Are you doing too much work? If you’re a marketing or sales professional, you likely feel overwhelmed on the job more than you should. In fact, 80% of marketing managers feel both overworked and understaffed, and burnout has brought average sales turnover rates up to 34%, which is more than double the all-industry average.

To make matters even worse, when you’re stretched thin in these roles, you end up working reactively instead of proactively. That holds both you and your company back.

As a marketing or sales professional, you may feel like you’re stuck on a hamster wheel of a never-ending workload and not enough time. So, how do you identify that problem early on and get yourself off once and for all?

Are you a marketing professional?

How to know if you’re stuck on the “too much work” hamster wheel

Your goal as a marketing professional is to build awareness, drum up interest in your company’s offerings, and generate leads. To do so, you need to consistently get your message in front of the right audience. For example, blogging and social media management are two simple, yet time-consuming tactics that achieve this goal. But if you’re the only one handling first drafts and feel like you’re nothing but a non-stop content machine, you’re stuck on that hamster wheel.

What you’ll be able to do once you’re out

Marketing is about more than just throwing content onto the web and hoping something sticks. You need to stop your endless cycle of content generation and take a step back to think critically about your content strategy and whether you’re truly hitting your goals.

Ask yourself: what else could you do with the hours you currently spend generating content? You could take a harder look at your competitors to see how they’re marketing to your audience. You could analyze whether your website, social media and content is truly driving leads, and if not, how it could have the potential to. And finally, you could make strategic changes to your marketing plan based on what you find.

How to get off the hamster wheel

Deep down, you know that someone else could write drafts of the blogs and social media content you’re stuck creating now. You also know that you need to differentiate your marketing from your competition’s, but don’t have the time to really dig into what they’re doing well and what you could do differently.

Unfortunately, it might not be the right time to hire another employee to take these things on for you, or you (or your boss) are unsure if you really need a full-time resource in this role. That’s okay. You can engage “Micro-Interns” who are great at tasks like blogging, social media content creation and competitive research to help you out. Then, your time will be freed to find new, innovative ways to reach your audience and drive interest in your company. You’ll also have the data to understand the benefits of those efforts.

Are you a sales professional?

How to know if you’re stuck on the “too much work” hamster wheel

You have a gift for communicating why your stakeholders cannot live without your company’s offering. But if you find that you’re spending more time mining contacts, building lists, and pulling basic data to prepare for a call than actually talking to leads and prospects, you’re stuck on the hamster wheel of too much work.

What you’ll be able to do once you’re out

As a talented sales professional, you should focus your attention on closing only the most qualified sales leads. If you could get off the hamster wheel, you’d be able to devote more of your time to courting contacts until they become customers. You could also skip the generic “hello” emails and get right to what you do best: personalized communications that hit your target customers’ specific pain points.

You’d also have more time to critically analyze your sales strategy and make changes based on your observations and sales results.

How to get off the hamster wheel

You need that list of new leads, but you don’t have to be the one to generate it. You also don’t need to be the one monitoring the industry landscape for updates on what your audience is looking for. Someone else could get that information together and send it your way so you can run the ball to the end zone.

Luckily, Micro-Interns are the perfect solution for lead generation and industry analysis projects. They can mine contacts and do the research you need to make sure you’re hitting on what your potential customers are really looking for from your company.

Whether you’re a busy marketing or sales professional, you don’t have to suffer through work that is not the best use of your time. Parker Dewey matches you with talented college students and recent grads who are eager to help you out. Through these Micro-Internships, you get your work done in a low-risk, high-reward setting and Career Launchers gain the experience they’re looking for in your industry.

And since we’re not a staffing firm and the Career Launchers are not your employees, contractors, or interns, there are no HR or legal burdens. You set the price, and it’s just a simple credit card swipe when the project is complete.

Ready to amp up your productivity, re-define work-life balance, and make an impact all at once? Parker Dewey is here to help.