Last week, I unplugged four out of the five weeknights. After 4:30/5 pm, I was off the computer and remained off. One night I was forced to unplug, but that’s another story you can read about on 40weeks Plus. However, what I realized last week was how great unplugging can be. I still think I got lots done – work-wise anyway, not in the home – but, I don’t feel overly spent.

Something else I found myself doing was connecting with my husband in small ways. Nothing major – but, I would catch myself staring at him, admiring the hard work he does to be a good father and husband. I found myself actually missing him and yearning to be near him. It brought back memories of those intense, passionate, and highly emotional days when we were only sixteen and learning to love each other.

Wonderful, isn’t it?

My unplugging continued through the long holiday weekend. I don’t think I opened the laptop more than once over the three day weekend, rarely checked in on email on my phone, and only tweeted once or twice over the weekend. While it wasn’t 100% unplugged, anyone who knows about working from home, especially in social media, knows it really was unplugging compared to a normal day.

And, not surprisingly, my world is not turned upside down. Sure, I have a few more emails to answer than I did on Friday afternoon, but nothing urgent. Yes, I could have gotten ahead on blog writing for this week, but all will not be lost. Instead, I have a weekend full of family time to show for it and many laughs that were shared. If only the house had cleaned itself while we were having fun this weekend…

Very timely, as I was going through my google reader account yesterday, these two posts were there waiting for me to read:

• The Importance of Soul Work for Bloggers and Businesswomen
• Productivity & Quality Down Time: They Go Hand in Hand

How did you spend your holiday weekend? Did you celebrate Labor Day as I did by taking a day off?

Most of us have tons of e-mail we answer on a daily basis. Even with the best social media routine, e-mail is just one of those things that keeps piling up. If you’re a blogger, you also likely receive pitches for story ideas and product reviews – probably turning down many of them.

Do you find yourself using the same response over and over again? Instead of typing out your response each time, why not use an e-mail template?

What is an E-mail Template?

An e-mail template is simply a response you save so that you can use again in the future. It will save you time from typing out a reply e-mail and will instead allow you to simply copy and paste your response.

How Do You Create an E-mail Template?

The simplest way to create an e-mail template is to save a document on your desktop with your response(s). I currently have a Notepad text document on my desktop with a few variations of my response to PR pitches. This is the standard “no, thank you” response for those pitches I’m not interested in.

However, I just found that if you use Gmail, you can actually save responses within Gmail as “canned responses” and simply insert your response into a new e-mail or reply. Doing that, you won’t even have to copy and paste the text, just click a button and you’re done! Plus, if you use filters, you can automatically reply to certain e-mails using your canned response, without ever seeing the e-mail. Here’s a quick how-to for setting up canned responses on Gmail.

How Does this Help You?

Just think about the amount of time you’ll save each day if there were less e-mails to answer. Or, how much faster you could empty your inbox if all you had to do was copy and paste a response or click a button for each e-mail!

Of course, you can’t possibly answer every e-mail in this manner. Some will still require you to type up a customized response. But I’m sure you can find a set of e-mails you receive that you can use an e-mail template to answer them faster.

Do you currently use an e-mail template? Have you ever thought about doing so?

Photo by Suzanne Edge

Facebook. Twitter. MySpace. Plurk. Identi.ca? With so many social media tools and networks out there, it’s hard not to get overwhelmed. How do you choose which to use? How do you keep up with them all? How much time will it take out of your already busy life?

Through trial and error, I’ve developed a daily routine to keep up with the various social media accounts I use. When I was working full-time outside the home, I had to really use my time wisely since I could not be engaged in social medial all day, but still wanted to maintain a social media presence. As you know, it’s not enough to just have an account, you have to actually use it and be “present” for your social media efforts to work.

Let me share a sample schedule of how I used social media when I was working full-time. In the mornings, I had the benefit of an empty home after my husband left for work and dropped off my daughter at day-care. Since I started work a little later than him, this meant that I had about an hour each morning to do my social media/blog work before I had to get myself ready. In this hour, I created the following social media routine and would do most (and sometimes all) of the following.

