The more options and categories you face, the less likely you are to act. Cut the choices down, starting with your CRM tags.
The idea
Walk into a grocery store with "marinara" on your list. Finding it is easy, because there's a whole aisle of sauce. Then the nightmare sets in, because there's a whole aisle of sauce. Research into consumer behavior has shown that the fewer options provided, the more purchases are made. Choosing still costs time and energy, even for spaghetti sauce. In my coaching we said it plainly: the more choices we face, the less likely we are to do it. We also named the bias that makes us add choices anyway: "More is easier, less is harder," because we falsely believe more is the answer.
How to do it
Open your database, spreadsheet or CRM.
Make three groups: Sphere A, Sphere B, Sphere C. A matters more than B, B more than C.
Spend more time and effort on your A's than on your B's and C's.
Delete at least one CRM tag you don't use.
Example
In our early years we helped people build databases with Past Clients, Current Clients, Leads, Referral Sources and (yes, I've seen it more than once) Enemies. Then came Amazing, Great, OK and Bad Past Clients, repeated for every group, until every contact meant fifteen or twenty choices. No wonder most people give up on tracking their relationships. That's the structure I'd now rip out of my own book's appendix. A/B/C replaced it.
Watch out for
Keeping tags you never use. Each one is another decision every time you look at a contact.
Relatable: In Relatable this is just three spheres (A, B, C), which keeps every contact down to one quick decision. A single spreadsheet column does the same. How-to: Create and organize spheres, Build your first spheres.
Related frameworks
The Midwit Trap: We reject the straightforward solution as too simple to work, then overcomplicate ourselves into burnout. The plain answer was right all along.
A/B/C Spheres: Sort everyone into three tiers by gut feeling (love, like, don't know) and spend more time on A's than B's, and more on B's than C's.
Tag Hygiene: Delete auto-generated tags and any tag with fewer than five people; tags are where overthinking starts.
Simple Systems Win: The tactic that works is almost always tiny and simple, and simple still takes consistent effort. Remove things before adding them.