become your advocates. 

I keep my pipeline pretty full just based on word of mouth. If you develop a relationship with your clients and treat them as individuals, they become friends. Every single person that you please with your efforts becomes your referral engine. The best prospect you could have walk through your door is someone who’s already been told why you’re awesome from someone they trust. 

If you could go back in time, is there anything you would do differently back when you were starting your business?

I would do a much better job staying organized with numbers. As Peter Drucker in The Effective Executive says, “What gets measured gets managed.” 

For the longest time I wasn’t measuring anything! I was just excited to get a check from someone. If you’re selling based on a project, track how many hours you spend on it — including emails, conversations and so on — then take out taxable expenses from everything and divide your number of hours into it. 

Time is hands down the most valuable asset we have, so you need to track how much of it you’re spending and where. 

Do you have any employees right now? 

No, but I have contract workers. I have one part-time staff person who works in New York and a few different people I work with in Atlanta who help with everything from strategy to PR development. There’s also a team of developers in Romania that helps with big website builds. 

What would you like to learn today from a community of other small business owners and self-employed professionals?

I would love to discover how to find mentors, business partners and potentially part-time and full-time employees. I also wish I had a technical co-founder, as I'm very much a sales and big ideas guy. I need a technical counterpart! 

Do *you* have tips you can share with Skip?

If you have experience with finding a mentor or a business partner, or with bringing on team members, we want to hear from you!

Share your story in the comments in below. :-)