Save articles and videos for later

Sometimes it's the simple things in life that can make the biggest difference.

So in this video, we're looking at five productivity tools which are very easy to use, but can have a big impact on your day. Hello everyone, Scott Friesen here at Simpletivity helping you to get more done and enjoy less stress.

And the first tool that we're looking at here is pocket. Now pocket is all about clipping and grabbing pieces of information on the internet so that you can read it in a distraction free environment Let me show you how it works.

Here on the web, you can see that I have the pocket extension available to me here in the top right hand corner. So let's say I'd like to read this article but it's a 13 minute read I just don't have time for it right now.

So instead I can come up here and select the pocket icon and instantly it is saved to pocket. If I like, I can add some tags or put it in a particular list, but let's keep things simple for our example.

Next up, let's say I grab this article here which I would like to read through as well, but I actually don't have time and I also don't want to be bogged down by all of these images as I go through this content.

Once again, I going to hit the pocket icon and in one click it is added to my list. Lastly, pocket also works for other content, such as videos. Here's a video that's a half hour in length.

I don't have time right now, but maybe I will later this evening. Once again, all I have to do is hit that icon and it is added to my list. Now, when I go back to pocket and select my list,

you can see that I have both the article, these two articles, and that video added to my list. And the great thing is, is that it's not just going to send me back to that webpage. I have a reading focused environment to do so.

Let's click on this therapy article as an example. When I click on it, you can see that all of the advertisement is taken away. I can just focus on reading this article without all of the other distractions.

If I go back and if I select something like the YouTube video, for example, I'm not brought back to YouTube. I can watch it right here within the pocket player.

So again, I'm not distracted by other things, other advertisements, or perhaps other videos. I can just focus on the content that I want.

Copy text from videos

Now, the next tool on our list is also about gathering information, but information which is often hard to get at. How often have you been watching a video and perhaps someone has put up a large quantity of text, and you'd like to take those notes to be used somewhere else or just maybe for your own personal reference.

Well, you could pause the video here and take out a notepad or try and write it down in your note taking app. But with the Selectext extension installed, you can see that there's a new button in the top left hand corner of my video.

If I select this it will automatically find all of the text on the screen. Then I can click and drag and select just what I want, and when I release it is automatically copied to my clipboard.

I can then go into any other application and paste that information and use it for my own purposes. Here is another example, from the very same video where the author has just pasted a screenshot of a particular email.

Once again, I can enable select text and now all of that text is selected. I can just select what I want. I don't need this copyright down below. And again, I can now go and paste this information wherever I like.

Selectext is a free Chrome extension and works on almost all video sites including Skillshare and even university lecture recordings.

Create step-by-step guides

Now, speaking of learning new things let's see how we can create a user friendly guide either for ourselves or for others, so that we can remember how to perform certain tasks. And for that, we're taking a look at Scribe. Let's get started by looking

at what a finished Scribe looks like. If I open up this one, titled Google drive sharing tip, you may think that I captured a number of screenshots and then I came in and had to type in this text and then add things like this orange circle.

But what if I told you I didn't do any of that? In fact, it took me only 55 seconds] to create this entire Scribe. The way that Scribe works is to record yourself doing those precise actions

and without changing a thing, Scribe will record where you went, what you did, and will even automatically zoom in and highlight where you clicked. Let me show you how easy it is to create your own Scribes.

In this example, I've returned to the pocket website. And perhaps I'd like to show someone how they can change pocket to dark mode but also change the layout of their list.

All I need to do is come up to the Scribe extension and select start recording. What Scribe will do, it will confirm that the capture has started and in the lower left hand corner you can see this lightly blinking light, letting me know that everything I do from now on will be recorded.

So first I'm going to come up to my list because this is where we're going to change the layout.

I'm going to click on my icon and I'm going to select this option down below. This is what I think they are going to prefer when it comes to their list layout. But then I also want to change it from light to dark. So I'm going to select dark as well.

And lastly, I'm going to click off of the menu so that they can see the page in front of them. When I'm finished with whatever it is I want to show, I can come down here and click complete recording.

This will bring me to the Scribe interface where I can see the entire Scribe but also edit for minor changes. So for example, by default it's saying this is the get pocket workflow. I might want to come up here and say get pocket dark mode and reading layout, maybe something a little more descriptive there.

I can add a further description if I want. Scribe is going to show how many steps are included in this guide and also how long it took for me to record it. Now, keep in mind I was going extra slow and narrating along the way, something that you don't need to do.

The first step is to navigate to, well, to your get pocket site. And if this is something too specific, again, we can edit anything here as well. Maybe what I'm going to say is just go to getpocket.com Click my list.

That's what I did. Then I clicked here and then I clicked this icon. If I want to be more descriptive, again, I can change the title then click the dark field and then click here. Actually, I didn't need to click here.

Did I? I only clicked here in this last step just to remove this screen. So I'm going to come up here and say, delete this step. When I'm finished with any minor edits,

I can come up here and select done. Now I'm ready to share this Scribe. I can either share a direct link, so I can send people to this Scribe, or I can also export it to things such as PDF.

Or if you upgrade to the pro version, you can export to other formats as well. If you'd like to use Scribe for free be sure to click the link in the description below.

Automate your favorite apps

Now, the next service on our list has been around for a very long time but continues to evolve as it connects more services and allows you to create your own custom triggers.

IFTTT, which stands for, if this then that, allows you to create your own custom applets. What is an applet? Think of it as a recipe when you want things to do something specific and perhaps between two or more services.

In my example, I'm going to come up here and select the create button. And here you can see the basic recipe which is waiting for inputs from me. Now, in my case, I want to be alerted of when things are snowing at my local ski resort.

So my trigger, I'm going to select if this and I'm going to select the add button. In this case, I'm going to look for a weather service. Now I could start scrolling, but I I highly suggest that you start searching for either keywords or key apps and services.

I'm just going to type in weather. And in my case, I'm going to choose this one which is called Weather Underground. Now, under this service, you can see there's a large quantity

of different triggers, which I can set up. But in my case, I want to look at this one here.

Tomorrow's forecast calls for, because I only want to receive a notification when something specific is in the forecast for tomorrow. I'm going to select this one and now I can choose a few other specific conditions.

Mainly what is the weather condition I'm looking for and at what specific location? So here, I'm not looking for rain. I want to be notified when it's going to snow tomorrow.

So I'm going to select snow and no, I don't want just a general location. I want something a little more specific. So I'm going to type in silver star, perfect Silver Star Resort. That's the address I want it to look for.

I can select create the trigger. So now we know the if, but what do we want to do about it? If there is snow in the forecast how do I want to be notified? Well, that's the 'that'. Here I'm going to select add again and I can choose another service.

Now, in my case, I'm going to be looking for an email. So I'm going to type in Gmail and I'm going to select that option.Next, I can choose a specific action  for Gmail. Because I want to send this email to myself, I'm going to select this middle option.

But if I wanted to notify other people, I can send to up to 20 recipients, I would choose this one here. Let me select this middle one. And yes, that's the account I want to send it to. I can customize things such as the subject line tomorrow's condition tomorrow.

That means this is going to say snow tomorrow, right?

Because that's what I'm looking for. And here's the body of the text. Of course I can customize any of these fields if I want to. But in this case, I'm going to leave it as is.

I'm going to select the big create action button. And now my applet is almost ready. I'm going to select continue. And I will see a summary up above. If tomorrow's forecast calls for snow then send yourself an email from this address.

Last but not least, let's select finish. And now this applet is ready to go. I will receive an email the day before if there is snow in the forecast at my local ski resort.

Set limits for distracting websites

Next let's take a look at a free extension which helps us with avoiding distractions.

Limit is a free extension, brought to us by Freedom which is all about trying to block out how much time we spend on particular sites. With the limit extension installed, we have a very simple interface which we can use to either add additional websites and also limit how much time we spend on those websites.

Now, by default, you're going to have a collection of roughly 10 websites listed here. And yes perhaps some common culprits such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter are listed.

And by default, it's going to give you a limit of 25 minutes, but you can customize this for each service. Maybe I want to allow myself 60 minutes on YouTube but I only want to give myself about 15 minutes on Instagram each day. If I want to add additional websites,

I can come up here and just paste in the URL. Lastly, if I want to see a visual indicator

as to how much time I've spent on a website, I can toggle this switch at the top. But remember whether you toggle this on or off if the limit extension is installed, it will block you from all of these sites after that limit has been reached.

So with amazon.com as an example, let's go to the amazon.com website. Here, you can see I'm on the home screen and really nothing out of the ordinary, but because I have that show timer turned on in the top right hand screen, it's going to tell me exactly how long I have been on this site.

And although you might find this distracting,

it can be a helpful reminder that you don't want to spend too much time on this site.

In fact, I really appreciate that it doesn't show a second by second countdown.

It only updates every 10 seconds. So it's a little less distracting as you navigate around the site. But because I've set Amazon for 25 minutes, once 25 minutes is reached, this site will no longer be available to me until the next day.

And if you're looking for even more ways to stay productive and to avoid distractions, you're going to enjoy this video on the screen in front of you. Remember being productive does not need to be difficult.

In fact, it's very simple.

