Spring cleaning is not exclusively relevant to 1950s housewives. If you work in an office setting, you probably already have a pretty good idea of how much clutter can affect your productivity. This extends beyond a messy desk. Although many business people are on their computers for nearly 40 hours a week, there are still plenty of digital tasks that get pushed aside time and time again. The turn of the season is a great excuse to finally take a moment to accomplish these things. Trust us, it’s worth taking the time at least once a year. It will not only positively impact your productivity, but you might be ignoring crucial digital marketing to-dos that could bring you more business. Here are this spring’s top 5 digital cleaning tasks you should add to your list…

1. Clean Your Computer, Inside and Out

• Disinfecting your keyboard is the bare minimum. If you’re constantly on a computer for work, it will save you time in the long run to clean out your files every now and then.
• Uninstall any software you don’t use anymore, get rid of shortcuts to software that you don’t actually use that often, don’t leave empty or unorganized folders all over your desktop, that kind of thing.
• We also recommend saving helpful web pages to your bookmarks and setting your web browser's homepage to a site that will assist your productivity instead of hindering it, such as Trello. 
• Don’t forget to go through your files. You're sure to find a half-finished document you forgot about or some old photos that would make great throwback social media posts. Plus, you’ll find a bunch of stuff that you can trash so that it’s easier to find truly valuable content the next time around.

2. Imagine an Empty Inbox, Then Work to Make It a Reality

• You may never actually get the number of emails in your inbox down to zero, but realistically, a lot of us could be deleting emails much more frequently than we are now. Take some time this spring to catch up, then bring these better habits with you through the rest of the year.
• Think about it like this: you remove the mail from your mailbox every day, why aren’t you removing the emails from your inbox every day?
• The golden rule is, if you can answer an email in less than two minutes, take care of it right when you see it. If it will take longer to answer, move the message into a different folder that you plan to revisit when you have more time. This way it won’t get lost in the abyss that is the inbox
• While you’re at it, unsubscribe from any marketing emails you’ve been getting to your work addresses that aren’t actually useful to you. We all have those newsletters that go straight in the trash. It’s time to simply get rid of them, for once and for all.

3. Move on to Your Social Media Inboxes

• If you’ve been lax in responding to direct messages and comments on your business’s social media pages, now is the time to catch up. It’s important to be doing this on a regular basis considering most customers expect that brands will respond to them within a few hours. The Social Habit found that 42% of consumers expect replies to their social comments within 60 minutes. Spring is a great time to get on top of this.
• It’s especially easy to forget to check platforms you don’t use as often, such as review sites like Yelp and personal LinkedIn pages. However, if prospects and clients are trying to connect through these sites, you must monitor them as diligently as your main social platforms.
• Once you’re caught up on responding to social engagements, take the time to come up with a new strategy for staying on top of online feedback from now on.

4. Speaking of Social Media…

• New season, new look, as they say! This is a great time to update any cover photos on your business’s social media profiles. In general, your logo should remain your profile picture, but that doesn’t mean you can’t have fun with your cover photo! Make is seasonally appropriate and/or use it to promote what your business is currently focusing on.
• While you’re at it, consider refreshing your bios. Do they still match up with your mission? If not, it’s time for a change.
• In fact, why not reassess your whole social media strategy. We do recommend meeting about social strategies on a weekly basis, but it’s easy to forget how important these conversations are. Stop pushing these meetings and take a deep dive. Review analytics and statistics in order to see what’s working and what's not. This will help you make educated decisions about your social content moving forward.

5. Keep Your Business’s Reputation Squeaky Clean

• Try Googling your business. You might be surprised by the amount of misinformation that pops up. Clean up your reputation by making sure your brand name, logo, and colors match across all platforms.
• Do the same with your hours, address, phone number, and other basic info. This is important because consistency and accuracy are the best ways to establish brand awareness, build brand loyalty, and avoid confusion. If people are confused by your online presence, it’s likely they’ll never make it through your front doors. How could they if they can’t figure out what your actual address is?
• Also, you may find some profiles that were not set up internally. This happens frequently on Google and Yelp. Take a minute to go through the process of claiming these profiles. This is how you make sure the information on these sites is accurate, plus you’ll be able to start responding to reviews. You may even find some old, superfluous pages that should actually just be removed all together. 

It can be hard to wrap your head around all of the online tasks you’re responsible for because you can’t physically see them in front of you. And although it can be hard to set time aside to really get on top of any digital clutter that may be holding you back, it’s definitely worth it. Spring cleaning is investing your time because you will get returns in productivity and prosperity during the rest of the year.