Find Information Faster: Organize Your Computer

If you've been using your computer for more than 6 months, it's probably safe to say that you don't need all the files and email messages stored there. When left untreated too long, an unorganized computer will perform slower and make it more difficult for you to find the information you need. If that's the case, it's a great time to make sure your computer is cleaned up and ready to roll for your next upcoming project or assignment. This article can help you get started.

Clear out your old, unnecessary files
So how long should you keep old files on your hard drive? It's kind of like cleaning out a closet—if you haven't used a particular file (or sweater) in a year, you're pretty safe storing it somewhere else.

How can you tell how old a file is? Rest your mouse cursor over the file to see when it was last modified. For more information right-click the file, and choose Properties. You can see when the file was created, last modified it, and most recently accessed. If a file is old, not important, and hasn't been accessed in more than 6 months, it might be time to clear it out.

You're the best judge to determine which files to keep, but here is a list of items you might want to consider saving:

• Tax and legal information

• Project-related files

• Favorite digital images from the year

• Plans you could leverage for future projects

• Important email messages

• Customer information

This article is written by Microsoft at Work

Microsoft Excel 2007 - Print Gridlines and Headings

Printing gridlines and row and column headings often makes it easier to read data in a large spreadsheet.

Follow these steps to add print gridlines as well as row and column headings to your spreadsheet.

1. Click on the Page Layout tab.

2. Check the Print box under Gridlines on the ribbon.

3. Check the Print box under Headings on the ribbon.

4. Click on the Print Preview button to preview your worksheet
    before printing it.  The gridlines appear as dotted lines outlining
    the cells containing data in print preview.

The row numbers and column letters for those cells containing data will also be present along the top and left side of the worksheet in print preview.

To turn off this feature, go back into the Page Layout tab and “unclick” these options.

Microsoft 2007 - Moving Text Using the Mouse

Word incorporates many different tools you can use to edit your document. One of the least used, but most unique methods of editing your document uses the mouse entirely. You can use your mouse to move text, the same way you would move another element, such as a graphic. To move text with your mouse, you need to first ensure that the feature is enabled.

To do this, follow these steps:

1.  Click the Office button and then click Word Options.

2.  Click Advanced.

3.  Make sure the box beside the Allow Text to Be Dragged and
     Dropped option is selected. (The option is in the Editing section.)

4.  Click OK to close the dialog box.

Once enabled, you can use the mouse to move text by following these steps:

1.  Select the text you want to move.

2.  Click on the text with the mouse and drag it to where you want
     it moved.

3.  Release the mouse button.

Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 - Use a Keyboard Shortcut to Make Screen Black or White During a PowerPoint Slide Show

While you are presenting, sometimes it is necessary to pause for a few minutes either to ask or answer a question. Instead of leaving the current slide on the screen you can blank it out.

Your options are to choose to make the screen either black or white. The choice usually depends on how your screen will look due to the available lighting in the room.

•  During a slide show, press the B key on the keyboard to make
   the screen black.

•  During a slide show, press the W key on the keyboard to make
   the screen white.

When you wish to return to the slide show, press the B or W key (as the case may be) to return to the slide last shown.

Microsoft Excel 2007 - One Touch Excel Charts

Have you ever wanted to create a chart in a hurry or you just want to check on certain trends in your data? Would you be surprised to know that you can create a chart in Excel with a single keystroke?

Follow these simple steps:

1. Select the data you want to use in the chart.

2. Press the F11 key on the keyboard

The chart that is produced uses all the current defaults. If this isn’t the type of chart you want to produce when pressing F11 you need to change the default chart type.

Microsoft Word 2007 - Experiment with Paragraph Placement

Sometimes one paragraph might work better above or below its current location. You don’t have to cut and paste to move paragraphs around. Just follow these easy steps to move a paragraph around in your document.

1.  Hold down the Shift and Alt keys together

2.  While holding those keys down, then use the up and down arrow keys
     to move the paragraph around in the document.

3.  Release the Shift and Alt key when you have the paragraph in the
     correct location.

It’s a neat trick. Try it!

Holiday Cheer

Get a tissue before you watch this video! You'll cry happy tears. It's Deck the Halls sung by various and sundry animals. The cats, of course, steal the show!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-0WVfj76bo

Microsoft Tip - Clean Out Your Email

Do you have a system for weeding out and organizing your old email messages? Here are a few quick ideas for taming your Inbox and getting ready to handle those messages in the months to come:

•  Create folders to store messages according to sender, topic,
   or date.

•  Create email rules to file and manage your messages automatically.
   For example, you can create a rule to send all messages from your
   manager to a special folder.

•  Go through your Sent folder in Outlook in and delete items you
   no longer need (especially those with large file attachments).

•  If you're sure you no longer need email you've deleted,
   empty the folder that contains it.

This article is written by Microsoft at Work

Microsoft Power Point 2007 - Coordinate Your PowerPoint Presentation with Design Themes

Design themes are a new addition to PowerPoint 2007. They work in a similar way as the design templates in earlier versions of PowerPoint.

A really nice feature of the design themes is that you can immediately see the effect reflected on your slides, before making your decision.

1.  Access the Design Ribbon

2.  Click on the Design tab to access the Design ribbon.

3.  Hover your mouse over any of the design themes shown.

4.  The design is reflected immediately on your slide.

5.  Click the design theme when you find one that suits your needs.

Microsoft Excel 2007 - Change Text Orientation

When creating your spreadsheet you may want to change the orientation of your text. Sometimes you have those Excel tables where you have narrow columns but the title has a group of words and word wrapping will not look right. For problems like this, you can change the text orientation within that cell.

To change text orientation:

1. Select the text you want to rotate, angle, or switch to vertical.

2. Click Alignment in the Home Ribbon.

3. Choose how you want to format your text.

1 Woman with 0 Budget Gets 20 Million Views

Amazing!  One woman has had 20 million views on YouTube and has 20,000 Facebook Fans.  If she can do it, you can do it. It's the content!

Read the article and be inspired!

Microsoft Word 2007 - Using the Spike to Edit

Word has a feature that allows you to collect groups of text and paste them in another location. It is different than the Clipboard, which allows you to work with only one item at a time. The Spike is named after an old-fashioned paper holder onto which people poked papers as they were done with them.

To collect information in the Spike, simply select the text and press Ctrl+F3. This cuts the information from your document and places it in the Spike. You can continue this process, and Word will add all the selected text to what already exists in the Spike.

When you are ready to paste the information somewhere, simply press Ctrl+Shift+F3. All the information in the Spike is deposited in your document at the insertion point.

Try it!

Why Your Advertising Should Not Lead with Price

Every day we're tempted to cut prices to gain a sell. This article is a good reminder of why that is a bad practice. I know we're all struggling to get every piece of business we can. But we still have to think long term and structure our businesses for the coming economic upturn.  Read the article.

PS Marketing Profs have a free newsletter that I've found very helpful. You can subscribe.

The Power of Right Clicking on Your Mouse

This is a great article full of tips on how and where to use the right click button on your mouse to utilize the features of Office. Could it be true?!?!  You don't have to use the ribbon anymore? You can right click only!! The article has lots of time saving steps too.

Read the full article!

Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 - Don't Accidentally Show a Menu During a Slide Show

By default, when displaying a slide show in Microsoft PowerPoint 2007, if you click the right mouse button a pop-up menu appears. This lets you jump between slides, change the pointer type, immediately end the slide show, and other options.  While some appreciate this feature, others might access this menu by accident, causing a displayed presentation to appear less professional.

