4 Content Time Wasters You Can't Afford

Do you feel like you're wasting hours each week creating your content? Four specific tasks were the ultimate time wasters when I look back over my content creation journey. 

Not only did these culprits waste time, but they also drained my energy and motivation because they took so long -- and most of them had roots in perfectionism. 

In today's episode, I'm breaking down the four content wasters that held me and my content creation processes back for too long so that you can avoid making the same mistakes again. 

You'll walk away from this episode inspired to "let it go" and have more time and freedom with your content. Enjoy!

If you've wondered why nothing is working in your business in 2025, you need a clear strategy. Download our free guide, Build Your Business's Strategic Foundation, where I'm walking you through a business model canvas and a customer journey map. You'll see how we use this at Proffitt Media, plus find templates for you to create your own. Go to krystalproffitt.com/strategy to download today.

Click the "Send Krystal a Text Message" link above to send us your questions, comments, and feedback on the show! (Pssst...we'll do giveaways in upcoming episodes so make sure you leave your name & podcast title.)

Transcript

Intro: 1:55

You are wasting time with your content. Who I know like that one hit hard. You're like, oh, okay, so this is how we're starting today's episode. Well, I am actually talking to the older version of myself. But it's like I'm going back in time and giving myself a coaching call for what I needed to hear back in the beginning. So I got started in 2018, with my podcast, and I look back, and I see where I wasted so much time in my content creation process. So while you may feel like oh, she's talking about me, she's pointing me out. This is actually me, talking to Krystal from 2018. And all the ridiculous things I was doing back then, like, I'm just gonna come clean and admit some of the ways that I was wasting time. And I can only see in hindsight, that it was just such a ridiculous amount of time that I was wasting in specific areas. So you may be doing some of these two are you're like, oh, my gosh, first of all, that is absolutely ridiculous. I'd never did that. Well, we're just going to talk about some of the ways that we can avoid making some of these mistakes. But I had to share them with you today, because I do not want you falling prey to these content time wasters. So let's get right to it. Welcome to the Proffitt Podcast where we teach you how to start launch and market your content with confidence. I'm your host, Krystal, Proffitt, and I'm so excited that you're here. Thanks for hanging out with me today. Because if you've been trying to figure out the world of content creation, this is the show that will help be your time saving shortcut. So let's get right to it, shall we?

4 Content Time Wasters: 3:52

Alright, so we are covering four content time wasters today, and these are big, like, these are not little bitty things that I did like this took hours of my life, like hours and hours that I don't want to admit, like, I don't want to look at a timeline in 2018, and see how much I wasted. But part of me doing this podcast and creating these kinds of lessons learned episodes is to kind of air out my own dirty laundry and say, Hey, these are the mistakes that I have made. So you don't have to make them. And it really pains me because when I look back, I am coaching my old self. And I want to say it's okay that you did all of that, like we're going to lead with love and compassion that I didn't know what the heck I was doing. But also I'm like really like you. You didn't see. Like, you didn't see that this was wasting hours and hours of your time. So it's like this double edged sword of I want to be compassionate and empathetic for my previous self. But also the like, tough coach in me is coming out. It was like, Girl, what were you thinking? What were you even doing? Because some of this is just ridiculous. We'll get there. We'll get there. Yeah, I got some stories to tell you today. So let's just dive right in.

