Have a nice day!

Oh, if you’d like to check out the iRenew bracelet, go to www.buyirenew.com.

I am going to update this blog post. I should be receiving my iRenew bracelet shortly and will do a full review immediately after I get it.  My review of the iRenew bracelet will be thorough and will talk about everything I have learned after using the iRenew bracelet for a week.  Stay tuned for the review!

Again, this is a test.

Users of Google’s Tasks app were polled on what they’d like to see next. In other words: What would their dream to-do app do?

This, of course, is a question that has played out in all of our minds. But for those business professionals who need better organizational skills and task management, well, they have more than a few helpful ideas.

One of the common requests from people was a task list that doesn’t always look the same, and one the supports delayed tasks. For instance, if you have a conference call scheduled for next Friday perhaps the app won’t show this task (and offer a completion check) until the day before as opposed to viewing it on the to-do list for an entire week. Basically, people don’t want an app that treats all to-dos as something you can do any time.

Here are some of the other dream to-do app requests:

- Available across platforms (iOS, mac, windows, android, etc…)

- Write note first, categorize later

- Color coding

- Syncing with Google Docs or web interface

- Email functions with enhanced features, like the ability to flag a message for future follow up.

- Quick & intuitive adding and editing of tasks.

- Reasonable security; password protection.

- Ability to turn on/off specific features.

- A task list that is hierarchical and allows projects within projects.

- A notification system alerting when to complete a task (email/notification) – and the subject line of the email needs to be the task.

So there you have it. Sounds easy enough, right?

Developers, now get crackin’.

Got a high fever but can’t stomach a long wait at the ER? No fear. Now you can text to find out how long the ER wait time is. MetroWest Medical Center in suburban Boston has launched the state’s first texting program that allows potential patients to find out ER wait times before making the trip to the hospital. The hospital began the service early last month in hopes of building its market share and improving ER performance — and by extension, patient satisfaction. Chief executive Andrei Soran said the hospital plans to measure how many patients actually come in to the ER after texting and whether the program increases volume and satisfaction.

To use the ER texting service, patients should text 63311 to 508-437-411. The ER wait times at Framingham Union Hospital and Leonard Morse ONLY will be texted back immediately.

Now, for those of you who avoid popular restaurants on the weekends because of their astronomical wait times – then Textaurant, a Boston startup, is for you. If the restaurant you want to go to is signed up with Textaurant, you can actually see wait times online or on your mobile device, choose a location, and get in the wait queue remotely – from wherever you are for FREE. No standing in line at the restaurant. No bulky pagers to hold.

Perhaps the only drawback is not having that glass of wine at the bar before dinner. But you could do that at home, right?

Textaurant also gives restaurants – ANY restaurant, not just in the Boston area –  a business advantage by allowing them to track their patrons’ habits at peak times. Textaurant also says it can help restaurants boost sales by helping them “find new customers.”

Waiting, for some people, can be blood-boiling and stressful. Let’s hope these services lighten the load on peoples’ blood pressure and, perhaps, save them a few bucks. No more paying anger management therapy sessions!

It’s better than my landline. It’s better than Skype!

Google added the free e-mail feature last week and it enables U.S. users of Google’s Gmail service to make calls from microphone-equipped computers to telephones virtually anywhere in the world.

And, all calls in the U.S. and Canada will are FREE – for now.

But, what is really so fantastic about Google Phone is…

1. The clarity.

Both my husband and I have placed calls using the Gmail calling feature and we were blown away by the lack of interruption and – more importantly – the clarity! It was as if were were speaking on a landline. Neither of us felt like we were on a conference call nor did the audio have that tin can conference call effect.

2. Its advantage over Skype.

The fact that all Google calls made in the U.S. and Canada are FREE undercuts the most popular PC-to-phone service, Skype. Right now, Skype charges 1.2 cents to 2.1 cents per minute for U.S. calls.

In the meantime, Google hopes to make money on its service by charging 2 cents or more per minute for international calls. Google’s international rate chart is posted.

3. Its services.

While Google Voice is still kind of a work in progress, the service allows most people to receive calls on their PC if they get a free phone number from Google – or if they already have one.

The phone numbers are provided by Google Voice – which, quite frankly, doesn’t have the best track record particularly with iPhone users, nor with available numbers. I have tried to get a phone number in my area code in New Hampshire and there is nothing available yet.

Despite my unsuccessful attempt to get a number, I still love the Google Voice service. It’s easy. It’s super cheap. And, best of all, it works great.

Nexus One may have been a flop… but Google got it right with this one.

http://blogs.countersoft.com/index.php/2010/06/get-undocked/

Their blog post has a quote from yours truly. 

We’re pleased to announce the launch of our newest product: 12pm.

12pm allows you to manage your project management accounts from your mobile device.  Perfect for anybody with an iPhone, Blackberry, Android, Palm Pre, or Windows Mobile device who wants to access their Basecamp, Gemini, Jira, or Bugzilla account.

What’s so great about 12pm?  For me it’s the fact I can manage all of my various project managers in one place, using one user interface.  We have clients who use Basecamp, Jira, and CounterSoft Gemini.  Now I don’t have to log into three different sites to see my tickets – I just use 12pm.