If you want to disable this feature, follow these steps:

1. Click the "Office" button.

2. When the popup appears, click "PowerPoint Options".

3. The "PowerPoint Options" dialog box appears. Select "Advanced" in the left pane.

4. In the right pane, underneath "Slide Show", uncheck "Show menu on right mouse click".

5. Click "OK" on the dialog box to close it.

Required Reading for Anyone Serious About Their Web Site

You want a web site that makes you money? Brings you new clients? Read and follow the steps in this article!

Google: How Ranking Works and What You Can Do to Boost Your Position

8 Tips to Get More Out of LinkedIn

Clear, concise article about how to best use LinkedIn. Read the article.

There is no magic bullet. It's just day in, day out pounding the electronic pavement.

.

Microsoft Excel 2007 – Hiding Worksheets

There may be times when you want to hide a particular worksheet so that it cannot be easily accessed. This is often done to protect information on a worksheet or keep it from prying eyes.

To hide a worksheet, follow these steps:

1. Select the worksheet you want to hide.

2. Display the Home tab of the ribbon.

3. In the Cells group, click the Format tool. Excel displays a menu.

4. Choose Hide & Unhide, and then choose Hide Sheet.

The worksheet is immediately hidden. Once hidden, there is no way to tell that it is "missing. If you later want to unhide the worksheet, follow the steps above and click “unhide”.

5 Good Computing Habits

Working on a slow, disorganized computer can be frustrating, and it happens to the best of us. This article will give you some easy-to-follow guidelines on how to keep your computer on the right track using tools in Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP, and Microsoft Office 2010.

Click here to read this great article from Microsoft to help you increase your productivity and organization.

Microsoft Word 2007 - Clearing Formatting From Text in Word 2007

When you’re cutting and pasting text into your Word document, it is easy to introduce formatting inconsistencies. But, it isn’t always so easy to remove these inconsistencies in your document.

There are several solutions you can try; you can try to apply formatting so that the text matches surrounding portions of your document; you might even use the Format Painter to help with this. But, sometimes, the best solution is to clear formatting from your text. You can then format it from scratch the way you want.

To clear formatting from text in Word 2007:

1. Highlight the text that contains the formatting you would like to
    remove.

2. Click on the Font section of the Home ribbon.

3. Click the Clear Formatting icon. The Clear Formatting button
    shows a white eraser, along with some letters.

When you click the Clear Formatting button, text and paragraph formatting is removed from the text. You can then apply new formatting. Or, you can leave it so that it matches your document template’s default formatting.

Think About Polka Dot Pianos

Interesting article from Andrew Kolikoff with Synergy Sales and Marketing about standing out in the crowd.

Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 - Page Setup for Presentations

Depending on the type of projector or screen you will be using for your presentation, you may need to change the page setup of your presentation. For example; a standard 4:3 resolution will look bad on wide screen like a projector. You can change the page setup as follows:

1. Click on View

2. Click on Slide Master

3. Click on Page Setup 

4. Select your setup

Microsoft Excel 2007 View Multiple Worksheets at the Same Time

When working with Excel you may need to see two worksheets on the screen at the same time. You can do this using the same general technique that you use to view multiple worksheets from different workbooks. Follow these steps:

1.  Make sure you have only a single workbook open.

2.  Display the View tab of the ribbon and click New Window in the
     Window group. Excel opens a second instance of the same
     workbook.

3.  On the View tab of the ribbon, click Arrange All in the Window
     group. Excel displays the Arrange Windows dialog box.

4.  Choose the method Excel should use to arrange your windows.

5.  Click on OK. Excel arranges the windows as you directed.

In each of the windows you can display different worksheets, even though they are part of the same workbook. When you are done, simply close one of the windows.

Microsoft Word 2007 - Remove Extra Space Between Paragraphs in Word 2007

Word 2007 adds a space between paragraphs by default. This space cannot be removed by using the backspace key, and it can be difficult to find the option to remove the space.

If you don’t want Word to add the extra space, you can turn it off. However, you will need to turn it every time you open a new document unless you alter the Normal.dot template.

To turn off the space between paragraphs, follow these steps:

1. On the Home ribbon, find the Paragraph section

2. In the bottom right corner of the section, click the button to show
    the Paragraph dialog box

3. Select “Don’t add space between paragraphs of the same style”

4. Click OK

How Ford Uses Social Media to Sell Cars

http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/how-ford-gets-more-sales-with-social-media/

Yes, Ford is a little bit bigger than most of our companies but the concepts they are using to sell cars via social media apply to all companies large and small. Watch this video to hear what they are doing.

Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint & Publisher 2007 – Format Painter

Everyone knows how to copy and paste text to in more than one document. But did you know you can do the same thing with formatting only?

The Format Painter is located on the Home tab, and it looks like paintbrush icon. When you click the Format Painter, Microsoft copies only the formatting of your selection and the cursor changes to a paintbrush.

When you click in your document, that same formatting will be applied. Your selection can be just text formatting or both text and paragraph formatting. That all depends on what you included in the selection.

If you want to keep pasting the same formatting, you can double-click the Format Painter button to make it “sticky.” When you’re finished “painting” just press Escape to release the painter.

You’ll find this tool in Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Publisher. This tool is really handy when you have a large document and you want to ensure that all your headings are the same font, size and color.

Try it next time; it will quickly become one of your favorite tools.

How to build your blog by commenting on other blogs

Here is an excellent example of how someone added a comment to a blog post that linked to their blog and promoted it to a brand new audience.  This is a good way to build traffic and followers for your blog!

• He complimented the host.
• He added to the discussion.
• He linked to his own post.

http://blogs.constantcontact.com/commentary/five-ideas-for-great-holiday-email-marketing/

PS - Good article about holiday e-marketing too!

Email Interruptions

A new study from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign indicates that on average each email interruption you allow costs you 17 minutes. The study was sponsored by Microsoft (one of the big culprits in the email frenzy!).

              See the alert flash on your screen or on your Blackberry.
              Stop what you are doing.
              Go read the email and respond.
              Go back to what your project  and get your focus back
                   17 minutes of your day


And you wonder why you can't get your work done!!

Instead follow this simple procedure to improve your email handling. I go into more detail in the Outlook Email Management class but even these minor changes will improve your productivity.

1. When you see an email alert or message pop up, look to see if it is a TRUE emergency. If it isn't, let the message go to your Inbox.
2. Check your Inbox every 2 hours. People would wait that long if you were in a meeting or out to lunch so the short wait won't kill anyone, lose a client or irritate your boss. Remember that you did look at the incoming message to confirm it wasn't an emergency.
3. Now you can handle all of the emails as a group which makes the process more efficient.
4. First sweep through the Inbox, delete the junk. Move the "read later" newsletters, jokes, etc. to a Reading folder to be perused at a more convenient time.
5. Second sweep through the Inbox, take care of any email that can be handled in 2 minutes or less. Reply or forward as needed then delete or store the original email in the appropriate folder for retrieval if ever needed.

Also store all of the FYI emails. You were copied to keep you in the loop but the message requires no action from you. Put the message in a folder so you can find it if the subject comes up and you need the background material.

