GDays Mandaue 2014: Secrets of Gmail

Overview of GDays Mandaue here.

Participants of GDays were required to select a category upon registering. Google for Management, Business or Marketing. I, obviously, wanted to join all of them but that option wasn't available so I had to choose a topic that I was most interested in. At the time, I had been mulling over studying business on the side but the more specific aspect of business I was slightly obsessing over from a distance was Management.

Our segment was facilitated by Jane Vestil, a Google for Educators partner and Cheer Garciano, owner of Cebu Web Services and Digital marketing.

Jane Vestil talks about Google Collaboration and Productivity Tools

The talk started out with an overview of the basic Google tools we're all currently using such as Gmail, Google Drive and Google Calendar. As it progressed, they started talking about a Google Apps Account. How is that different from a regular Google account when you sign up for Gmail? The features are basically the same, being able to use Google tools and whatnot, the difference is just that a Google Apps Account will enable you to use tools powered by Google, like plug-ins submitted by developers for example.

The first Google tool they delved into was Gmail and this feature was such a surprise to me when they first introduced it. Google Advanced Search uses a set of queries that perform specific functions in Gmail Search. For example, you want to look for an email sent by thatperson@gmail.com to you with a file named testfile attached. Among the hundreds of mail you receive daily, it would be time consuming for you to browse through all the possible mails containing that person's e-mail. So, with the specifics in mind, you type:

from : thatperson@gmail.com filename: testfile

And boom! The mail that you were specifically looking for is presented. More keywords are listed in this documentation conveniently compiled by Google. Next up was something called E-mail Delegation, whose concept wasn't that new to me but setting it up was still quite hazy. Basically its being able to let someone view your inbox and reply to messages on your behalf. It's pretty convenient if you're a founder and have a business trip out of town with limited internet. You can give your co-founder or a trusted employee to keep you and your company updated by replying to important e-mails for you. Learn more about E-mail Delegation through this link ma'am Jane sent me after all my annoying questioning hehe.

A similar feature is forwarding where you can automatically forward your e-mails received from your website e-mail to your personal Gmail address for convenience:

e-mail sent to contact@me.com >> forwarded to >> me@gmail.com

After running through Gmail's built-in features, we then moved to Google Labs - experimental features created by Google Developers. A lot of them may have some bugs and imperfect features but you always have the option to disable them after you've installed them. Some labs ma'am Jane uses herself are Canned Responses, which enables her to create and use a preset response to a specific type of mail, and Quick Links, a lab that allows you to save and create a link of a frequent search result in your inbox. You can look through more Labs by going to Settings >> Labs in your Gmail page.

Cheer Garciano gives a short presentation about The Internet

I personally don't use this feature but maybe when I'm more embedded into my career, I see a future use for this feature. Google Tasks help you keep track of the things you need to do, set deadlines and even use e-mail messages as the reminder itself in Gmail Tasks. I raised my hand and being the kiss-ass, thick-faced chick that I am, I asked a few questions along with a few others in the room. Apparently, Google Labs won't work on mobile _{(unless some genius codes something for it)} and Google Apps aren't free either. To create an account, there's a $5 monthly subscription fee.

"Don't be impressed with technology. Be amazed by what you can do with it."

In between ma'am Cheer's talk, she mentioned something called Internet Penetration which basically just means how many people in an area have access or are using the Internet. This data is considerably important to digital marketers, with their efforts revolving around how many people they can reach.

"Think. Create. Engage. Optimize." Strategy of doing Digital Marketing.

Ma'am Cheer shared the general steps of using Digital marketing to gain customers.

1) Generate Traffic - get people interested in what you're doing and basically, have an audience.
2) Convert Traffic to Leads - Make this audience interested enough that they are willing to pay for your service.
3) Nurture Leads into Customers - Turn this willingness into action. Baby your prospective customers into actual customers.
4) After the cycle is done, Analyze the Process to look at what you did wrong, what you did right, and how to engage the next batch of customers.

Google Analytics is a great tool to monitor activity in your site. It shows you the number of viewers currently in the site, what they are doing, what category they belong to, their location and more. Consider signing up for Google Analytics to keep a better eye on your users and possible customers.

After the session, I was literally mind blown about all the things you can do with Google Apps and Tools. And to think what we discussed that day was just a fraction of the Management features Google has. I guess my overall reaction to everything I learned was that there really is no excuse for you to not build a kick-ass product/business. Every resource is available to you through the Internet. It's just a matter of being motivated, persistent and smart with your resources and decisions in life and/or in your career.