Our Favorite Business Tools

Business Brain, episode 470 for Casual Friday, July 28, 2023. Greetings, folks, and welcome to Business Brain, the show where we pick a topic, we pick a couple of topics. Either or you pick a topic, you send it in to us at FeedbackUsBrain show, and we analyze it from a lot of different angles such that we each get the opportunity to tune our business brains together, making us better at all the things we do and really helping ensure we get to keep living those charmed lives that we love. Our sponsors for this episode include notion.com business brain, where you can go and try Notion projects for free today, and Pearl Diver IO, where you get to find out who it is that's visiting your website. We'll talk more about those in a little bit. For now, I don't know where I am today, but I'm Dave Hamilton.

And I'm Shannon Jean. Somewhere out here in California. Sure as well. Since we're recording this a little early so we can enjoy Casual Friday away from.

Yeah.

Our computers and our phones. No phone Friday.

No phone for. Oh, I like this. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I, I recently had an experience, Shannon, that, that was immediately obvious that we needed to talk about here on the show. We had, as we do every couple of years, we had somebody come out and service the air conditioners. We have, we have story. Contractor story. Yep. So, yes, they service the air conditioners in the house and in the office. Great, Fine. So they came out on a Friday. And the guy that was here was nice. He was the Eeyore guy I mentioned. Oh, yeah, right. He was. But whatever. The next day I opened up the. I was like, I said to Lisa, did he change out the filter? And I may have even mentioned this on the show because the important thing was something I found a week later. But I, I looked and he had, he had changed out the air conditioner filter. It just so happened I had it on my calendar to do like that Saturday because I changed them every six weeks. And I open it up, we have 14 inch wide filters in our. Our house. He had taken a 16 inch wide filter from his truck or whatever and like ripped off 2 inches of this and stuffed it in and jammed it in there. Yeah. And I was like, okay. And so I took a picture of it and threw it away and put one of our filters in. I'm like, I'm not gonna, like, yeah, I don't know what this is all about, but it looks like the pieces of this thing are just gonna get pulled into the system. And I don't know that I want that in there. So, yeah, in fact, that's kind of the things I want the filter to filter out. So. So I did that and it was like, you know, whatever, I'll, I'll email them and I want to ask them because they had chosen a different like, rating of filter than we found works with our system. So I wanted to ask their opinion on that. So I was like, okay, I'll email him at some point and ask and I'll share the picture then. But it's not a big deal. Whatever, you know, About a week later, in fact exactly a week later, we're sitting in our living room. It had been a hot day. And my wife's like, I really dislike that our living room, it feels so stuffy. It's always warmer than the rest of the house, which has sort of been a truth ish in our house for a while. But it felt more than that in this moment. Like, yeah, I agree. I'm like, maybe when they were cleaning the system, they adjusted how much air was flowing to this zone and, you know, maybe that's the issue. So I knew the system was on and I could, because I could hear the system running. And I put my hand under the filter, under the register, you know, the vent, and there was zero air flowing out. Oh. And I'm like, oh, my gosh. They closed it. Like, what's going on? So I checked the other vents quickly. I'm like, yeah, okay. So it has been flowing. I go up into the attic now it's like, this is like 9, 10 o' clock at night or whatever. I go up and I see the, the, the duct for that vent and had been removed completely from the system and was just blowing nice cold air into my attic.

Oh, that's nice.

Oh, yeah, super happy. So obviously I took a picture of this too, and I. It was, it was 100% obvious to me that this was something the guy did intentionally. And I don't know why. Somebody, I posted it on Facebook. Somebody said, oh, yeah, that's an old trick for those of us in the south when working on air conditioners in the attic.

Oh, yes.