 Upgrade your fonts

Are you suffering from boring-looking Google Forms? Don't worry. In this video, I'm going to show you five different ways in which you can make your forms that much more engaging. Hello, everyone, Scott Friesen here at Simpletivity helping you to get more done and enjoy less stress.

Now, the first thing we're going to do] that's going to make our form look a lot different from everyone else is by changing the text and the fonts. In fact, this is something that we've only been able to do in the last little while.

If we come up to the top and select, customize theme, you can see that we now have a text style area where we can change both the header, the question, and the text itself.

So rather than just using the Roboto default, that even sounds pretty ordinary, doesn't it? I'm going to come here and I'm going to select something like, oh, I don't know, maybe Impact, something that's going to really make my title stand out.

Next, we can change the question,which I think is rather important. So that the question stands out and is a little more bold than the answers themselves. In this case, I'm going to choose a font called Lexend.

And if you see a font that has a little arrow to the right, you can see that you have other additional options in terms of the size of the boldness or maybe if you want something extra thin.

In this case, I'm going to select, semi bold, so that those questions really stand out.] They really differentiate themselves from the answers, and I can see at a glance that there's only three questions in this particular survey.

Last but not least, you can also change the text of the answers, and this will also apply to the description of the survey as well. But I'm going to leave that as is. Already, this survey is starting to stand out and look different from a standard survey.

Add animated header image

The second thing that we're going to do is to add a header image, something that's going to be a little more eye-catching at the top of our form. Now, typically the first place I like to visit when it comes to finding images is Google Images.

And what I'm going to do is do a search for background GIF, because what you can do is add a moving image to the top of your form. I was already looking at this one here.

And if you click on these images, the GIF will be in play, so you can see what that's going to look like.] All I need to do in this case is right-click, and I'm going to choose, save image as.

Then, back in Google Forms, under the same customized theme pullout, I'm going to select, choose image, for the header. Our first option is going to be able to choose from one of the default themes, which are selected here.

And there may be something worthwhile looking at, but keep in mind, every other Google Form user

is presented with these options as well. In this case, I'm going to select, upload, browse, and I'm going to go find that image that I downloaded just a moment ago.

Once the image is uploaded, you will notice that you will be pre-selected with the size and dimensions which will fit to your form.

Here you can see the entire image in the background, but if I want to drag this up or down, maybe I want something just a little bit lower, right about there, that's what I want to include in my form.

I'm going to select done. And in just a few seconds, it will add this to the top of my form. And remember, because I chose a GIF in this particular example, yes, there's going to be something moving.

So when they access this form, already it's going to be that much more engaging

Make your background stand out

for them to interact with. The other thing you will notice whenever you upload any type of header image is that Google Forms will try to match those colors for the background color and the other accent colors within the form.

You can see that this light blue in the background and this somewhat darker blue up top is being pulled directly from my header image. But I'm going to suggest that you go one step further

and make your colors even a little bolder. By default, Google Forms has a habit of selecting a fairly light color for the background. But because we have a white background here for the questions themselves, I suggest you go for something a little darker.

This makes your questions stand out even more.] And don't forget, you can always add your custom colors to your color palette as well. Now that we've changed the look of the form, both by an image color and text, let's see if we can make some of the questions and the layout a little more interesting.

I'm going to come down here to this last question

Limit checkbox choices

where I'm asking, which color do you like the most? And I've given the user five different options. Now, we need to be careful when it comes to some of our questions, because in this case, I'm asking for a favorite or only one answer. But you know what?

I might actually get more valuable information if I ask them to select their two favorite colors or maybe three favorite colors, not just their number one favorite,

because maybe I like blue the most, but orange is a very close runner up.So in this case, we're going to create a selection of checkboxes and then set a limit as to how many they can select.

Our first step is to come over here to the dropdown, and we are going to select checkboxes, but we can't leave it in this state. Why? Well, this is going to allow a responder to check as many or as little checkboxes as they like,

and that's not going to give us very valuable data. First off, I should probably change the question so they know what to do. Maybe I'll say, please select your two favorite colors. Something like that. Now, we can't leave it as is, we need to select these limits.

In order to do so, we're going to come down to the three dots here and we're going to select response validation. This is going to allow us to choose a minimum, a maximum, or a specific number.

The first option here is select at least. So we can either say there's a minimum, select at most, a maximum, or select exactly. Now, because I've framed this question as please select your two favorite colors, I'm going to say select exactly.

I'm going to come over here and type in the number two. It also gives us the option to type in a custom error text message. So here, I'm going to say, please select two, and maybe I can add an exclamation mark if I want to.

So now when someone is presented with this question, they will need to select exactly two from the answers given. If you ever want to remove this validation, you can always come over here to the far right and click X.

But let's see what this will look like for the user. I'm going to select the preview button and now we can see what the form will look like to our users. Let's scroll down to that last question, please select your two favorite colors.

If I select orange, immediately it's going to say, please select two. Now, it's true, this warning message is always going to appear, even if they are in the process of selecting others. If I go and select blue, perfect, I've filled the requirements.

It will allow me to check another box, but once again, I will not be able to submit the form because I have this error message in place. So I'll have to choose between red and orange, and yes, I'm going to deselect red, and now I can proceed with submitting this form.

By the way, I'd like to thank Rondalene for asking this question

about how to use limited checkboxes. If you have a question about how to use Google Forms, be sure to let me know in the comments down below.

Create multiple sections

Lastly, let's take our forms to the next level by adding sections. Sections can be extremely helpful, especially if you have a large number of questions, and rather than sending the full page to a responder, you can break up your survey into different sections.

In order to do so, we want to come over here to the sidebar and select the last option, which is add section. This will add a section to the very bottom of the screen. Now, there won't be anything listed there just yet.

We can either start to add our additional questions or we can drag other questions into this section. So in this case,] I'm going to call this just maybe page two or continued, or maybe you want to break up your survey into different themes or different titled components.

Now, I could either hit the plus button and add a new question to this section or what I can do is grab an existing question and drag it into this area. Now when someone opens up this form, all they will see are these first two questions, and then they will see the next button, which will bring them to this next section.

Now, you are not limited by the number of sections which you can create. So I've seen some people actually create a form where there's only one question per section. It can allow the user to really focus in on that question before they start scanning for other options on that page.

You will notice at the bottom of a section there will be a dropdown option. Now, by default, it's going to say, after section one, continue to next section. And in most cases, that's going to be the behavior you want.

But if you have multiple sections, you can send them to a specific section at any time or maybe you want them to submit the form at that time. I'm going to select that preview button once again, and here you can see I'm only given the first two questions.

If I hit next, I will then be brought to page two, and here I have the option to choose my colors. Because I'm in preview mode,

it has saved my selections from last time. Of course, this will not be present when you send it to your users. Now, if you'd like to learn how to use conditional logic where you can send people to a specific section based on their answers, be sure to check out this video where I walk you through the process.

Thank you so much for watching.

And remember, being productive does not need to be difficult, in fact, it's very simple.

Remove things from pictures

Are you wanting to save time and spend less effort? Well, in this video I'm sharing with you seven helpful websites which will allow you to get in, get out and get on with the rest of your day.

And let's dive in with website number one, magiceraser.io. Now Magic Eraser is designed for you to remove certain elements from any images that you upload. And as we land here on the home screen you can see a perfect example here as we are removing a car from this image.

But let me show you just how easy it is to use this tool. Here you can see, I can either drag an image or click an image to upload. So there's a particular image here that I would like to upload and make some adjustments.

So right away, our cursor, as we hover over the image, is going to show this circle. And if I click and drag, let's say I want to remove this tree in the background. All I need to do is click and select the area that I would like to remove.

Now you can unclick and move to a different section. Maybe if you want to remove multiple elements but in this case, let me just finish covering the tree. And then down below, I can hit this button Erase and in just a second, the tree is gone.

And what I love about this tool is that you may have noticed that that tree trunk actually went down below this chain link fence but it didn't remove the chain link fence. It knew that I just wanted to remove the tree.

Now I can adjust the brush size if I want to. If I want to make it larger or if I want to make it smaller. Maybe I find that this lamp over here

is a little distracting as well. So I'm just got to cover this as well and then I'm going to hit Erase. Perfect. Now there's a lot more focus on the person where I want viewers to pay attention and I can download this and post it on social media or use it in some other format.

Now you can always go back and hit the undo button. Here you can see that that lamp is now removed. Although I can't redo. So if I want to go back and remove this lamp I'll actually have to cover it one more time and you can also go back to the original as well.

So if I want to go back to my brushed version and the original version I can do so here. Now when you're happy with your finished image you can come to the top of the screen and select Download.

Note for free users the maximum size is 600 by 600 pixels. But if you would like to download the full resolution or a higher resolution you can upgrade to their premium plan.

Productive background sounds

Number two on our list is all about blocking out distracting sounds in the background

or perhaps creating noise that will get us in a more productive state. And for that, we're taking a look at Noisli. Now there are many different websites available to us

that will produce background noise or background sounds including YouTube.

But what I like about Noisli is that it allows us to customize our own mix and even save our favorites. So here in the middle of the screen you can see that we have a few different icons.

