I have never been a fan of motivational speakers. In fact, there is only one motivational speech that ever stuck in my head. The rest were immediately mocked and forgotten. It was delivered by a C-level executive at a previous employer during an on-site brainstorming session with the entire web team, for which I was the in-house SEO. I find myself thinking about it at least once a day and the message hasn't failed me yet. 

"Why not now?"

This simple question is written on a sticky note on the side of my monitor and it's responsible for a lot of my success as an SEO consultant.

The theory is simple. What is stopping you from tackling an item on your to-do list right now? I mean *right now*, as you are reading this post. 

Stop Twittering, sign out of Facebook, quit reading blog posts (oh, the irony) and start doing something productive. Yes, these things are fun and can be informative. But they are giant timesucks. They slow you down and impair your ability to get things done. 

As an SEO, there is only so much you can learn from other people. You have to try things out for yourself. If you work in a marketing department or an agency, chances are your to-do list is now filled with tasks previously performed by laid-off co-workers. If you are a consultant, I bet there are some tasks you have yet to complete for a client to exceed their expectations. If you are looking for a job or running your own ventures, your job is never finished.

Add up the spare minutes (or hours) you spend on social sites or RSS feeds every day and think about what else you could be doing with that time. Why not do something about it right now?