    6.  Third pass through the Inbox is where you have to use your
         thinking cap.

You don't want to allow an email to become a priority for your day just because it was an email. So turn the message into a Task on your To Do List so it can be prioritized and managed along with your other tasks for the day.  Outlook has a feature to do this very easily. We can figure out how to make it work in your task management system if you use some of software or method.

If necessary, reply to the message just to acknowledge the sender. "Cindy, got your message and will take care of _____ on Wednesday."  Cindy feels respected and knows that her issue will be addressed.

Now store the message in the appropriate folder where you can find it Wednesday when it shows up on your task list.

   7.  After the third pass, your Inbox is empty!  It's ready to gather the
        next two hours of emails.

You are ready to go back to your Task List to work on the projects you had planned for the day. You've saved time by not jumping at every individual email. You're responded as needed to keep everyone happy.

As I mentioned Outlook has features to help you be more efficient. This is where software can really make an improvement in your daily life. Take advantage of it!

Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 - Quickly Apply Transition Affects

Transition affects can help you make your presentation stand out.  In previous versions of PowerPoint, it was not easy to apply transition affects. However, in PowerPoint 2007 it is much easier.

1.  Click on the Animation Tab in the ribbon.

2.  A drop menu appears with pictures of all the
    different types of transitions that are available.

3.  Drag your mouse over the different types of transitions
     to get a preview of how it will look on the slide.

4.  Find the transition that works best for you, and
     click on it.

What an easy way to make your presentation look professional.

Microsoft Word 2007 - An Easy Way to Navigate Through Your Word Document

When you're working on a long document, it is easy to lose your place. And you can spend a lot of time scrolling through your document to find a particular section. In Word 2007, there is an easy way to navigate through your document. You can turn on the thumbnails view.

To turn on thumbnail view:

1. Click on View in the Ribbon.

2. In Show/Hide section, select Thumbnails.

On the left side of the screen, a pane will open containing thumbnails of your document's pages.

With thumbnails view, you'll see small pictures of each page of your document. The thumbnails are too small to read. However, you'll see the general layout of the pages, including pictures and other objects. Also, each thumbnail is numbered, so you can easily jump to a specific page.

When you click on a thumbnail, Word will automatically open that page in the main document area. You can begin editing without using the arrow keys to move the cursor or using the scroll bar.

It’s a great time saving tip. Try it the next time you have a large document.

4 Tips for Safely Conducting Research on the Web

Surprisingly, basic safety is often ignored by people using the web to research information quickly and efficiently. If you use the Internet for research of any kind, you could be exposing yourself and your company to hidden dangers such as the unauthorized transfer of confidential information. And no one wants to be the person responsible for a companywide computer network shutdown.

Whatever your reason for using the web, there is a smart way to conduct research on it: with an alert eye and a vigilant approach. Use these four tips to help protect yourself and your company from prying eyes and malicious programs.

Click this link to continue reading this article.

Microsoft Excel 2007 - Combining Text from Different Cells

Did you know you can combine text from different cells into one cell?

The “&” symbol consolidates text information in the same way as the “+” symbol adds numbers. The space between quotation marks adds a blank character between the separated texts. If you don’t need blank spaces, then take out the blank spaces in your formula.

It is easier for me to show you this tip in the following example:

1. In cell A1, type the text Your

2. In cell A2, type the text Computer

3. In cell A3, type the text Lady

4. In cell A5, type the formula: =A1&" "&A2&" "&A3

Voila! You now get the text Your Computer Lady in one cell A5.

Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 - Turning Web Addresses into Hyperlinks

By default, when you enter a hyperlink into a Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 presentation the program automatically turns the address into a hyperlink. Many people appreciate this feature, especially if they email presentations to others. If someone wants to visit a site mentioned in the presentation, they merely have to click a link instead of retyping a web address into their browser.

However, the automatic hyperlinking of an address also turns the text color to blue and places an underline under the address. For visual reasons, if you are presenting a slideshow to a group you may not want web addresses to stick out so much. This feature can be disabled as follows:

1. Click the "Office" button.

2. Click "PowerPoint Options".

3. The "PowerPoint Options" dialog box appears. Select "Proofing"
    in the left pane.

4. In the right pane, click "AutoCorrect Options".

5. A language-specific AutoCorrect dialog box appears. Click the
    "AutoFormat As You Type" tab.

6. Underneath "Replace as you type", uncheck "Internet and
    network paths with hyperlinks".

Microsoft Word 2007 - Remove Extra Space Between Paragraphs in Word 2007

Word 2007 will add a space between paragraphs by default. This space cannot be removed by using the backspace key, and, it can be difficult to find the option to remove the space.

If you don’t want Word to add the extra space, you can turn it off. However, you will need to turn it every time you open a new document unless you alter the Normal.dot template.

To turn off the space between paragraphs, follow these steps:

1. On the Home ribbon, find the Paragraph section

2. In the bottom right corner of the section, click the button to
    show the Paragraph dialog box

3. Select “Don’t add space between paragraphs of the same style”

4. Click OK

You can remove the space between paragraphs you’ve already typed in your document. Simply select the paragraphs and then follow the above steps.

Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 - Password Protect a Presentation

Have you ever wanted to password protect your presentation because you share a computer with someone, or you have confidential information in your presentation that should not be viewed by others?

There is a way to put a password on your PowerPoint 2007 presentation.

1.  Click the Office button.

2.  Choose Save As.

3.  In the bottom left corner of the Save As dialog box, click on
     the Tools button.

4.  Choose General Options.

5.  Enter your password. Please ensure you keep a record of your
     password.

Microsoft Excel 2007 - Add Today's Date to an Excel Spreadsheet

Have you ever forgotten what day it is today, but you need to put today’s date in your Excel spreadsheet? The TODAY function is one of Excel's date and time functions that is used to add today's date to a spreadsheet.

Just type in any cell =TODAY( ) and today’s date will appear in that cell.

Microsoft Word 2007 - Inserting Word Documents into Your Word Document

Cutting and pasting is easy in Word. But, if you want to insert the entire contents of another document into your Word 2007 document, there's a quick shortcut.

To insert a document in your current Word 2007 document, follow these easy steps:

1. Position your cursor where you would like to insert the document

2. Open the Insert ribbon

3. Click Object in the Text section

4. Select Text From File from the popup menu

5. Select your document in the box that opens

6. You can opt to insert a portion of a Word document or a range of
    Excel cells, if you choose. Just click the Range button. You can
    specify a range of Excel cells or a Word Bookmark.

7. When you're done, click Insert

Magic! It’s a real time saver.

5 Extraordinary Blog Post Types that Will Grow Your Audience Faster

Great article about the right types of blog posts to write!  Must Read!

Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 - Nudging Objects Slightly

Have you ever gotten frustrated when you try to move a picture/object on a slide just a little bit? Here is a solution to try:

•  Click on the picture/object you are trying to nudge.

•  Press Ctrl with one of the arrow keys (up, down, left, or right) to
   move the selected object in increments of .02 inches.

It’s easy and enables you to move the picture/object to the perfect position.

Administrative Support for The O'Malley Group

Tim O'Malley, President, of The O'Malley Group calls on Your Computer Lady for word processing assistance. Tim pulls information or details from multiple sources (AIA documents, manufacturer technical data, etc.)  to create a working document for his projects. Your Computer Lady cleans up the document formatting and returns a professional document to Tim in less time than it would take him to do the clean up and with a lot less frustration!