And if we hover over them we see that this is a thunderstorm. These are leaves. This is a summer night. And if we click on one of them, let's click on this summer night for just a moment. (crickets chirping) You can hear we've got a few crickets.

We can adjust the mix and the volume but we can also combine them together. So maybe I like the sound of water, (water sloshing) but maybe I like the sound of water combined with rustling leaves. (water sloshing) (leaves rustling)

Maybe a little too much water. So I'm going to bring this down a bit. So a little bit further in the mix. Now you can combine as many of these different sounds as you like, and of course adjust the volume.

It even gives us three different flavors of white noise. If that's something that you prefer as well, but once you've got a mix that you like, you can either save it as a favorite. You can see if I click on my Favorites, I have one called forest with a stream.

It's a combination of this one here and this stream here. (birds chirping) (water spattering) At the very top of the screen we can also take advantage of a timer. Now, by default, it's going to be set to 25 minutes but you can adjust that time as well.

So if you want this sound to fade out or finish after a certain time, you can do so here. Noisli is absolutely free. So you can save your favorites and adjust your combinations and use the timer up above.

However, if you would like additional sounds to access you can upgrade to their pro plan.

Create free polls

The next website on our list is going to be the easiest way for you to create a quick poll and then share it with friends or colleagues. And for that, we are going to Polls.io.

Now, yes, it is true. We can create polls on Twitter, Facebook, Zoom and many other applications, but sometimes you don't want to share that poll with the world. You just want to share it with a few people, a few specific people, perhaps via email or by another messaging service.

Here at Polls.io, immediately, you can start typing in the question and the options down below. So maybe I'm going to ask what is your favorite Radiohead album? That's my question. Down below I can give my options.

Maybe "OK Computer". Maybe "Kid A" and maybe "In Rainbows". Something like that.

Now, if you need more than three options you can always select Add another option because I probably should add "The Bends". But in this example, I'm going to select Create this poll. Our poll is now live and we can share it with as many others as we like.

Directly to the right of the question you can see this purple share button. By selecting this what I can do is either copy the link or if I like, I can copy the embed code and put it on my own website. You can see I can also share it on popular social media platforms as well.

Easy email management

The next website on our list allows us to spend a lot less time within our inbox. SaneBox has been cleaning up email for more than a decade. And the great thing is it's available for Gmail, Outlook and Apple mail clients.

So regardless how or where you manage your email SaneBox can help it keep it uncluttered. What are some of the key features of SaneBox? Well, number one, rather than managing and creating complicated filters, SaneBox won't allow certain sender from getting buried.

It will also add a snooze feature if your email client doesn't have such a feature. It will also banish annoying senders and emailers for good. So rather than finding that unsubscribe link you can select the option here right within SaneBox and be sure that you will never hear from them again.

And last but not least, it even includes a do not disturb feature. So you can focus on the messages at hand and not be distracted by incoming mail. Now, if you're tired of drowning in all of that email I have a special offer for you.

If you go to sanebox.com/Simpletivity, you can sign up for the free trial and get a $25 credit if you choose to continue with the subscription. To learn more, see the link in the description below.

Improve your writing

Now, the next website on our list is going to make your writing so much easier for everyone else to read. Here we are at hemingwayapp.com and you'll notice we've got a lot of color going on. We have some sample text here, but what I often will do

is copy and paste something that I'm writing and just plug it right here into the app.

Now you'll notice that the colors that are highlighted, both the sentences and some specific words, correspond with some colors here on the right hand side of the screen. So for example, it's telling us that we are using two adverbs meeting the goal of two or fewer.

Two or fewer? Well, it's looking at the total number of words and seeing what's most appropriate to make this easy and readable for your viewers.

I can see quite clearly where those adverbs are located if I want to choose to omit them or perhaps change them. Green means the use of the passive voice. Phrases in green have been marked in a passive voice.

And again, it's saying that I'm within a respectable range in this particular case. I can also see that there is a word which has a simpler alternative. Now this can be really, really helpful.

If you are wanting your readers to understand and especially if you're looking at a global or international audience you may want to avoid harder to define words. So instead of utilize, maybe I can say use, and yes, it will even give you suggestions.

So you can click on the simpler word. The last two are sort of a light yellow and a pinkish color.

Yellow meaning sentences that are hard to read. And then the pinkish color meaning sentences that are very hard to read.

With this helpful knowledge I can then identify these sentences. In this case, perhaps if I just add a period and then capitalize this next sentence, you can see that this is much easier for people to read. You will also notice that Hemingway will give us a readability grade.

In this case, a Grade 6 grade

which it's identifying as good. Meaning someone who has completed a grade six education should be able to understand and follow along with the text on screen.

Faster marketing copy

Now, speaking of publishing and creating great written content, let's take a look how we can use artificial intelligence to create better writing. Here we are at Copy.ai

and really it's what the name suggests. We can write a variety of copy, from Facebook advertisements to blog articles, to complete webpages, all with the assistance of artificial intelligence. Once you've signed up for your free Copy.ai account you can see the wide variety of different projects which we can create.

Everything from product descriptions to website copy, blog articles, even brainstorming and sales copy. So to get started all I need to do is provide a few simple answers to three important questions.

Number one, what is my product called? Well, in this case I'm going to say it's called Google for Everyone. Something like that. Then describe your product. Now remember, we want to allow the artificial intelligence do most of the work so we don't have to be very lengthy with this description.

I'm going to say this is a course that will teach you how to use a variety of Google apps and products. Maybe something like that. And then lastly, we can choose our tone. Now by default friendly is going to be selected but you can see,

we can choose from professional to adventurous, to empathetic or persuasive.

In this case, I'm going to keep it with friendly and I'm going to select Create Content.

Now with our new batch of results, let's take a look at this first option here. Google for everyone is a self-paced course that will teach you how to use a variety of Google apps and products. You'll learn how to manage your email, create documents and presentations, work on projects with others, organize your calendars and task list,

increase online security and much more. I think I should create a product or a course exactly around this. So at the very least, Copy.ai will give you some fantastic ideas.

So whether you need to create advertisements, marketing copy, or complete articles,

Copy.ai will prevent you from staring at a blank page.

Install multiple apps at once

Now, the next website on our list is something that I wish I knew about years ago. Here we are at Ninite.com. Now Ninite is specifically for Windows users who want to quickly and easily install or update all of their favorite apps with just a single install file. Here you can see in step one, you can pick and select all of the apps you want.

So let's say I'm starting out with a new computer or perhaps I just want to make sure

all of my most important applications are up to date. So I'm going to select the Chrome browser and Firefox. Maybe I want AVG security, Google Drive for Desktop.

I can install all of my popular messaging tools like Skype and Zoom and Thunderbird.

You can see, I can go into all of these different categories and select the files that you're probably already using or maybe you want to install just in a single click.

Once you've selected all of those applications, step two is to download your custom installer and updater. No matter how many different apps or services you select in your installer it is going to be the fastest way to both install and keep those applications up to date. Now, if you enjoyed this collection of helpful websites

you are going to enjoy this video next where I show you seven free websites

that you're going to wish you knew yesterday. Remember, being productive does not need to be difficult. In fact, it's very simple.

Problem with most document converters

Uh-oh, I was just sent this 13 page document which I need to know about for my upcoming meeting. Problem, I got to jump in my car and get to that meeting.

I wish there was a way that I could summarize all this information and then maybe convert it to audio. Wait a minute, summarize plus audio? Yeah, that's exactly what I need.

Hello everyone, Scott Friesen here at Simpletivity helping you to get more done and enjoy less stress. And yes, it's a fact, dealing with documents can be some of the most time-consuming components of your day, but it doesn't have to be.

Whether you want to convert or translate or merge documents together, in this video, I'm going to share with you seven different tools which can help you do that so you can spend less time with your documents and more time focused on your work.

Now, when it comes to transforming your documents, you may first come to Google and type in something like convert to word and you'll find an awful lot of options here.

Maybe I'll click this first one, convert a PDF to word file. So all I need to do is select...

No, wait a minute. This actually isn't the conversion tool here. This is an advertisement

and how much do I actually know about this service? What are they going to do with my files? I obviously have to upload them first before I convert them. And then if I want to do something else such as translate or summarize, I'm going to have to go to some other website.

Workflow Central by Xerox

Well, there really is a much simpler and more secure way and it starts right here at Workflow Central by Xerox. Here within Workflow Central, we have access to seven different tools, which are not only powerful in and of themselves, but better yet,

we have the ability to combine these tools together. So in my example, I'm going to select summarize.

I'm going to choose where that file is from. Whether it's on my local drive or if I want to connect my account directly to my other cloud services, such as Dropbox, OneDrive or Google Drive. In this case, I'm going to stick with my local drive.

I just need to select browse and I'm going to go and find that very long draft document. Next up, I can choose if there's a particular page range that I would like to specify, but in this case, I'd like to summarize really the entire document.

I'm going to select next in this case and I can choose the summarization length. This is really great because I don't want just some default length, maybe I want to get about 20% of what's happening in this document.

It goes one step further by telling me do I want to specify is this a business document? Is it related to something legal? If you want to get even more granular, there is a large collection of specific domains so that it can pull out keywords depending on your use.

