I read and listened to Colleen’s a.k.a The Communicatrix’s post about seeing your goals daily. I came away inspired, but I didn’t have the time to do what she suggested. I admit that I am sometimes lazy, but I would still like to be reminded of my goals daily.

The first thing to have a Gmail account. If you don’t have one, you can easily sign up for one.

The next step is to create labels. Labels are the way that people organize their emails in Gmail.  If you don’t want to create labels, you  can use the starred items system  which Lifehacker has a how-to on.

For the purposes of this post. I created the labels S/Goals and S/Tasks. For more on how I came up with these labels, read the post from Web Worker Daily.

Next go to the Labs feature. You can get there one of two ways. Either click on the beaker icon on the upper right hand side of the gmail account, or  click on “Settings“, then “Labs“.  Find and enable the  Gmail Labs Plugin for Multiple Inboxes. With Multiple Inboxes you can see up to 5 groups of emails based on labels or other email addresses.

After Multiple Inboxes Plugin is enabled, you can go designate what folders you would like to see visible when you open up your gmail account.  Click on “Settings” again and then “Multiple Inboxes“. Here you can see which labels are visible. There’s room for 5.

Now, you can go ahead and go through your emails  and label them S/Goals and/or S/Tasks, but what happens if you think of a goal or task and you are away from your desk?

Enter filters.

To create a filter, you go to “Settings” and “Filters“, and click on “Create a new filter.”

We are going to create a filter so that all emails coming from the goals email will be labeled with the S/Goals tag.

1. In the To: field type username+goals@gmail.com where “username” is you current gmail account.

2. Click on the “Next Step >>” button.

3.  Click on the checkbox next to Apply the label and select “S/Goals”

4. If you have emails already labeled,  they should appear below the settings. You have the option to apply the setting to the existing emails.

5. Click “Update Filter”.

6. Repeat  steps 1-5 for the “S/Tasks” label.

The result:

My goals and tasks are now visible whenever I open up my gmail account.

How do you use your Gmail account to accomplish your goals?

The free business card offer (just pay for shipping) is still good until the end of the month (June 30th). So if you have videos on YouTube & are in need of some business cards, now is the time to act. Learn more at http://goo.gl/Uvwl

Linchpin: Are you indispensable?

I just finished reading Seth Godin’s Linchpin: Are You Indispensable? and one question has stuck out in my head.

What is Your Super Power?

If your not able to communicate to others what makes you unique and what makes you stand out from the pack, how do you expect to make an impact?

When networking, we only have a minute, if that to make a statement about yourself.  If you need some motivation, ask trusted colleagues what they think your strengths are, you’ll be surprised.

I found that when you have more than one strength, its just best to focus on one at the beginning of the conversation. The more dialogue and repertoire you have, the more people would like to learn more about what you do.

If you need more insight, think about the “old school” comic books or think about other colleagues strengths and how your skills can complement theirs and vice versa.

For women business owners, the need for excellent PowerPoint presentations while soliciting partners or customers is crucial to a successful small business. As a women entrepreneurs, we need to know our audiences before creating PowerPoints to address them. This is a crucial process for us all.

Given my artistic sensibilities, I enjoy designing PowerPoints for business presentations. However, sitting down to organize images, write text, insert graphics and add animation to a presentation is VERY time consuming. On top of that, the hard part about designing my own presentations isn’t just about the time. It’s recognizing the importance of professional – and catchy – presentations!

Well-executed presentations can offer potential clients and partners the absolute best first impression possible of you and your business. Presentations for current partners will ensure continued quality control within your small business. You could spend hours trying to design your own presentation, or you can hand the task off to someone who can get it done quickly and efficiently.

One organization that handles other businesses presentation design is www.123PPT.com. 123PPT offers creative and concept development, along with technical capabilities to develop state of the art presentations not only through PowerPoint, but also through Adobe FlashDesign, CD-ROM, DVD, video, and animation. 123PPT will give you esti­mates based on your exact needs.

A similar business presentation organization is ProPoint Graphics. ProPoint offers Flash and PowerPoint presentation design services. ProPoint serves large and small business alike, and similar to 123PPT, ProPoint will give you a quote on request.
Who designs your PowerPoints? How do you decide what content to include in your PowerPoints? How do you implement your brand in your PowerPoints? We would love to know, so shoot us a line.

John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing wrote a post about Make a Referral Week, which happens to be this week.

In the spirit of things, I’m going to recommend Google Voice.

Just in case you didn’t hear,  Google Voice lets you screen calls, takes voicemail and you can forward your  calls to your mobile, work or whatever location(s)  suit you.

Recently, I have been using my Google Voice account to contact venues for an event I’m throwing. Its convenient because I am not giving out  a personal number.  The interface is nice because you can read your voicemail in your account don’t have to listen to voicemail “in order” like with most phones.

