Business Tools

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Awesome resource for promoting your Direct Sales business –> Promoting Direct Sales

PARTY PRESENTATIONS & HOSTESS HELPERS

Business Enhancements: Lots of handy things for your business (stickers, folders, lapboards, etc.)

The Booster: stickers and buttons

Online Invitations: evite, pingg, my punchbowl, crusher, whoozin

Phonevite: Great for guest reminder calls!

 

HOSTESS GIFTS AND GAME PRIZES

My Girlfriend’s House: Cute cellophane bags to put smaller products in for customer delivery (USE CODE: tenoffmr10 at check out to get 10% off your order)

Express Yourself Online: Lots of great novelty items for your Direct Sales business

Novelty stores like the ones listed below have great gift ideas too (type in a theme like “purse” or “kitchen” depending on your product line and see all the fun things that come up).

Dollar Tree
Party City
Oriental Trading Company
Windy City Novelties
Century Novelty
Shindigz
Birthday Express
M&N Party Store
My M&M’s

 

APPOINTMENT SCHEDULING

Google Calendar (watch THIS VIDEO on how to sync your Google Calendar on someone else’s iPhone)

Schedule Once

TimeTrade (how to set up a Time Trade appointment calendar for your DS business is part of one of my upcoming free webinar trainings.  Click HERE to sign up!)

GenBook

TimeBridge

Doodle

Efficient Lady’s Organizer

 

CLIENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS

Oprius

The Client Angel

Efficient Lady’s Organizer is a personal information management package specially designed for ladies! It has a fashionable and pretty interface – a choice only of happy and demanding ladies! Many great features such as time management, contact manager, planner, reminder, diary, notepad, password manager, and more…are integrated in just one package. Various measures such as password protection and automatic backup can guarantee your data security. With the built-in one-click search similar to Google you can quickly find what you want from within your massive personal information. A text editor similar to Microsoft Word is integrated for you to write diary, notes and comments at any time. A lady’s day, starts from opening Efficient Lady’s Organizer!  Try it for FREE.  Click here to learn more and download a free trail.

 

TIME MANAGEMENT

Schedule Once

ohdontforget.com

www.erincondren.com: life planners, great personalized calendars to organize your life and business

Efficient Lady’s Organizer

 

EMAIL NEWSLETTERS

Constant Contact: This is a paid service but well worth the investment.  You can try Constant Contact Email Marketing free for 60 days to see if it fits your needs.  Every free trial includes a subscription offer for their email marketing best practices newsletter and coaching tips on how to get started with email marketing–very valuable information!
Mail Chimp (this is the one I use and it’s FREE up to your first 2000 contacts)
Mad Mimi: Another great email marketing service that has a free plan (up to 2,500)
My Newsletter Builder
iContact
aWeber

Emails for Small Business with Constant Contact

 

EVENT SITES – REGISTRATION, RSVPS, TICKET SALES

EventBrite: Click here to start for free.  Great site for setting up events and collecting contact information.

 

BUSINESS SUPPLIES/HOME OFFICE

www.vistaprint.com: business cards, business supplies
http://www.moxicopy.com: 3 cent black/white copies and 5 cent color copies!
www.envelopes.com: bright pink bulk envelopes for hostess/lead packets and new catalog mailings

 

RECORD KEEPING AND TAXES

BizXpenseTracker <–my FAVORITE expense tracking and mile-logging app
Expensify.com

Visit the TAXES resource page for tips and the APPS page for more great apps.

 

VIDEO

YouTube, Vimeo, eyejot

 

MEETINGS, CONFERENCE CALLS, WEBINARS

www.joinme.com or join.me – screen sharing
www.freeconferencecalling.com: website to set up your own conference call line for your team
signupgenius.com – is a great way to organize events and get people to volunteer

 

SCREEN RECORDING & VIDEO SOFTWARE

Camtasia – This is the one I use for most of my training videos on Facebook and YouTube. Camtasia is a powerful screen recorder program that can capture anything on your screen. It is loaded with awesome features and has lots of free training tutorials.  You can record your entire screen, single applications, or part of your display, save your screencasts in multiple formats, upload directly to YouTube, and more. You can quickly edit audio tracks separate from the video, so you can narrate what you’ve recorded later and then combine the tracks into a final video, and more.  Very easy to use.  Camtasia is from the makers of SnagIt!, another highly recommended program.  Camtasia is not free but worth the investment.  You can try it for yourself with a free trial.  Learn more HERE.

