Today I’m presenting for a free webinar on Free Google Tools at noon until 1:00 (CST). You are all welcome to attend. It’s a project for the Minnesota Renewable Energy Marketplace. http://www.mnrem.com/blog/?page_id=53
You can register here: https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/606704318
Here’s the official description:
Google has a range of free tools that can not only save your money but make it easier for you to collaborate with others online. This session will highlight a few of the tools that are most useful to small businesses.
Title: Survey of Free Tools from Google
Date: Thursday, February 2, 2012
Time: 12:00 PM – 1:00 PM CST
After registering you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the Webinar.
I will post the slides and an archive from the presentation on the MNREM site later today if you’re interested in the topic but can’t make the time.
Sorry for the last minute notice – but sometimes that’s the best way to get fit it into your schedule.
Thanks to John Byers from Byers Media http://www.byersmedia.com for the heads up on Shoeboxed.
Shoeboxed http://www.shoeboxed.com/
It is similar to Expensify, which I mentioned a couple of weeks ago. It allows you to digitize and track your expenses. Like Expensify, there’s a free option and several tiered services.
Other great tools:
Box http://www.box.net/
Box lets you store documents, media and all of your content online, so you can access, manage and share them from anywhere.
DropBox https://www.dropbox.com
Is a similar service that allows you to create a shared folder.
Some great resources.
OK a couple of weeks ago I mentioned QR codes with a promise to say more later – well it’s later. It’s a little later than intended but I got mixed up with a great vacation in the West of Ireland and a week back home for work. (For a great refresher or demonstration of QR code you should check out this link from my friend John in St Paul: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsPRpQfHYOY).
Google Local Business Center has changed and is now Google Places. You know when you search for something and you get the almost phone book like listings at the top – well that’s Google Places. And if you have a business web site – especially if location matters – it makes sense to claim your address (real and URL) on Google Places. According to the Google blog here are some of the new features of Google Places (although first I’ll add that one of the best features is that most features are still free):
• Service areas: If you travel to serve customers, you can now show which geographic areas you serve. And if you run a business without a storefront or office location, you can now make your address private.
• A new, simple way to advertise: For just $25 per month, businesses in select cities can make their listings stand out on Google.com and Google Maps with Tags. As of today, we’re rolling out Tags to three new cities — Austin, Atlanta and Washington, D.C. — in addition to ongoing availability in Houston and San Jose, CA. In the coming weeks we’ll also be introducing Tags in Chicago, San Diego, Seattle, Boulder and San Francisco.
• Business photo shoots: In addition to uploading their own photos, businesses in select cities can now request a free photo shoot of the interior of their business which we’ll use to supplement existing photos of businesses on Place Pages. We’ve been experimenting with this over the past few months, and now have created a site for businesses to learn more and express their interest in participating.
• Customized QR codes: From the dashboard page of Google Places, businesses in the U.S. can download a QR code that’s unique to their business, directly from their dashboard page. QR codes can be placed on business cards or other marketing materials, and customers can scan them with certain smartphones to be taken directly to the mobile version of the Place Page for that business.
• Favorite Places: We’re doing a second round of our Favorite Places program, and are mailing window decals to 50,000 businesses around the U.S. These decals include a QR code that can be scanned with a smartphone to directly view the mobile Place Page for the business to learn more about their great offerings.
You can take advantage of as much or as little as you want – but as I said it make sense to at least claim your spot. You can do so here: http://google.com/places
First I know many of you will appreciate the humor in the fact that schools in Dublin have been closed today and tomorrow due to snow. Less than 2 inches of snow!
Second since in Dublin I’ve been trying a new online phone service called Magic Jack: http://www.magicjack.com
Magic Jack is a piece of equipment and service that will give you very cheap phone service. You just plug the equipment into a USB port on your computer, then plug a phone into the other side; set up service and away you go. I set it up at home and got a US number. I think I paid $20 for a year of service. Now I can call anyone in the US and they can call me on this number. If I’m not connected they get my voicemail, which is part of the $20 service.
Like Skype the quality is not consistent. I’ve had 30 minute phone calls that were clear as a bell, usually made at night or on the weekend. I’ve had other times (working hours) where the quality has been shaky and where I am cut off every 3 minutes.
What I do like about Magic Jack is that I can make the calls on a phone, not headphones. So even when the quality is not great it seems better than international Skype calls. Voicemail messages are emailed to me. That’s a huge plus. The price is right. Skype is great for video. I think the Skype to Skype calls might have the best consistent quality – but for every day use – especially for friends and family (where it’s OK to call back every 3 minutes) I’m leaning towards the Magic Jack.