In this case, I'm going to select next and then we are brought to our convert to audio settings, which yes, I want it in English

and I'm going to select next. At this stage, I can give it a different name if I want to

and I can choose if I want to email it to myself, re-upload it to wherever it came from

within my cloud repository, or just download the file. This is what I'm going to select in this case and then select run.

Workflow Central will immediately start processing that job and will automatically download it to my system,there it is, as soon as it's complete. And now I've got a summary audio version of that document.

Just a little over two minutes in length, which I can listen to on my phone, in my car, or maybe right here on my computer while I'm doing other things.

How to hide sensitive information

But remember, converting to audio and summarizing your documents are just two of the seven tools available to us. Let's take a look at a few more. Here to the left, we have redact, which is probably the easiest way to block out sensitive information or specific words or phrases in just a few clicks.

Now keep in mind that Workflow Central supports some of the most popular file types, but goes way beyond just text files.

So whether it is a word document, PDF or text file, that is great, but you can also redact things such as JPEG, GIFs or PNG images as well. In this case, I am going to select a word document because there are a few names in which I want to blank out in this particular case.

Once again, I can specify a page range if I like, but I want to do the entire document here. On the next screen, we are able to choose a specific location and this can be so helpful if you want to, by default, block out credit card numbers, email addresses or things such as taxpayer identification numbers.

Since I have the United States selected here, it is bringing up some of the most common things which we would like to block out. Of course I can choose which one of these

that I would like to allow through or allow to be visible. But in this case, I'm going to leave them all here. So all person names, email addresses, and phone numbers should be blocked out. Now down below, I can also add my own custom words or phrases.

In this case, I'm going to choose the word reset, and I'm also going to choose the word Simpletivity because maybe I just want to share what I'm doing with this document, I don't want to let them know the name of the program, I don't want to know that I'm actually directly involved.

I'm going to select next and now we can run this transformation. With my job completed, I can now open up this PDF document

and all of those keywords along with specific names have been blotted out. Now I can safely send this to someone knowing that the names and keywords will not be visible because perhaps, I haven't gotten permission or I haven't confirmed these particular quotes from these particular individuals. I can safely share this knowing that they don't have access

Saving default settings for future documents

to sensitive information. Another bonus of using Workflow Central is that you can save any of your conversions. Here we are back in the redact menu and maybe this time I need something for Canada looking for specific information here, but I've also added some other specific words. When I hit next, I'll have the ability to save this

so I don't have to reselect those options or reenter those words. By saving this workflow, I can give it a custom name. I'm going to call this hide details and I can even choose my own unique icon. So maybe I'm going to pick something like, oh,

maybe like this checkboard and I'm going to choose this black icon and hit save.

Now you can see near the bottom of the screen I have my custom workflow. So the next time I need to redact a particular document and it fits those requirements,

I no longer have to choose those settings. When I hit next, it already has my specific location and those words ready for me to go so I can continue and go ahead and run this job.

‍Convert, translate and merge documents

Looking at the additional tools available to us, we can convert files to Microsoft Office documents, we can convert handwriting to text and we can translate into more than 40 different languages.

And what I especially like about the translate feature is that you can translate five languages at a time. So if I need to convert or transpose something, I can do it in a matter of seconds. Last but not least is the ability to merge,

which has quickly become my most used feature cause not only do I need to merge the same types of documents together, but sometimes I need to merge images with PDFs, with word files and a variety of other types and I can do so right here within just a few clicks.

If you'd like to learn more about Xerox Workflow Central and start using it for yourself, be sure to click the link in the description below. Remember, being productive does not need to be difficult. In fact, it's very simple.

Add Keep Notes to Google Docs

Did you know that you can share and link your Google docs with your Keep Notes?

Well, in this video, I'm going to show you all of the different ways in which you can share information between these two apps and stay tuned to the very end because I have a bonus tip for Google Calendar users.

So here I am within Google docs, and I'm about to set forth with an agenda and a pretty lengthy document about some of the things that we are going to be working on. The problem is, is that I've actually kept most of my notes here within Google Keep.

Maybe I've added a few ideas while I'm on the go on my mobile phone, and I've included a few bullet points and even a checklist over here, but how can I quickly and easily get that into my new document?

Well, rather than coming over here and trying to copy and paste this text, there is a much easier way. And in order to do so, we're going to make use of the Google side panel here on the right hand side.

Now, if you don't see the Google side panel, come all the way down to the bottom, select this little arrow to show the side panel, and you will see multiple Google apps, including Keep Notes.

By selecting this, we have access to all of our notes. But wait, it gets better because no, I'm not just going to copy and paste what I need, I'm going to make it so much easier on myself. If I come over here to this particular note and I select the menu, I can say add to document.

And there in just a single click, I now have that information inserted directly into my document. Maybe I also want to add this checklist that I mentioned before. Same thing, I'm going to say, add to document. And now I've added that checklist as well.

You will notice in this case it's going to convert the checklist into bullet points but I can of course edit that any way that I like here within the document.

Add Keep Images to Google Docs

The nice thing is that this also works for images. So let's say I want to add this image

into my document as well. Now I could use the same menu option and say add to document, but with images, it gets even better. This time what I'm going to do is I'm going to click and drag that image over here. And you can see wherever I release it,

wherever that cursor ends up, maybe I want it in between these two sections, I'm going to release it. And now that image is inserted. Let's just reduce the size of that a little bit in this case.

Maybe I want that last image, this circle image here with the documents, I want this near the bottom, again, I'm just going to insert it and paste it into my document. I'm going to resize it so it's a little more fitting with this particular document.

And so now in just a few clicks, I've added these several notes here from Google Keep directly into my document, and perhaps I'm almost done. I can continue to work the way I like by adding little snippets or short notes or images here within Google Keep and then bring them into the relevant document.

Add Keep Notes to Google Slides

Now you should note that this also works for a few other Google apps, including Slides. So maybe instead of a document, I'm putting together a presentation and I want to include these budget numbers.

Let's just say, add to slide. And if I want to add that image, I can just click and drag it, put it on the slide as well. Let's just resize it a bit, and perfect. This slide is almost done.

Add Google Docs to Keep Notes

Now while this is a super easy way to get information out of keep into your doc or slides, what about if we want to go the other way? Here I have a sample document

and perhaps I want to grab this quote or this sentence here and add it to my Keep Notes. Maybe I want to expand upon it, or I just want to simply remember it a little later. Well, we can do that here as well. The nice thing is that we don't even have to have this sidebar open or the side panel. All we need to do is select the piece of text

or images that we like and then select right click.

And near the bottom of our menu option, you will see something that says save to keep. By selecting that option, it's going to automatically bring in that snippet or whatever it is that you've highlighted into a Google Keep note. But it gets better.

Not only have we grabbed the text, but if I click on this note and expand it, you can see that it's actually added a link, a direct link back to this document. So if I open up my Keep Notes and here is that new note, and I say, where did I find this particular quote?

Or where can I find out more information? I have that link directly here. If I click on it, it's going to take me exactly to that particular document where I can go and find other sources or do whatever it is I want to with it.

Now, going back to Google Keep, we don't have to keep this link if we don't want it. You'll see that there's an X here. So if we want to remove the source, I can do so.

Take Keep Notes and link to Google Docs

But there's also an additional way in which we can link notes in Google Keep

to a particular document. Let's say this time around,I don't want to just copy a section

or an area of this document, but I want to take my own notes with this document.

Maybe I want to come back and think about some of the revisions I want to make.

Well, with the Google side panel open and with Keep selected, you can see that we have the option to take a note at the very top. As soon as I select take a note, you will notice not only am I ready to start entering in text, but it's automatically linked it to this document.

So maybe I'm going to write a note to myself. Let's discuss this article in the next meeting, something like that. I'm going to say done. And now I have that linkage back to this document. Again, going back to Google Keep, here is that new note, and I can go directly back to that document.

So you don't always have to single out or copy a selection of text. You can simply take your notes here. You'll notice when we return to the document, that note will always be shown at the top as a related note.

And yes, I could take other related notes to this particular doc. All of my recent notes will still be available to me down below, but they are separated between related, meaning related to this document, or slide if we have that open up,

and recent, meaning all of the other notes available to me

Copy Keep Note into New Google Doc

from Keep Notes. But wait, there's even more ways in which we can find useful connections between Keep Notes and Google docs. Now, for some of you, you may be creating your documents or articles or blog posts or whatever you do within Google docs right here within the docs interface.

But for some of us, we like to collect those notes and maybe ponder and put together a draft right here within Keep Notes. Example, I have an article that I've been working on here which is rather lengthy, but it's almost finished as well.

I'm almost ready to publish. So I'm ready to put it over here into Google docs. But once again, instead of having to open it up

and copy and paste everything here, I can come down to the more menu and select copy to Google docs. By selecting this option, it's going to copy everything within the note to Google docs. I'm going to say open doc, or I could just go to my Google drive menu.

And now I have that entire note right here waiting for me so I can add further images or maybe do some more complex formatting, maybe finish this off before I'm ready to publish. So I can start my draft or I can start elements of my notes right here, and then copy it directly, the entire note right into Google docs.

