I know it takes time to plan a little Architecture. Sure it’s easier to set it up as you go (I’ll remember my password- I use the same one every time- that always works til it doesn’t). You can always come back later to connect the dots. Right? You can add the foundation after you build the house. Can’t you? Well I guess you can but my question to you is which is easier? To lay the foundation before you begin or to come back, jack up the house and add it later. The former may appear to get you moving faster but the latter will cost you far more time and money later.

Do you find yourself opting for the short term gain of taking action when compared with the long term gain of planning which saves time and money? I’m not talking strategy. I’m not talking business plans. I’m talking some architecture. Some decisiveness. Now I agree with the refinement approach. I say get it out there. I’ve written about perfection versus imperfection. I’m all for shipping as Seth Godin might say, but not at the expense of thinking just a wee bit first laddy.

Example- you get moving so fast that you look up and notice you have:

• 2 domain registrars
• 3 hosting companies
• 2 webmail accounts, one Gmail account a and a Yahoo account
• 2 CRM’s
• 2 personal facebook accounts (whoops didn’t realize the fan page was for your business)
• Several websites on different platforms with broken links and no taxonomy whatsoever

What could have been different if you’d made some architectural decisions along the way? We’re going to host with Hostgator or Bluehost. We’re registering all our domains with Godaddy. We are going to host our email and calendar sharing with a corporate Google Apps account. We are going to set up Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and LinkedIn correctly the first time. We’re going to document our passwords along the way in a secure but retrievable place. We’re going to put together a quick sitemap before we launch the next micro site or blog. We are going to collaborate with Basecamp. I’m an affiliate of some of these but they aren’t links so I guess I’m cool.

Pause, Think, Decide ( A Committed One), Ship, Refine, Repeat

OK this is a loaded post. I use godaddy to register my domains. I even have a reseller account with them since I consult with small businesses and non profits. I host a couple sites with them and use their template builder for a couple sites as well. Primarily I register with godaddy and then change the nameservers at godaddy to point to Media Temple where I host all my wordpress blogs and blog/websites. Media Temple has a one click application and grid hosting plan that I like.

Now here is my key to organizing domains. Stop buying them compulsively. You know who you are. I am so guilty of this. I get a creative idea or thought- boom, I buy a domain. It’s only $9-$10 bucks with godaddy. Here’s the kicker. When you buy 30 to 40 to 50 of these puppies over the course of a year, they start renewing on you like 3 per month. That’s $30-$40 bill each month.

Here are couple tips I have used lately to tame this domain madness.

1. I set up my view in my control panel to see what domains I have, when they renew, and whether of not they are forwarded. That’s pretty much all I care about.
2. I eliminate all the .nets I have purchased. Since I have .com, I’m not too worried about someone else getting .net. What does it matter anymore? They’ll just come up with a creative play on words or get .tv or .us or .me. So I don’t know that you are really protecting your brand that much if you do buy up all the different extensions. One exception to this that I have been toying with lately is buying the .com and .net or .whatever and using one for my main blog and the other for a website or ning social network site. Just a thought.
3. I really analyze which domains I have purchased and which ones I’m using or will use. I let the others expire. Yes I know it’s crazy. I can hear the murmurs now. “As soon as I throw something away I need it.” You cannot wait until you get a notice of a annual renewal, because you will not take the time to log in and take the renewal off of autopilot.
4. Since many domains I purchase are catchy names that I want to advertise with, I try to make sure the splash page or forwarding is set up. The problem with this is setting up landing pages for multiple sales pages takes a long time. Are you going to load each one with Google Anayltics and track it as well. Before long your business will be SEO, web design, and online marketing- when you actually own a coffee shop, sell houses or do free lance consulting. The other problem is that Google Adwords and organic seaches really don’t like it when you forward domains. One alternative to splash pages is to create Squidoo lenses, but don’t be spammy.
5. Last but not least- do not register with multiple registrars and hosting companies. You will create a nightmare of web architecture and you will save a couple dollars. I have worked with some customers organizing their computers or offices and others with blogs and online marketing. It can take days to reconnect the dots when you have domains registered with 2 different resellers, yahoo, godaddy, bluehost, hostmonster, etc. It’s the equivalent of spending 2 hours, and 2 gallons of gas saving $8 shopping, by driving all over the city to 3 different stores.

So to summarize.

• Buy less domains by actually thinking “will I use this and when.”
• Periodically log in and take inventory of the domains you have renewing soon. Take them off autorenew and they will be canceled with no more effort on your part.
• If you have multiple domains for sales purposes- set up your sales pages or forwards and use them. Set a deadline and get it done- or admit you won’t and cancel them.
• Buy what you need now unless it’s a really big idea that you want to act on in the future. Maybe a blog you’d like to start, a social network you’d like to build or a book you’d like to write.

Hope this helped.

OK, this video should be pretty self explanatory. I’m organizing my backpack for the first time in months. You know the thing I carry with me daily, transporting all my key work tools and belongings. I touch it everyday of my life. I put things in it, take things out and it’s probably with me more than my wife and kiddos. So why would it be one of the last frontiers of organization in my world? Because it became second nature and blended in.

