Kids play with simplicity. Complications were invented by adults. I haven’t met anyone who never felt overwhelmed in his or her business yet. But overwhelm comes from overcomplicating things, usually in our heads. What helps when you feel overwhelmed is remembering simplicity and going back to the basics. The rules of marketing will never change.

It’s as if our wealth of potential was a beautiful diamond. When we pick it up from the earth, it’s covered in dirt. If we don’t know to remove that dirt, we’ll think that’s all there is to the diamond: it will shine just a little bit from here and there. But when we remove the dirt, it will shine brilliantly from every single facet and will astound everyone. The cleaner our diamond, the more we can contribute to our businesses.

One day I was gazing at my son playing. He was running back and forth, from one activity to another, never getting tired. His productivity was way higher than that of any adult I’d ever met or read about. So I wanted to find out…. was there something our kids can teach us about being more productive?

Most of the actions described in this article are little tweaks that you can make as early as today. They break down into 3 areas: your customers' interaction with you and your staff; what your customers see, hear, smell and touch; your interaction with customers after they leave your store

Introspection is an act of reflection. When we reflect, we question. We start by questioning things about ourselves, but we don’t stop there. Over time, by getting into the habit of self-reflection, we create a habit of not taking what we hear and see as status quo, but of thinking about what it means and how it can become better.