Now it should be noted that there is no sync or link between these two. When we select copy from this option here, it really is going to be copying that particular note. If I start to add or make changes here, nothing will be reflected here on the Google Keep side.

Add Keep Notes to Google Calendar Events

Now, as I promised at the beginning, I have an additional bonus tip for those of you who use Google Calendar and also want to connect it with your Keep Notes. You will notice that the Google side panel is available to you here as well.

So if I open up Keep, I have the ability to start taking notes directly from this window, but we can also connect our notes directly to meeting events. Here I have an upcoming meeting

and I want to take a few particular notes, but I don't want to add it in the description of this event because I don't want to share it with those whom I'm meeting with. I'd rather take my own note here and then reference it when the meeting arises. So with this meeting selected within Google Calendar,

I can come up to Keep Notes and say, take a note. And you will notice, not only is it ready and waiting for me to start inputting those notes, but I now have a link directly back to this event.

So I can say, let's talk about this before the meeting starts, or I can add all of my bullet points, all of my notes that I want to prepare in advance. And when I select done, I have a related note with this particular meeting.

It doesn't matter if you're viewing this calendar event from the main screen or if you open up the note in full view, you will have that related note available to you here.

But if we go back to Google Keep, here we have that same note, and yes, we have that link. So what meeting are we talking about? What do these notes refer to? We can quickly and easily in just a single click go directly to that particular meeting

in our Google Calendar. Now, if you enjoyed these Google tips and tricks, you're going to love my other drive and Keep Notes videos right here on the Simpletivity channel.

Remember, being productive does not need to be difficult. In fact, it's very simple.

How to access Drive share settings

Do you want to share your files quickly and easily? Well, in this video I'm going to show you everything you need to know when it comes to sharing your files and folders right here within Google drive.

Hello everyone, Scott Friesen here at Simpletivity, helping you to get more done and enjoy less stress. And the first thing you need to know when it comes to sharing your files or your folders is how to open up the share dialogue.

Now, when you have opened up any Google file, up in the top right hand corner you will see a share button. Here within this Google sheet you can see I have this green share button, and by selecting this, I will open up the share dialogue.

However, this isn't the only place that we can access that share button.

Even if you have other files which are not Google specific, so for example, here I have an image I will still have access to that share option. If I select the more actions I can come down here and select share as well.

But perhaps the easiest way to share your files is from the main menu, because perhaps you don't want to jump in and out of all of your files, or perhaps you'd like to share multiple files at once.

So by selecting any file you will also have these share option here in the top right hand corner. We can also right click on a file. And about the third option down is the share option.

But maybe the fastest of all is if you select any file or folder, and then select the Period Key on your keyboard that will also prompt up the share dialogue. Now our very first step is to select the people

Adding people or groups to share files with

or email addresses in which we would like to share this file with. Remember all of your contacts within Google contacts will appear here but they don't have to, you can enter in any new email addresses as well.

And if you happen to have groups within Google contacts those will also be available to you here as well. So I'm going to enter in this dummy account and add this individual, 'cause I would like to share this document with them.

Next I want to take a look at the dropdown menu directly to the right of the name or names that I've input here.

Now, by default, it's going to select them as an editor but that may not be the right selection for you, as an editor in this case, they will be able to add and edit anything within this Google sheet, but we do have two other options available to us as well.

The first one is as a viewer, this will give them read only access so that they can see the entire sheet but they won't be able to make any changes. The second one down below is of a commenter, which is kind of like a viewer, but they also have the ability to add suggestions, this won't make any changes to your file or to your document, but you'll be able to see any suggestions or any comments which they add. So make sure that you decide what is the most appropriate level that you would like to grant to this user or users.

Notify people and add a message

Now down below, we have a check box which will be selected by default telling us that this will notify these individuals once we hit the send button. With this checkbox selected, we can enter in a message such as, just wanted to share the new file with you.

If you do not want a notification sent out directly from Google drive, you can uncheck this check box. In this case, you have two options available to you. By selecting the blue share button down below they will instantly have access to this file within their Google drive account.

Or if you would like to send them the link via email

or some other form of messaging, you can select copy link. And now I have a link copied to my clipboard and I can paste that into my message and SMS,

Advanced settings for sharing files and folders

or some other messaging format. Now, before we hit share in this case, I want to pay special attention to one more option available to us and that is the settings or gear icon in the top right hand corner. By selecting this option here we have two additional check boxes available to us.

The first one says, "Editors can change permissions and share". With this checkbox selected, anyone who I select or add as an editor here will also be able to share it with other people and change permissions.

If I do not want to give them that level of permission, I can uncheck this checkbox. The second option down below says, "Viewers and commenters can see the option to download, print and copy". Keep in mind that this second checkbox does not apply to editors.

Editors will certainly have the ability to download, print and copy, but maybe I just want to give someone a preview of this file, so I'm going to make them a viewer.

If I also want to make sure that they can't make a copy for themselves or they cannot download that file I would leave this checkbox unchecked as well. So depending on the file that you are sharing make sure that you select that gear icon and double check just before you hit share.

Now that I'm ready to share, I'm going to select share. And now you can see that we have a new share icon beside this file type. Just like we look down below, I have a few other files that have that share icon as well.

So even at a glance I can see whom I'm sharing these files or folders with.

Editing share settings in Drive

Now, what if we want to share with additional people the same file or perhaps we want to remove access? Well, we can hit that share button in the variety of ways

or use our shortcut key of the Period Key on our keyboard. And now we will always have full access as to whom we have shared these files with. So here is the individual that I've made as a viewer but perhaps I want them to get more involved with this file.

I can simply come down to the right side and change their ability from viewer to an editor in this case, of course they won't become an editor until I hit the save button down below.

The other thing that we want to pay attention to here is that perhaps I want to remove access to this individual as well. Well, I can do so here by this dropdown and remove access so that they no longer can access this file. The one above here you can see is transfer ownership but it's currently disabled

because I don't have anyone as an editor at the moment. If I save this and make that individual an editor and then reopen this file, I can now come down and transfer ownership to them. In this case, they will have all the abilities that I currently have

and they will be the owner going forward, I will still have access to this file but they will be the owner of this particular file.

Using links to share files and folders

Down below you will also notice that we have another option available to us

as soon as we have shared this file with one or more individuals. And this is giving us the ability to restrict, meaning that this file will only be shared with people who can open the link but we can choose to change that to anyone with the link.

Now, this might be helpful if you're wanting to share something with the world or something publicly, such as perhaps a lead magnet or some other free resource and you don't want to have to add individuals one by one and it's not sensitive information.

In this case I can choose anyone with the link and then I can select copy that link. And now when I go and paste it… Let me open up an incognito window just to show you. They will have direct access to this sheet.

Now keep in mind, they only have view only access, so they can't make any changes to this sheet. I'm trying to hit delete on my keyboard, I'm trying to enter in other numbers, I can't do so because I only have view only access. So another safe and easy way to share files with others in this case, if you want to publicly share that file

How to share entire folders with others

with the rest of the world. Now don't forget all of these share options and settings which we've reviewed also apply to folders within Google drive.

Let me take a quick look at this test folder. I have five different folders within this folder and a variety of different files as well, but perhaps going forward I don't want to have to manage

one by one or file by file who has access. Maybe I have colleagues that I want to give access to everything within this folder, either now or when files are added to any of these folders.

In this case, all I need to do is select the folder I want to share, hit the dropdown menu, and then select share. And we are going to be prompted with the exact same menu that we saw when it came to sharing files.

In this case, I'm going to add another individual here. I'm going to make them an editor in this particular case.

I'm going to hit send and once again, we will see that that share icon is visible here,

and now going forward any new files that I add within these folders will be shared with everyone else who has shared access. So a quick and easy way to share multiple files, multiple folders, both in the present and going forward.

Now to get even easier access to all of your dry files and folders, be sure to use Drive for desktop. To learn how to set up for yourself on your computer, be sure to watch this video next.

Remember being productive does not need to be difficult, in fact, it's very simple.

How do labels work in Gmail?

‍

This video is brought to you by SaneBox. More about them a little later in the video. If you want to be more effective with managing all of your emails, you need to get familiar with labels.

So in this video, I'm going to show you everything you need to know about how to use and create labels right here within Gmail. Here on the left-hand side of my screen, you can see that I am using several labels.

And within my messages themselves, you can see that I've applied several of these labels.

This can make it so much easier for me to find the information that I'm looking for

and to highlight certain messages such as these two urgent emails. So, what exactly are labels? Well, labels are an awful lot like folders, allowing you to categorize your messages.

However, unlike standard file folders, you can apply labels to as many emails as you like, meaning that a single email here can have as many labels and doesn't have to reside or be assigned to a single folder. This can give you a lot more flexibility

How to create a label in Gmail

when it comes to managing all of your messages. So to create a label, all we need to do is come over here and hit the plus symbol to the right of Labels. The first thing we need to do is give this a name.

And in this case, I'm going to title this Manager because maybe I want to identify all of the messages which are being sent from my manager. Now, in this case, I'm going to leave this checkbox unchecked, but we'll come back and address how we can nest and create sub-labels a little later on.

At this stage, I'm going to select Create. And now here on the left-hand side, in alphabetical order, you can see my new label presented as Manager.