Happy New Year!
I wanted to start the year off with a Byte with the hope that it would keep me on tracking for weekly (not sporadic) updates for 2010.
This site is a month too late for me (now that we’re in Dublin and our house is occupied in MN) but I thought it might help others: Second Porch: http://secondporch.com
It’s a Facebook Application that helps you promote or find vacation housing. I can’t speak too much about adding a property, except that it’s free – but I can say that searching for a place is easy. Each listing includes comments, recommendations, fans and any connection you might have to the location. (So if you have a friend who has a friend who stayed there you might see that show up.) Place are available for rent or trade.
If you have a place to rent/trade it might be worth checking out. Or it may be a way to find nice accommodations for your next vacation.
Google now hosts template-based sites: https://sites.google.com/site/sites/ I set one up: https://sites.google.com/site/pelicancruises/
The good news:
• the site looks very OK
• it only took about an hour for me to setup
• I feel like it could look good with another hour or so work
• I could point a domain name to it
• I suspect it ought to do well with Google
There are definitely some things I don’t love about the site. I’d like to be able to make more changes to the templates. I think it’s easy to plug in Picasa pictures and slideshows.
So while I don’t think you’ll find Fortune 400 businesses moving to this anytime soon, I think this is a great starter web site.
Today I’m giving a presentation to the Professional Women in Real Estate group in St Paul Minnesota. I’m excited to talk with the group. I suspect that everyone is coming at it with very different levels of experience and expertise. Here is the presentation I’m going to use.
I think I’ll also mention the Minnesota Voices Online list – the focus is rural and more community building but I think it’s a good group for anyone looking to implement a social media plan.
Today someone asked me how to drive traffic to their site. I know I’ve written on this before but I thought that if I came up with a list of 7 things to do that Byte readers might find that to be interesting too. So here it is:
1. Give them a reason to visit the site today. Maybe a coupon, a special recipe, a video – whatever you think would motivate your target visitors.
2. Email (call or send a postcard) to past visitors and/or customers. Personalize it as much as you can.
3. Send a link to five well connected friends or colleagues and ask them to send it on. But again give them a reason. “I’m offering a free poster on my web site, would you post it on Facebook?” works better than, “Will you ask your friends to visit my site, I build trucks.”
4. Get connected yourself and post your link (on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter…)
5. Visit blogs that relate to your site. Post a comment. Don’t try to sell your site. Write something so clever or smart that they want to see who you are and link without you pushing.
6. Remember to tell people to visit your site when you meet or see them – draw on that reason to visit.
7. Give them a reason to visit in the future. Change up your reason to visit. Put a time stamp on the coupon, create a new video, have a monthly contest. Allow people to sign up for an email announcement of changes or subscribe via RSS.
It’s hardly an exhaustive list but these are mostly the kinds of things you can do when you have downtime. Most things will also give you an excuse to contact people and strengthen relationships and that’s always good for business too.
OK I know I’ve been terrible with the timely bytes this summer – I’m going home on Thursday and that should help me get back on track. In the meantime…
Someone asked me about email to fax and fax to email options last week. I haven’t tried any of these – and most of them won’t from Ireland but I tried to pick the best I could.
The following services allow you to send and receive faxes through your email. The big difference seems to be price:
E-fax http://www.efax.com - There is a pay per page rate. There is also a 30 day trial.
MyFax http://www.myfax.com - Cost is $10 per month. Apparently you get 300 free fax pages, which implies that you pay a usage fee after that. There also have a free trial.
Go Daddy http://www.godaddy.com/gdshop/email/fte_landing.asp - Cost is $14 per month for an 800 number. Unfortunately, you use minutes while sending or receiving fax.
UnityFax https://www.unityfax.com – There’s a $2 setup fee, $5 per month and $.05 per page over limit.
Free Fax to Email http://www.freefaxtoemail.net - Good to receive but apparently not to send.
I know I’ve talked about Skype www.skype.com before. I’m not the biggest user at home – but I love it when I’m in Ireland. My new favorite thing is that I can forward my Skype phone number to a landline (or cell phone). So my Twin Cities number now rings through to the house where I’m staying in Dublin. I love it because the quality of the call is more like a regular call – less like a Skype call.
I think I paid about $50 a year. When I look at my account it seems as if the number has elapsed, but it still works. For $50 a year I think I’m going to have this number forward to my mother-in-law when we go – then it’s super cheap calls for the rest of the year.
