Gmail Internal Productivity Hacks

It is common to use Gmail with your official business email.  Gmail is a great free gift from Google. There are several uses for it in your lawn care business. Lets look at the settings area in this video.

We are now inside of Gmail. What we're now going to do is look at some things that we can do in Gmail internally to get more productivity. Now one thing that we can do in go inside of the settings area of our Gmail and going here, we then see that in a space that there is an Undo Send button. What this does is allow us to recall an email before it is sent. We can determine a certain period that an email will remain in our box when we send it so that if we make a mistake or feel as if we need to go back and retrieve that email after we've sent it, we can do that. We can set it for a specific period of time. For example, we can set that period at 30 seconds.

So this means then that when we email within 30 seconds we can go back and recall that email if we changed our mind about it. So if we set this parameter all we've got to do is then just save our changes and we can do that at the bottom of the page. The one other feature we can use in our Gmail box is one that will allow us to preview emails before we must delete them and determine them as being read. And so we can do that by adding in a preview of each email. And, again, that preview will allow us to read the email without having to designate it as being read. And this will be of a special advantage now that we have buttons on the outside that we can manage our email quickly. So what we'll need to do is we'll need to go inside of the gear. We'll need to go to the settings area.

Once we get there we're going to click the Labs link. When we get to the Labs link what we're going to do is scroll down. We're going to look for the preview pane. We get to the preview pane we're going to click enable. And when we do that we're going to scroll down and we're going to click save changes. Now before we use this feature, we want to go back inside of our settings, and we want to determine how long it's going to be before a conversation is determined as being read. We can control that here and we can say that we never want this email to be determined as read until we mark it as read. So we can use never.

We can say 20 seconds, 3 seconds, 1 seconds, or immediately. So we can use the never button and then we can save our changes. Now when we go and we click an email, you'll notice then that this email can now be previewed, but it won't be marked as read. So we can then manage that email as we see fit while we can get a preview as we scroll down our box. And you'll notice then that these emails have not been determined as being read. Now one final activity we can engage in is we can go back into the settings, we can go back to the labs, and while we can add any of these labs, there's one that will help us if we often search our inbox. What we can do is we can enable what's called quick links and then we can click save changes. So now, if we search our inbox and we were to type in the parameters CPA marketing, we can save that inside of our quick link system.

And so in this case, we can then leave this as search forward/cpa marketing, or we can put the URL in there. You can leave this as it is. We're just going to click okay. And so now what will happen is anytime that we want to search our box for CPA marketing, all we must do is go to that link. We can do the same thing again. So you'll see now we've typed in ClickFunnels, and so we can do is we can click quick link. We'll see that search ClickFunnels. We'll click okay, and now we have that quick link in our browser. So we can use this anytime that we do a search often and we can use it to quickly access that search inside of our browser, inside of our Gmail account.

Calendar Productivity Hacks

You are now looking at Google Calendar, and you access Google Calendar by going to your web browser, writing in calendar in the search bar, and you'll see a result at the top or near the top that says Google Calendar. If you click Google Calendar, it will take you to the application. It's likely that you're already aware of the calendar's basic function or you're likely to have used the calendar. The question is, how can you use the calendar to collaborate and to work with others so that you might complete projects and to complete tasks. And to do that, we are going to go into the settings area, and it works much the same as some of the other applications. You'll go to the gear and then you're going to click settings. The one thing to note is that you can change the default view from the week to the month or whatever you would like to look at whenever you open your Google Calendar.

The other thing to be aware of is that you can have all the events from Gmail automatically added to your Google Calendar. This is done by default, and you would have to turn it off to change this. So all your events from Gmail will be added and that will control all of the other applications that you are going to be working with. What we're going to do is look at the calendar tab which means we'll go to the very top. We're going to click calendars And what you're going to notice is that you have a calendar that is going to be your name, and this will be your default calendar and that's the one that we were looking at when we first entered Google Calendar. Now what we're going to do is click share this calendar. Now there are some important considerations to make. You can make your calendar public, and this will be public to the entire Internet.

And this would allow you to make your calendar an appointment calendar so that you can show people when you are free or busy and they can schedule an appointment. So you can do that by making your calendar public and then choosing only to share the free or busy information. This would hide the details of your calendar from the public. Now you can choose to keep your calendar private, but what you can do is you can share your calendar with a specific individual whom you want to manage the calendar for you. This is where you gain productivity. You can put that person's email in there and you should use their Gmail address when you do that. We're going to type an address in there. Now, before we add the individual we want to look at where we want to give them permissions.

And if we use the drop-down arrow you'll notice that we can create a calendar where we can allow someone to make changes and manage sharing. So if you have a virtual assistant that's going to be managing your Google Calendar, you can give them full control over the events. You can have someone change events or you can make it so that they can only see your events. If you want someone to have full control and to manage the calendar, you'll want to default to make changes and manage sharing. When you click save or add person, that person will then be added to your calendar, and you'll see that here. And when that person opens their email they'll get an invitation stating that they've been invited to manage the calendar. Now all they'll have to do then is just go to click the link to view the actual calendar. That person will then be able to look at your calendar.

They'll be able to go to a specific appointment, and they can make an appointment for you. So in this case, we could make it so that the person could write in an appointment, and they can then add that event to your calendar. We're going to click edit event and then you'll see that on the calendar that we have been working on. We're going to have that event added. Now it's placed on the calendar of the person who’s going to be managing your calendar. So now what we're going to do is look at the calendar as if it were yours. And you'll notice now that that event is now on your calendar with an event that has been created by a person who is managing your calendar. In looking at the settings area, there are 2 other items that we'll want to note.