Changing the color of labels

Now, perhaps the first thing you'll want to do before you start using that label is to change the color. As you can see in the examples here, having distinct and different colors can really make things stand out.

So in this case, I'm going to select the three dots and my very first option here is to choose a label color. In this case, I'm going to select this blue color so it can stand out from some of the other labels that I'm currently using.

And you may also notice by selecting these three dots, you have other options available to you here as well. For example, by default, when you create a label,] it will always show in the label list and it will always show in the message list,

meaning when you've opened up an email and you want to apply a label, but you can always come here to adjust those settings. You can select the Edit button if you need to rename that label and if you'd like to remove a label or add a sub-label.

Adding labels to messages in the inbox

So in this case, let's go ahead and add this label to a couple of our messages. Now, there's a few ways in which we can do so. Perhaps one of the easiest is to just simply drag that label onto a message.

So if I click and drag, I can just apply that label to this message here. Let's do that one more time and I'm going to apply it to this message down below. So that is perhaps the easiest way to apply labels.

Now, we can also do it in the reverse order, but if you click and drag a message from your inbox into a label, not only will it apply the label, but it will remove it from the inbox.

So for example, I'm going to take a look at this "We have news for you" email. I'm going to click, I'm going to drag it over my Manager label, but it's telling me that it's actually going to move this conversation in addition to applying that label.

You can now see that that message is gone. But if I click on the Manager label, it is now waiting for me here, along with the other two emails, which I've applied that label.

You'll also notice that when you click on the label here on the left-hand side now that we're only viewing those messages with those labels, the label will not appear on the front of the email.

That's because Gmail assumes that you know that these are all Manager emails. And at the very top in our search bar, it's going to tell us this as well.

But if I was to open up any of these emails, you can see that this label is applied

Adding labels to opened messages

at the top of the screen. And that leads us to the third way of applying labels right here within Gmail. If I open up this email and I start to read it, perhaps I've decided that yes, I'd like to apply a particular label.

Now, I could go over here and drag this label onto this email once again. And if you ever need to remove a label, all you need to do is select the X here, but I could also come to the top of the screen.

This is especially useful if I have a very long list of labels. If I select the label icon, not only will it give me a full list and allow me to apply multiple labels at once, but I can also search for a particular label.

So if I start entering in the words UR, it's going to filter that down to my Urgent label. I'm going to select that and select Apply. Once again, you can apply multiple labels at once.

So if I want to apply my Manager and my Newsletters label to this as well, I can do so and have three different labels apply to a single email.

Add labels to multiple emails at once

Returning back to our inbox, we can also apply labels to multiple messages. So for example, if I come over here to the left-hand side and start to select let's say these three messages and maybe one more down below, I can come up to the top of the screen and again select that label icon.

I'm going to start typing in the name of the label I want, that Manager label, and hit Apply. Now I've applied that label to four messages at once, which has made it that much easier rather than going into each one one at a time.

Returning to our inbox, let's take a look at a few more ways in how labels can help us stay organized within Gmail. Under the Labels menu, you will notice that there is a number beside some of my labels.

Just like your inbox will tell you how many unread messages you have, your labels will do the same thing.

So for example, if I click on my Action Required even before I enter into this label menu, it's telling me that I have six unread messages. Clicking on this will actually show that I have a total of nine, but there are three in which I have read already.

These numbers can be a helpful indicator as to how often or when you should be checking in on some of your labels.

Creating nested or sub-labels in Gmail

But another way which labels can be useful is if we create nested labels, sometimes also referred to as sub-labels. So within Newsletters, I have an awful lot of things going on. So maybe I would like to segment this out in a few more ways.

What we can do is come up here to Labels. And in this case, I'm going to call one Golf Digest because perhaps I receive a number of golf-related newsletters. This time, I am going to check the nest label under and I'm going to select Newsletters because I want this label to appear within the Newsletters label category.

I'm going to select Create and now on the left-hand side, you can see that I have Golf Digest listed here.

Now, you can add as many nested labels as you like. And if it gets a little too busy,

you can always collapse that menu so now the Golf Digest has been minimized, but I can expand it at any time. Let's go back to my inbox and I'm going to apply this label to a message which I have not applied a label to yet just to show you how it will be displayed.

Here, you can see that two labels will not be assigned, but it will actually show both of the labels. If I click on this message itself, you can see that it will show the parent or top-level label Newsletters slash the name of that sub-label.

Now, you can nest other labels within other labels, so these can sometimes get a little lengthy,

but it can be a great way to segment out

Adding labels that use AI to manage email

different pieces of information. Now, despite all of your efforts, it can be rather difficult to reduce the amount of spam and unwanted email you receive. But there's a reason why I only have eight messages here in my inbox and not 152, like I did just a few days ago.

And that's because I'm using SaneBox, the easy and simple way to better manage your email inbox. With SaneBox, SaneBox gives you some very customizable folders that actually learn from your behavior.

So rather than just adding a new label, like I would typically do here within Gmail, SaneBox has actually added some customizable folders which have some pretty special powers with them. So for example, there's a lot of email that I don't want to start here in my inbox.

Rather than creating a number of individual filters, what I can do is train SaneBox to send certain messages to the SaneLater folder where I can come and review these messages whenever I need to.

And if something ends up here in my inbox that I want to see in the SaneLater folder going forward, all I need to do is drag it over and it will learn from my behavior. Now, I've got a special offer just for Simpletivity viewers.

You can get started with SaneBox whether you use Google, Office 365, or Apple Mail right away. But if you decide you like the service and sign up for SaneBox, my friends will give you a $25 credit towards your subscription.

That's like getting 50% off of their initial plan for the entire year. So be sure to head over to sanebox.com/simpletivity

or click the link in the description below.

Intro

Do you want to save time, increase your focus, or stop procrastinating? Well, in this video, we are counting down the top 10 productivity books which are an absolute must-read.

Now, for the sake of this video, we are only looking at books published since the year 2010. Why? Because books published prior to 2010 have no mention or knowledge of smartphones, social media, or the way that we interact with the online web.

Now, this certainly doesn't mean that older books still don't have value and have some incredible principles to share today, but such classics as "Getting Things Done"

or "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" really do read as if they were published generations ago and don't seem quite as applicable to our day and age. So with that being said, let's dive into our list. Starting things off at number 10, "Make Your Bed".

Make Your Bed

Former Navy SEAL, William H. McRaven, became somewhat of a YouTube star after his commencement speech in which he talked about the importance of making your bed in the morning went viral.

Shortly after McRaven published the book, "Make Your Bed", which not only includes how important it is to start your day off right, but also nine other lessons, which he learned during his time as a Navy SEAL.

While this is a relatively easy and short read, "Make Your Bed" outlines the importance of doing little things in your life and how they can impact the rest of your day and also the people around you. Number nine, "Grit".

Grit

Author Angela Duckworth has spent most of her career studying successful people.

And in her book, "Grit", she explores what grit is, where it comes from, how it drives success, and most importantly, how you and I can develop it.

After many years of study and research, Duckworth has found exactly why it's so important for us to be consistent and to persevere regardless where we are studying, working, or spending time with others.

The good news is that each and every one of us can develop this important trait. Number eight, "The Miracle Morning".

The Miracle Morning

Author Hal Elrod had an experience many years ago which not a lot of us can relate to. After surviving a horrific car accident, Elrod decided to start living his life in a very different way, and how he started was by changing his morning routine.

By waking up a little earlier and including a series of steps in his morning, he found that he was able to transform his day, and as a result, it has transformed the lives of millions of other readers.

"The Miracle Morning" will not only give you a recipe to starting your day, it will give you a variety of new ideas and inspiration so you can customize it for your own needs. If you are wanting to start the day off fresh, then "The Miracle Morning" is a must-read for you. At number seven, "Atomic Habits".

Atomic Habits

Now, for many years, I considered "The Power of Habit" by Charles Duhigg as the essential reading when it comes to starting or stopping habits, but that was until James Clear published "Atomic Habits".

Now, to give credit, James actually references some of Duhigg's work at the beginning of his book, but "Atomic Habits" is a much easier read and a much more actionable read so you can start applying the powers of habit-breaking or habit-starting right away.

There's a reason why "Atomic Habits" is still at the very top of most non-fiction best-seller lists and probably will be for many years to come. If you want to learn anything about habits, then this book is for you. Number six, "Never Split The Difference".

Never Split the Difference

Now, at first glance, you may think that this book doesn't fit into the productivity and time management category. After all, its focus is all on negotiations and negotiating strategy. However, as author Chris Voss points out, our entire lives are made up of negotiations.

And no, I'm not just talking about buying and selling. Anyone that you have a conversation with, anytime that you are trying to put across an idea, you are negotiating at some level. "Never Split The Difference" is one of the most entertaining nonfiction books I have ever read, why? Because Chris Voss spent most of his career

negotiating real-life hostages around the world. He takes those very extreme situations, which hopefully many of us will never be involved with, and shows the tactics which he has used and are applicable in our everyday lives.

So whether you are wanting to improve your business, improve your relationships, or maybe just get your kids to watch a little less screen time, "Never Split The Difference" might just be the productivity book which will transform the way that you speak with others.