This video is two parts and the second one cuts off at the end. My cell camera ran out of memory. Our main camera was out of batteries. We buy those things once a quarter and Murphy’s law got us. My Macbook isight camera was too stationary for this shot. I apologize for the muted somewhat bumpy shot, but listening to my explanation should help you tackle your own small organizing project.

Part 1

Organizing my Backpack from Bryce Raley on Vimeo.

Part 2

Organizing my Backpack part 2 from Bryce Raley on Vimeo.

Here are links to some of the items in the video.

Retractable Mouse

Case Logic

Flash Drive

Moleskin Notebooks

Vibe Liquid Nutraceutical

OK I’ve done it. It took about two hours, but would have been much shorter had I not tried multitasking. Why did I multitask? The only exception I make for multitasking- watching sports, namely the NFL playoffs and Kentucky versus Louisville annual rivalry game in basketball.

I had let my Gmail inbox get way out of hand lately. I have followed David Allens GTD system in the past, by addressing emails when they show up if they take less than two minutes to address. I also had created a series of @ labels to capture next actions. For example @ read/review and @ add to database and @ waiting for. The missing ingredient was a whole lot of elimination. I realized last week that I cannot keep up with the endless emails coming into my inbox on a weekly basis, nor do I want to. It’s not like they all lead to profit. Between comments from my blogs, twitter and facebook notifications, email newsletters, email advertisements (why can’t everybody send one update per week max), customer conversations, billing statements, reminders, and everything else; I could no longer find the important messages amongst the clutter. After reading a few other blogs and books, and using organizing principles I decided to tackle this problem of information overload via email.

1. I decided that I would much rather get my content from RSS (google reader) than from email newsletters. If the ezine (email newsletter) I was subscribed to had a blog with an RSS feed, then I subscribed to the feed and unsubscribed to the ezine. This presents a small issue because some, myself included, send ezines and do blog posts. Here is the difference: I only send one very well organized weekly ezine. Everything else is posted to my blogs. If I couldn’t get the feed or the ezine had different content, oh well. I have the websites bookmarked and I can always go there if I really want to check in on the authors latest information. This cut back drastically on the number of incoming emails I was getting.
2. I decided to unsubscribe to all email ads. Even the really cool ones from Apple, 37 signals, and Igourmet. It didn’t take much will power to boot the uncool like Vistaprint. I love their printing for certain products but I don’t want to hear from them every time someone at their office uses the bathroom. This cut out a lot more incoming mail.
3. I turned off many of my reminders and notifications, except Twitter. I love Twitter and really feel it’s useful. Although lately, many people have stopped answering the question and started using Twitter as 2nd email.
4. I deleted all the unread ezines and updates in my @ read/review label (works like a folder except better for non Gmail users). Let’s face it I wasn’t going to sit down and read all 200 backlogged ezines. If it was important enough it will be recycled.
5. I consolidated many of the labels I had created to store my mail. Google already has great search features for finding your messages and they give you so much storage space you don’t really need to delete. I love to delete though. It’s liberating. I do label and archive most semi important messages. When consolidating my labels I looked for common bonds when sorting through my system. For instance I took all funny emails, political emails and neat stories and put them into a label called Keepers. Then I purged the labels for Funny, Politics and Misc. In Gmail you can edit any message or multiple messages by selecting the email via clicking it and then by clicking “More Actions” new label or existing labels. The cool thing about Gmail verus using a folder system is that messages can have multiple labels. Maybe you got an email that was from a customer but pertained to a software or blog they recommended. You might want to label it with both the customers name and the new blog.
6. Now my inbox is empty. My @ read/review can now be managed on a weekly basis. I batch (let it accumulate and do it all at once to avoid start up time and task switching) this activity for Saturday afternoons or Sundays while watching football, basketball or golf. It’s not power reading and doesn’t require a lot of concentration, so I just quickly sift through and see which ones interest me.
7. Last I use the star function in Gmail to star the emails that require a next action. These would be responses, info requests, passwords or billing info to print or record for future reference. This could also be a thread that needs a reply. I like to use a @ waiting label for emails that have been sent or that require someone else to act.

Now that I’ve given you a game plan, get on top of your email inbox this month. January is a great time to clear out the clutter and close those open loops in your head. The fact that your inbox in cluttered up probably means that you don’t know what you might be missing. Here is the rub. It may be nothing and all your worry is for naught, or it could be a very important opportunity that is going unaddressed. Don’t procrastinate it any longer. Block out a couple hours with no task switching and get er done.

Here is a list of topics that we may organize during January to promote “Get Organized Month”.

