In the starting days of a small business it is hard to do all the things that need to be done without all of the needed staff. Small business owners need to take advantage of the services offered at Google.
I started my professional career at age 22 being the Office Services Manager for one of the top law firms in the country. I had a secretary. All of the restaurants and night clubs I've managed, I have bar managers and assistants. However for my start up marketing business that backs all that I do now, it is just me. The daily struggle of a small business person. Who is going to make sure I keep appointments? Who is screening calls for me and letting me know about important missed calls? Tough questions for a business that is growing but not yet at a point to start paying out salaries. Well I have found the best assistant for the small business man....GOOGLE!
Google offers many services built for the digital age fast pace business person. Most are even FREE just for having a gmail account. I have to manage several calendars for myself and my clients. Google Calendar allows me to share appointments with clients and also remind me of my schedule. From my office computer to my smart phone I can be constantly in touch with my clients and myself schedules throughout the day. Looking for a solution to being reached with one phone number when I am in the office or on the go without having to remember to forward and unforward phones lead me to Google Voice. Google Voice gives you a free phone number that can ring multiple phones! So now with just one number you can call my office or cell! No more call forwarding every I leave out the office. Google Voice also can sms or email you missed calls or voicemails. So if you miss a call while you are in a meeting, you can see what calls you missed and what they were about. During that stage when your expensive web developer is taking his sweet time creating your site, and you trying to understand how to build your own temporary site, Google has a great application called blogger. Blogger as the name states is designed to be a blog site. It is easy to navigate and understand which allows any user to be able to create and maintain their own site. It is also great to use to blog about your company. Now if you are a marketing person like myself and are anal about making sure your site has its own .com, here is a little secret. You can buy your .com for many times less than $15 per year from places like Go Daddy .com, and have that domain forwarded to your blogger site. This gives the site the capability to have its own professional .com at the same time allow you to create and maintain your own site until your web developer delivers your official site. Even my web browser helps me as a small business person. Google Chrome, has a great layout and allows you to add the applications that you use the most throughout the day right into the browser. Then the sites you visit and the applications you use automatically link to my Android smart phone. And yes, Android is another great Google product!!!
The amazing part about using Google as my personal assistant is that I only mentioned the products that I use for business on a daily basis. Google has many more services for the small business person. So if you are frustrated trying to grow your business all alone, give Google a try!
I started my professional career at age 22 being the Office Services Manager for one of the top law firms in the country. I had a secretary. All of the restaurants and night clubs I've managed, I have bar managers and assistants. However for my start up marketing business that backs all that I do now, it is just me. The daily struggle of a small business person. Who is going to make sure I keep appointments? Who is screening calls for me and letting me know about important missed calls? Tough questions for a business that is growing but not yet at a point to start paying out salaries. Well I have found the best assistant for the small business man....GOOGLE!
Google offers many services built for the digital age fast pace business person. Most are even FREE just for having a gmail account. I have to manage several calendars for myself and my clients. Google Calendar allows me to share appointments with clients and also remind me of my schedule. From my office computer to my smart phone I can be constantly in touch with my clients and myself schedules throughout the day. Looking for a solution to being reached with one phone number when I am in the office or on the go without having to remember to forward and unforward phones lead me to Google Voice. Google Voice gives you a free phone number that can ring multiple phones! So now with just one number you can call my office or cell! No more call forwarding every I leave out the office. Google Voice also can sms or email you missed calls or voicemails. So if you miss a call while you are in a meeting, you can see what calls you missed and what they were about. During that stage when your expensive web developer is taking his sweet time creating your site, and you trying to understand how to build your own temporary site, Google has a great application called blogger. Blogger as the name states is designed to be a blog site. It is easy to navigate and understand which allows any user to be able to create and maintain their own site. It is also great to use to blog about your company. Now if you are a marketing person like myself and are anal about making sure your site has its own .com, here is a little secret. You can buy your .com for many times less than $15 per year from places like Go Daddy .com, and have that domain forwarded to your blogger site. This gives the site the capability to have its own professional .com at the same time allow you to create and maintain your own site until your web developer delivers your official site. Even my web browser helps me as a small business person. Google Chrome, has a great layout and allows you to add the applications that you use the most throughout the day right into the browser. Then the sites you visit and the applications you use automatically link to my Android smart phone. And yes, Android is another great Google product!!!
The amazing part about using Google as my personal assistant is that I only mentioned the products that I use for business on a daily basis. Google has many more services for the small business person. So if you are frustrated trying to grow your business all alone, give Google a try!