Now, if you've enjoyed this book list so far, you're going to love Shortform. Shortform is my go-to place for detailed and actionable book summaries.

So whether I'm looking for that new book to read or maybe I just want to browse through and get the key points of a bestseller, I can go to Shortform and find exactly what I want. Shortform does a great job of distilling the most important and crucial parts of any book.

And best of all, if I want to choose to listen, rather than read the summary, I can do so here as well. If you'd like to start using Shortform for free and read the summaries of all the books in today's video, go to shortform.com/simpletivity or click the link in the description below. At number five, "Essentialism" by Greg McKeown.

Essentialism

If there's one thing we can all relate to, it is feeling that constant pressure to do more

in less time. But the book "Essentialism" reminds us that when we say yes too often,

‍

and sometimes without thinking, we are saying no to a long list of other opportunities. Author Greg McKeown shows us real-world examples and real people

who are starting to live the essentialist lifestyle of doing less, but better. Yes, you can achieve more and you can do it with a clearer head just by making a few adjustments as a part of your day, and perhaps, with the way that you live your life.

"Essentialism" is a very practical book and can really help us reflect on what is most important to us and what are some things that we may be able to put aside or ignore altogether. If you're looking to make a significant but important change,

"Essentialism" may be the read for you. Number four, "How Will You Measure Your Life?"

How Will You Measure Your Life?

When you get to the very end and look back on your life, will you look back with a big smile on your face or may you question some of the decisions and choices you made along the way?

In "How Will You Measure Your Life?"? Clayton M. Christensen highlights and asks some very important questions to help us reflect and help us to make better decisions moving forward. This particular book holds a very special place on my bookshelf.

Why? Because in two separate circumstances, this book has influenced two major career adjustments which I have made over the course of my life.

I feel that this book is so valuable that I actually try to read it every three years or so, just to reset myself and see if I'm making the right decisions for me, not only to play to my strengths, but so I can better the lives of those around me.

Whether you're looking to make a big or small change in your life, "How Will You Measure Your Life?" will help you answer some of life's most important questions. Number three, "The 4 Disciplines of Execution".

The 4 Disciplines of Execution

I actually first read this book when I was a manager of a team and found it incredibly helpful. While the way this book is written is still very much focused on managers and team leads, in my opinion, this is the very best book when it comes to goal setting,

and more importantly, goal achieving. In fact, I use these four disciplines in my own business, and use them to achieve my own personal goals as well.

If you're looking for a concrete plan, which is repeatable and which has found success in almost every industry, then I would recommend that you pick up "The 4 Disciplines of Execution". Number two, "The One Thing".

The One Thing

If you've ever joined me for one of my live workshops or virtual seminars, you know that I speak very highly of "The One Thing". And in particular, one of the key questions,

which is shared within the book. Author Gary Keller outlines how we are distracted in so many ways and how we can properly prioritize what we should be doing next.

One of the great things about the one thing is that you can use them for big, significant projects, but you can also use it for the very next thing on your task list.

It contains a wealth of real-world examples and things that you can start to apply

both in your life, but also in your career right away. Now, just before I reveal my number one pick on this list, let's take a quick look at some honorable mentions.

"Smarter Faster Better" by Charles Duhigg. Not only is Duhigg a very entertaining author, but this book summarizes some of the very best productivity tips. "12 Rules For Life" by Jordan Peterson.

This book attempts to address many of the complicated questions in which we face in today's modern world. "Range" by David Epstein. Why being more flexible can actually lead to greater success than staying in a very focused discipline. Number one, "Deep Work".

Deep Work

In a world where we are pulled in so many directions when it comes to distractions

in social media and/or technology, "Deep Work" is, in my opinion, the most profound and most important book of our age. Cal Newport is a prolific productivity writer,

but in "Deep Work", he gives us a template on how to eliminate distractions and expand our focus. Not only is "Deep Work" full of real-world examples,] some of them which may be controversial in our ever connected and fear-of-missing-out world,

but as Cal Newport points out, if we don't focus on what's most important and don't set enough time for it, how can we expect to achieve the things we want?

Now, do you agree with my choices for this list? If not, be sure to let me know in the comments down below, what are some of your favorite productivity books and where would you put them in your own personal rankings?

Remember, being productive does not need to be difficult, in fact, it's very simple.

Wrong way to create user guides

Would you like to create professional looking guides in just minutes? Well, in this video, I'm going to show you the easiest way to create step-by-step guides that your users will absolutely love. So let's dive in.

About 10 minutes ago, I started creating this user guide within Google docs and already I'm extremely frustrated and I'm only at step three.

Do you know how time consuming it is to write out every step and then go and grab that screenshot and then come back and paste it and then go to the next step? And then I got to go back and grab that screenshot.

And then, oh, did I remember the step in between. This took me 10 minutes to complete already, and I don't even have any highlights within this particular user guide.

Meanwhile, earlier today I took just 55 seconds to create this nine step guide which includes links, which includes highlights. And I didn't enter in any of this text and look at how beautiful and easy this guide is to read.

How did I do it? By using a free tool called Scribe. And yes, you heard that right, it's free. With scribe, I can create documentation, training materials, how-to guides, or maybe even for my own purposes. So I can remember how to do that complicated thing in QuickBooks.

How to create a Scribe guide

So let me show you how it works. Here I am within my Scribe dashboard and as you can see, I've already created several Scribes.

Now the great thing about Scribes is that they're easy to share and they're also easy to edit if I ever need to come back and make some minor changes but let's go ahead and create a Scribe from scratch.

All we need to do is come up here to the top and select new.

And when you have the extension installed, you can also access it from your browser as well. I'm going to select new Scribe in this case. And either it can help me launch a new tab or I want to show people how to do something or find something within Google Drive.

So I'm going to select Google Drive. The capture has started, indicated also by this flashing icon in the bottom left hand corner. Now, Scribe is not recording any of my audio. In fact, I'm not wasting any time just by moving my cursor around,

because scribe is only going to record my actions. It's going to take a look at where I am clicking or what text I am entering. And it's going to record all of that and produce a beautiful how-to guide. So in this case, I'm going to come down here and I'm going to right click on this file and I'm going to select share.

And then on this screen, I'm going to go and find someone to share this with. I'm going to select that individual here. I'm going to change them from an editor to a viewer. And then I'm going to come up to this icon.

This is what a lot of people miss or don't realize that there's some additional settings and I'm going to uncheck both of these boxes.

I'm going to go back and then I'm going to hit send. So as you can see, that only took me a few seconds, less than a minute to do all of those different steps, but let's go and see what Scribe is going to do. When I'm ready, I can come down here, click on the icon. I can either pause my recording.

I can delete this particular scribe. I can always move these controls if they happen to be in the way. But in my case, I'm just going to say complete recording. And in a new tab, it's going to show me my scribe

Editing your user guide

so I can review it and make any changes if necessary. At the very top, it's going to give maybe some type of default title because I happen to be in Google Drive but I'm going to say this is, this was How To Change Share Settings.

Maybe something like that. I can even give it a unique icon if I want here. And because Google is often a little more associated with maybe a green color here. I kind of like that document though. Let's keep with that document.

Down below, it shows that there are a total of 13 steps and it took me 57 seconds to record, but chances are I probably could have done that in 25 seconds if I wasn't narrating what I was doing. So down below the very first step is to navigate two.

And yes, it's even going to record your URL, because that's probably going to be helpful if you're directing someone to a particular website or a particular application. The great thing is is that all of this is editable.

So for example, if I don't want them to go to that full length there, I can just delete what I don't need. And boom, it's still going to be clickable for the user. Go to drive.google.com. Starting in step two, you can see that scribe has recorded all of my actions in detail.

Yes, I right clicked on this particular image. It will even have this helpful circle color showing exactly where I clicked. Then I clicked shared and then I clicked on this box as well. And an additional built in bonus is that scribe is zooming in on my actions. You can see here, it hasn't just taken a screenshot of everything.

It has zoomed in specifically on the icon or in this case the dropdown in which I selected. Now you can make changes to this.

If you want to pull it back a little bit more, or maybe you want to pan it around, you can do so, but I love how without even changing a single thing, I could probably go ahead and just send this off to the person whom I want to share this with. Now, each of these stages can be editable.

So for example, in this step down below, I did start to type in the letters Sc to search for this email address but you know what, I'm actually going to remove that step.

So I'm going to say delete, because I think this is pretty self explanatory and no,

I don't want them to click or search for that particular user. So I can come in here and edit this. Maybe I can say search for the user you want to share the file with, something like that.

So each of these stages are editable. If I want to, I can also come in here and edit the image as well. So if I'd like to crop that image or maybe I want to annotate, maybe I want to really specify a particular area.

I can create an arrow such as this. I also like that scribe has added a redact forever area. So for example, maybe I want to make sure that we are not sharing other people's email addresses down below.

So I can just cover over this area. And I can say done here in the top right hand corner and now we're returned to my scribe. It's going to update that image. So we've got the arrow and now those email addresses are removed as well.

Sharing your guide with others

Now, when we're all happy with our scribe, the very next step would be to come

and share it with someone else. Now, probably the easiest way is going to be

to copy that link. And if I open up a new incognito window, I'm just going to paste it in here. You can see it's exactly what we saw in the editing mode. Of course they can't edit it, but things like the link.

