Hahaha! Nice play on words eh? (Insert cheesy grin here)

Yes, I’m here to tell you about Xmarks, a company recently acquired by my beloved LastPass. Xmarks is an easy to use bookmark and sync tool now offered completely free from LastPass. You can install Xmarks on each of your computers and it will integrate your web browser and keep your bookmarks safely backed up and in sync. They also offer backup and sync your passwords too. Xmarks supports Firefox, Chrome, Internet Explorer, and Safari.

Of course there’s more to Xmarks than just what meets the eye, here are some more perks:

• Site Rankings and Reviews

Xmarks will highlight the top sites in your search results based on how other users have bookmarked and rated them. Sites that are ranked in an Xmarks Topic will show a ‘Rank in Topic’ flag next to the result. Sites that have user-submitted reviews will show an average rating. Simply click the stars to see all the ratings and read the reviews.

• Click through to Xmarks.com and discover more!

Clicking on the ‘Rank in Topic’ flag will take you to Xmarks.com to view the Top 10 sites about that topic. Discover similar sites, read user reviews, and even write your own.

• Site Info built into your browser

Click on the Xmarks info icon in your location bar to see detailed information about the site you are on, and discover other great sites just like it.

• Click through to Xmarks.com and discover more!

Clicking on GET SITE INFO shows you lots more on Xmarks.com. Discover similar sites, read user reviews, and even write your own.

• See suggested tags when you bookmark

The next time you add a bookmark, Xmarks will automatically suggest a list of bookmark tags. These suggestions are based on the tags other Xmarks users chose for the same site.

• Quickly find tagged bookmarks

Type a tag name into the Firefox 3 location bar (also known as the Awesome Bar) to quickly find sites with that tag.

[This feature is only available in Firefox 3+. You can easily turn this feature on or off from the Xmarks settings dialog.]

Definitely an add-on worth checking out!

Readers meet my new best friend, BackupCreator.

I’m not sure if you can consider it a miracle or just a great coincidence, but either way I’m the luckiest girl in the whole world for purchasing and installing this when I did. Let me take you back to the weekend of October 15^th…

I’m sitting in my office working on a website for a nonprofit organization I had just recently signed on to create a website for. The organization is so wonderful and important to its creator and the people’s lives it will touch and benefit so I’m really excited to be a part of it and doing one of my favorite things – website design! Anyways, I’m sitting there playing with codes and themes, conjuring up ideas when I remember reading a post about a WordPress Plugin that backs up your work just in case the unthinkable happens and you’re stuck at square one again. So now I’ve navigated my way to BackupCreator.com and purchased the plugin and go back to creating the website. The following Monday I hear from the creator of the organization and she informs me that although she’s purchased the .com, .org, and .net URL’s she wants .org to be the primary URL. Um…I’ve already created the entire site—info, pictures, and all—at the .com URL. But instead of panicking I’m able to use BackupCreator to back up the .com version to my computer, call the hosting company and ask them to make the URL change, then I restored the back up to the .org URL and VOILA! Now, is that considered a miracle or a coincidence? I’m going to go with pure genius!

Since BackupCreator saved my life once with my clients work, I decided to go ahead and purchase it for two of my own sites. Having two purchases must have thrown up a flag for the team at BackupCreator because I received an email shortly after informing me that I only need one license to cover every site that I personally own and I was promptly refunded the second purchase.

Whether you’re creating websites for your business, clients, or just a personal website or blog for family and friends, it’s such a good idea to back it up after making any changes and BackupCreator.com is a great way to do it.

Sitting down in front of my computer this morning I go to log into my online email account, my Facebook, and I need to check my online banking real quick. Between my personal accounts and my client’s accounts I’ve got a treasure trove of user names and passwords for at least two dozen different websites, social-networks, online banking, and so many, many more. In the past I’ve built spreadsheets to keep track of all the different passwords I use every day. I’ve also tried using the contacts section in Outlook to keep track but I need something more, something better, and something that will not only remember all these user names and passwords but do it securely while allowing my day to continue to move smoothly. So my hunt begins and I quickly come across LastPass and just as quickly fall head-over-heels for it, and this is why:

• It’s easy: Never forget a password again and lot into your sites with one mouse click.

• It’s everywhere: Automatically synchronize your data: access it from anywhere at any time.