Others to consider would be Screenflow (Mac), Screencast-o-Matic, Screenr, CamStudio, and ezvid just to name a few.  I’ve worked with many, but Camtasia and SnagIt! are the best.

 

SMART PHONE APPS

Buy or plan to buy a smart phone! View a list with links and descriptions by clicking HERE.
Apps I use and recommend:  Google Voice, MyConsultant, BizXpense Tracker, Checkout Helper, Inventory Now, Expensify, Google Translator, Genius Scan, Square, Pocket Parties, Photon, and many more!

www.google.com/voice — Google Voice — offers you a FREE phone number in any area code. The phone number is forwardable to any phone and if you do not answer the forward it goes to your Google Voice Mailbox you set up.

1. It is totally FREE!
2. You can get as many phone numbers as you want, and you can SPELL words too — like AVON, TUPP, FREE, etc.
3. This allows every single person on your team to have a “business line” for their business without giving their actual cell phone number to customers. It will still come to their cell, it just shows up as the Google Voice Number if the caller is not already in their address book, so you KNOW it is a business call.
4. The missed call goes to your Google Voice Mail and it is a 100% business greeting there, that you record, verses a personal cell phone message.
5. A caller leaves a message and Google voice translates it into text and TEXTS you the message!!
6.You can text from your Google Voice account page!
7. You can get numbers in different area codes, so if you wanted to do some advertising in another state, you could get an area code and local exchange right there in that area! People might be more inclined to call a local number.
8. You can get a different phone number for each avenue of advertising you do, so you know what advertising is working and what is not.

 

LEADERSHIP RESOURCES

TrainersWarehouse This site offers hundreds of effective, innovative and fun products for trainers and educators across all industries.  Popular products that improve retention and make training more engaging include game show templates and buzzers, icebreaker and team-building games,”fiddles,” presentation software, debriefing tools, tactile memory joggers, and achievement rewards.

Baudville: Great resource site for team recognition tools and ideas.

 

 

DIRECT SALES GURUS:

Dana Wilde <–Author of my FAVORITE book, Train Your Brain.
Get free training HERE.

Julie Anne Jones <–Systems and Organization Genius!

Deb Bixler  (see also www.createacashflowshow.com)

Karen Clark <–GREAT Facebook Tips

Karen Phelps  (Lots of free booking webinars, see also www.karenphelps.net)

Mary Christensen (Best-selling author on various Direct Sales topics)

Lyndsey Baigent (Discover your natural gifts, known as “The Booking Queen”)

Teresa Garrison (Leadership, Team-building)

Jane Deuber (co-founder of DSWA)

Belinda Ellsworth (The Power Hour)

Jennifer Fitzgerald (creator of The Client Angel)

Lynsey Jones (Systems for running your DS business efficiently)

Christie Northrup (aka the “Lemonaid Lady”)

Becky Spieth (Christian/Faith-based Direct Sales trainer)

Nicki and Grace Keohohou (co-founders of DSWA)

Steve Wiltshire

Shari Hudspeth

Pat Pearson

Sue Rusch

Julie Henderson

Dr. Steve Taubman

Tammy Stanley

 

LEADERSHIP, ENTREPRENEURSHIP, BUSINESS, WEALTH, SUCCESS GURUS:

Anthony Robbins
Robert Kiyosaki
John Assaraf
Dave Ramsey
Wayne Dyer
Dani Johnson
Dave Ramsey
Napolean Hill
Abraham Hicks

 

PODCASTS, ONLINE RADIO SHOWS, TELESEMINARS:

The Mind Aware Tele-Seminar
Deb Bixler’s CashFlowShowRadio
Home Business Radio Network

 

BOOKS:

A reading list is available here: READING LIST.