Perfect. They can go directly to their drive account. They can come through here and see all of the steps in which we recorded but that's not the only way in which we can share. If you would like to share directly from scribe,

you can enter in the email addresses of those that you'd like to share your guide with.

Or we can also export it in a variety of ways, probably exporting as a PDF makes the most sense or is going to be the easiest for people. Just show you very quickly what that PDF will look like.

Essentially what we saw before, but nice and clean, direct, easy to follow and so much quicker than recording a video. Quicker for you, because it takes you only a few seconds or minutes to produce and quicker for them to digest,

because maybe they just need to skip down to step number eight, for example, and they don't want to have to sit through the first three or four minutes of your video.

Now you can create and share as many guides as you want for free. And if you need to record things out of your browser, you can upgrade to this scribe pro plan.

To get started with scribe and to create your first how-to guide, be sure to click the link in the description down below. And if you enjoyed this video, you're going to love these free Chrome extensions that will help you get the most out of your day.

Remember, being productive does not need to be difficult. In fact, it's very simple.

Why sending bulk emails is valuable

There are so many reasons why you may want to send the exact same email

to multiple recipients. So in this video, I'm going to share with you two methods

in which you can do so right here within Gmail. Hello, everyone. Scott Friesen here at Simpletivity helping you to get more done and enjoy less stress. And perhaps the number one reason to send one email to multiple recipients is so that you can save time.

Rather than having to write out that message over and over again, or copy and paste the same message here, why don't we just write one message and then send it out to 50, 100, or maybe even 1,000 recipients at once?

Well, here within Gmail, I've started to craft a particular email. And in this example, perhaps I'm promoting a sales event, or a special deal. I've got the subject line and I've got the body of the email. But let's come up to the Recipients section here.

Send email with Blind Carbon Copy

You're familiar with the two field. You're probably using that most frequently. And you might be familiar with the CC field, which stands for carbon copy. But what you might not be as familiar with is the BCC field, which stands for blind carbon copy.

The difference with BCC is that everyone included in the BCC line will not see anyone else in the BCC line. So they'll receive the email and feel as if it was created just for them.

Now, remember, anyone in the BCC line will see if you include someone in either the two or the CC line. So for our example, we're going to leave those blank and we're just going to include names here in the BCC field.

Now, you could go ahead and enter in those email addresses one at a time. But if we're dealing with a lot of addresses, you're probably going to want to make use of copy and paste. Here, I already have a spreadsheet. And I'm just going to go ahead and copy these email addresses here,

and then I'm going to come back to my message. And I'm going to paste them in the BCC file. So here you can see all of the names and all of the email addresses listed here. And, remember, even though I have roughly 30 addresses here on the receiving end, they're going to have only their name present.

They're not going to see anyone else because I've included them here within that BCC field. Now, the one thing that you're going to want to note before hitting that Send button is double checking the body of that message. One of the downsides of using the BCC line within Gmail is

that we can't customize any parts of the message. So, for example, I can't say, "Hi, Leota," or, "Hi, Sage," because everyone would see that on their end. I have to leave it at Hi, comma.

And I can't say anything specific about their company, maybe the city or the state that they live in, because, otherwise, everyone would receive that within the message. So you will need to keep your message somewhat generic.

But at this stage, I'm going to go ahead and hit Send. And, now, that message has been sent

to all of those addresses. Now, just to show you what this looks like on the receiving end, here is the message from my test account. Here's that "Special Sales Event Just For You." So I'm going to open up this email.

I can see who it's from, but you can see that there's no one else listed here. Even though there were 33 listed on that BCC line,

it says if this message was sent just to me. So you can be rest assured that you can send a bulk email to many recipients without disclosing those other email addresses.

Gmail plus Google Sheet template method

But what if we want a simpler way to do this and have the ability to add some personalization? Well, in that case, we're going to want to make use of a Mail Merge feature.

Now, if you type in Gmail Mail Merge, the number one result will be this one here from Google itself. Now I could spend the rest of the video walking you through this particular solution, but I won't. And here's why. It's not simple.

It's not easy. And there's actually a lot of room for error, which is the last thing I want you to do

when you're sending out emails to perhaps hundreds of recipients. At the very top, it says that this is for a beginner level, but coding level beginner. Yes, if you have a background in coding or software development, this is fairly straightforward.

But there is still too much room for error.

Customize your bulk emails with mail merge

So instead, we're going to take advantage of the Right Inbox Gmail extension.

Now I've talked about Right Inbox in the past because it's so much more than just a mail merge feature. But I'm going to show you just how easy it is to set up a mail merge and track and personalize those messages right from within your Gmail account.

So with the Right Inbox extension installed, I now have access to this Mail Merge button, which appears directly above my Compose button. So rather than starting my message here, I'm actually going to start by selecting Mail Merge.

And here you can see some of the other mail merge campaigns which I've either set up in advance or one that is currently running and has started to send a number of those emails. To get started, all we need to do is select this Create Campaign button.

And our first step is to choose how we want to add our email recipients. Now, if you only have a small handful, maybe a dozen or fewer, you may want to add them manually and just type them in.

However, for anything larger, it might be more efficient for you to upload a CSV file. So in this case, I'm going to go ahead and upload that same file which I copied from in the first example. Now, when it comes to the contents of your file, you can add as much or as little detail as necessarily.

Yes, of course, your file must contain an email column. However, in this case, you'll notice, I've also included the first name, last name, and the name of the company in which they are associated with.

This is actually quite helpful because I'm going to start to use these other fields as a part of my customization. So back within Gmail, all I need to do is go and select my specific CSV file.

How to add merged fields to your email message

In this case, I'm going to upload it and say Upload CSV. And now I'm ready to start creating my email. Now, you'll see that the editor looks a little bit different but we still have all of the features and functions of a regular Gmail message, including indentation, bold, italic, and even the ability to insert images and links.

So on the subject line, maybe this is a "Special Sales Event," right? That's going to be the title of my line here. And when it comes to the body, this is where we get to personalize specific aspects.

So rather than just saying, "Hi," isn't it a lot more personable if I say, Hi, first name, such as, "Hi, Scott," or, "Hi, Charlene," for example. By adding this Insert Merge Field, it's going to include their specific name.

And here you can see the other three headers. First, last, and company name just as you saw in my previous CSV file.

Now down below, I can say something, like maybe, "We are looking forward to serving," and here I'm going to insert the company name, "serving company name in 2023," or inviting them to a conference, or whatever the purpose of your email happens to be.

Now, in this case, I'm not going to add anything further, but I could add other details. If your CSV file contains information such as the product they last purchased, or perhaps the region of the world in which they live in,

Adding automatic follow-up messages

well, you can include that here as well. Now, a very powerful feature here within Right Inbox is that we can add a follow-up in addition to the original email. So down below, if I wish to, I can say, add a follow up.

And maybe in this case, if they haven't replied to me in just three days, I want to send a special follow-up message. Now, we have a few other options here as well, including if they have opened up the email, maybe the following day after they open the email, I want to send a special message. Maybe if I've included a particular link, I want to send a special message as well.

You can add multiple follow-ups, not just the one, based on your specific needs. Now, in this example, I'm going to remove that follow-up, but this is a very powerful feature right here within Right Inbox.

Next up, let's hit Preview just to see if everything is looking the way we want to. At the top, it's going to show the actual email address which is going to send it out to. And I can see it's going to say, "Hi Lenna, we are looking forward to serving Feltz Printing Service in 2023." 

"Hi Donette, we are looking forward  to serving Printing Dimensions in 2023." Now, of course, you don't need to go through each and everyone. But it might be a smart idea to preview a couple of them just to make sure that your formatting is correct.

But you can see how much more personal, how much more engaging these emails will be since they're addressed to a specific individual

and include some very specific information about them.

Confirm and send out emails

Our very last step is to confirm and schedule this Mail Merge email. Now we can choose a date in the future, a specific date and time. We can also enable link tracking. So if you want to track when a recipient clicks a link in your email, or when they open that email.

This can be especially helpful so that you can reply or engage with them at the appropriate time. The last thing here is you need to be made aware

of the daily message limit within Gmail. There is a 250 daily limit. So if you want to be within that limit, you may need to send out these emails at a smaller batch per day. Now, for myself, we're perfectly fine because we're under that limit.

So I'm going to say 50 per day is absolutely fine. And I just need to acknowledge at this particular step. Lastly, in the top right hand corner, I'm going to select Start Mail Merge. And, congratulations. It will start running at approximately this time later today.

I'm going to return to my campaigns. And now I can see this one that I just created has started to run, is scheduled to go, but I can go back and review the data from my other campaigns as well. And look at all this valuable information.

How many were actually sent? How many have replied?] How many have opened? How many were clicked? And how many perhaps were bounced? Maybe you don't have the correct email address. In my case here, this is because I'm using sample data.

So almost all of those email addresses are fake email addresses, but valuable information that you can use in the future. Now, if you enjoyed this Gmail tutorial, you'll love my video on how to get the most out of filters and labels.

Remember, being productive does not need to be difficult. In fact, it's very simple.