• It’s safe: Protect yourself against phishing, scams, online fraud, and malware.

• It’s secure: All your data is encrypted locally on your PC-only YOU can unlock it.

• It’s Multi-platform: Using Mac, Windows, or Linux? LastPass works everywhere.

• It’s FREE: No catches or gimmicks. It’s free to use on all your computers.

LastPass says it best…

Enjoy!

I want to tell you about Doodle. Not doodling, but Doodle.com. It’s an online scheduling service used for both personal and professional reasons. This little tool allows you to schedule a lunch with clients or friends, proposing several dates and times and lets the recipients indicate their availability.

It took me about 3 minutes to set up MyDoodle; a free account for regular users. After setting this account up I was able to install a plug-in to link to my Outlook account. In attempt to be organized many people live by our Calendar and this nifty little tool allows us to quickly set up meetings from a quicklaunch button right on your Outlook toolbar. Another helpful function I quickly signed up for is the MeetMe page. This gives you your own www.doodle.com/yournamehere address so that your friends, clients, family members, etc can reach out to you and suggest a meeting or lunch date.

Doodle also offers Premium Doodle (which is the only charged serviced), Doodle mobile to keep you connected while on the go, along with Doodle from anywhere.

I love all the free help the internet is offering to us, whether it is for personal or professional. If you need a calendaring system I would encourage you to give Doodle a try and take advantage of what’s out there.

Too often we go to print something from the web and get the most ridiculous looking set of pages you’ve ever seen. Everything is choppy, sentences broken up and even cut in half, and nothing looks like it’s supposed to.

Recently I found something to make this phenomenon simply just disappear. Readers meet Joliprint! Joliprint is a web app as well as a mobile app; it allows you to save as a pdf for reading later. Joliprint reformats the page and its contents to make it 100% easier to read, and to be totally honest, it looks much prettier also.

Here’s an example of a print out of YourVirtualAdvantage.com services page before using Joliprint.

Ok…so that looks…umm…good.

Let’s see how it would look after using to Joliprint.

Voila!

I’m not kidding; this is the exact same page. The first one is a print preview of the services page and the second is the pdf formatted version. It’s so easy to download and even easier to use. Once downloaded all you need to do is drag the Joliprint icon up to your book marks toolbar and any time you need a better formatted print out of a webpage just hit Joliprint and let it do all the work for you.

Did you think that was all? Oh no, no, there’s more! I’ve shown you how the download works but let’s look at what else you can do.

You can save in your Google Docs or my favorite share on your Facebook or Twitter accounts. And last but not least emailing or copying and sharing the link to friends, family, clients, teammates, etc.

Check out the options below and enjoy!

There are many ways to share information whether its photos or documents, personal or professional, sensitive or not. We’ve use email, ‘whale mail’, ‘sendthisfile’, and share on a social website. With all these options there are drawbacks. Email doesn’t allow us to send enormous files, and let’s be honest, file are getting bigger all the time. A viable solution…

HELLO DROPBOX!

Let me start by just highlighting a few of the features Dropbox offers that make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

• 2GB of Dropbox for FREE. Yes, a subscriber can get up to 100GB. (We’ll get back to this)
• Your files are always available from the secure Dropbox website. Dropbox keeps a one-month history of your work.
• Dropbox works with Windows, Mac, Linux, iPad, iPhone, Android, and BlackBerry. Bring your files when you’re on the go. Edit your files in your Dropbox from your phone! Easy to upload to Dropbox and just as easy to share with whomever you choose.
• Works even when offline. You’ll always have your files, whether or not you have a connection.
• Dropbox transfers just parts of the file that change. When someone makes a change to an item in a shared folder, you can see the changes immediately.
• Manually set bandwidth limits-Dropbox won’t hog your connection.
• Invite friends, family, teammates, clients (ANYONE) to a folder. It’s as if you saved a folder to their computers.
• Send a link to any file in your Dropbox using your Public folder. The Public Folder lets you easily share single files in your Dropbox. Any file you put in this folder gets its own Internet link so that you can share it with others—even non-Dropbox users! These links work even if your computer is turned off.