You want to keep cool, so you keep yourself cool. Because it could be 150 degrees up there, you know, Like, I get that, but you don't forget, like, have a checklist. Right? You know, and clearly he took it off for some reason. I mean, I could see the tape was like, ripped by a human. It wasn't just an accidental. Like, I knocked it off. I mean, it's been on for 17 years. It didn't just somehow magically fall off. Right. And so I was. So I fixed it, obviously. I just put it back on and suddenly everything was better. No great surprise. And the next day, I chose to do this via email because I wanted to send the pictures to show, like, the filter and this thing. And I also wanted to give the company an opportunity to direct this to the person in charge of the oh, crap role. Right? And every company has the oh, crap role, right? Like, you are made aware of something bad. It could be this, a mistake that you, Your company made. It could be something that happened, you know, through no fault of your own. But there are those moments where you're like, oh, crap. Everyone in your company has an opinion as to who the oh, crap role is served by, right? Who is it in the company that gets it? It's probably you, the business owner. But, you know, might be in, like, in the case of this air conditioner company, it might be, say, the service manage or something, but someone that is adept at dealing with acknowledging a mistake that you made and. Or a bad scenario, even if it's not your fault, and figuring out how to get through it. And, you know, the two tokens of customer service.

I was just going to ask that. Are they using the two tokens?

They should be. The guy. The guy didn't entirely use the two tokens. Like, you know, he was fine, but he wrote back. He's like, oh, I can't imagine. He's like, it must have just fallen. He apologized, but he's like, yeah, I can't see any reason why he would have, you know, taken that off. And I'm like, same. But be that as it may, he did, you know, I didn't reply that way. He. But the guy, I said to them, look, here's these two things. I want you to come out and look at my, first of all, my repair handiwork and redo that properly, because I don't know how to reconnect the duct properly. You know, I just did it. But also, I want you to go over everything that he might have done, because now we've identified two corners that he cut. How many others? I don't know what to look for. You do. Would you please come out and take a look? And the guy was like, yep, I'll schedule a time. So he owned it at that level. And then of. But he was. He was like, oh, I don't think this was a mistake. And, oh, the filter thing, it's not that Big of a deal. I'm like, okay, don't ever say that. You know, that's not the two tokens. But when he got to the house, he leaned in heavily on the two tokens thing. He picked up that, this is awful. I have no excuse for this. This is terrible. I know it's your first time working with us. Like, he did the whole, the whole spiel. It was like, ah, okay, all right. Yeah. Smart. Yeah, yeah. You have an opportunity to do this, you know. Yeah. So figure out in your company who people think holds the. Oh, crap role. I think that's, that's sort of my, my lesson here is because. Because someone does and. Yeah.

And maybe that's the best problem solver.

Yes.

And, you know, you may have to do it in the beginning. Of course, you know, as you grow your business, getting somebody in that role is really important.

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Yeah, I love revisiting this tools every once in a while because even though some of them are the same, I usually add a few things and I think it's worth, worth discussing especially on a end of the week podcast. The first one I've mentioned a bunch of times, but I still rely on it every day is filemaker. Filemaker Pro.

Yep.

And you know, if you manage data, and I know you do if you want a customizable database that will jump through hoops and is easy to manage for a non technical person, especially the new, if you get the new version like the FileMaker 2023. Yeah, it's. It's crazy. And I love that they still sell a single license that you don't have to pay a subscription for if you, if you want to do it that way for yourself.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I love that.

Yeah.

So for me that's the, that's the first one.

Oh no. Filemaker is, is on my list too. I, you know, I, I know it's, it. Feet. If you have been aware of the fact that filemaker has been around for as long as it has, it might feel like antiquated software. There's something better. If you found something better, let us know because I have not. You know, for what it does, it is fantastic and yeah, it is great. Yep. Yeah.

For me the next one, it sounds simple but it is critically important to my workflow. It's the Apple Notes app and it, I just can't stress enough how awesome it is for scanning documents, sharing data across different, you know, to different people, managing your ideas lists. I mean it's just an incredible and undervalued app that if you're in the Apple ecosystem, I just, I, I couldn't live without it. We're going to post in the Show Notes a. A productivity framework for using Notes that it'll, it'll blow your mind. Multiple folders, nested automated folders, some really great stuff that you can watch this guy's video and I don't have his name in front of me, but we will link it in the Show Notes.

Yeah, I need to check Apple Notes.

Amazing. I give it to you right now.

