Archive for Systems & Organization
Running Your Business With an iPhone
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Don’t you just love technology? A few short years ago it really wasn’t possible to run your business from your phone. Now you can do almost anything with the help of applications for your iPhone.
Writing/Editing
There are a number of apps that let you view and edit documents directly from your smartphone. One of the most popular is called Documents to Go. It lets you view and edit documents right on your phone.
You can also find text-based writing tools like PlainText and iA Writer that are inexpensive and easy to use.
Desktop Communication
You can use the GoToMyPC app to connect to your work computer. This makes it easy to access your work files directly. No need to plan ahead. You can also use Apps like Dropbox and CloudTalk to share and store information that is accessible both from your computer and your smartphone.
Communication
With Skype you can have voice chats (and video chats if your device has a camera) with customers and contractors.
You can also use dictation applications like Dragon and QuickVoice to record your thoughts or create business content or documents.
Payment and Invoicing
PayPal offers an easy to use payment application that lets you send invoices and manage your account from your smartphone. Many banks also offer applications that let you manage your account from your phone. Intuit, the makers of Quicken and QuickBooks also have a payment processing application called GoPayment that you can use on your smartphone.
Blogging
Like to blog on the go? Check out the WordPress application that makes it easy to write, edit and publish blogs from your smartphone.
Social Networking
There are myriad applications to manage your social networking for both Facebook and Twitter. You can post pictures, comments, and stay in touch with your friends from just about any mobile device. Check out Friendly and the iTunes Facebook app for Facebook. Check out the HootSuite application for Twitter.
Organization
Last but definitely not least are the wide number of organization and brainstorming applications that you can find to not only grow your business but also to manage it from your phone. Check out MindNode for mind mapping applications. Evernote and One Note are both fantastic note taking, clipping, and organizational tools.
And don’t forget the basics. You can access your Google accounts with Google applications which means you can check your AdSense earnings, analytics and of course you can check your email too.
Smartphone applications make owning and operating a business easier than it has ever been before. You can network, invoice, pay bills, brainstorm, publish content and launch new products – all from your phone.
6 Steps To Using Google Docs
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Most word processing software programs don’t come cheaply. Even the most commonly used, MS Word comes at a hefty price tag if it wasn’t preinstalled on your computer. If you’re looking for a top-notch word processing software that is absolutely free, don’t look any further than Google Docs.
Google Docs is Google’s answer to a web based documents system. To use the software all you have to do is have a Gmail account or go to http://docs.Google.com and register for a Google account. It’s absolutely free. In addition to word processing, you can create spreadsheets, forms, and presentations.
Once at the Google Docs website the rest is easy.
Step #1
Click on the Create button in the upper left hand corner.
Step #2
Choose the type of document you want to create. If you’re familiar with Excel, MS Word, and PowerPoint, these document types will look and feel familiar.
Step #3
Once you’ve made your document choice a new document will open. If you have chosen to create word processing document you’ll see the same type of toolbar at the top of the page. You can format your content the same way you would a Word document. You can choose your font type, size, and formatting. You can justify the page right or left, highlight, list items, and include text links.
Step #4
After you have created your document, the final step is to save it and here’s one of the ways where utilizing Google documents really pays off. You’ll save your document as a Google document. It won’t really ask you how you want to save your document. And it will store the document in a main folder or you can create sub folders, this allows you to label and organize them how you see fit. Whenever you sign into your Google or Gmail account you will have access to all of your Google documents.
Step #5
If you want to export the document and store it on your desktop or hard drive all you have to do is click on the file menu and choose “download as” from the pop up list. There you will see that you have the option to download the document as HTML, Open Office, Text, Word, RTF or PDF. That means if you’re sending the document to someone who uses MS Word, you can download it as a word doc and send it to them quickly and easily.
Step #6
Here’s the final reason Google documents is a great resource, you can share your documents by simply clicking the word “Share” in the upper right hand of the document toolbar. There you will see you have a number of options including sending a link to the document to a person, emailing the documents to a person or persons, inviting people to view the document or publishing as a web page. This makes collaboration very simplistic.
Google documents is one resource that makes creating, editing and sharing documents quick and easy and perhaps best of all, it’s extremely user friendly and it’s free.
Tips for Making Business Easy: Getting Rid of Email Clutter
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Email is a great way to stay in contact with friends and family. It has become an essential part of doing business in today’s economy. Because email is so easy to use, it’s easy to find yourself overwhelmed with the number of email messages you receive each day.
This clutter can become a source of stress. If you take an active role in addressing your email clutter, you’ll be able to reduce this stress. You’ll also spend less time dealing with your emails. And you’ll have time left over for more important things. Below are a few steps you can take to assist in your email clean-up.
Prevent Unwanted and Unsolicited Emails
Major email service providers such as Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo Mail have gotten very good at identifying and filtering spam email, but you can help them get better. For example, if you’re a Gmail user, click the “Report Spam” button to identify any spam messages that you happen to receive. Hotmail users should use the “Junk” button.
When enough users identify a certain sender’s messages as being junk or spam, then the service will be able to better filter future message from that sender.