Now back to this 2GB of Dropbox free stuff. It’s true!  Some might think this is a lot, some maybe not so much. But the way Dropbox works is once you put a file into a shared folder the recipient can move that file out of the folder and put it wherever they choose to on their computer freeing up that space again. Maintaining the space is key to keeping those 2GB free. Not everything needs to be moved out because 2GB is still a lot of room and when working with clients and/or co-workers some files will always need to be shared. As your business grows or if you’re thinking you might need more space the option is out there. With all the amazing features and security Dropbox offers it’s definitely a service to check out and I’m pretty sure once downloaded and learned this is something you’ll learn to appreciate. Check it out for yourself.

by Donna Gunter, The Internet Marketing Automation Coach (TM)

The notion of doing a business retreat for myself is very new, although not novel, as we used to conduct a retreat each year as a part of both the Student Affairs staff and the Residence Life staff at the college where I once worked. When I heard about this same concept for self-employed business owners from Business Coach Chris Barrow, I thought, “Why am I not doing that for myself?” Thus, my Annual Business Retreat was born.

Here’s how you can create this annual retreat experience for yourself:

1. Book 3 days for your retreat on your calendar. Ideally, you’ll want to be in a location where you’re not readily accessible at a time of the year when you can devote serious time to business planning and development. If you can’t find 3 days together, at a minimum book 3 half-day slots that you can devote to this activity.

2. Isolate yourself from the distractions of life. My initial retreat experience involved staying with a friend in her guest home about 10 miles out of town. She lives in the mountains, so my cell phone didn’t work, and the house wasn’t wired for phone service, so that meant no phone calls and no Internet surfing. My friend and her husband worked all week and drove their cars to work, so I had no way to escape, as my friend’s house is very rural and there’s nothing to escape to within walking distance. Forcing myself into isolation left me with little choice than to work on my retreat materials.

3. Do your work in a serene environment. I have fond memories of last year’s retreat experience — sitting out on the back deck with a moderate temperature and low humidity, and the breeze was gently blowing the trees of the woodsy area I faced. There were no people passing by, no cars on the road — just me and nature and my computer. It was perfect. I took breaks as I needed them during the day.

4. Be willing to go in an unexpected direction. At the beginning of the process, ask yourself some hard questions during your retreat. My favorite is, “What kind of business do you truly want?” Answer this question as though money is no object, using your best assets and skills with none of your perceived weaknesses or liabilities, incorporating the best of what you also want in your personal life. The answer you receive may surprise you, and will serve as a great jumping off point to begin writing your business vision.

5. Write your three-year vision. This statement shouldn’t be a vision in which you expect to accomplish everything in the next 36 months. Instead, think of it as a rolling vision, or something you’ll continue to work on and revise at a minimum each year at your retreat. Expect it to evolve and change, as most visions do, but at least you’ll have some idea of what direction you’re headed.

6. Be willing to acknowledge all that was good, bad, and ugly about your business and your life in the past year. Hiding from the truth, even if you’re only hiding it from yourself, won’t do you or your business any good. It was my experience in writing about what I didn’t like during the past year and what didn’t work so well for me that led me to the place of creating my ideal day/week/year and gave me the information about how to structure that new vision for myself.

7. Create your 90-Day Goals List. After you’ve mapped out a 3-year vision for yourself, you now need to translate the upcoming year’s vision into a set of measurable goals. The easiest and most manageable way of doing this is to create a 90 Day Goals List. On this list, you take 7 categories: Business, Financial, Family, Social, Physical, Intellectual, and Spiritual, and create 3 goals for each category. Do this every quarter, and put the task on your calendar on the first day of every quarter (Jan. 1, April 1, July 1, and October 1) so that it becomes a habit.

8. Plan your finances for the upcoming year. On your retreat take your financial records — your Excel spreadsheets or Quickbooks or Quicken files — so that you know your financial standing. Note your expected personal and business expenditures for the upcoming year, along with things you’d like to do and items you’d like to purchase, and then plan your income, or how you’re planning on paying for your expenses.

9. Map out your entire year on your calendar. Based on your vision and financial goals, you’ll craft your upcoming year’s calendar in terms of vacation time, travel, other kinds of rest days, profit-generating days with clients, and business development days. I did this for the first time for 2004, and it’s made all the difference in keeping me focused!