1. Overediting My Solo Podcast Episodes: 5:20

So number one, the first content time waster that I fell prey to for a long time, and I have a feeling this one's going to hit home. Because I know some of you do this too. But I was over editing my solo podcast episodes. So I mean, I could just where do I even begin? I'm stumbling over my words, because I don't know why I treated interviews versus solo episodes so much differently. It's like there was a totally different lens that I put on, like imagine this, like different hat that I put on, like, I'm doing an interview episode and I'm editing and I'm like, okay, like, you know, I can, that's okay, because we were talking we were in a conversation, but whenever I went, so just let me back backstory a little bit to the beginning. I did mostly interviews for the first. I mean, it was at least the first 10 I'm trying to remember I don't know if it was the first 20 But I know the first 10 were interview episodes. And then I was like, Okay, I'm comfortable. Now I'm gonna start doing solo episodes. And when I started doing that, I don't know why I thought it was such an atrocity like it was a sin against humanity. Whenever I had It comes in my soul episodes, or there were breath sounds because you all, whenever I edited interviews, I was not that harsh because in my mind, I had the lens of, well, this is what it's like to be in just a normal conversation. Like if I were sitting down at the dinner table with my mom with my husband, with my kids like, this is how we would talk, I would maybe go on a little tangent here, or, you know, say, um, a few times, or maybe even just take a breath to pause and really think about what I was trying to say. But it was downright horrifying if it happened in a solo episode. So I put this totally different type of scrutiny on my episodes that were just me. And I know there's some of you out there that do this too, because I have talked to you. And maybe you're nodding, and you're like, raising your hand roll like shyly but maybe you're like in the car, and you're like, oh, my gosh, like, she is totally speaking to me right now. This is what I do all the time. Well, I need you to stop it. Okay, I need you to stop being so hard on yourself. Because at the end of the day, and we'll get into this here in a little bit about just just keep going. It gets better. I actually someone told me the other day that they said, I am so impressed with your presentation skills. You know, I was at a meeting and they were just like, oh my gosh, like you, you handled those questions really well. And you were able to go through the whole presentation from soup to nuts, and you just knew like, what was going on? And you were able to fill these questions and do this. And I started thinking I was like, Yeah, I better be able to as much talking, as I have done in the last four years, I better be able to do those things. So I just want to tell you, if you're just getting started, maybe you are branching out for the first time and you're starting to do so episodes. It's totally natural. It is natural for you to be harder on yourself. I feel like this is our default is we are our own worst enemies. And we are so much more critical of ourselves than we are of other people. So I'm telling you right now, stop it. Stop holding your solo episodes on a different type of pedestal than you do. Whenever you're having a conversation with someone else. Just remind yourself like put a sticky note on your microphone, wherever you're recording and say, I'm going to get better. This gets easier because it does it gets so much easier over time. So stop over editing your solo podcast episodes. It's such a huge time waster.

2. Proofreading and Formatting Transcripts: 9:48

Now, number two, the second big content time waster. Y'all. I want to say this one like it makes me laugh. Like, I'm I'm blushing right now, because I really don't want to say, Okay, I was proofreading and formatting my transcripts. And it took me hours, hours. And this. This is not like, Oh, you did that. But then you turn it into a blog post. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, that is not what happened. Okay. I used to go through every single line, line by line, second, my second have my audio. And I would check the transcriptions. I checked it for spelling, for capitalization. For grammar, y'all. This took me hours and hours to do. And fun fact, most people don't even read the transcripts of my audio. Okay. I know that there is a small subset of this audience, whether you are hearing impaired or you use them to help you really focus on what's going on. That is a very small portion of this audience. And that's why I believe transcripts are crucial. If you're not doing transcripts, you should because there are likely people in your audience that need them that they really need them to follow along with your content. But y'all, let's be honest, you don't have to have it perfect. It doesn't have to be like someone is not going to stop listening to your podcast. If a period is in the wrong place in your transcription, or the fact that my name was spelled with a C whenever it's supposed to be spelled with a K and otter, you should know this by now. This is my transcription tool otter.ai And it always defaults to a C and I'm like, come on. I've been using you for like three years. I thought your AI is supposed to be smart. Other than that, what that tool produces for me is Good enough. And it is good enough for the people that really need those transcripts. So you don't have to take what you said on a podcast episode because I will have run on sentences. That's what it was, it was a bunch of run on sentences that didn't have any type of punctuation, or the grammar would have been funky, I would have had so many ellipses or dashes where I went from this point to that point, and it was bonkers. I spent so much time doing it. And I'm here to tell you, you don't have to do that for your transcripts like a minus work, which is what otter.ai does for me, I would call it a minus, because it's still not perfect. It's not I will be very clear. And upfront, I still have to do a few things. Whenever I go in there, which I have my tips and tricks that I do every time I go to edit a transcript, but I don't make it perfect. It's not worth the time. For me. It takes me roughly 10 minutes to edit a transcript now 10 minutes, maybe maybe like that's pushing it that's being very generous in a very long episode. I don't spend that much time doing it. Whereas before I spent hours and hours and hours, but a minus work, y'all it's good enough for me. If it's good enough for me, it should be good enough for you too. All right. So don't spend so much time proofreading formatting and editing your transcripts. It's a huge time waster.