It's interesting. I was going to add Apple Notes for the first time to our tools discussion here. We recently. I recently moved our podcast workflow for MacGeek Gab out of Evernote and over to Apple Notes, primarily because Evernote has stopped supporting AppleScript. And I've got a couple of Apple scripts that I use to get things into Notes and to manage things just to make my workflow a little more efficient. I can do it without it, but it's better with it. And we've been sort of limping along with Evernote's diminishing applescript support over the years. And I finally moved it to Apple Notes because Apple Notes is so much more robust now than it used to be. I can share a notebook with someone else or multiple other people. We can collaborate. You know, it really has matured to a point where it's a fantastic tool. The only sort of asterisk that I would put on there is that it is Apple only. You know, it's not like Evernote or Microsoft OneNote where it is cross platform. So if you need it to be cross platform, it's not for you. But otherwise Apple Notes, it really has become a world class business product if you want it to be. But it can also be a very simple, basic note taking app that gets out of your way. It's, it really is to me the epitome of Apple's software design because it does everything I need it to do and it will do everything you need it to do too. Even if you don't need the complexity that I need or even if you need more complexity that I need. Right. Like it's.

Yeah, that's right.

Yeah.

I just scanned like a 42 page document into notes and it's automated. It's like put the next document out, put the next, put the next page, put the next page. But I mean, it's just, it's mind blowing how easy it is and how, how detailed it can be if, if you want it to be.

Absolutely, yeah. No, it's. I, I can't wait to watch this video. When's the episode going to be over? No, never mind.

Yeah, that's right. That's right. You can watch it sooner. I just posted the link for.

Yeah, so so far we have talked about two products that are either Apple or wholly owned by Apple. So what, what's next?

Well, I, it's an Apple product, but I'm, I'm, I know they have one on, you know, Android, Windows, whatever. But it's my reminders app. I'm constantly shocked that not more of my associates and business partners and vendors and friends are not picking their phone up and saying, remind me to X. Because we're always talking about things to do and, or, oh, I will follow up. I'm going to do this, I'm dead. And that, you know, I always have my phone with me. So picking up the phone and just, hey, remind me tomorrow at 9am to send these documents to X. Boom.

Yeah.

And then the next thing I remember, remind me tomorrow to, you know, I love, you know, time flexing is a huge luxury and I, I feel blessed and privileged that I have it. So when I'm walking around a piece of property or I'm traveling, I'm constantly using my business brain thinking of ideas, this kind of thing. And if I don't put it in a note, I put it in a reminder, remind me to do this, remind me about that. I mean, it's just the reminders apps are unbelievable. It's like your AI assistant, if you will, on a very simple level, but they're really powerful.

And I will highlight something that you said several times in your examples. Add a date to your reminders. And I share this because of the way my brain works with reminders. If you were to just say, hey, remind me to call Shannon. It will put a reminder, call Shannon. But it will be way at the bottom of the list because you didn't. It's undated. So date and time, you can do time too. I don't use time, but yeah, I certainly use data. I'll say, remind me today even. Yeah, and it'll come back and say, I've put this on for tonight. And it's like, whatever, it's on for today. Like, you know, it's, it's, it's fine. But, but I use it and I use it more often with Siri than I do without Siri for capturing data. You know, because I like you, I can do it while I'm walking around. I can do it in the car where I'm having that downtime, you know that, that hypnotic time where ideas percolate and it's like, oh, I gotta dig into that, but not right now. So remind me tomorrow or remind me today and it will go off and do it. But yeah, yeah, it's great for capturing those things. I don't use the Reminders app at all. I use Reminders to capture it. It syncs to my icloud reminders and then I use an app called BusyCal to manage those. But it works the same. It's, you know, it's fine. I just, I just prefer the interface of busycal better. But I'm, I'm capturing with reminders via Siri all the time. That's cool. Great. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I have a new one that I really like that I've been using. I think I mentioned it here maybe a few months ago. It's an app called Rewind and it's Rewind AI.

Yeah.