10. Be patient. As I began this process last year, my thoughts and my direction and my work on this vision were just not “wowing” me–I was having a hard time dredging up any enthusiasm about where I had been in my business and where I was going. I continued to plod along regardless, doing my writing and completing my tasks, hoping that at some point I’d have a breakthrough that I could get really excited about. Everything finally jelled with me late in the third day, when I resurrected an idea I’d had several years ago but wasn’t quite sure what to do with it, yet it seemed to match perfectly and pull together all of these disjointed ideas I had. Had I not remained patient and vowed to continue to move forward with the process, I wouldn’t have found the direction and motivation that I needed.

An annual business retreat is the most powerful thing I’ve ever done for my business and it gave me clarity of intention for my life and business like nothing else I’ve ever done. Knowing where I’m going and how I’m going to get there and developing the financial picture of that plan was extraordinarily empowering. Don’t delay in creating this this process for your business!

Internet Marketing Automation Coach Donna Gunter helps independent service professionals create prosperous online businesses that make more profit in less time by teaching them how to automate their businesses, leverage their expertise, and get found online.  Would you like to learn the specific Internet marketing strategies that get results? Discover how to increase your visibility and get found online by claiming your FREE gift, TurboCharge Your Online Marketing Toolkit, at ==> http://www.TurbochargeYourOnlineMarketing.com

If you’re looking for a fantastic way to boost revenue selling your products or services, you should highly consider setting up an affiliate program. A lot of people have amazing success doing this. An affiliate program is designed to help others to sell your products for you. They earn a commission each time they make a sale.

What’s in it for you? You gain exposure to potential sales that you might never have on your own. Your affiliates advertise your products on their websites, blogs, and newsletters.

What’s in it for them? A commission check of course. There are thousands of people out there that make more than a decent living selling other peoples products. This works well for the affiliate because they don’t have to spend time developing their own product or service to make money. They can dedicate their time to selling yours.

If you’re not sure how to do this, there are many resources available online that will help you set up your affiliate program. You can do it in just one day. I use 1shoppingcart.com for my affiliate program. They pretty much do everything for you except develop your product. They’ll help you with banner and URL codes as well as track your affiliates and make it easy to pay them.

After setting up your program, you’ll need to spend a little bit of time promoting it to affiliates. You will need a page dedicated to your affiliates. Some sample text ads as well as text they can use in an email message. Provide them with banners. You may want to offer several articles that they can incorporate their affiliate code into. Affiliate also benefit from regular messages from you reminding them to promote your service (these could be in the form of an autoresponder); they will also want to know about any sales or promotions you have upcoming.

The more successful they are, the more successful you are!

I thought I would share with you a few products and tools that I absolutely love.  They make my life so much easier. In fact, I honestly don’t know what I would do without them now that I found them!  They save me much needed time and energy. Check them out! I’m sure you’ll find they just might make your life easier too!

Blue Host – I’ve used several hosting services in the last few years and find that BlueHost is the most affordable and reliable. The value Blue Host offers for the price is flat out stunning. You can host an unlimited number of domains and you get unlimited bandwidth. That’s important in today’s online business environment as video and audio become more important.

Word Press – If you are searching for a blogging platform that really delivers, there is no comparison. WordPress installs quickly and painlessly, works well right out of the box and is massively extensible with themes and plugins for a truly unique blog. I’ve never met anyone who regretted moving their blogging to the WordPress platform.

Studio Press– If you’re in the market for a spectacular WordPress theme you have to check out StudioPress. The themes at StudioPress are all search engine optimized and easily customizable from the WordPress dashboard without having to learn any PHP or HTML at all. Whether you’re just getting started as a blogger or you’ve been at it for a while, StudioPress will give you the professional advantage, making your blog the best it can be.

Thesis - Another very poplar theme. I’ve worked with both and find them easy to customize and the support is second to none.

My Dropbox – Put your files into your Dropbox on one computer and they’ll be instantly available on any other computer where you’ve installed the Dropbox. You can even create links to share your files with others, and your files are securely backed up if anything goes wrong with your computer. It’s free for up to 2 gigs. I was thrilled when I discovered this.