Image from webtreats on Flickr

Sample Social Media Routine

• Open up my browser and open a tab for each of these sites: ping.fm, myspace, facebook, plurk, twitter, gmail, google reader, and delicious. As I completed my tasks for each site, I would close the tab and move on to the next.
• Post a status update using ping.fm.
• MySpace: Even then, MySpace was slowly being phased out of my social media routine, but since I (still) have some real-life friends and family that use it, I would check in every morning. It was a very quick check of messages, comments, and friends’ status updates.
• Facebook: I would login and respond to any comments or messages sent to me. I would post a “Happy Birthday!” message for those with birthdays that day and possibly leave a comment or two on others’ profiles. If I had something to promote – a contest or my latest post – I would do so via my fan page and/or group. Of course, I’d also take care of any requests that were waiting for action – friend requests, even invites, page suggestions, etc.
• Plurk: Though not a common microblogging platform, it’s one I was exploring at the time and continue to participate in since I’ve made some connections that are not elsewhere. Again, I would quickly check in on any replies to my updates and try to comment on one or two people’s updates.
• Twitter: Similar to the rest, I would login to Twitter and be sure to respond to any @ replies or DMs I received overnight. I would also review new followers and follow-back appropriately (or not). I would then leave this tab open since I would often interact with various other folks that were up early like me.
• E-mail: I use gmail for my e-mail, which has the ability to star items you need to come back to and label your messages for finding later. Simple Mom has a nice system she uses for managing her inbox that I try to follow. I would definitely take about 10 minutes each morning to check urgent items and clear out the “junk” so that it didn’t clutter up my inbox.
• Google Reader: I didn’t always have time to get to reading some blog posts – it just depended on how much time I spent on the other tabs. But, some days, I’d be able to read a few posts from those blogs you “must” read each day.
• Delicious: Since I have the delicious plugin installed on Firefox, I’d only need to open this up if I saw there was new activity in my network or if anyone had sent me a link. But, in browsing resources bookmarked by those in my network, I’d often find a great article or tip or even a blog post idea.

Photo by Jen R

Each morning I’d go through my routine and get a great head start on my day – social media wise, anyway. Then, during the day while I was at work, I would monitor twitter, facebook, and e-mail using my smart phone. Of course, I wasn’t always on it. But if I took a quick break from my desk and especially during lunch time, I’d be able to update my status (again using ping.fm) and check in on comments.

In the evenings, after dinner and the nightly bed-time/bath routine for baby girl, I’d take another hour (sometimes two depending on how busy the husband was) to go through the same routine. However, I would focus less on checking comments/messages and more so on clearing out e-mail and writing a blog post.

Wondering what I do now that I’m not working full-time? The same. Though I don’t always have the house to myself in the mornings anymore, I still take a half-hour to an hour each morning and use the same social media routine. The days that baby girl goes to preschool, I do this routine after I’ve dropped her off. The days she’s home with me, I use the time when she’s eating breakfast and watching her morning cartoons. If I’m lucky and she’s overslept, I go through my routine before she wakes up.

Through the rest of the day, I periodically check in on social media and e-mail. As I mentioned in a previous post, I tend to login again mid-day and in the evening. I try to follow my social media routine each time, but depending on other projects/tasks I have to get done, I may cut my routine in half during those times.

Seem like a lot to-do? Keep in mind that you don’t have to have accounts for all the sites that I do. You will find those that serve your needs the best. Truthfully, though, once you get into a routine, it will become habit and not be so overwhelming.

Additional tips:

• Always answer @ replies, DMs, comments, etc. for the various networks you belong to. It’s so frustrating when you’re trying to talk to someone and they ignore you, isn’t it? Don’t ignore.
• Catch what you can while logged on. You won’t be able to read every single status update for every single network you belong to.
• Retweet interesting statuses, share good information, and useful links/resources. Your readers will appreciate it and will come to know that you have valuable information.

Have you already created your social media routine?

Image from Anne Helmond on Flickr

Every once in a while someone will make a comment about how they “see me everywhere” online. I’m on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Plurk, Delicious, StumbleUpon, Friendfeed, and various Ning communities. There’s actually more places to find me, but those are the most commonly known ones. Naturally, I’m also asked how I can keep up with multiple social media accounts. Typical questions include:

• Do you log on to all the different sites to update them?
• How often do you update your status/account?
• Are you always on your computer?

I’d like to say I’m just that talented, but the reality is that there are tools out there that help me keep up and make it “seem” like I’m everywhere. Some are web-based, and others are self-created, but all help me stay on top of my social media presence. I’m going to give you three simple ideas for helping you be more present in your social media efforts without going crazy.

3 Tips To Help You Manage Your Social Media Presence

1. Use Online Tools

Using tools like Ping.fm can help you update multiple social media accounts with one step. You create one account on Ping.fm, link it to all your other accounts, and update your status for all of them from one place. I use this to update Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Plurk, BrightKite, Identi.ca, and a few other sites all by sending one message. The even better part is that you can link your Ping.fm account to your cell phone, Skype, AIM, and other instant messaging platforms to update your status on the go. That is, you don’t have to go to the Ping.fm site to update all of your accounts – you can do it by simply sending a text from your phone or an instant message.