3. Taking Too Long to Choose Content Teaser: 13:27

Number three. Okay, we've done number one is over editing. Number two is proofreading and formatting. Number three. Okay, this is one, this is this is going to hit home for some of you, because you've asked me this, and I'm going to tell you, you're taking too long to choose the teaser content that you are going to share on social media like here. Here's a perfect for example, because this is the question I specifically get this question a lot. Krystal, I want to create a soundbite for my podcast episode, or a short video clip from my YouTube video. But it takes me for ever to choose just the perfect clip. So how do you decide how do you pick that perfect clip that you're going to share with your audience? And if you've asked me this question, or you wanted to ask me this question, maybe you're like, oh, yeah, I've been I've been meaning to ask her that. You're gonna be frustrated with my answer. Because if you asked me, I'm gonna tell you just pick something. Okay? And I'm laughing like I'm laughing with you, not at you. Because at the end of the day, it doesn't have to be this mind blowing clip that gives away the best content that you're publishing or some aha moment that you're like, oh my gosh, if I don't share this, like, people won't even want to listen to the whole thing. Like, it just has to be something y'all you don't have to like, I have had people tell me like, this is literally what people have said, and I have done this in the past. So I'm raising my hand here. And I'm like, then it too, but they'll say it takes me forever to go back and listen, I go back and I listen to the full episode. And I even listen to it on like a slower speed to find that little nugget that will make all the difference because that is what I want to share on an Instagram reel or I want to put it as my tick tock or whatever the case may be. It's the biggest time waster ever. Don't do that. It is way too much work, y'all. It is way too much work. It should not take you longer than five minutes. Like I'm putting a cap on this five minutes, set a timer. That is how long it should take you to choose a soundbite from your podcast or a clip from a YouTube video that you should share. Because creating the teaser content, like the actual creating like the soundbite if you're doing a fancy graphic, or you're doing some video editing, yeah, that might take a little bit longer, but choosing just choosing what you're going to share. So imagine you have a full podcast episode in front of you. Let's call it it's 25 minute episode. If you are going back and you're listening to that episode, you'll have told me that you do this. You will listen to that episode from zero to 25 minutes, multiple times and say I just don't know what to pick. Like, what is the one thing that I should share for this episode? And oh my gosh, like I'm literally I'm putting my hands on my face and I'm just like, just pick something. Pick something it doesn't matter. And I'm not saying it doesn't matter as in like you shouldn't like, take your time and picking it, I'm saying that you are spending so much time you're wasting so much time that I would rather see you spending that time, right? If it's taking you 30 minutes to pick a 62nd clip that you're gonna share on Instagram, y'all. Okay, hang on, I'm getting, I'm getting so fired up about this. Because you come to me and you say, Krystal, I don't know how to do SEO really well. And I'm struggling with my marketing, I can't find really good guests for my content, or I wish that I could add in another platform. And I'm like, look at all the time, you are wasting, re listening to the same damn thing over and over and over again, just for a 62nd clip. Okay, and like I said, I'm getting fired up and passionate about this, because I want to see you educating yourself learning new tactics, getting like having deeper conversations with your audience or finding new strategies that you can test and try or creating a new program that you can sell to your audience, but you can't do it because you are spending so much of your time listening back to your own voice listening back to these interviews, rewatching YouTube videos for hours trying to find a 62nd clip that you can share on Instagram, or two people might like it. And maybe you'll have one person that comments and it's usually the people that are like DM me for a collaboration, it is not worth it. So please stop doing this. Just grab something and go. Don't spend so much time trying to find that perfect piece of content for your teaser episodes, or your teaser clips that you're going to share on social or with your audience in some other way. Oh, okay. Okay, calm back down. I don't have my Apple Watch on right now. Because I was just thinking, I wonder what my heart rate is right now. Because I feel it, I feel my heart beating in my chest. And I just get so fired up about this job. Because you've come to me and you say, I want to learn new things. I want to do this. And I'm like, I'm trying to show you where you can pick up that time to be able to do it. And really paying attention to these time wasters will help you get there.

