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5 Techie Tools for Your Biz

  • On 4 Jul, 2012
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Guest Post:  Kelly Paull

[Editor’s note: This month, Kelly digs in and gives you a handful of great tools you can start implementing right away. Don’t get overwhelmed! Take a good look at the options Kelly recommends, start with ONE, and go from there. Remember to test before you implement a long-term solution.]

1. Is your email signature pulling its weight?

How many emails do you send a month?  I bet LOTS!  You never know who is going to be interested in knowing more about you and may just connect with you on one of your social media sites.  Does every.single.person in your life know what you do?  That includes your child’s soccer coach, the neighbor who is putting on the local community garage sale, and the customer service manager at Oakley Suglasses Corporate office?  (OK, those are MY recent emails, but I bet you have some peeps who don’t have instant access to your links!)

These two email apps are my favorite, check out each one and make sure that even your humdrum daily emails are working FOR you! (and they are FREE!)

WiseStamp–  add Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter, quotes, QR codes…  The options go on and on.  I have two favorite apps for this one, the Facebook LIKE button, get them to “Like” your business fan page right from your email signature!  How cool is that?! The second app I think you will enjoy is the Constant Contact link (you’ll need to be using Constant Contact for your newsletters).  This allows your email recipients to click into your latest email campaign.  Now, I call that two birds with one stone!

BrandMyMail– is more than just an email signature app, imagine an email that is branded, has an awesome signature app AND allows you to position things on the page just like a newsletter program.  Watch out, you’ll be drowning in creative juices!

2. Fill in the blank:  I spend too much time doing ________.

Set your timer,  your e.ggtimmer.com to be exact!  Never lose track of time again while checking emails, posting on Facebook, searching online, chatting with a team member, PINTEREST or whatever else makes you forget that the children need to be fed AND you have a business to run!

3. Leverage Facebook without wasting time!

First, set your timer (see #2 ), then spend about 30 minutes gathering up content that you would like to share on your business page this week.  Ideas would be motivational quotes, tips for using your products, fun recipes, amazing images, and videos.  Then you are going to go to your Facebook page and use the NEW facebook scheduler.  The image below will show you where to find the clock that will schedule your posts.  Simply type out your posts as usual, add links or images like you normally do, THEN click the clock, add the year, the month, the day, and the hour that you want it to post.

Tips for the facebook scheduler:

  • your scheduled time needs to be more than 10 minutes into the future.
  • if you do NOT add a day, the post will STAY at the top of your page for that month, all subsequent posts will be posted below this one for the month.
  • once you have scheduled a few you can then go to ‘Edit Page’, then ‘Use Activity Log’ to see what you have scheduled and to make any changes or even delete what you have scheduled.

You have spent about and hour getting your posts for the week scheduled and ready to go!  Remember to comment back to everyone who comments on your awesome content, you’ll be growing your following in no time! (for MORE tips visit Directly Successful)

4. Ever wish you had a place to save and organize ideas, links, screenshots, mobile images, notes and more?

Evernote is an amazing site that you can load on your computer, your phone and your mobile devices.  It syncs all devices so you have what you need where you need it.  If you are a direct sales leader who puts together meetings, talks or presentations you will LOVE this tool for keeping things organized and at your fingertips.

Direct sales consultants can use this tool for keeping track of:

  • business expenses (simply take a picture of your receipt with your phone and send it to your Evernote “business receipts” notebook, come tax time you will have all your expenses and receipts at your fingertips!)
  • mileage
  • marketing ideas
  • social media post ideas (use in conjunction with # 3 and you are now a total ROCKSTAR!!)
  • links to great content you want to check out later

What are YOUR ideas for using this tool?  Leave them in the comment section!

5. Did you know there is a simple way to store and share everything from music to documents, pdfs, images and more?

Dropbox is one of my ALL TIME favorites!  This tool helped me switch over from a laptop that was on its deathbed to my new macbook without even a second glance.  Dropbox is a cloud based service (it is free unless you are a cloud hog), meaning your documents, images, team training materials, videos, etc are all stored on a server so that it doesn’t take up all that space on your computer.  It also allows you to simply and easily share content without the ridiculous need to add an attachment to emails.  Picture inviting your newest team member to a folder on dropbox to begin their training!!  Share pictures from your latest convention with everyone and store them there so they don’t bog down your computer!

Here is a simple video to show you how dropbox works.

Have fun organizing, sharing, posting, saving time and using techie tools for your business!

Share in the comments YOUR favorite techie tools, we can’t wait to try them out as well!

 

Kelly Paull is the Honey Badger of Niche Marketing at DirectlySuccessful.com  She’s a techie geek with 8 years of direct sales experience and a passion for helping women navigate the technology necessary to run a smooth operation.

 

 

 

[box type=”info”] If you’re reading this on the blog, or your Kindle, you’re only getting half the story!  “Party On!” is designed for direct sales professionals serious about building a real business, not an expensive hobby. Each week we share additional resources and stories beyond what you see here on the blog, including complimentary training courses, downloadables, and more. Learn more and register for your copy of “PartyOn!” today. [/box]

21 Comments

  1. Rachael Painter

    Ooooooh!!! Great tips, Kelly!! I need to revamp my email signature. I love that one!

  3. Kelly Brian Paull

    Teena, there IS a lot packed in there. I didn’t realize until I was done writing it how MUCH there was to take in. I’ll be doing follow up mini posts on each one of these tools over on Directlysuccessful.com this month.

  4. Kelly Brian Paull

    Rachael- can’t wait to see what your signature looks like when you are done, you have your own creative juices that I just love!! Thanks for leaving me a comment and letting me know you were here =}

  9. Lisa Robbin Young

    Awesome stuff, Kelly. Really. I almost edited it because there was SO much in there, I was afraid folks would get overwhelmed, but you did such a great job, it was too hard to edit anything! 🙂

  10. Lisa Robbin Young

    Super! Be sure to invite them to get their own copy of PartyOn! so that they get the Summer Biz Boosting Guide coming out in a few weeks. Only our subscribers will get it. 🙂

  11. Angelina Devlin

    Kelly, Thank you for this article. I can’t wait to work on my email signature and to apply #3. I can not wait to share this with my associates.

  18. Renee

    Thanks for the tips Kelly! Your post on scheduling Facebook pages comes at a perfect time for me. You are a rock star!!!

Comments are closed.