Networking calender

I was introduced last night to a new web site - NetworkingPhoenix.com  This site lists hundreds of networking events and groups in the Phoenix area. They offer a Passport for $10 a month that gets you into a lot of the events without paying the event's registration fee.

Shout out to Chandler Small Business Meetup. Interesting people and excellent networking!

Microsoft Excel 2007 – Splitting Text from One Cell to Several Cells

Have you ever gotten a spreadsheet, and you need to break up the first and last name or break the address down to street address, city, state & zip. There is a very easy way to do this without retyping the information.

1.  Insert the correct number of columns you will need once the data is
     split. For example, if you have Miller, John, you would insert 1
     column to the right of Miller, John so that the text has a place to
     be inserted.

2.  Highlight the column that contains the data that needs to be split.

3.  Click on Data in your ribbon.

4.  Click on Text to Columns and a dialogue box will appear.

5.  For our example, you would pick Delimited, press the Next
     button.

6.  Pick what your delimiters would be (tab, semicolon, comma,
     space, other). For our example, it would be comma.

7.  Excel will then draw a line in the dialogue box to show you
     where it will split your text. If you are satisfied that it done
     correctly, click Finish and watch what happens.

It’s a neat trick, and a time saver. Try it!

Microsoft Word 2007 - Adding a Stylish Cover Page

Sometimes your Microsoft Word 2007 documents would benefit from a fancy cover page. Instead of boring black centered text on a white background with the document name and title, why not add color, modern graphics, or a photograph?

Follow these easy steps to add a cover page to a Microsoft Word 2007 document

1.  Select the "Insert" tab in the Ribbon.

2.  In the "Pages" group, click the "Cover Page" command.

3.  Click on your desired cover page template to add the cover page.

4.  In the cover page, double-click on the fields highlighted to add the
    appropriate text.

What a difference an informative yet stylish cover page could make with your next document.

How to Build a Content Timebomb

Well written article about writing blog posts. His basic premise is that you write timeless articles using keywords that people can find when doing searches. For example, instead of an interior designer only writing about new products (short time frame since they're only "new" for a short time), the designer would also write articles about how to choose the right colors for a living room remodel (a post that is relavant today, in six months or in six years).

An additional advantage to writing the timeless articles is that they can be submitted to blog sites such as Digg, ezine, etc. to promote the writer as well as the blog.  The article could also be used in a monthly newsletter!

Read the full article.

Microsoft PowerPoint – Make the Most Out of Your Slides

To be an effective presenter, your slides need to be crystal clear. Think about it, people can’t read and listen at the same time. Consider these points when preparing your next presentation:

•  If you put a lot of text on your slide, they’ll be reading your slide and
   won’t hear what you are saying. Stick to short bullet points.

•  If you need to provide detailed data such as a spreadsheet, use a
   handout so people can follow along with what you are talking about.

•  All text should be legible.

•  Keep animation to a minimum.

•  All visuals should be high-quality.

•  Avoid distracting backgrounds.

Microsoft Excel 2007 - Changing Worksheet Gridline Color

Want the gridlines in your worksheet to be a different color? You aren't limited to light gray/black. Excel 2007 lets you make them any color you want.

Most people using Excel leave the gridlines visible so that they can easily see the cells. By default the gridlines are a light gray/black. You can easily change the gridlines to a different color by following these steps:

1.  Click the Office button and then click Excel Options.

2.  Click Advanced at the left side of the dialog box.

3.  Scroll through the options until you see the Display Options
     for this Worksheet section.

4.  Ensure the Show Gridlines check box is selected.

5.  Using the Gridline Color drop-down list, choose the color
     you want to use.

6.  Click OK.

Microsoft Word 2007 - The Mini Toolbar

Having to move back and forth between the Ribbon and the body of your document is sometimes a waste of time. Word 2007 includes the clever mini toolbar.

Highlight text and point the cursor at it. Did you see what happens? A nearly transparent mini toolbar appears above the text, with a set of commands relevant to the text you've chosen. Move your cursor to the mini toolbar and it becomes solid; click a command to use it.

If the mini toolbar disappears for some reason, reselect the text, and it reappears.

Try it! It’s neat and very productive.

Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 – Turn off Automatic Capitalization

Can I Stop the Automatic Capitalization in PowerPoint 2007?

Yes, all the Microsoft Office products default setting in the program is to capitalize the first word in a line of text. This auto correct feature if very helpful in Microsoft Word, but not in PowerPoint. One of the main features of PowerPoint is creating slides containing bulleted text, which are often not sentences, but simply keywords. These points do not need to begin with a capital letter.

Follow these easy steps to turn off this feature in PowerPoint 2007:

1.  Click the Office button in the top left corner of the screen

2.  Click the PowerPoint Options button

3.  Select Proofing in the list of options

4.  Click the AutoCorrect Options... button

5.  Remove the check mark from the option Capitalize first letter of
     sentences

6.  Click the OK button

From now on, any new line of text in PowerPoint will not be "corrected" to begin with a capital letter.

Jumping on the Social Media Bandwagon

A client asked me yesterday if I really thought all this "Social Media hype" was worthwhile. It can take up so much time and it's hard to see the results. I wanted to share my response with you because this is a VERY legitimate question.

I would not go out and join 10 new networking groups and spend all of my work day going to networking events. While each of the 10 groups might be good and each of the events might be good, that is just too much networking in proportion to my company size, my marketing budget and my workload.

The same thing applies to social media. Don't join LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Plaxo, ... just because they are there. Really look at their demographics and their structure to be sure it fits your overall marketing plan. If I was a rock star, I would spend a lot of time on My Space, not LinkedIn. As a business consultant, My Space offers me nothing while LinkedIn has real potential.

Work on one social media platform or type at a time. Don't try to blog, email, LinkIn, ... all at once. Choose one. Fill in your profile completely. Listen to what is going on on the Wall or in the groups. PARTICIPATE. Build some real connections. Then move on to the next one.

Set limits for your minimum participation and your maximum participation. One blog post a week. No more than 30 minutes a day on LinkedIn.

There is software to help you cross-pollinate your social media sites. Use it!  My blog post will show up on LinkedIn and as a Tweet, for example. I will add other info on LinkedIn and in tweets but each effort is used at least twice.

Social media is new. You don't have to get it perfect right now. No one has it perfect. It's NEW. This is your time to learn, experiment and even make mistakes. You can fix them and improve.

Social media is here to stay. It will change Twitter may be absorbed into another company. LinkedIn might become part of some conglomerate. But social media is here to stay. It is not optional. But how you use it is.

Be wise! Ask for help. There are plenty of classes, books, webinars and gurus to help you, including Your Computer Lady.

Microsoft Excel 2007 – Sort from Left to Right

What if you need to sort something, but your data is left to right instead of top to bottom? Can you do that in Excel 2007? The answer is “YES!”

Excel 2007 default is to sort top to bottom. If you find you need to sort left to right, follow these easy steps to change the sort orientation:

1.  Click “Sort”

2.  “Options”

3.  Click, “Sort Left to Right”

Microsoft Word 2007 Insert Copyright, Trademark, Other Symbols

If you need to add symbols such as a copyright symbol, trademark symbol, or registered trademark symbol to your Microsoft Word 2007 document, there are a few ways to do so, including the following:

Keyboard Shortcuts
The following keyboard shortcuts will insert special characters:

1.  Copyright Symbol: Alt + Ctrl + C

2.  Trademark Symbol: Alt + Ctrl + T

3.  Registered Trademark Symbol: Alt + Ctrl + R

Ribbon
1.  If you prefer to use the Ribbon or need to access other symbols,
    do the following:

2.  Click the "Insert" tab in the ribbon at the top of Word 2007.

3.  In the "Symbols" group click the "Symbol" command.

4.  A pop-up will appear, allowing you to select from several
     frequently-used symbols.

5.  If necessary, click the "More Symbols" button on the pop-up
     to open the "Symbol" dialog box. Find the symbol you want
     and click “Insert”.