Try our free 14-day trial and get set up in just minutes.  Let me know what you think!

http://its12pm.com

Springpad, by Boston-based Spring Partners, Inc., is here. And, it’s arrival is making thousands – if not millions – of jobs obsolete.

Springpad is a FREE Web service and iPhone application that does the work of a personal assistant – and more!

Jot down quick notes, snap a photo, scan a bar code, capture a GPS location, send an e-mail, or access Facebook and Twitter –  all with Springpad.

Springpad’s motto is simple, yet brilliant: “Never forget again.”  And you won’t.

Enter a restaurant name, for example, and Springpad will add the address, phone number, links to online reviews, and reservation services. Every entry is instantly surrounded by relevant information.

The goal? A personal database that grows on its own and is easily sorted and searched.

Springpad has a cool social feature as well. It lets users  search the databases of friends who also use the service.

As mind-blowing as this app sounds, there are others like it on the market.

• Evernote
• Cozi
• Microsoft’s OneNote
• OmniFocus

…just to name a few.

It’s scary to think that our personal lives – pictures, notes, e-mails – are constantly being dumped onto the Internet. And, it’s even scarier to think that I may need an app to help me organize that information – and connect with it.

Pen and paper – what?

Personal assistant – who?

There’s no need for any of that anymore. With software like Springpad, staying organized and connected to family, friends, and colleagues is all just a iPhone finger tap away.

Mouse clicks are apparently on their way out too.

Sick of the mindless nonsense on Facebook (and endless FarmVille notifications from friends), I decided the other week to revisit my LinkedIn account.  I’m glad I did.

LinkedIn really is an extraordinary site – and one that seems to have stood the test of time in the world of professional social networking. Sure LinkedIn is slow at times, but its connections, recommendations, jobs features are all great stuff.

Now as I dig deeper into LinkedIn’s world, I’m discovering my profile can be so much more than just a glorified resume.

Here are five things I didn’t know about LinkedIn… until now.

1. Video. Add video to your profile with LinkedIn’s video application. Reel Social Media has step-by-step instructions for those who are technically-challenged. This is a great feature for anyone who wants to showcase speeches, presentations. It can even be an unique way to add recommendations.

2. Tag your contacts. Give your contacts unique labels so you can remember who they are and where you met.

3. Reorder your profile to highlight your best attributes. Again, don’t think of your profile as a resume. Think of it as a mirror image of yourself.  LinkedIn just introduced this new reordering feature and there’s a handy video guide on the company blog.

4. Who’s viewed your profile? Stroke your ego and stay on top of who’s paying attention to YOU. LinkedIn let’s you see who’s viewed your profile, a feature the other guys don’t have – yet.

5. Get traffic. This may seem like a no-brainer, but people don’t take advantage of this feature as much as they should. Everyone should use LinkedIn to drive more traffic – especially targeted traffic – to their website. Do this by first linking yourself to people you know, then by answering the questions of people you don’t.  Also, join and participate in groups that cater to your niche.

Admittedly, I’ve only begun to scratch the surface at LinkedIn. I’ve spent way too much time away.

I’m back now and excited to see what the site can really do.

These new year predictions have almost become obligatory. Many of them are stale and cliche – but we expect them and we LOVE to read them.

Considering this was a bumpy year, especially for small business, I wanted to jump on the prediction bandwagon as well.

What will 2010 bring to small businesses?

More money? Green responsibility?

Since I don’t have a crystal ball, I’ve turned to the experts.

Small business expert and USA Today columnist Steve Strauss offers this look at the top ten small business trends we can expect in 2010.

And guess what?

This news is actually insightful!

The New Frugality

A variety of factors have coalesced to create an era of frugality – the bad economy, stubbornly high unemployment rates, and the burst of the housing bubble to name just a few.

The upshot is that people are spending less, saving more, and are looking for bargains. For the small business person, this has several ramifications: First, as you well know, it’s tougher to get people to spend, and spend more. That isn’t going away any time soon. Secondly, you have to give people what they want, and what they want are bargains.

The New Employee

This trend is another directly related to the changing and challenging economy. More and more, employees are shifting, or are being shifted, to part-time or independent contract status. It might be a forced furlough or a forced downsizing, but whatever the case, full-time employment with full-time benefits is becoming harder and harder to find, and to offer.

It is not hard to understand why employers are doing this – it saves money – but it also creates a far less satisfied workforce. I know, “they should be happy they have a job!” — but really, can’t we begin to raise the bar again here soon?

Less Money, More Responsibility

The fact of the matter is that more and more small business will have to learn to get by on less, even while their financial burden grows. There are a variety of factors at play here again, and all are equally culpable: Fewer customers with less to spend, banks who won’t make loans, tighter credit generally, the end of the home equity ATM, etc.

Yet, while the trend is less money to go around (although it will certainly be better than 2009), the financial demands on small business continue to grow. Thankfully, Congress tried to do something about out-of-control health care costs for instance, but if it helps (debatable, hopefully) it won’t be for several years.