4. Perfectionism & Overthinking Your Content Will Be Always Mind-Blowing: 19:19

So let's talk about the last one. So number four, the fourth content time waster that we need to talk about today is perfectionism. And overthinking your content, because you are holding everything up to this standard that every single episode, every single piece of content, every single email, every single social post, all of it needs to be mind blowing. I've heard so many of you do this. And I'm laughing at myself because I'm going back to that little baby creator in 2018. Because the expectations I put on myself back then were totally unrealistic. I'll be very honest with you, there was not an ounce of reality in the goals that I set for myself, or what I just expected. Everything to be like I was so hard on myself in those first 18 months of creating my content. I was comparing every single thing that I was doing to other podcasters the ones that I listened to the ones that I saw there were in my industry, and people that had been doing it for a decade. And I was like well, if my podcast doesn't sound like Pat Flynn's then what am I even doing? If my show notes don't look like Amy Porterfield, then why am I even wasting my time? Like I wanted to have the super high quality Show Notes by myself and on a very, very low budget. Like it was just asinine. How crazy like I look back and it was just it was completely unrealistic. And it wasted so much time. It wasted so much time of me just trying to be perfect because y'all perfectionism. It, there's no no need for perfectionism and content. Alright, it's such a creative endeavor, that it will never be, quote, perfect. And I've learned over the years that I'm not going to blow your mind. Whenever I put out a piece of content, I have made peace with that, because it is just not statistically probable. It's not going to happen every single time. I hit publish. But I will tell you, I'm very comforted with the notion that your mind will be blown probably 15 to 20% of the time whenever you are a regular participant in my content, and I'm okay with those odds. Alright, maybe you're like well Krystal just fit 10 to 20%. That doesn't sound like a lot, it sounds like your expectations went from pretty high. Now you're swinging the other way, and they're pretty low. But let's look at how much content has been produced since 2018. I've published more than 1000 podcast episodes at this point between this podcast the Prophet podcast in the potty report, it has over 1000 episodes. And if I apply 20%, right, the 20% rule, that means that 200 200 podcast episodes have that mind blowing potential 200 episodes y'all bet is freaking amazing. And to say that out loud. It's just one of those things where I look back to the perfectionism that was holding me back and all the overthinking that I was doing. I never in my wildest dreams, thought in 2022, you will hit 1000 episodes. Never, never in a million years, I remember thinking, I hope I can make it to 20 episodes. I was like my first goal. I just want to do this without quitting before I hit 20 episodes. Never in my wildest dreams did I think, Oh, I'm gonna hit 1000 Like no, no problem, it's going to be a piece of cake. Absolutely not, that was not a thing. So to be able to say, within those 1000 episodes, there's probably about 200 that were super impactful for people in this audience. It's amazing. And I can live with that. So I hope that you put this lens and throw away perfectionism. Throw away overthinking your content, because it is not serving you. So stop beating yourself up that everything needs to be perfect. And just keep publishing your content, because you're wasting time getting caught up into perfectionism. And overthinking that everything has to blow every single person in your audience's mind. It is not realistic. So let's drop that now. Like commit right now. Say, we no longer I'm like raising my right hand. I will no longer strive for perfection. Say with me, I will no longer strive for perfection. Because you will be so surprised how much time you will save. When you say you know what, this is good enough. This is good enough to put out there like you will free yourself. Do you feel that like, your shoulders are getting a little bit lighter, they're a little bit looser, when you're not thinking this has got to be perfect. This has got to be perfect. I'm like mimicking typing on my keyboard right now. Like, oh, this has to be perfect. I need to spend hours on this. And I needed to lose sleep. And I need to stay up until midnight and unlimited. Like, let's stop that. Let's stop it right now. Let's stop it forever. Perfectionism will eat up so much of your time. And it is not worth it. Okay, we got through the four big time wasters that are just chewing up your content time. And I just don't want this to happen to anyone else. Because I have suffered these myself, and I want better for you.

Outro: 25:20

And if you are listening to this in real time, I have an extra special treat for you. Because this week, I am teaching a masterclass all about time. It is called Easy Peasy content, six ways to save five plus hours creating each week and I want you to register for it. It's only available for a limited time, there's only three dates that I'm teaching this. So you want to make sure that you get your butt in this training, because it's going to be so stinking good. So I want you to go to KrystalProffitt.com/episode374. And I'm going to have links to everything in today's show notes. You're going to see the four content time wasters as well as a link to join us and easy peasy content. This is going to be so much fun. So if you're like nodding along today, you're like, oh my gosh, Krystal's talking to me. Yup, I'm wasting time doing that. Well, I actually have six ways that you can save time I told you about what is wasting time like where we are wasting a lot of time. But I want to teach you ways that you can save time, you can cut down on doing a lot of unnecessary tasks in your content whenever you apply the principles that I'm teaching in this free training. So again, go to KrystalProffitt.com/episode374 and I will see you there but that's all I have for you today. So if you enjoyed today's episode, make sure you hit the subscribe or follow little button wherever you're listening to this podcast and as always remember keep it up we all have to start somewhere