Microsoft PowerPoint - Do the Research!

When preparing for a presentation, you often need to research facts and figures, as well as find quotes and opinions, before you draw your own conclusions (or to back up your own opinions). It's important to get the facts right.

How do you research a topic? Where do you go? Of course, it depends on your topic, but the principle is the same: look for non-partisan, original sources of the highest caliber.

Look for Academic Sources
In the field of multimedia, for example, look for academic sources. There's a fair amount of research that's been done in the field. In business, you can also look for academic research on marketing, human resources, productivity, and more.

Find Writers Who do their Research
You might not have the time or resources (such as subscriptions to the journals) to do all of your own research. In this case, you may want to rely on articles that others have written. If you do so, you need to carefully judge the credentials of the author and the thoroughness of the research.

Look for articles that include references, indicating that the author did the research you don't have the time to do. Also, when you do a search on the Internet, go to Web sites that have reputable names.

Keep Track of your Sources
Write down and keep your sources, making them as complete as if you were creating a bibliography. This means you should include the following:

•  Author
•  Name of book or article
•  Date published
•  Journal or publisher
•  Place published (if a book)
•  Issue number (if a journal)
•  Page number
•  URL, if any

Verify your Sources
If a claim seems doubtful, try to find corroboration.

Citing Opinions
Opinions are different. Anyone has the right to an opinion, but whose opinion do you trust? Whose opinion do you want to put out there as authoritative? Therefore, look for the most well-known and respected sources for opinions.

Of course, you're entitled to your own opinions. And in fact, a presentation is stronger when you have a point of view and have drawn a conclusion from your research. But make clear that the opinion is yours. Don't pass it off as absolute fact. If you can cite respected third-party opinions, and bring the audience through your facts, data, and logic, you'll be able to bring them around to agree with your opinion. That will be an impressive success!

Microsoft Excel 2007 - Selecting Non-Adjacent Cells in Excel

By selecting multiple cells in Excel you can delete data, apply formatting such as borders or shading, or apply other options to large areas of a worksheet all at one time.

While using the drag select method with the mouse to quickly highlight a block of adjacent cells is probably the most common way of selecting more than one cell. However, there are times when the cells you want to highlight are not located beside each other.

When this occurs, it is possible to select non-adjacent cells. Although this cannot be done solely with the keyboard, it can be done by using the keyboard and the mouse.

Follow these easy steps:

1.  Click on the first cell you want to select with the mouse pointer to
     make it the active cell.

2.  Press and hold down the Ctrl key on the keyboard.

3.  Click on the rest of the cells you want to select Without releasing
     the Ctrl key.

4.  Once all the desired cells are selected, release the Ctrl key.

5.  Do Not click anywhere else with the mouse pointer once you
    release the Ctrl key or you will clear the highlight from the selected
    cells. If you release the Ctrl key too soon and wish to highlight more
    cells, simply press and hold down the Ctrl key again and then click
    on the additional cell(s). If you select a cell by mistake, click on it
    a second time while still holding down the Ctrl key to clear the
    highlight.

6.  Now use your mouse to click on the action you wanted to perform
    (i.e. font, add borders, bold, add shading, delete, etc.).

Microsoft Excel 2007: Clearing Everything Except Formulas

Need to get rid of everything in a worksheet except for your formulas?

If you want to do the clearing manually, you can follow these steps:

•  Press F5. Excel displays the Go To dialog box.

•  Click the Special button. Excel displays the Go To Special dialog
    box.

•  Select the Constants button. The four check boxes under the
   Formulas option then become available.

•  Make sure that all the check boxes under the Formulas button
   are selected.

•  Click OK. Excel selects all the constants (cells that don't contain
   formulas) in the worksheet.

•  Press the Del key.

This works great if you only need to clear out the non-formula contents of a worksheet once in a while.

What can your Alt Key Reveal in Microsoft Excel, Word & PowerPoint 2007?

I came across a little known secret in the Microsoft 2007 Office Products that I would like to share with you.

Open any of these 2007 Microsoft Office Products, Excel, Word & PowerPoint. Now press the Alt key. Did you see what happens in your ribbon?

Yes, it gives you all the short-cut keys that are available. You no longer have to remember every short-cut key. Just press the Alt key, and a number or letter shows up next to all the short-cut keys.

For example in Word 2007, “ALT P” gets me to the shortcut of Page Layout. It also shows me more short-cuts within Page Layout. For example “ALT M” drops down my margin options.

WOW! I find this amazing and what a way to increase your productivity. Try it!

Microsoft Word 2007 - Turn Off the Ribbon

Some people would prefer to have as much screen space as possible when working on a document. To do this, Word 2007 allows you to turnoff the Ribbon.

The Ribbon will still be available when you want it, all you need to do is click on the appropriate menu (Home, Insert, Page Layout, etc.) and it appears. It then discreetly goes away when you are no longer using it.

There are several ways to turn off the Ribbon:

•  Click the Down arrow to the right of the Quick Access toolbar button
   and select Minimize the Ribbon.

•  Press Ctrl-F1 to turn the Ribbon off. Press Ctrl-F1 to make it appear
   again.

•  Double-click the current tab above the Ribbon to make it disappear
   and then reappear again.

Marketing Calendar

Jennifer Maggiore makes a great point in her post about using an Editorial Calendar. Here's a link to a sample that I use for YCL and my clients. It's just an easy Excel file. But it makes you think through your actions (Oh wait, the newsletter is scheduled to go out the day AFTER our class!!) and gives you a place to gather ideas. Nothing is worse than sitting down in front of a blank piece of paper on the day of your deadline to write the newsletter. But if you've been gathering ideas and plugging them into the Calendar, you know what to say!

Sample Marketing Calendar

Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 – Compressing Pictures

You can ask PowerPoint to compress pictures in your presentation so that you can optimize your presentations more efficiently. With this decreased size you can email them and transport them easily.

To allow for maximum amount of editing later, PowerPoint saves pictures within presentations in a poorly compressed format. When working on a presentation locally, this is highly desirable because it gives you the most flexibility in editing later. However, when trying to get your huge PowerPoint file small enough to fit into an email or on a USB drive, this can be a problem. Here’s how to decrease the sizes.

1. Click Save

2. Click the Tools drop down menu besides the save button

3. Select Compress Pictures

4. Click Options

5. Check automatically perform basic compression on save

6. Check Delete cropped areas of pictures

7. Check the appropriate target output (print, screen, or email)

8. Click OK

Microsoft Excel 2007 – Centering Your Worksheet Data

If you are working with smaller worksheets, they can look odd when printed. Why? Because Excel normally prints your worksheet data at the upper-left corner of a piece of paper. If the worksheet data is small enough, the placement of the data on the printed sheet can detract from what you are trying to convey.