Something else I often do is pre-schedule updates using sites like SocialOomph, ObjectiveMarketer, or HootSuite. With these sites, you can create a message and publish it at a later time. Some even allow you to set the message on a repeat schedule, if it’s something you want to be seen at different times of the day or for multiple days at a time. This is great because it means you can go to work all day, run some errands, spend some time with the family, or have some fun and your social media presence doesn’t suffer.

Image from Aaron Coyle on Flickr

2. Schedule Your Social Media Time

This is one of those self-created tools that has helped me. I try to have set times in my day that I dedicate to managing my social media accounts. I use those times to update my status, respond to comments/replies I received, and manage requests (i.e., followers, friend requests, group/page suggestions). This works better for me than constantly having the windows open on my computer. I can continue to work on other things and know that I won’t be tempted to keep clicking over to check for the latest comment. Taking breaks throughout the day from social media doesn’t greatly affect your presence. People know that you have a life that just may take you away from your computer. It’s ok to have chunks of the day where you’re more interactive than others.

For me, what seems to work the best is to check in on social media about three times throughout the day – on average. Some days I only check in once or twice, but generally speaking, I log on in the morning, mid-day, and evening. I find that this keeps me up to date, present, and coincides with the majority of people’s schedules. There are those who work early in the morning before the kids are up or before heading out to their “day job.” There are also those that take a lunch break and those that work after the kids go to sleep. By checking in on my social media accounts during each set period, I can interact with a variety of people and those in different time zones from me.

I don’t spend a large chunk of time during any of those three periods, either. I log on to each site, respond or manage requests, and move on to the next. Unless something extremely interesting caught my eye or required me to spend more time managing the situation, I typically complete my social media rounds within 30 minutes, if that.

Image from Volker on Mobile

3. Use a Smart Phone

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a post about how I use a smart phone to increase productivity. I included ideas for managing home tasks and personal calendars, as well as blogging and social media tasks. Like I mentioned in that post, it helps to fill in some gaps throughout the day where you may find yourself with some time, but you’re not near a computer. You can update your status – use that text feature from Ping.fm – or check in on a few comments you may have received. Either way, you can easily be present while on the go.

I know you’ll find these tools to be useful and will eventually find the right combination that works for you. If you’re already familiar with these tools, you know what a great help they can be for managing your social media presence. What do you find works for you? Let’s hear your tips in the comments below.

If you’re a blogger and user of other social media applications, you know that it can sometimes be hard to keep up with everything. You’ve got blog posts to write, PR emails to answer, comments to keep up with, and a social media presence that needs to be constantly updated. Add all that to your day job or freelance/client work, plus your family and household responsibilities, and it’s a wonder you’re able to do anything!

In order to try to alleviate some aspects of this busy life, I use my smart phone. Of course, my phone can’t clean the house or cook dinner, but it can help me organize some details of our household and allows me to stay up to date with various social media accounts. Let’s dive right into how this works for me.

Image from Volker on Mobile

How to Use your Smart Phone to Increase Productivity

Using the Memos or Notes Feature

I use this feature to jot down quick notes as I’m out and about. For example, I could be in the store or in the car and get an idea for a blog post, so I’ll quickly note it in my “blog post ideas” memo. Some other memos that I constantly have in my phone and update as needed:

• Grocery List – If I notice we’re out of something, I add it to the list so I can later reference it when planning a weekly dinner menu or preparing to go to the store.
• Music to Download – Sometimes I hear a new song on the radio that I like, but know that I won’t remember it later. I write down the name and artist for downloading on iTunes later.

Calendar

Unfortunately, my Palm Treo does not have the capability of syncing its calendar with the Google calendar. However, if I’m not in front of my computer or not at home, I can quickly add an item to my phone’s calendar and later add it to my Google calendar. I also use the reminder feature on my Google calendar to send myself text message reminders of important events.

Those of you who have phones that allow for syncing these calendars, can constantly keep up to date with your agendas since you’ll always have your calendar on either your phone or on the computer. I’m a little jealous. {ahem} Moving on…

Tasks/To-do List

There are actual to-do list applications for some phones; others simply call it a task list. You can add an item you remembered you have to do and even assign a due date and set a reminder. Sometimes, though, I just use my memos function to write up a quick list of things I want to achieve on a particular day. It’s a bit old-school, but it works for me.