Prioritize Your Incoming Emails
One way to reduce future clutter in your inbox is to have a system that can help you prioritize new emails as you receive them. If you can deal with the important emails right away and leave the low priority emails until later, then your inbox won’t get cluttered quite as quickly.
Most email providers give you the ability to create rules or filters by which you can identify emails which come from certain people as being the most important. If you use Gmail, consider giving Gmail’s “Priority Inbox” a try if you haven’t already. This feature does a great job at automatically highlighting the emails you’re likely to find most important.
Organize the Emails You Must Keep, But Delete as Much as Possible
Another key element of the decluttering strategy is to identify the emails you absolutely must keep. Also identify why you must keep them. If you’ve already acted on the email but still need to keep it, then get it out of your inbox and into a storage folder or archive. If you don’t need to keep the email, simply delete it.
Finally, one of the most important things you can do is identify those emails that you can address in a few minutes or less. Once you identify those emails, take the necessary action – right away – so that you can be done with it, and delete the email. Simply leaving these emails and telling yourself you’ll “deal with them later” leads to more clutter.
Tax Write-Offs
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You can save a ton of money on tax write-offs if you’re running your own business. For many small businesses, taxes are one of their larger expenses, sometimes even their largest expense. Are you aware of all the write-offs you can use to reduce this expense?
Sample Write-Offs
Home office space – You can’t claim your entire house as a deduction, but if you have a specific room or area of the house that’s solely used as a home office, you can claim that space as a tax write-off. Just figure out the percentage of the square footage in your home that your office space takes up and divide your monthly rent or mortgage by that amount.
Health insurance, self employment taxes and contributions to retirement plans – Your health insurance is most likely completely tax deductible. You may also qualify for tax breaks depending on your retirement plan.
Internet and phone – If an internet connection is required for business operation, chances are you can deduct it. The same can be said for your phone. You can’t deduct your primary line, but if you have additional lines specifically for business it can probably be deducted.
Filing fees – In most states, you have to pay some sort of filing fee to maintain your corporate or business license. These fees can almost always be deducted.
Any office supplies – Staplers, paper, pens, etc. can almost always be deducted.
Computers, printers and scanners – So long as the digital equipment is used primarily for business, you can probably deduct it.
Domain, hosting, shopping cart, etc. – Any expense that you incur as a result of having your website up can be deducted.
Meals – You can deduct 50% of your business meals. What is a “business meal?” A business meal is basically a meal you have with one or more persons who are in some way related to your business.
Recording Tax Write-Offs
Save all your receipts. If it’s not self-explanatory what the receipt was for, make notes on the back of the receipt so that when tax day comes it’s clear to you or your accountant what the expense was.
If you’re deducting a meal, make sure you write down who the meal was with on the back of the receipt as well.
In general, if it’s an ordinary expense, you won’t raise any red flags at the IRS. On the other hand, if you start creatively deducting things that generally aren’t considered business expenses, you risk getting audited.
If you keep good records and keep abreast on what your write-offs are, you can greatly reduce the amount of taxes you need to pay at the end of the year.
*Disclaimer* Please keep in mind that I am not a tax attorney, so please check with your attorney or CPA before filing your taxes.Google Cloud Print
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Google Cloud Print allows you to print any email from anywhere, with one click from an Android or iPhone device. It’s a revolutionary service that makes printing easier for professionals on the go. How does it work and could you benefit from it? Let’s find out.
To get started, you need either an Android device or an iOS device. You also need a Windows PC computer connected to a printer. Linux and Mac aren’t currently supported, but will be supported in the near future, according to Google.
Download and install Google Chrome, Google’s proprietary browser. Connect your Google Chrome browser to your printer in Chrome.
Once that’s set up, you can now print from any portable or even non-portable device by clicking “Print” in any email. Note that you need to be using Gmail for this to work.
Once you’re set up, do a test print from your Android or iPhone device to make sure the connection is working properly.
Who Benefits Most from Google Cloud Print?
Naturally, Google Cloud Print is most beneficial to people who are on the go often, and who also often need things in paper form. This could include people such as lawyers, product based businesses, coaches and really just about anyone who often gets work-related emails that need to be printed.
Since so many people read their emails on the go today rather than when they’re sitting at their desk, it really doesn’t make sense to force people to wait until they’re at a computer to print everything out.
You should be able to read, delete, archive and even print all your email from a mobile device on the go. Google Cloud Print allows you to do this.
Google Cloud Print for a Business Address
One further use for Google Cloud Print would be to attach it to your office’s printer rather than your own printer. That way, anyone who needs to print on the go can use your office printer to print things out.
Create one email address that’s shared among employees. That email address is connected to Google Cloud Print and any employee can forward emails to that email address, log in and print documents from any mobile device anywhere.
In other words, you can effectively wire a printer in such a way that anyone working for you can print any document anyone needs, no matter where they are.
Google Cloud Print may be a truly revolutionary technology for offices all around the world. Would your office benefit from using Google Cloud Print? The only real way to find out is to give it a try. Since it’s included in Google Chrome, it’s quite easy to install. Getting started only takes five to ten minutes. Why not give it a shot?