To help offset this problem, Excel provides a way you can easily center your printed information. You can center the data horizontally, vertically, or both. Follow these steps:

1. Display the Page Layout tab of the ribbon.

2. Click the small icon at the bottom-right of the Page Setup group. Excel displays the Page Setup dialog box.

3. Select the Horizontally check box if you want the information centered left-to-right between the margins of the page. OR Select the Vertically check box if you want the information centered top-to-bottom between the margins of the page. You can check both so that your worksheet centered both horizontally and vertically.

4. Click OK.

Microsoft Word 2007 - Showing or Hiding Formatting Marks in Word 2007

Over the years, many users have switched from WordPerfect to Microsoft Word. And, they virtually all miss one very cool WordPerfect feature, the ability to reveal formatting marks.

Displaying formatting marks has a couple of benefits. First, it allows you to troubleshoot formatting in your document. Second, you can select formatting options just the same as you would text.

Word will display certain formatting marks. You can see formatting marks for spaces, returns, tabs and tables. The feature isn't as powerful as WordPerfect's. However, it will still save you considerable time.

The formatting marks are helpful when you're editing a document. You will be able to spot inconsistencies at a glance, before you print your document.

You can enable formatting marks in Word 2007 from the Home ribbon. In the Paragraph section, simply click the paragraph symbol. Clicking it again will disable the formatting marks.

You can also have greater control over the formatting marks you see. For example, you can display just the spaces or tab characters, if you’d like.

Follow these steps:

1. Click the Office button

2. Click Display

3. Select the formatting marks you’d like to display

4. Click OK

To disable the formatting marks, open the options again and deselect the formatting marks you want hidden.

Network For Good

Great web site for volunteering or donating to good causes. They offer excellent services for the donor, the non-profit.agency and even companies looking for community involvement.

Network For Good

Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 - Finish Your PowerPoint Slide Show with a Professional Look

How often have you been in the audience for a PowerPoint slide show and suddenly it was over? No indication that the end was here. Just last slide and it's done.

Let your audience know that the slide show is over by simply ending it with a black slide. You don't even have to create a new slide and make it black. There is a convenient feature in PowerPoint that does this for you. Here is how it is done.

Steps

1. Click on the Office button.

2. Click on the PowerPoint Options button at the bottom of the dialog
    box.

3. Select Advanced in the list of options on the left.

4. Scroll down in the list of options, until you get to the Slide Show
    section.

5. Check the box for End with black slide.

6. Click OK

A happy client!!

This kind of response is the goal of Your Computer Lady!!

Pamela,

You were sent to me from Heaven!

David Gill

Lights Up Arizona LLC

P: 480-600-2504

www.lightsuparizona.com

Lights Up Arizona is a relatively new company but David has been involved in the lighting industry for over 30 years!  Great experience to help you with your lighting projects. Check out the beautiful options on his web site!!

Microsoft Excel 2003 & 2007 – Merge & Center Cells

The merge and center formatting featured in Excel 2003 & 2007 is a handy option to quickly format titles and headings in Excel spreadsheets. It allows you to center titles evenly above your data by merging a number of cells into one and then centering the title/text in this one cell.

1. Highlight the cells you want to merge/center.

2. Right click your mouse, Format Cells

3. Click on Alignment.

4. Click on Horizontal, Center

5. Click the Merge Cells box

6. Click OK

You text is now centered over the data you requested. Using this Right Click format short-cut key, allows you to also, change the text type, size, style, format your numbers, add a border and fill in the cell with a color or pattern. Finding quick and easy ways to do things will always increase your productivity.

Microsoft Word 2007 – Saving Frequently Used Tables

Do you seem to create the same size table often? Now you can create this table and save the table in the Quick Tables gallery.

Follow these steps:

1. Create your table.

2. Highlight the table.

3. On the Insert tab, click Table, click Quick Tables, and then click Save Selection to Quick Tables Gallery and Name the table.

4. To find/use this table, click on the Insert tab, click Table, click Quick Tables, and scroll down until you find the name of your table.

It’s that easy!

Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 – Customize Auto Correct

AutoCorrect is a feature in PowerPoint 2007 that will automatically correct a common spelling error. You can also tailor it to use as a quick way to enter repetitive, lengthy phrases.

For Example - You work for the law firm of Hokkel, Pokkey and Lynderrocker, and must type that name on the slide often in your PowerPoint presentation. It is very easy to make a mistake typing such a difficult set of names.

Steps to Add an AutoCorrect Entry

1. Click on the Office button in the top left corner of the PowerPoint
    2007 window.

2. Click on the PowerPoint Options button in the bottom of the
    dialog box.

3. Select the Proofing option in the list and then click on the
   AutoCorrect Options button.

4. Enter the misspelled word or specific keystrokes in the
    Replace text box.

5. Enter the correction in the With text box.

6. Click on the Add button to add the item to the list.

7. Click on the OK button when all entries have been made.

Now test it.

1. Go back to your PowerPoint presentation

2. Type what you put in the Replace text box on your PowerPoint
   slide, and then hit the space bar on your keyboard, and your
   entire word should show up.

Neat trick to not only make sure you spell long names correctly, but also a short cut to cutting down on keystrokes. Try it!

Microsoft Excel 2007 – Adding Data Quickly

One of the shortcuts provided in Excel 2007 allows you to copy data from the cell above the current cell.

All you need to do is press CONTROL SHIFT "

How does this works. For example if you enter 12345 in cell A4. If you then move to cell A5 and press Control Shift ", 12345 appears in the cell. If you then go to cell A6 and type ABC and press Control Shift ", you end up with ABC12345 in the cell.

This shortcut can be handy when you are entering data that has a lot of similarities like inventory numbers or part numbers.

Microsoft Word 2007 – Save Default to .doc Format

Microsoft Office 2007 is a major update. Word and other programs in the suite will use new document formats. Word 2007 saves files in the .docx format, which is different from the .doc format used in Word 97-2003.

The new document format in Word 2007 can cause difficulties when it comes time to share your documents electronically. You cannot open a Word 2007 document saved in the .docx format in Word 97-2003. When save your Word 2007 documents, you can save it in the Word 97-2003 format, but you would have to remember to do that every time you save a document.

You can ask Word 2007 to always save your documents in Word 97-2003 format so that you don’t have to worry about having any problems sharing documents. To do this, follow these simple steps:

• Click the Office button

• Click Word Options

• Open the Save options

• Beside Save files in this format, select Word 97-2003

• Click OK

Your documents will be saved in the .doc format, which is compatible with earlier versions of Word and you don’t have to worry about sharing your documents with people who don’t have Word 2007.

Video Marketing

The need to differentiate yourself from your competition has never been greater. Nor has the need to market your services / products consistently, concisely and clearly. Let’s discuss a relatively new tool to help you with both needs – video marketing. It fits so perfectly for the architect, the interior designer, … really the entire construction industry which is a visual business.

YouTube is now the #2 search engine in the world following Google (who just happens to own YouTube). The most popular videos viewed on YouTube are consumer or non-professional short videos. A short video is typically 3-4 minutes long.

Granted, a lot of video viewing is by the 18-24 year old crowd. They’re watching not only short videos but also music videos, full length TV shows, movie previews, full length movies and news stores (top five according to the survey). Average weekly viewing is 4.6 hours.

Do not be mislead by thinking videos ONLY appeal to that group. 50% of all online users watch videos weekly according to a study by Frank N. Magid Associates, Inc., in conjunction with Metacafe.