Image from Artillery Unit Blog

Email on your Mobile Phone

Of course, email is one of those features that allows you to easily stay connected. You can quickly send out an email to a friend if you’re at the doctor’s office or waiting in the car. Or you can easily respond to a PR email to let them know you’re interested in the opportunity – or not. Sometimes, I just go through and clear out the “junk” type emails so that when I sit down at a computer to actually answer my emails, there are less to go through in my inbox.

Social Media Maintenance

This is probably what I use my smart phone for the most. I’ve found that I can keep up with my social media presence much better by using the phone throughout the day to fill in those gaps when I’m not near a computer. I’ve often received comments from others about how I manage to “be everywhere” and regularly update my social media profiles. How do I do this?

• Text Messages – I can easily send a text message to update my Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn status. I use other tools as well to update multiple accounts at the same time – all via one text message. It keeps my profiles up to date and maintains a live social media presence.

• Web Browser – I check in on Twitter and Facebook by using their mobile sites. This is another area where my Palm Treo lacks in functionality, since I cannot easily respond to replies on Twitter. It’s not impossible, but it’s a little annoying as there are a few steps I have to take. That said, I can still respond to comments on both sites if I feel it’s time-sensitive and can’t wait until later.

If you don’t already have a smart phone, I suggest you buy one. Some people feel it complicates their lives even more. But, I think if you use it effectively and in moderation, it can actually enhance some aspects of your life and help keep you organized.

If you have one, what are some of your favorite ways to use your smart phone? Do you use one feature more than others?

It’s been nearly two weeks since I left my full-time job and have been working from home. In the last two weeks, I’ve had days that were really really productive and days that were not very productive at all. In thinking back, there were things I did differently on those days that perhaps had an effect on my productivity. I realize now that just a few changes in my routine or habits for the day, provide me with a greater chance of getting things done. With that, I share with you my personal tips for working from home.

5 Tips for Working from Home for the WAHM (or anyone really)

1. No TV
   This should come as no surprise, but it’s worth repeating. If I try to work on the laptop and watch TV at the same time, one of the two suffers. So, what’s the point in wasting energy by having the TV as background noise if I’m concentrating on work? Or conversely, what’s the sense in having my work suffer because I keep pausing to look up at the TV? Choose one or the other. This will also help with saving money on the power bill.
2. Listen to Appropriate Music
   I am a person that needs music to be able to work. When working in total silence, my brain doesn’t function. I know, it’s a little contrary to how most people function. But, for me, the silence is ear splitting and doesn’t let me think straight. So, I always have music on. However, there are certain types of music that allow me to get more work done than others. I’ve found that lately, listening to more acoustic or chillout music has helped me when writing or when just brainstorming ideas. That’s a personal taste, but the idea is to find music that inspires you and help the ideas flow. You don’t want to be distracted by the music.
3. Sit at a Desk
   When I worked outside the home all day, I was accustomed to working on my social media and blogging business at night by sitting on the couch on my laptop. This worked fine at the time since it was only a couple of hours each night. But, now, I realize that the days I tried the same method, I didn’t get as much accomplished as the days that I sat down in a proper chair at a table. We have an actual office area with a desk, but it’s at the very back of the house and I’ve found our dining table more appealing since it’s in a brighter part of our house. If you have a desk and office space that you’ve made your own, then even better! Either way, though, sitting upright instead of slouching down into the comfy couch works much better.
4. Eat and Drink Properly
   I am the worst about this. I will go hours and hours and forget to eat. Or just plain ignore the hunger signs. I even tweeted about it. I get so caught up in the work, that getting up to get something to eat is pushed to the side sometimes. The same for drinking water or any fluids. But, that is so bad. So, I have to remind myself to take a break and get some food and a bottle of water. It helps me in not just feeding my brain so that I can continue to be productive, but also provides a quick mental break and has many times allowed for new ideas to flow.
5. Shower and Get Dressed
   This may seem ridiculous to include since I think we all know not to go around stinky and naked, but what I’m really saying is do this early in your day. The days I worked in my PJs and waited to shower until the afternoon, I felt out of it. I fed into the feeling and didn’t really do much. When I shower early on, it helps me feel refreshed and ready to get things going. And you don’t have to sit around your house dressed like you were going to a business meeting either – unless you want to. Just change out of your “bumming around the house” clothes.

So, go ahead. Try some of these simple ideas and see if you feel better about yourself during the day and in turn, get more done.

And, please, share any additional tips you have in the comments below.

***More resources on productivity I’ve saved on delicious***

I’m providing these Tips for Working from Home in a printable format for you to download and share with others. Feel free to share liberally by pointing back to this original post.

Photo credit: supershoppertoo