Don’t have a Google account? We are giving away 3 of them. Just leave a comment  and tell us how a Google Voice Account  can set you free.

Small Business Owners and Entrepreneurs, listen up! I recently spent the majority of a couple of days helping a colleague restore her data after her computer was stolen.  Well, we restored as much as possible.  She was not good at making regular backups.  As a result she lost a significant amount of data that she will never see again.

I wanted to take this opportunity to provide a friendly reminder to make backup copies of data that you do not want to lose; and data you hold near and dear to your hearts!  I know many, and perhaps most, of you have your own businesses, so you could not only be sad from losing personal files, you could also devastate your business if you do not make regular backups.  I’d hate to hear if some of you lost time, money and customers as a result of not having backup copies.

Some important files to backup that are often overlooked include:

Email

Tax returns

Customer files, including order histories as applicable

Photos

MP3’s, including your music files (I’d cry if I lost my hundreds of iTunes songs)

Address files

Phone lists

Application files (e.g., Word, Excel, Viso, etc.)

Invoices

Stored cell phone numbers and messages

Etc…anything important to you

Be sure to create more than one backup.  For example, do not keep making your backups onto the same filename on an external hard drive, on the same USB drive, DVD, etc.  If your backup media is damaged, then your data on the backup may not be able to be retrieved.

Which brings me to the next point…store your important backups somewhere safe!  For your personal backups, a fireproof safe in your home *may* be okay, but preferably, store your backups off site in a secured location such as a bank deposit box.

And make your backups regularly… I recommend making it a weekly event.  It is amazing how many important files you can lose over just a week’s amount of time!  And if you have something extremely important, make a backup of it right away.

If you use online services to backup your data, let us know which services you love! Let’s promote what works!

Are you starting a business or a small business owner?  Wild Women Entrepreneur CEO, Ja-Nae Duane, offers tips from her upcoming book, “How to Start Your Business with $100.” Here is an easy marketing tip:

I make it a point to market my business in every possible situation, including the times when I’m browsing books at the local public library or bookstore.  While doing my own shopping, I’ll simply prop my business cards into relevant publications.  By utilizing similar methods, you too can land new clients while showing creativeness and ingenuity!

Even in the depths of the digital age, people continue to rely on hard-copy books as sources of information.  Imagine this scenario: A web/graphic designer – we’ll call her Susan – is seeking to expand her client list. She arms herself with a stack of business cards (a must for EVERY business, large or small) and heads down to her local library or bookstore.   Concentrating on the most appropriate library sections – such as “Technology,” “Art and Design,” or “Small Business” – she inserts several business cards into as many relevant publications as possible.

A few days later, a fellow entrepreneur in dire need of a website for her own business visits the same library in search of information on web design. She picks Web Design for Dummies from the stack. As she flips through the pages, growing more and more daunted by techie lingo, she finds your business card… and pauses.  It’s like a god-send!  Silently, she ponders: “Should I really suffer through the stress of purchasing design software, and spending countless frustrating hours trying to design a website? I could really use that time to focus on my own work.  Maybe I should give Susan a call and see what the rates are like.”

Just like that, Susan has landed a new client. This technique is simple, effective and most of all – FREE!

Let’s get going! Perform a web-based search of the most popular books in your industry (Amazon.com is a great place to start).  Take note of these books and locate them in your nearest library or bookstore.  Place your business cards into these books and other publications in the same area of the library.  It is helpful to place your cards into relevant sections of books as well. For example, the above-mentioned web designer might have placed her cards into the section of the book that describes costly design software. Such a maneuver is like an unspoken sales pitch!

Feel free to share your tips and your stories below. We would love to hear from you!

What is Google Wave?

Just in case you haven’t heard, Google has recently launched Google Wave. Google Wave is a service were you can collaborate with colleagues using text, photos, videos and links. I have used it to communicate with friends, but I am curious about its business applications. We have a few invites available. Every 100th subscriber to The WildWE Facebook Page will receive a Google Wave invite.

Also we are planning something extra special for our 1000th subscriber. So stay tuned.

Here are some helpful business links that we stumbled upon over the weekend.

Do you Love a Local Business? Apply for a Grant

How soon should I incorporate?

How to be great client.

After reading “Work Less” from Entrepreneur.com, it made me realize that many of us forget why we started our own businesses in the first place. Here are 3 Simple reminders:

• Spend More Time with our Friends and Families: Many entrepreneurs start their own businesses to make their own hours and work from home.  Setting a schedule that allows you to have the time to spend with your loved ones is the key to keeping that balance you crave.
• I Can Do it Better Myself: Great! Then prove it. Show the world that a great product and great customer service doesn’t have to swallow your life up. This is your chance!
• FUN: When you lose the fun in life and in work, then you lose yourself. This is what life is all about. How can you add more fun in your life?

This is your life! This is your business! How are you going to make the most of it? Share your own stories and thoughts below.