People process information and learn in different ways and video marketing speaks to both the audio and visual learner. They see you and/or your product while hearing your presentation. Another study shows when the combination of voice and visuals are working together, information is absorbed and retained at a much higher level. It's more than six times that of hearing alone (a phone call) and three times that of seeing alone (emails).

The really good news for businesses is that the audience actually responds better to amateur videos. They are not expecting gorgeous models, perfect delivery and slick productions. “Authentic” and “transparent” are crucial words for video marketing as for other types of social media.

There are three tools worth checking out:

The Flip Camera
www.TheFlip.com For just under $200, you can purchase a camera for quality videos which can immediately be uploaded to YouTube, your web site or other multi-media sites.

Mojo Video Marketing
www.MoJoVideoMarketing.com This firm will help you create videos or will use your videos. The critical part of their service is the automation. Remember the seven “touches” rule to make a sale? Mojo will help you set up your marketing process. Their software will send the videos out on your schedule. Mixing phone calls, emails and meetings in with the videos gives you a powerful presence. Equally important is the consistency. All of us have found a business card under a pile of paper on our desks of a good prospect that we met and then accidentally forgot. Mojo is so easy that you can add contacts to your video campaign from your SmartPhone. The touches continue on schedule!

GoldMail
www.GoldMail.com There are several companies that will convert still photos into a video (www.animoto.com). Most provide background music. Some will attach an audio recording. Gold Mail’s genius is the simplicity of their software to let you create the video yourself. You can use still photos, a PowerPoint presentation or one of their templates. You record your message with each slide. If you make a mistake, you can correct a single slide! I tested the software one Sunday afternoon. Being a multi-tasker, I tried the software out and created a message to my family and friends. It took a little over 30 minutes and that included finding recent pictures of the cats and of my new car.

Once you have created your video, you can insert it into one email or into a broadcast message through an Email Service Provider. Forrester Research has stated that adding clickable media to your emails can increase click-through by 2 to 3 times. A higher open rate leads to higher conversion rates. If you include a link to your web site in the email, you can also increase traffic to your web site.

Speaking of web sites, all indications are that web sites with videos generate more traffic both in new visitors and in keeping visitors on your site longer.

Bruce Clay, one of the godfathers of SEO, has even said you basically won’t exist, in search engine terms, if you don’t have video: “I think, that a year from now, we are going to be sitting here saying – ‘if you don’t have video, if you don’t have engagement objects on your website, you are just not going to rank. It will make you last among equals if you don’t have it.”

Once your video is uploaded to YouTube, it is quite simple to embed the video on your web site. You can then measure it’s success with Google Analytics or other traffic reporting software. You don’t need to abandon text or other graphic content on your site. There are people who want to read details. There are people who want to see charts, technical data, etc. Adding a video differentiates you. It marks you as a technology leader. It shows an openness to new ideas which is certainly important in your industry!

Don’t stop with posting the video. Tell people about it. Link from your daily emails. Include a link in your monthly e-newsletter. Submit the video to Metacafe.com, StumbleUpon.com, Digg.com or other video sites. Mention the video in all of your social media activities. This isn’t a field of dreams. You need to promote the video, your web site, your social media activities. Each marketing effort should support every other marketing effort

Microsoft PowerPoint - What Makes a Successful Presentation?

Planning is probably the most important step in creating a successful presentation of any kind. Planning helps you decide on the content and the order in which the information will be presented. Use the following steps as a guide in planning your PowerPoint presentation.

1. Determine the Purpose of the Presentation

    • Is this presentation about a product for a client?
    • Is it a business presentation about the latest sales figures?
    • Is it about a new idea you are introducing?

2.  Determine the Presentation’s Audience

     • Your staff
     • New prospective client
     • Group of small children
     • Convention for people in the same line of work -- for example; a
       group of dentists

3.  Gather Your Information

     • Remember the KISS principle (Keep It Silly Simple) when
       designing your presentation
     • Focus on three or four main points only
     • Know everything about the topic so you are ready for questions
       after the presentation

4.  Sketch Out the Slides on Paper

     • Make sure the slides emphasize the main points to be made in
       the presentation
     • Try to have only one main idea on each slide
     • List no more than four points per slide

5.  Determine the Order Of Your Slides

     • Although this can be changed later, having a rough idea of the
       order of your topic points, will help you plan the order of your
       slides

6.  Create the Presentation

     • When creating the slides, be consistent in your choice of
       background colors, fonts, transitions, and animations

Your Computer Lady has extensive experience in helping creating powerful presentations. Give us a call the next time you need an effective PowerPoint presentation.

The Power of Confidence

Just had to share this story I read. Pablo Picasso credited his mother with much of his success. She believed in him from the beginning. She told him, "If you become a soldier, you'll become a general. If you become a monk, you'll end up as the Pope." In Picasso's own humble way, he ended the story, "Instead I became an artist and wound up as Picasso!"

Microsoft Excel 2007 - Hide the Ribbon in Excel 2007

In Excel 2007 the Ribbon, which has replaced the menus and toolbars found in earlier versions of Excel, can quickly be hidden to give you more room to work in your spreadsheet.

To Hide the Ribbon Commands:

• Press the CTRL + F1 keys on the keyboard.

Only the tabs will be left showing above your spreadsheet.


To Show the Ribbon Commands Again:

• Press the CTRL + F1 keys on the keyboard

Microsoft Word 2007 - Changing ScreenTips Settings

Like previous versions of Word, Word 2007 features ScreenTips. When you hold your mouse over a button, the name of the button appears. Additionally, Word displays a brief description of the button.

ScreenTips are designed to make your work in Word easier. They are very helpful to those who are new to Word. But, advanced users may find ScreenTips annoying. If you don’t like the ScreenTips feature, you can disable it. Or, you can opt to have Word simply display a buttons name without a description.

To change ScreenTips settings in Word, follow these steps:

1. Click the Office button

2. Select Word Options

3. Open the Popular section

4. Locate the drop-down box labeled ScreenTip style

5. To disable Screen Tips entirely, select Don’t show Screen Tips

6. To disable button descriptions only, select Don’t show feature descriptions in ScreenTips

If you later decide you would like to see ScreenTips, repeat the above steps and select Show feature descriptions in ScreenTips.

Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 - Recording Narrations

PowerPoint lets you record narrations for every slide. This can be helpful if your availability is not possible when the slide show has to be shown.

To record narration:
• Click the Slide show tab.
• Click Record Narration icon.
• Here you get options for setting up microphone.
• If you want to start from current slide just select Current Slide, or you can choose First Slide.
• Save at the end and you will be asked if you want to save the timings for each slide.

Remember to speak clearly and don't rush!

Microsoft Excel 2007 - Row Height and Wrapped Text

It is fairly easy to put more text in a cell than can be readily displayed. While you can widen the column to fit your text, sometimes this is not a good option. Instead, you can wrap the text within the cell, so that the cell height is increased to display all the text.

Follow these steps:

1. Select the cells whose formatting you want to affect.

2. Press Ctrl+Shift+F. Excel displays the Format Cells dialog box.

3. Click on the Alignment tab.

4. Make sure the Wrap Text check box is selected.

5. Click on OK.

The text should now be wrapped within the cell and all visible.

Writing Your Elevator Speech

The American Family Business Accelerator program had an excellent presentation on writing your elevator speech. Here is the tool they provided. Even if you have an elevator speech I suggest working through this tool to see if it spotlights any fine-tuning you need to do.

