If you are working on a project you may want to collaborate with others even if it’s something as simple as an article where you could communicate and make changes with a ghost writer.  If you’re putting together a launch then it can become complex and collaboration becomes more important.

You have probably been aware of Google docs but may not have used it.  For instance you might have Microsoft Office and don’t think that Google docs would be of value to you. That is the way that I was thinking I was thinking about it. But somewhere along the line someone pointed out to me that by using Google docs then Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, and PowerPoint documents could be shared with others.

Lets say you were having a seminar and you wanted to keep track of hotel room availability and let your attendees know how many and what rooms they could get, you could put a spreadsheet on your site that they could check. Maybe you could get the hotel to update it for you as reservations come in.

Now you can let your imagination run a little bit and see how you could work with others to improve whatever you are doing quite easily.  Combined with something like Instant Messenger or e-mail, you can rapidly improve what you are doing.  You can find out more about Google docs at docs.google.com.

Have you ever sat down to write an article, opened up your web browser, opened Google do your research and wished that you could have saved webpages in a file somewhere? Have you also wanted to save some your Word documents there also? How about a couple of e-books and reports?

It’s nice to be able to save everything in one folder. What if you could save them all on-line for no charge?

There is a Web 2.0 service called esnips.com. I’ve been using it for about two years now and it works perfectly. While you can use it to share all kinds of things with others, I’ve been using it is a private place to save my research.

They even provide 5 GB of free storage.

You can use it to:

• Save webpages
• save Word documents
• save PDF files
• save spreadsheets
• save graphics
• save text documents
• save pictures same video
• same links

Because you save everything in different folders you can save as a project, you can build swipe files, you can just save your thoughts if you want to.

Since this is a free service you might want to go to esnips.com set up a new account. (more…)

When you are writing an e-book how long does it take you?  Would you
like to be able to write faster without losing quality in your
writing?  I’m going to give you seven ideas you can use to write high
quality articles and save time doing it.

1. (Be comfortable — really comfortable). If you are most
comfortable in your office with a quiet symphony playing in the
background or are most comfortable sitting in the swimming pool on a
bright sunny day then that is what you should do.  Writers do their
best when they are in an environment that makes them feel good.  This
happens both in the quantity of work and the quality of work that
gets done.

2. (Get rid of your distractions).  All of your distractions need to
be eliminated. This may seem impossible but it needn’t be.  For
instance, if you work at home and have kids, try sending them to
daycare even if for only one day a week.  Alternately, you could try
working during their nap times or at night when they are in bed. It’s
important to be able to continue a train of thought and eliminating
distractions is one of the best ways do this.  I’ll are is said that
for some people this takes care of writers block problems.

3. (Speed up your typing).  If you can’t type 45 wpm, consider
taking a typing class or get a speech recognition program such as
Dragon NaturallySpeaking.  Since most people think much faster than
they type, their fingers slow them down.  By speeding up your typing,
you will be able to continue your thought process and make your
writing much more enjoyable.

4. (Use a mind map). By using a mind map such as PersonalBrain, you
can speed the process of writing an e-book. A mind map lets you
visually see and organize your thoughts ahead of time and as you go
along.  It also lets you see where your connectors should be — at a
glance.

 It’s also a great tool for future projects where you might
incorporate some of the same ideas. I found this to be one of the
most important tools I have.

5. (Spellcheck it later).  Spellcheckers are important for any e-
book.  You want to lend credibility and professionalism to your e-
book.  The problem with spellchecking is it can slow you down and can
break your train of thought.  Performing tasks like this while you’re
writing adds a lot of speed bumps to your writing process.  The best
thing to do is do you’re spellchecking after your work is done.

6. (Proof read later). Many writers want to proofread after they are
done with each page or chapter.  Don’t make a habit of this.  If it
becomes a habit, you can totally interrupt and stop your writing. You
might get on a roll and feel like writing more which is good. But, if
you stop and proofread at the end of a paragraph or a chapter, you
have just missed everything up.  After you are no longer in the mood
to write, then proofread.  You might even want to wait until the e-
book is done before you proof it.

7. (Set a time limit). Yesterday I read a Warrior Forum thread from
a guy who couldn’t get things done. Nathan Faulkner had a spot on
answer:

“Having “all the time in the world” is problematic, because it’s
easy to push things off for “later” or to get caught up doing things
on forums or elsewhere and not actually get anything done.

Try this… set aside just ONE HOUR wherein you’ll focus on your
work. I’ve been a fan of using this little online “timer” that I can
program to sound an alarm at the end of a predefined amount of time:

http://www.vickiblackwell.com/timer.html

(Note: The above url may not be active by the time you read this. In
that case do a search for web timers.)

Maybe try starting with 30 minute increments and say to yourself
that you’ll create an entire review page or whatever it is that
you’re doing that works. Force yourself to rush and to get it done
before the alarm goes off, etc. I hope this helps!”

When you can speed up your writing, you will enjoy it more and you
will write more e-books and better e-books. Use the above tips and
become better at what you do.