For those that possess a little willpower they can get their work accomplished on the computer without wasting the same time that those of us who are easily distracted or like to put off not so fun tasks do.

Let me introduce to you a lovely set of tools tools you can utilize to stay focused, or at least not be able to waste time on the internet

http://macfreedom.com/ (also for PC’s)

For just $10 you can have a tool that will block the internet on your computer for anywhere from a minute to 8 hours.

However maybe you need the internet, you just don’t need all of the internet (ahem.. facebook…) that leads us to our next option:

http://anti-social.cc/

For $15 you can reclaim your productivity. Downside, it’s for mac only So I have not personally tested this application because I’m a PC kind of girl but from what I’ve read it looks great. From the website:

When Anti-Social is running, the only way to get around the block is by rebooting your computer. As you will feel a deep sense of shame for rebooting just to waste time on Twitter, you’re unlikely to cheat.

If you do try out Anti-Social leave a comment and let me know how it worked for you!

Come see me on April 2nd from 2-6pm at 1602 Hogeboom Ave, Eau Claire.

It’s fun, it’s informal… there’s chocolate and a photo booth… what more do you need?

]]> http://www.technologicalnonsense.com/meet-me-saturday/feed/ 0 http://www.technologicalnonsense.com/so-you-wanna-be-a-mobile-publisher/ http://www.technologicalnonsense.com/so-you-wanna-be-a-mobile-publisher/#comments Sat, 05 Feb 2011 20:39:27 +0000 Jessica Harrison http://www.technologicalnonsense.com/?p=258 If you didn’t just read the post I wrote from my phone you might want to… it’s short but it goes to show just what you can do with your phone.

First do you have a blog? A wordpress one?

Okay got the blog now do you have a phone you can download apps on? Android, Blackberry or iPhone they’ll all work for this as far as I know. Go to your market, store or wherever you download apps from and type in wordpress.

http://blackberry.wordpress.org/

http://android.wordpress.org/

http://ios.wordpress.org/

Okie dokie, app installed? Good… open it and log into your blog. (You can also start a new wordpress.com blog with this app but my personal preference is to do that on a screen that is bigger than my phone.) You’ll need to make sure you choose the right account type to add so you need to know if you have a wordpress.com blog or a self hosted blog.

• If you have your own hosting you have a self hosted blog.

• If you go to wordpress.com to log into your blog and/or have a blog address that goes www.myblog.wordpress.com then you have a wordpress.com hosted blog.

Enter your username and password and boom you’re ready to go! Whoops did you get an error message? If you got an error message saying you need to enable something or another then go to your computer and log into your blog, go to the settings tab and choose writing. Scroll down and check the boxes that allow remote publishing. Try logging in again and it should work! Any problems let me know and I’ll try and sort them out for you.

From this app you can see comments, posts, pages and stats (you may need a plugin for this with a self hosted blog) as well as write them.

But there are a few things to keep in mind:

• When publishing from your phone you won’t have access to add on plugins for things like SEO so you may want to log in via a computer and edit your post at a later date to make sure you have your keywords and meta data in place.

• When you’re writing a post you’ll enter the title, then the content and then you have the option to add tags and categories below that you have to change the status to published in order for the post to go live once you hit save.

• You can even add media from your phone to your posts but I’d advise against adding too many crappy cell phone pics to your blog so take your time to make sure it’s a high quality photo.

Happy Posting!

This post is the first in a series of posts about utilizing your phone to run your business from anywhere.

Read the rest of the posts here: Mobile Office

Join the forum discussion on this post

While many phones now have the ability to provide internet services and WiFi is abundant sometimes it’s just not possible to pull out a laptop and get setup for blog writing (or updating, checking stats, approving comments, etc.)

For some people this is the worst case option but with my particular phone, the HTC Evo if you’re curious, I have a very large screen to do my blogging business with.  I just need to remember to watch out for my phones autocorrect tendencies, like when it wanted to write flogging instead of blogging…yikes.

For those of you that are interested in using this feature I’ll be writing a post (from my computer) with the details to get it up and running.

FREE

WORDPRESS

E-COURSE

Yes, that’s right Free e-courses are here and the first one is all about WordPress.

What is an e-course? It’s a mini course on WordPress (or any other subject) delivered straight to your e-mail inbox so you can follow along as you please and refer back to it at a later date if you need to.

Want in? Just click on the E-courses tab above and you’ll be taken to the area where you can sign up for the new WordPress e-course.

Let me know what you think and what other curriculum you’d like to see available!

Or in this case I make business decisions with a little help from my clients.

If you’ve got a few minutes it would be great if you could take some time to answer the questions in this short survey I’ve created: Click here to take survey

It’s confidential and you can skip any questions you don’t think pertain to you.

This will really help me figure out what you want in 2011

Enter Google.

