Category: Tips

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TeamUp Reviewed – Part Two

Our TeamUp Calendar
Our TeamUp Calendar

My uncompensated review is continued from Monday.

I have trained my team that when they complete one of the tasks that at the end they add -DONE. I have to say this has made my life much easier and has streamlined management for my social media manager.  When you are working with many remote employees who each work when they have time, you need to know when something is DONE.

Sorting
I really like the option to show TeamUp calendar by day, three days, week or month. I typically use the day and three day.

Emailing Updates
I have set my team members up to receive calendared events that have changed. I also get an email at the beginning of the day with each event that has been updated. I encourage my team to drag items they don’t finish for a day to the day they will do it on. Allowing me to identify if I have a problem with deadline slippage or team members who may need additional intervention.

Repeat Events
This is a brand new feature that suddenly got turned on in my account last week and I have to say I am now using it all the time. I can now take and event and repeat it on my schedule – certain days, certain days of the week or even monthly. This has helped me move from user to advocate.

I have to say that TeamUp is a problem solver for my team management issues and allows my manager to know what deadlines are met and not without time consuming double checks. For me, while on travel, I can know what is happening with my team with minimal intervention.

I highly recommend this free app to you to try out too. Find it online at https://teamup.com/.

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TeamUp – Reviewed Part One

Our TeamUp Calendar
Our TeamUp Calendar

TeamUp is an online group calendaring tool that I found and am now using heavily for my 6 person content creation team.  My team works remotely. We share files via Google Drive and had tried using a joint Google Calendar, but that just never seemed to have caught on with my team.

So, before I went on vacation I started looking for an easy to use, user-friendly online calendaring app to keep my team on track.

First, I do want to say that I am not being paid by team up or receive any consideration from them, I am simply a user turned advocate.

In fact I am using the free version right now although they do have a premium version and I am carefully scoping it out.

Here’s what I like and why you may want to consider using TeamUp too.

Easy to set up
I was calendaring tasks for my team in less than 10 minutes and the application was intuitive. I did not even have to read the documentation, although they do have nice videos and startup guides.

Color Coded
Each team member has their own color. I can see at a glance who has tasks to do and each team member can click their own color and see only their tasks in the group calendar.

SmartPhone App
My team has Apple phones and I have an Android one. Whatever I selected to try had to have an app available for iPhone and Android. TeamUp’s app in Android looks prettier. The Apple version looks more like a daily agenda list.

Come back Wednesday January 25th to read the rest of my review.

 

 

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What Are You Worth? “Just Nancy”

Nancy McCord
“Just Nancy” – My Point of View for Today.

Have you ever wondered what you were worth when it comes to the value you offer clients? If you are new in the business, you may not have a clear idea of your worth, but if you are a seasoned professional you probably have an idea of what you bring to the table in regards to customers.

Here’s how I’ve found out my own worth:

I’ve chatted with clients when they have not purchased a service. In several cases, I found that my prices were too low and actually scared a customer into feeling that others were more valuable as they charged more.

In one particular case, I actually got the client back when the higher priced resource shot themselves in the foot by not providing attentive customer service. I learned from that situation that sometimes having a low price is not a good thing.

I’ve provided white label services and have seen the markup that is put on my own price and resold without additional value. In this case I found out that I was priced lower than the market and clients were willing to pay more for quality hands on, attentive service.

I watch how busy I am. If I am having trouble staying on schedule as I have too many customers, I know that I may need to review my pricing and consider adjustments or packaging of services together. If on the other hand, you are not busy and just getting established, you may need to drop your price to pick up business.

I think the key is to gauge what is happening in your industry and in your own business.  If you have not done a market survey and even blind shopped your own marketplace, now’s the time.  It is important to make sure you are not priced too low, but especially not priced too high.

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Time Management Tips

Time is Money! When It Comes to Being Productive in Your Job.
Time is Money! When It Comes to Being Productive in Your Job.

I am experiencing one of my strongest business growth trends this year and as a result I have become a master of time management in order to be productive.

Here are my top tips to get more out of your day:

1. Turn off email notifications. These are those messages that float across the bottom of your screen if you are using Outlook telling you that you have email. While you are working resist the urge to check your email. Stay on task and check when your task is done.

2. Control your phone calls. I use Google Voice and I update my voice mail message regularly. I do not answer my phone when I am really in production. I simply let my calls go to voice mail. It is better to finish up a task faster than to be constantly interrupted.

3. Control your email. When I am really tied up, I will post an auto responder on my email alerting clients when I will touch base back with them. Then mid morning and mid afternoon I will send a quick email response letting a client know I got their message and that I will respond either by the end of the day or the next morning. Then I make sure I do just that.

4. Use a call scheduling app for clients that need to chat with you. Instead of my trying to corral a client and exchange multiple emails to find a time to chat about a project, I put the client in control and use Calendly for my phone call scheduling. I have set the parameters of when I will take calls and the client chooses a time that is good for them. The call appears automatically in my schedule. The client can even self-manage and cancel or reschedule a call. I just make sure that I have time available and code in my Google Calendar when I am free and not available.

5. Control your task list, each night I plan my next day. I move things on my calendar and decide what I will do when. I group similar tasks together like perform all my AdWords work in the morning and all my webmaster work in the afternoon. I even schedule time for lunch, my workout, and planning time. I have found that if I schedule these things I assure that I do have some downtime and flexibility in my schedule if I have to drop in a project or take a call.

6. Move all your email, calendar, and file exchange to the cloud. By moving to the cloud, I have been able to increase my productivity as my smartphone has become my mobile desktop. I can move files to my staff, check on staff projects, and keep abreast of projects even while I am walking on the treadmill.

By being productive and very schedule oriented, I am generating more time for existing clients and more time for taking on new clients.