1. My Documents- Finder in MAC
2. My PC
3. My Backup Files
4. My Delicious Bookmarks
5. My Fridge
6. My Pantry
7. My Physical Files
8. My Supplies
9. My Pictures on PC and Flickr
10. My MAC
11. My Backpack Account
12. My Contacts in Google and Highrise
13. My Domains
14. My Blog Posts
15. My Van
16. My Garage
17. My Wife’s Craft Room
18. My Wireless Network
19. My Home Office
20. My Notes
21. My Books
22. My Email and Labels(folders)
23. My Google Reader
24. My Children’s Toys
25. My Shed
26. My Closets
27. My Fireproof Safe
28. My 2009 Calendar
29. My Equipment
30. My Itunes
31. My Basecamp Account

To start with:

37 Signals products- Highrise-Basecamp-Backpack- Now we can share pages and update them with task lists, notes, pictures and files. We can organize the info and act on it seamlessly.

Copilot- now I can sit at my computer and fix yours by actually taking over your mouse and looking at your screen. This happens with a simple link I send you and takes 30 seconds to download.

Apeer- Now we could share and edit documents, videos and photos in a live environment. This is not sharing- it’s better.

Gotomeeting- we can conduct live webinars or meetings from the comfort of our own offices. I can train you or your staff to work better, and use their stuff better.

These are just a few. Their are so many new ones each day I have trouble keeping up. Somebody has to sift the tools and show you how they make your business work better.

Now that I’ve switched from Outlook (It makes my stomach turn when I see it open on someone else’s screen these days), I am learning how to use Gmail more effectively. I am very amateur on the true power of Gmail at this point. I am however, getting very good at transitioning small business customers to Gmail and other Google apps. This would include setting up the accounts, imapping old folders, popping multiple accounts, creating labels and other handling other administrative tasks.

I haven’t had enough time to figure out the little tweaks that will I’m sure make Gmail even more efficient and effective. Organizing is much different in Gmail than in say Outlook or web-based email clients. Instead of creating a series of folders, and then moving an email to a particular folder for reference later; Gmail’s labeling system with the use of tags (Web 2.0 concept- I guess, but I could be speaking out of turn), allows users to tag an email with several labels instead of putting it into one folder. Although dragging and dropping an email into one solitary folder is simpler on the surface- and I love simpler- labels in the long run are much more intuitive. Need a for instance- here you go.

Say you get an email of a receipt from your backpack account. Well in my mind I need to label this with a star or with an @ action label, because I would like to print it for my tax file. I also want it labeled accounting. Just in case I needed to reference it by association, I may label it Backpack. Now six months from now if I needed to access this for tax purposes or to correct a bill, then I could by association look in one of two or three places. In the old way of doing it. I would be forced to choose one folder that best associates with the email. Well I probably couldn’t make that decision at that point, so I would just procrastinate and leave it in my inbox.

I’m still getting used to not dragging and dropping files but I can see the benefit in this new method of labels/tags.

It seems like syncing devices (except for Ipods) will soon be replaced by feeds and ical type applications. I know that I get ical type feeds in Google calendar and backpack and they can be sent directly to my phone via text or to GMail and Google Reader accounts. Since many smart phones/PDA’s and certainly the Iphone, all have nice web browsing and web functionality these days; why would we continue to need to physically sync a device to our desktop or laptop. I’m sure it won’t fade away that fast, but it might go away a little quicker that the VCR.

This is not a new revelation to anyone in the digital world. I am going to link to a video which explains how Google Reader increases the efficiency and organization of online reading. Most small business owners I meet are not using this time saving method of keeping up with their favorite blogs.

Instead of the old way (going out to each website, news site or blog site to see what they’re up to) you can read your online news the new way using feeds. RSS feeds are changing the way we get info.

Check out this video from Common Craft.

My wife and I probably don’t talk enough- I’m sure that’s the case as far as she is concerned. She is the one who told me that woman speak more than twice the number of words in a day as men do. So I thought I was off the hook. Not so much. Well when we need to talk about something important like issues of faith, parenting or date night; we sit down and discuss them face to face. I’m not suggesting you become a robot in dealing with your spouse or family, but for the little interruption conversations throughout the day- we’ve opted for the Backpack message board. I can make a quick post in the newsroom and my wife is immediately notified via email or text. Now instead of the old way (replying to a chain of six emails- which isn’t so bad in Gmail) you can each take time to reply to the post when you find the time. No more interruptions via phone calls or emails that need a reply. The whole conversation is right in front of you and it’s organized by all the different post topics.

Just this last week, My wife I had handled the following tasks within Backpack’s message board.

1. Dog’s vet trip, and which account to use for payment.
2. RSVP ing for a kids fall bonfire/hayride.
3. How to handle servicing the heater before we crank it on this year. It was 32 last night in Louisville, KY.
4. Fixing an incorrect medical bill.
5. Coordinating a dinner for friends of ours who just had a baby.
6. Registering for a class at church.
7. Preparing a list of things we needed for our monthly Costco trip.

These were just a few. When the task or issue is resolved we delete the message. Pretty simple. When we check email or blogs, we just check Backpack’s newsroom as well.

I’m sure there are a ton of other digital tools and programs that will also get the job done. Backpack is so intuitive that we opt for it.