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The Easy Way to De-Bulk Your Bulk email

I subscribed a year ago, much like many of us that chase some type of deals, to LivingSocial and Groupon. Little did I know I found myself on EVERY one of their list for EVERY product or service they push EACH day. This accounts to anywhere between 12-17 emails a day…that I look at about a minute per email.

I found when I switched to the new Gmail (and new theme):

The template optimizes and skips your inbox so it protects from the barriage of bulk emails. Here is the label it creates [BULK], found on the left panel:

I see that it also auto-creates some other labels to help you with the more important email: notifications, forums, payments, orders, and so on. I am pretty sure these are custom to how you receive email. 

Some might not like this option but I think it is a great step forward for Google. I simply check these labels, skim them for important stuff, and move on with more important stuff to do!

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Life Hacking Tip: Instant Backup of Tagged Facebook Photos

One of my good friends is a photographer. Often times he is posting his AWESOME photos on Facebook, and well ocassionally, I appear in those photos.

I wanted a way to hold on to these photo without:

• downloading each of them individually from Facebook
• Ask my friend each time for the raw files each time I saw him

I used ifttt as my solution. ifttt is an online automation suite of tools to make “recipes” of things you want the site to do for you automagically. Perhaps you want to be texted each time it is going to rain within 24 hours or you want all of your hipster Instagram photos to be published to Facebook when you snap them. This site can do that.

• First you create “If”/”then statements: “If FB posts a tagged photo of me THEN it gets sent to Dropbox
• Allow ifttt to access your FB and dropbox accounts.
• configure what folder you want dropbox to put it in.

Simply, all these are basic API calls but it is cool to have an easy interface to do so. You can turn these triggers or recipes on and off at anytime- and best of all it is FREE.

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Using Simplicity as a Differentiator

In a world where many consumers value features, price points, and excellent customer service for the products and the services they buy- I often find there is a new direction companies should compete on. Simplicity.

Why is Simplicity undervalued? Well, Often times it is seen as a cost to the business or just plain lack of understanding of what it is like to be there own customer. What I would love to see:

• simple product descriptions and media on product/service websites; Who is it for, what is it do, and how much does it  cost. DONE. No more.

• simple sales transactions; I don’t need to fill out a lead form , fill out a 19 question email, “so  ours sales team can better assist me..” [CRAP]. I should be able to tell you why I think I need your service, and you should let me know if it is possible. No lies-straight truth.

• simple cancel methods; I shouldn’t have to call, I shouldn’t have to talk to 4 managers- just let me cancel. You can take back almost anything you buy with a receipt- why is it so hard to say, “I don’t need it anymore.”?

I think every company has a broken link in their chain of simplicity. What is yours?

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Stop Being a Crappy Customer

A bit of disclosure: This post is a product of my observation of people I follow on Twitter (@TaylorBarr). In no way does this post relate to my current employer, clients or customers I have had in the past or present. Cool? Thanks.

Ever have an experience where you are EXTREMELY angry with a service or product, and you feel so inclined to tweet about it? How about when you do, it looks like this?

Well….STOP.

In no way am I telling you stop giving feedback to companies about their services or products. In fact, this post is to outline HOW to contact businesses through social media without being an ass (Since we have all probably done it at one time or another):

• Don’t Curse. You, the customer, just look stupid. Politely ask what is the problem or explain your situation.

• Ask for a “follow back” to explain the situation privately. No one likes dirty laundry. Openly ask them if they can follow you so you can direct message what is going on.  They will love you for it.

• Remember to thank them for the fix in the problem.  Half of the time when we get what we want, we forget to followup and thank the individual (or the group of people) that made it happen. Remember what your mother said, “Always say thank you!”

• “If they don’t respond, what do I do? Tweet more negative stuff about them?”  NO. Be an adult and make a logical decision. Every company and their products doesn’t fit every customer out there (Most people forget this).Find what your looking for elsewhere that fits your open feedback policy. 

Thanks for reading. Did I miss one? Tell me your thoughts in the comment section below. 

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Listen to it. [Episode 2]

I changed the name of the series to “Listen to it” a little bit more forward and direct— and after all, you should listen to it!

Here are the music album picks. Listen to them and let me know your feedback!

Funky Big Band

CSC Funk Band- Things Are getting a little too Casual 

 This sounds like a grownup High school band mixed with some funk (like the Youngbloodz brass band). Gritty, street music with some simple but effective arrangements.

CSC Funk Band - Caneca by ROCKBEACH

Vocal Driven Blue Grass

The Wood Brothers- Smoke Ring Halo

Just started listening to this one. Was REALLY impressed by their first album and always have a solid sound; mix of bluegrass with a bluesy feel. Really great for the Summer time.

The Wood Brothers - Shoofly Pie by thewoodbrothers

Black Keys-ish/ HARD and heavy blues.

Radio Moscow- Brain Cycles

This band impresses me. They are pretty young on the musical front but sound like they are heading in the same direction as the Black Keys. Afterall, they are on the same label as the Blak Keys.

RADIO MOSCOW by alivenaturalsound

Funky Dance- Like MGMT

 Portugal. The Man - In the Mountain in the Cloud

This was released in July, but I can’t stop listening to it. Great sound-alot like MGMT’s “Kids” album.  Electro mixed with heavy swells of sound— I dig it.

Portugal. The Man - In The Mountain In The Cloud by ATL REC

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Fastest Way to Shutdown Your Mac Each Day.

Now, before I tell you this I have to preface that I am not a tech guru or geek that knows the ends and outs of Technology. This technique works for me and makes powering down a breeze… if you do it safely.

1. Open up your Terminal (Spotlight> Type, “Terminal”)
2.  Make sure to shutdown any and all programs that hog crazy amounts of CPU (stop streaming Pandora, Shutdown Photoshop, etc.  on it’s own- SAFELY, not force quit).
3. Once most of your programs are closed, execute this script:

 sudo shutdown -h now

     4. It will ask you for your system password. Execute. Then it will tell you, “System is shutting down {prompt} now!” 

It will then bypass the normal, “Are you sure? [giving you 2 minute timer before shutdown”] and cuts to the chase.  Before you gripe and say, “this is horrible for your computer” I only do this when I need to turn off my computer immediately, not every time I leave my desk for an extended period of time. It is safe if you don’t pull the chord on a lot of your programs.

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The Act of Streamlining

 

stream·line

 [streem-lahyn] -to alter in order to make more efficient or simple.

I am consistently looking for ways to streamline my life. I find that if you can set up a process that works efficiently, almost a self-sufficent system, then you, in turn, will be more productive. If not productive- it makes life a little more simple.

Here are some of the things I have streamlined:

• My computer turns on 15 minutes before I start work and opens my browser with tabs of the all the sites I uses in a given work day.

• I use rdio for music. It streams music to your computer or mobile device. I have streamlined it by autosyncing my collection every time I am in a wifi zone. It saves my music for the times I don’t have a internet connection-without taking up storage (oh, and I don’t have to do it manually).

• I started using Google+…alot. I used this chrome extension to have Facebook inside of my google+ account (and be able to still use the features). One less thing to attend to. 

What have you streamlined? Looking forward to your responses.

(Source: dictionary.reference.com)