The first is that you'll see that there is a calendar called get productive with g tools 1. This is the classroom application that we were working with earlier in this course. That means that all the events that we create will be added to our Google Calendar when we look at it, and we can either control those notifications or we can add them. The same is going to be true with the person who we are working with. So you can ask or request the person who is going to be working with you in your Google Classroom, that they would use their Google Calendar so that they could look at the same calendar you are. Once again, being able to look at the same calendar and work from it will allow you to be more productive. Finally, we're also going to go to the labs tab. And then looking at the labs tab, we can use many different aspects of Google Calendar we use daily.

Finally, there is a detailed section on our main calendar which we can look at by going into that calendar. We can write in a description in case it is going to be shown to the search results. There are calendar addresses and private addresses that we can share or that we can access the calendar from the web. We can export the calendar and we can embed the calendar on a website. So in this case, we can take our entire calendar, pick up the embedded code, copy example, we can take that embedded code. We can make sure that it lands in the area that says text in WordPress where we can put a t where we are allowed to place HTML code. We're going to write in calendar, and then we're going to place our embed code. We're going to click publish, and then we can view our post with our Google Calendar. And you'll notice our calendar is now on our website. So again, if you wanted to make your calendar public or wanted to allow others to place appointments or if you wanted to keep it semi-private, you can do that.

Google Calendar Multiple Calendars

Being organized and keeping up with email in your lawn business can be challenging.  You can set up a separate email for marketing, signing up for free newsletters and other incoming marketing, personal mail, bill paying, website requests,etc.  All of these separte accounts can flow together into one dashboard. This videos will cover using multiple calendars.

Now that we have reviewed some basic functions of collaboration with calendar, we can now look at managing multiple calendars. And to create another calendar that we'll have control over within our calendar system, all we'll need to do is to go to this drop-down arrow and then click create a new calendar. We can then write in that calendar's purpose, and we'll have all the other details that were discussed earlier. We can make this calendar public, or we can choose to just share this calendar with someone else so that if you want to have a certain calendar that doesn't have all of your details, but you want to make that calendar public, you can do that. What we're going to do now is we're just going to click create calendar. And you'll notice now that that calendar has been added and you'll see that calendar in this area. We can choose to toggle that calendar off and on by clicking the link, making it available so that we can see the events at a glance, or we can choose not to see the events at a glance.

What we can also do is view a calendar that a friend makes public, and we can do that by placing their email address inside of this area and we'll be able to see the public portion of their calendar. Now although Google uses the term, this could very well be a partner, or it can be someone with whom you're working or someone to whom you have outsourced a task. Now if you want to see all your events immediately, all you'll need to do is to use the agenda button. And you'll notice that we'll see the assignments from Google Classroom. We'll also see the events that we have placed on the calendar and everything else that we have listed in this sidebar. If we wanted to take out birthdays for example we can do that, and we will only see all the other events. If we take out the classroom, we'll only see our calendar. So you have control over what you will see in the calendar in the agenda area, but agenda area is great for being able to note what you have coming up at a view where you can just see the line-by-line events.

Google Documents Basics

There was a time when everyone with a lawn business had Microsoft Word, but things have changed. With Google Docs, you can do everything for your business that you would have done in Word. Google Docs is free and at least worth learning how to use. This can be another $200 savings for your business each year. 

You are now looking at the search bar and you'll notice that we have written in docs and that will give us the search result Google Docs. We're now going to work and collaborating with documents and we're going to do that by clicking Google Docs. And if we get this screen we'll just click go to Google Docs and this will take us to our Google Docs dashboard. Now, if you go to the left side menu you're going to notice that you can work with word processing documents, spreadsheets, and Google Slides. And we're going to look at all those things. Now the other thing that you're going to note is that in this menu is Google Drive where all the documents are housed and we're going to be working with Google Drive sometimes. Now when we work with the word processing application we'll start by clicking this blank page and we're going to open up a new word processing document.

Now, it's likely that you're already familiar with this application where you can write documents. So what we are going to do is we are going to work on collaboration. We can do that by opening a document that's already on our hard drive that we want to work with others to edit and perfect. So we're going to go to the file area and then we're going to click the open command and that open command is going to take us to our hard drive. We're going to look at finding a document. It's going to take us to a certain screen and we're going to click upload. Then you'll note that you can select a file from your personal computer. Now the first document that we're going to work with is going to be a Microsoft document, Microsoft Word, and we're going to import that into Google Docs, and we'll just select the document from our hard drive and then we'll click open.

Google Docs will then open the document so that we can then work. Now, we can then work with others on this document by going to the share button and writing in the names of others who can work on the document. So we're going to do that right now. Now before we add the person we’re going to determine what they're going to do. Here we want them to be able to have the highest amount of autonomy which allow them to comment and edit. So we're going to click can edit and then we're going to send the invitation. You'll notice that Google Docs says that this document is shared with 1 person, and we can do that with as many people as we'd like. We can share it with others to work on the document.

So now let's look at what this would look like from the person with whom we have shared the document. So that person will now have an invitation where they can then open the doc in their web browser. And you'll notice now that there are 2 individuals working on the document. But what we can do inside the document is we can make our own edits and we can make them alongside of the person with whom we're working on the document with. So in this case, we're going to change an area here and then we're going to write in a comment. And we're going to add in that we're changing a particular line And once we've done that we're just going to click comment. And then our comment will be right where we made the edit. So, now, let's look to see what it will look like for the person who created the document.

You'll notice now that the same line has been edited in the document that the cursor where the edit is made is color coded. It's also color coded with the comment, and we can make changes ourselves. So what we're doing is we're collaborating in real time on a document or either asynchronously so that we can make our changes earlier in the day, and then someone can come later in the day and make changes and we'll still be working on the document. So now that is basic collaboration. In the next video, we'll look at more advanced collaboration.