Previously I posted a short and sweet post about why I love Google and now it’s time for me to really dig into that and explain myself to you. We’ll start with my calendar…

I used to use, and still have, a very awesome spiral bound monthly calendar but it didn’t fit in my purse and I’d forget to pull it out and enter things when I was working on my laptop somewhere. So I relied a lot on my memory, which as I mentioned earlier is usually too busy generating things for me to do to worry about what I actually have scheduled already. Let’s just say I may have missed an appointment or two. With the Google calendar it’s already on my computer when I’m checking my e-mails or working with a client. I just pull it up and pop in the info and I’m ready to go. There’s also PLENTY of room for details (unlike the little boxes on my planner) and I can log into Google from anywhere. And with the growing number of those fancy internet phones out there, I’m breaking down and getting one in the next couple months, I will be able to fit my calendar in my purse.

So aside from fitting in my purse and being present on my already open laptop I also love the sharing features. I can share my calendar with anyone I want, like my new assistant (more on that for a future post) and the program I use to setup my photoshoots and keep track of my clients. Along with sharing my calendar I can also import calendars from others, holiday calendars or most importantly for me my calendar from my studio management software. Now I can look in either place and see exactly what I’ve got going on, photo related or not.

Of course the downside to all this is if you can’t get on Google you don’t have your calendar so when I know I’ll be going somewhere that may or may not have internet access I’ll often print off the current month so I have a paper copy of my calendar just in case.

You can also use Google calendar to list the tasks you need to accomplish for the day. I don’t personally use this feature as I get a lot of pleasure out of crossing things off with a pen once I get them done but I do occasionally put the really important things on there just in case I neglect to look at my to do list.

Coming next: Google Reader

Not only is it my search engine of choice but I also use it for….

1. My Calendar
2. Keeping up on the blogs I like to read
3. A substitute for Microsoft Office
4. Analytics for keeping tabs on my websites
5. E-mail with pretty impressive spam filters
6. Groups and sharing other things with others
7. Picasa

Those are just a few of the applications Google has provided, the ones I’m most familiar with, however there are MANY other choices depending on what your needs are.

So we start once again a series, over the next couple weeks I’ll be writing posts on the applications listed above be sure to subscribe to the blog (below) so you don’t miss anything.

There are some basic customizations you can do without adding any extra applications just by hitting the edit page button (under the page profile photo).

Currently there’s probably not a lot going on in your edit section but as you add applications to your page (networked blogs, etsy, fbml, reviews, and so much more) you’ll be able to edit them in this section and decide if you want them as a box or a tab on your page and things like that. I’ll leave you to explore this a little bit as I want to move on to talk about some more interesting things.

Here is the secret to your success: Static FBML application (type it in the facebook search then when the page shows up choose the add to my page link over on the left) this application allows you to input your own custom code on a facebook page. This allows you to make a newsletter sign up page, a contact page, a welcome page and whatever else your heart desires.

Once you’ve added the FBML application go back to your page’s edit section. You should see FBML-FBML  listed under the Applications section, probably right near the bottom. Click on the edit link under the FBML-FBML title and you’ll be taken to the area where you can enter your code or write whatever you want to show up on your page. The box title is what will be listed on the tab on your facebook page.  You can add as many boxes as you would like using the Add another FBML box link at the bottom of the page.  The customization options with this application are endless!

After you’re done entering all your text, code, etc. you’ll need to go make the tab show up on your page. Click on the thumbnail in the upper left and it will take you back to what you see when you first land on your page. Click on the + that is located at the far left of your tabs, this will allow you to add the tab you just created by clicking on it. Once you’ve clicked on it, depending on how many tabs you already have, it will either show up right away or you’ll be able to locate it by using the >> tab. If it’s one of the hidden tabs and you want it to be visible right away then just click the >> and drag the tab over to where you would like it to be.

You can follow these instructions for any other applications you load as well and if you’ve just made a welcome page you might want to head over to this post to get a refresher on how you make that page the first one people see.

Okay so now that we’re on the same page here – you have people that like you your page – let’s talk about what you can find out. First head to your facebook page and on the left side as you scroll down you’ll see a section called insights. This is only seen by the administrators of the page and can’t be seen by the people that like the page. Mine is telling me that I’ve had 28 interactions so far this week, yours will be telling you something completely different I’m sure. Regardless of what it says there will be a little blue link that says See All, give that a click and you’ll be taken to a page with lots of information on it.

You’ll see 4 different graphs on this page, the graphs on the left you can change what you’re looking at. I could probably go on for paragraphs and paragraphs detailing all the stuff you can look at but I think that a general overview of how to change things will best get your on your way to finding out the information that you can utilize and will help your business.

To change the graphs there are drop down menus, click and you can choose what you want to see. The first set of graphs are about what your fans are doing (yes they still call them fans on this page – get your stuff straight Facebook!) and how many are active. The second set of graphs will tell you about how many fans you have, if that number is higher or lower than previously and info about your fans – male/female, geographic area, etc.

So now you’ve got the resources, use them!