Garbage in / Garbage out is also very true.  When you enter data into your CRM database, take the extra time to do it completely and accurately, correcting errors as you go.  Using the Google Forms I’ve written about here, you can do an easy import of the information into these databases.  However, if the site visitor has entered errors (likely), then correct them before or after the import.  I like to do it in the Google Spreadsheet before the export to .csv.

• Onsite service
• Sales not requiring a physical showroom
• Real estate
• Mortgage brokerage
• Insurance

There are many more, and it’s getting easier to take an office mobile, with netbook computers and cellular broadband connections.  Using an online intranet and a netbook over cell broadband, virtually every office management function can be accomplished in the mobile environment.

And, we’re talking about an up-front equipment investment for netbook and printer of less than $500, with ongoing costs under $60/month for cell broadband.  Can you rent office space for that, and keep the utilities on?  I’ll be doing an extensive series on Intranets and the mobile office, so subscribe to my feed or newsletter to keep up.  You’ll be glad you did if a mobile office is something you’d like to do.

With the right Intranet service, and I’ll show you which one, you can create custom databases for your business.  Then you can do everything from billing to inventory right from your netbook in the field.  Ain’t technology great?!

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The plugin is WP-Invoice, and it’s great.  I installed it and set it up in just 10 minutes on the road.  I mean literally on the road, sitting in the right seat of the car working on my cellular broadband connection.  Setup was a breeze, and I did a sample invoice to check it out.  It emailed the invoice link to me, and I pulled it up, with a button to pay via PayPal.  It even handles recurring payments.

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Basically, I was about to take a trip and found that the hotel where I’d be staying wanted to charge me extra for Internet access.  I had been thinking of checking out using cell service for my Web access for a while, but this forced the issue.  I purchased the broadband modem at a mall kiosk on the way to the airport.  It only took a few minutes to install the software and get online access.

The speed is sufficient for everything I need to do on the road.  And literally, I’m typing this post in the right seat of the Jeep while my wife drives down I25 between Albuquerque and Santa Fe on the way home to Taos, NM.  Be careful though, as the supposedly “unlimited access” isn’t.  The allowance is generous, and probably will not cut you short for all your normal web work.  But, uploading a lot of large files or watching videos incessantly may take you into the overage charges … and you don’t want that.

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When you sign up for an Intrante, or online office space, you get several features that are common to most all of them:

• Sharing of tasks
• Share calendars, appointments, meetings
• Document sharing for reading or for editing and updating
• Announcements section, like an online bulletin board
• Depending on Intranet vendor, other sharable features

Keep in mind, this is all online, so there is no software to install on your computer, and no network software to keep updated so all can have access.  You can set up varying levels of permission to users, letting them see or edit only what you want them to.  This gives you the ability to actually maintain files online that are specifically designated only for management, employee groups, or individuals.

In the next post about Intranets, I’ll introduce you to the one I highly recommend, as it also gives you the ability to create custom databases that can accomplish great things for your business.

If you’re into feed readers, then you probably rely on yours to bring you a great deal of the day’s news, whether business or personal.  If you do research on the Internet for any reason, as I do for writing, then your feed reader is likely a very busy place.  I use the Google Reader, but there are a great many great free readers out there.

Also, if you’re really using your news reader, or aggregator, you are always looking for new feed sources, or for new ways to serve them up.  One issue I have is a new interest in something, but all I have is some keywords or a key phrase.  Another is if I want to monitor a page that doesn’t have a feed.  Both of those are free and easy to handle if you know which tools to use.

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Google Alerts – For those cases where I have an interest in a topic, and I want to know when new information comes out on it, I use Google Alerts.  You can have them delivered to your email, but I prefer they come to my reader.  Just enter your keywords or phrases, and Google scours the web for the material.

Page2RSS – When I come across a site that doesn’t have an RSS feed, first I say some less-than-flattering things about it, then I go to Page2RSS.  It’s free, and I enter the URL of the page I want to monitor.  From then on, when that page is changed in some way, I get an alert in my reader.

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http://phototropic.co.uk/swiftlet

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/3102

[podcast]http://functionaltech.com/wp-content/podcasts/002-emailwebpage.mp3[/podcast]

Let’s use an example email address of    YourName@gmail.com.   Now, if you want to do something special with certain emails, you can add an extension to the first part of the address with a “+.”  Now it might look like this:  YourName+special@gmail.com.  The word “special” can be anything, even a person’s last name or other unique word you want to use.  Gmail will deliver the email because the first part before the “+” is a valid address.

Now, all you have to do is to create labels or filters to do whatever you want automatically with emails sent to this special address.  Here are some ideas about how you might use this feature:

• Use a transaction number or ID after the +, giving this address to participants in a transaction.  You can then automatically capture all transaction related email in one place.
• Use this feature to create a request email from your website or elsewhere that responds with a Gmail canned response.  You can deliver special reports this way.
• I use it for research, creating labels that match the words after the +.  Thus, any site I find that would be a good tech topic, I send with a “+tech.”  It gets filed away automatically to my tech research label.
• Use for ordering things, or for sites where you might want to be rid of them later, as you can do auto-delete when you no longer want email from them.

I’m sure that you can think of lots more to do with this feature, as it’s quite handy.

EmailThis is a Firefox addon that does a great job. It even has settings to email into Google and Yahoo Apps. It installs in the right-click menu, and it just takes a second to send myself or someone else a link to a web page.

Canned response allows you to do automated delivery of special reports that a user requests from your website.  The report is an attachment, preferably in PDF format, and you can set up the email for totally automated processing using extended email addressing and filtering.

Virtually any email content that you might want to deliver automatically to a requesting site visitor can be handled with filtering and canned responses.  You’ll find this Google Labs feature quite useful once you learn to use it.

[important]There’s more on this topic, plus an instructional video, in the Premium Content below the Related Artciles.[/important]

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