In a nutshell:
     F  -  Find their pain point
     A  - Answer their problem
     R  - Reasons why you're different
     M - Make them want more

In theory, it's easy to tell someone what you do. You're asked that question all the time. But in reality, it's hard! And it is so important!  You want to wordsmith your answer so that it can be stated in 30 seconds. The words have to be clear and concise to give a total stranger the picture of what you do. It's that pivotal "first impression."

Beyond answering "What do you do?" your elevator speech plays a major part in your entire marketing plan. It is the first step, the foundation of the whole plan.

• When you create a company brochure, you would start with the elevator speech and expand to share examples and details to support the speech.
• When you are writing content for your web site, each page should support and expand upon that basic elevator speech.
• If you participate in any review sites such as Angie's List, Yelp or Kudzu, your elevator speech would be the content you fill in for their format.
• The elevator speech would be the starting point for your Summary section on your LinkedIn profile.

Take the time to write a good elevator speech. Use this excellent tool. Call Your Computer Lady for help if you need it. We'll brainstorm with you and help edit the speech until it's just what you need!

Microsoft Word 2007 - Understanding the Different View Options

Word provides different ways you can view your documents, depending on your particular needs. The major views available in Microsoft Word are:

•  Print Layout
•  Full Screen Reading
•  Web Layout
•  Outline
•  Draft

You can choose which view you are using by clicking on the view controls at the right side of the horizontal scroll bar or by selecting a view from the View tab of the ribbon.

Print Layout view is the one most closely related to what your document will look like when you actually print it. This viewing mode, which is the one you will probably use most of the time, allows you to see your headers and footers in place, what your margins look like, how your text boxes appear in relation to text, and what your graphics look like in your document. This is the viewing mode you should use if you want to always see what your document will look like.

Full Screen Reading view allows you to read your document using the full screen of your system. The view gets rid of the ribbons and uses the maximum screen space available to display your document. Typically the document will be displayed in two facing pages, but the number of pages displayed can be affected by the size of the monitor you are using. There is no editing allowed in this view. You can exit this view by simply pressing the Esc key.

Web Layout view is designed to allow you to easily see how your documents will look if used in an online environment. It is provided for those who intend on publishing their Word documents online.

Outline view is used when you want to work with large portions of your document at the same time. It allows you to collapse your document and view only the major headings. The text under each heading can be hidden so it does not obscure your view of document organization. When you select Outline view, an additional Outlining tab appears on the ribbon. This tab allows you to control what is displayed in this view.

Draft view can be considered a "pared down" version of the Print Layout view. It allows you to generally see how your text will appear on paper. This means you can see what each line will look like, how the text appears, and where the lines will break. You can also see where each page will break. This view is helpful if you are using an older, slower computer that can't display the Print Layout view particularly quickly.

Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 - Globally Change All Fonts in Your Presentation

Have you ever started a new presentation and copied some slides from another presentation into it and then realize that all the fonts are different. Did you know that PowerPoint has a convenient feature that allows you to make a global change to all the fonts in the presentation at one time?

Follow these easy steps to globally change your font in your presentation:

1. In the Editing section on the Home tab of the ribbon, click the Replace > Replace Fonts...

2. In the Replace Font dialog box, under the heading Replace, select the font you wish to change from the drop down list of fonts in this presentation.

3. Under the heading With, select the new font for the presentation.

4. Click the Replace button. All the text in the entire presentation that used the original font is now replaced with your new choice.

5. Repeat the process if your presentation contains a second font that you wish to change.

Note - Just a word of caution, all fonts are not created equal. By that I mean, that a size 24 in Arial font is very different from a size 24 in Barbara Hand font. Make sure that you check the sizing of your new fonts so that they will be easy to read from the back of the room during a presentation.

Microsoft Excel – Clear or Delete? Is there a difference?

Yes, there is a difference. As you are editing your Excel workbooks, one of the most common actions is to clear or delete cells.

Clearing cells means erasing everything within them, whereas deleting actually deletes the entire cell (or cells). This may sound like an odd distinction, but it is not really.

When you delete a cell, the other cells around that cell move to fill where the cell used to be.

To clear the contents of cells you have selected, display the Home tab of the ribbon and click the Clear tool in the Editing group. When you do, you will see a submenu asking what you want to clear. Your choices allow you to clear any of the following:

• Clear All - Everything related to the cell except the cell itself.

• Clear Formats - Any formatting applied to the cell.

• Clear Contents - The information in the cell. Any formatting and comments remain in place.

• Clear Comments -The comments attached to the cell.

You should make your selection based on what you want cleared and then choose the appropriate menu item.

Deleting is done by selecting the cells you want to delete and then choosing Delete from the Edit menu. When you do this, Excel attempts to determine how the remaining cells in the worksheet should be moved to close up the hole that will be created by deleting the cells. If it can figure it out (for instance, if you are deleting an entire row or column), then the operation is completed. On the other hand, if it is not obvious how the remaining cells should be moved, Excel displays the Delete dialog box, which allows you to specify whether cells should be moved up or to the left.

Constant Contact Email Marketing Classes - FREE!

Ron Cates with Constant Contact is presenting two email marketing classes in Phoenix on June 23rd.  Ron does a GREAT job presenting the benefits and how to's of email marketing. Call me for details if you would like to attend. If you aren't sure you should be doing email marketing, go to one of these classes!!!  If you are just getting started and need to know how to do a great job, go to one of these classes!!!!

ASID Past Presidents Meeting

Thank you, Past Presidents, for the invitation to talk with you about social media. I had a great time!  After an overview presentation about social media, we opened the floor and simply talked about the pros and cons of social media and its impact on our businesses. 

Where do I find the time?
Just like any other marketing you do for your company, you have to set aside social media time. When you join a new organization, you plan on attending the monthly meetings. You know it will take ___ hours each month. Add some more time if you're going to serve on a committee which, of course, you really need to do to truly benefit from the organization. Schedule a set amount of time for social media.  Start with 1 hour a week. Measure your results. If the results are good, add more time. (Only count real business social media, not the time you spend on personal networking! Sharing photos with high school friends or your family is important but don't mislead yourself into thinking that is your marketing/social media time!)

Measure the results
Doing email marketing via Outlook is not the best use of your time or efforts. You can't measure the results. It is well worth the small monthly fee from a service like Constant Contact in order to have traffic reports. (FireDrum internet marketing has a free account for up to 750 emails.) Use the reports to ensure that what you're doing is having results.  All of your social media should be giving you results. Did you meet a new prospect? Did you get the chance to make a new proposal?  Track what you do and what you get from the effort. Sure, there are intangible benefits to social media as there are to any marketing effort. But you should have tangible results and you definitely should have a system in place to measure each marketing effort. (This is where your Customer Relations Management (CRM) software comes into play.)


Consistentcy
It's important with any marketing effort to be consistent. If you join an organization, show up for 90% of the meetings. If you set up a profile at LinkedIn, show up and participate on a regular basis. You can't blame LinkedIn or social media if you show up once a month, send a message to an old friend and post a half-hearted article. Show up on a regular basis. Send messages even if it's a simple Happy Birthday to a colleague. Give your opinion. Share your expertise.

Let me close with my social media mantra. Maybe it will inspire you too. It's from the legendary Dale Carnegie.

You can make more friends

in two months

by becoming interested

in other people

than you can in two years

by trying to get other people

interested in you.