Welcome the Era of Hyper-Connectivity

Whereas your online life and brand used to consist of independent activities that were essentially stand-alone silos, the accelerating trend is towards using a variety of tools to create an e-interconnectedness. As explained by Adam Ostrow Editor-in-Chief of Mashable, it is easy, and smart and important, to now connect your blog to you Facebook account, which can also connect to your Twitter account, as well as MySpace, YouTube and more. Every time you update your blog for instance, your content automatically filters across your interconnected online world.

The opportunity and challenge is that you can increase your online presence multi-fold. Do it right and prosper, do it wrong and don’t.

Green Opportunities

The failure to reach any sort of comprehensive, legally binding, climate agreement in Copenhagen is further proof that Trend No. 6 is real and growing: There will continue to be opportunities galore in the eco-sphere for the entrepreneur. Governments may not be able to create green energy or zero emission cars, but the sharp business person can. There is and will continue be a growing and lucrative market for products that heal the environment.

Social Media Grows Up

Have you noticed that “social media” is a term that doesn’t really describe the experience that well anymore? Yes its social, and yes its media, but for business it has become so much more than that. Tapping, nay, mastering, social media is one of the hottest of all online trends:

• Everyone from Jet Blue to Comcast has turned to Twitter as a customer service tool.
• Companies like Whole Foods and Popeys increasingly use it to get feedback, post company news, etc.
• Big business has discovered what many small businesses already know: Facebook is a great place to advertise. “Facebook” in fact was the most searched term in 2009. (Source: Experian Hitwise)

Going Local

Consumers are increasingly looking for a local angle when looking where to spend their hard-earned dollar. Example: The explosion of farmers markets across the country. According to Entrepreneur, “there are almost 5,000 farmers markets across the country, the result of more than 5% annual growth for the past five years.”

Additionally, with people staying closer to home right now because of the economy, with folks focused ever more on community and family, and with the green ethos growing, home is where the heart (and dollar) is.

Sharing vs. Shared Experiences:

According to a recent NPR podcast, we used to share national experiences. The nightly news was a shared ritual for instance. The OJ Simpson trial was a shared experience, the same with Vietnam, and so on.

But that is changing, for two reasons. The first is the fragmentation of the media. With innumerable news outlets, websites, cable channels, mobile options and the like, the opportunity to create shared experiences is diminishing. We are all not watching or experiencing the same thing nearly as much.

Secondly, with the advent of easy to generate user-created content, sharing experiences and opinions is becoming ever more prevalent. YouTube, blogs, Facebook,Yelp, email even, all contribute to both the media fragmentation as well as the sharing culture.

For the small business person, it is vital to realize that 1) people look for, and increasingly expect, the personal, and 2) small, localized, immediate user-created media are where the eyeballs are headed.

Mobile Mania

Maybe the only marketing trend that is hotter than social media is mobile mania. Why? Maybe because there are four-times more cellphones than PCs worldwide, or because they are the favorite product of Gen Y, or because in 2000, there were almost no texts sent but this year, 130 billion texts will be sent amonth, and only 23% of those will come from my daughters.

So yes, mobile marketing is exploding. Whether it is creating the Next Big App, offering customers a real-time mobile coupon, or creating a text marketing campaign, in 2010 there will be mobile options galore for small business.

Even better maybe: The variety of ways to measure the success of your mobile campaign. According to the Mobile Marketing Association, they will include: “The number of eyeballs, shakes and finger swipes. The number of blogs, articles, tweets and diggs. The number of acquisitions, conversions, calls, responses or purchases. Total basket size, consumer recall, loyalty and recommendations. Check-ins on foursquare and check-outs on Amazon.”

It is a new world indeed.

The Start-Up Economy

Last year, 2009, my top trend was entitled “Economic Tumult,” and tumultuous it indeed turned out to be; the Great Recession is great in all the wrong ways.

But this year, while the state of the economy will continue to be the most significant trend effecting small business, the outlook is both brighter and calmer. It is calmer because things are slowly getting back to, if not normal, at least something recognizable. And it is brighter because out of the rubble, a new, vital, innovative start-up economy is being born.

We have entered the era of small business. Whereas GM president Charles Wilson once said “What’s good for the country is good for GM, and vice versa,” it can now safely be said that what is good for small business is good for the country. Consider these statistics.

Small businesses now

• Number almost 30 million
• Employ more than half of all workers
• Constitute 99.7% of all employers
• Constitute 97% of all exporters
• Create the majority of business innovations
(Source: U.S. Small Business Administration Office of Advocacy, 2009)

With 10% unemployment for as far as the eye can see, with the unemployed running out of benefits, and with benefits not what they once were for the employed, start-ups of all shapes and sizes are taking root: One person shops, home-based businesses, part-time ventures, online enterprises, high tech companies – you name it. These are the folks who, with their creative energy, drive, ingenuity, and hard work will be leading us out of this anything but great recession.

Here’s 2010!

When you move your mouse, the rest of the page fades into view.

I kind of like it.  It’s an interesting way to emphasize the important parts of your site.  When a visitor first sees your home page, only show the important things.  When the mouse moves anywhere on the page, the rest of the design/fluff fades in.  You can probably only get away with this if you’re Google, but it’s kind of cool.