Roboform – Do you struggle with managing all of your logins and associated passwords?  Roboform is a tool that manages your logins and passwords while maintaining strict security protocols through encryption. You can also use it to create profiles for filling out any kind of online form that you use frequently such as comment forms, article and directory submission forms as well as social bookmarking sites. There’s also a synch tool that allows you to securely store your passwords on the Roboform server so you’ll never lose another password or login again. It is an indispensable tool that keeps me organized and running efficiently.  Check it out!

1ShoppingCart – This is the premiere site for all your eCommerce needs.  1ShoppingCart solves the challenges faced by many online business owners including:  order processing, autoresponders, email marketing, affiliate program creation and maintenance and more. It really handles every ecommerce application you’ll ever need in one reliable, secure and easy solution.

Learn About Online Business- Learnaboutonlinebusiness.com offers a variety of services and products to help online businesses make the most of their web presence.  I attended the Blog Design Bootcamp and  learned tricks and techniques that made my site more effective even though I had been using WordPress for a while.

Tungle – Accelerate your calendar! Tungle handles everything from time zones to double bookings. Great for online scheduling. You can even integrate Tungle with LinkedIn, Xing, Facebook, Ning and your blog allowing people to see when you are free and schedule meetings with you.

Smooth sailing…

I’m in the process of completely rethinking my business model, and that will be my primary focus as I plan this year’s business retreat for myself.  Your business model doesn’t have to be at all complex, but should provide the guiding force for all that you do, like guiding you to the opportunities to accept (and those to decline), the joint ventures and strategic alliances to pursue, and the new ideas you should retain and develop, as well as those to let go of.

Here’s are the 4 steps I’m following as I create the blueprint for my business model:

1.  Make clients pay well for your most valuable commodity — your time.  I see many service business owners tying themselves up with (and tying themselves down to) far too many 1:1 clients.  You have only so many hours in the day, and at some point you’ll hit the wall and not be able to expand the number of 1:1 clients you see.  Sure, you can hire and train additional staff to handle the overflow, but in many cases, you make less money in this model while tripling your headaches.  Make your 1:1 time with clients your highest-fee service, charging a premium fee to dispense your expertise.

2.  Ongoing recurring revenue is key.  Feast or famine seems to shape the life of the service business owner, regardless of industry.  Wouldn’t your life be much more sane if you knew that you could count on recurring revenue each and every month, rather than having to  constantly go out and find new clients?  This was one of the models I adopted early on in my virtual assistant practice, i.e. working exclusively with clients on retainer rather than a “pay as you go” model.  What is it that your clients need from you that you could provide on an ongoing basis with them that isn’t time-intensive for you?

3.  Always have an upgrade.  Never offer a stand-alone product or program that doesn’t have a natural tie-in to the next level of program or service that you offer. If there’s no way to leverage what you’re offering into some type of upgrade, don’t offer it! For example, a free teleclass can lead participants to enroll in a paid short-term group program.  From that program, plan to enroll a certain percentage of those participants into a recurring revenue continuity program. You can then upgrade a percentage of these participants into a live event or small ongoing mentoring program, and from there make an upgrade offer to your premium 1:1 time.

4.  Design the blueprint.  Brainstorm all of the types of programs, products, and services you might offer in your business.  Your list might look like the one below:
 

• Consulting

• 1:1 Service Provision

• Group Coaching/Mentoring/Continuity Programs

• Sale of Info Products

• Private Retreats

• Strategy Sessions

• Live Events

• Speaking

• Information Products or Books

• Licensing/Certification Training

• Teleseminars/Webinars

• Subscription Membership Website

Pick 3-5 of these items that will make up your business model, and then determine what percentage of income you want to derive from each.  Your total needs to equal 100%. Then, determine the order in which you offer the components of your program over the next 1-2 years.  This becomes your blueprint for action.

How do you determine your success? If your business still suffers from feast and famine, take a long, hard look at your business model for the solution. Every offer you make in your business should flow seamlessly into the next, which will result in a steady, predictable income that you can increase over time as you become more expert at designing and following your blueprint.

Online Business Coach Donna Gunter helps baby boomers create profitable online retirement businesses by demystifying the steps needed to successfully market a baby boomer business online. Would you like to learn the specific Internet marketing strategies that get results? Discover how to increase your visibility and get found online by claiming your FREE gift, TurboCharge Your Online Marketing Toolkit, at == > http://www.TurbochargeYourOnlineMarketing.com