Duct Tape Marketing is one of my daily reads. In this post, author John Jantsch argues that marketing is your highest payoff activity. John writes:

I don't know about you but most small business owners are do-it-yourself types and get sucked into doing the littlest silly work faster than you can say "Oh look, the copier is jammed again." If you want to achieve any of your goals and finally start making what you are worth then you’ve got to stop doing $5/hr work. Period.

John suggests that you calculate what your time is actually worth per hour (your Personal Average Yield, or PAY) and delegate everything that doesn't contribute to your business' growth. John continues:

So I ask you. Is fiddling with the copier, chatting with the mailman, running to the office supply store, making deliveries, or returning meaningless email paying you $72/hr? For that matter, doesn’t mowing your own grass, washing your own car, cleaning your own windows take you away from marketing your business? I know, now I’m asking you to give up most of the fun things you like to do everyday but hey, if you can get the neighbor kid to mow your grass for anything less than $100/hr, therefore giving you 3 hours to write a killer sales letter - it’s probably a steal

Figure out your PAY number, paint it on the wall in your office, and then go about setting up your business in a way that allows you to focus on the only things that can really pay that kind of money: marketing, innovation, and customer service. – cause everything else is just a cost.