And this app sits on your computer and it basically you give a permission to track you all day. All the information is local. It doesn't go up to the cloud, it doesn't do anything, but it tracks everything. So when I need to go back and say, I thought I searched, I was looking on the web for something and yeah, you could search your history or I was on a zoom call and I think somebody mentioned this YouTube video for this. Well, all of that's searchable with the Rewind app. Meetings, anything you do via your computer, FaceTime. And like I had a zoom meeting on Sunday afternoon. After the meeting, I jumped into Rewind. It had the whole meeting recorded because it's recording my screen. And it also had, of course, a transcript. And then when I said, hey, summarize this transcript. It gave me a 15 point, you know, thing that I emailed all the participants within like a minute of the meeting ended. And they all thought I was far smarter than I really am.

Yeah, right. That's interesting. What's the pricing like on that?

Well, I'm using the free version.

Really?

And yeah, it does that for free. And the pricing is they have it up here. There's a free. You get 50 total rewinds.

Got it.

So I'm still on that. 12 bucks a month is their basic plan.

Okay. So at some point, assuming you continue to get value out of it, they'll. You'll get to a point where it's like, okay, now you got to pay. Yeah, all right. It's pretty cool.

And maybe something else will come along, but you know, their, their tagline is what if you had a perfect memory? Yeah, that's kind of what it does Is it. It's tracking all this stuff. I love that. It's localized. It's good stuff. You ought to check it out.

Oh, yeah. Heck yeah, man. I'm putting this on the list for we. We do segments on our Mac Geek Gab podcast.

Oh, yeah.

Cool stuff found. And this is 100% going to be on that. Yeah.

And you know how we've talked about chat GPT and you could upload a PDF and then ask questions. Well, you can do the same thing. This ask is you can ask questions about stuff that happened during your day. And it's like. It's like a automated to did list, if you will.

Right, right.

I'm enjoying it. Yeah.

That's awesome, man. All right, we're going a little long here, but you got one more for us.

I'm just going to do one more.

Great.

And I'm going to bundle them together. And I'm going to say Twitter and Reddit.

The two platforms that have had major technological issues recently.

Correct. However you get past that and avoid anything you're not interested and dive into the sections that you are interested, the topics that you want to learn about.

Yeah, these.

These sites are a masterclass in any topic. If I'm trying to learn how to build a deck, you know, and there's a whole deck forum on Reddit, that will just blow your mind. And you know, on Twitter, I'm not involved in any of the drama on that platform because I'm involved in the small business, you know, people.

Yeah, Twitter's been great for me. I just, I like you said, you avoid it. You choose not to follow the topics and the people and you train it. Where I've had problems with Twitter is just their, like, technological, like we talked about a couple of weeks ago, just their technological stuff. I've been having again, for the stuff I'm interested in. Mastodon has been fantastic. And I'm really, I'm curious about threads from Instagram, because threads, their plan is to integrate with Mastodon, or federate with Mastodon is the term to use. So it would. It would connect the two. Right. And when that happens, I think that that's going to be really powerful. So I'm eager. Yeah, I'm eager to see where it goes. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And so using these for business, I mean, I know a lot of people, you know, it's social. It is a social network, but the connections that you can make. In fact, you know, as you are well aware, we often find topics platforms and we're connecting with business people. We're going to have someone on the show in a couple of weeks that we just recently featured featured a tweet thread. So, you know, it's just a great resource. Ignore all the noise about, you know, fine tune your your feed to give you really good stuff and it's fantastic.

Awesome. Sweet. Thanks for hanging out with us a little extra today on Casual Friday, folks. Feedback at BusinessBrain Show. Send in your tools. What is essential to you for your day? We do it right now. You don't even have to press pause because we're. The episode's over, folks, you know, so just send it into us. Feedback businessbrain show we'd love to hear from you and follow us on Twitter and Mastodon and we'll put a, we'll put links in in all the places. So wherever you are, we are. And we'd love to hear from you there too. Thanks for hanging out. Thanks for checking out our sponsors, of course. Notion.com businessbrain Pearl Diver keep living that charm life, will you? We'll see you next week.