Someone recently asked me how I stay organized with internet marketing. She wanted to know what tools, websites, and other things to use.

I was overdue on this question, and VERY busy, so I made a video while on the airplane to answer it. (Talk about maximizing time! ) However, I just listened to it and realized it’s much noisier than I anticipated… so I had it transcribed. Here’s the main gist of everything:

#1: Calendar. I put everything that’s going on in a main calendar that syncs to my phone. At one glance I can see all upcoming appointments, due dates for projects, and anything that I need to remember. It’s a GREAT way to have an overall big picture look at what’s happening.

#2: I use a 3 subject notebook method that you may have heard me mention before. Here’s how it works: the last section of the notebook is where I list out my yearly goals (like making $10,000 a month). In the second section I break down how I can achieve those goals in 3-6 month increments (like having 500 people pay $20/month). The first section is daily to-do items where I break down the second section even more. This helps me keep my eye on the end goal. If you want to learn more about this, I recommend Time Management Tricks, where I outline this (and a lot more) in more detail.

#3: 30/60/90 day plans are also great. You can outline what you want to get done in 30, 60, and 90 day increments if you’re not yet willing to go a year out.

#4: Outsourcers are a highlight of my life! One of my VAs is just amazing. I spit out any random thought that I have for her onto a Jing video, and she’ll make a list out of it, and then an action plan. You can hire someone like that too.

#5: I have a different folder for every single project. It’s MUCH easier to organize things that way.

#6: I ONLY put things on my desktop if I’m working on them at the moment. If I get more than 5 icons on my Desktop I start to get uncomfortable. I literally feel repulsed when I look at some other people’s desktops and see a computer littered with icons. How can you NOT feel overwhelmed by opening up your computer and seeing that every day?!??

#7: Mindmaps are VERY awesome. You can use them to brain-dump a bunch of thoughts and not worry about them fitting in any kind of order. There’s also something about them that make even the most daunting tasks NOT seem like they’re too much to bear.

#8: I LOVE Google Docs. I share a lot of spreadsheets and files in Google Docs with outsourcers. I find it easier to use than Base Camp, and it’s free!

#9: Dropbox is another FANTASTIC tool that I love collaborating with people on. Here’s one way I use it: I put a file in Dropbox for my VA, she downloaded it, edited the file and designed it, and then uploaded the finished PDF in there. It was so easy!

#10: Use Action Enforcer or a timer. When you set amounts of time that you’re going to allot to certain tasks, it helps you get them done a LOT faster. I won’t go into this too in too much detail since this blog post is about organization, not productivity, but I think it needed to at least be mentioned.

I hope this helps! If you have any other internet marketing questions, simply reply to this page and let me know. I’ll be happy to make follow-up videos or blog posts!

I finally decided on my wedding dress!

For a few days I was completely stuck between 2 of them. One dress was a dress I always envisioned, and the other was one the saleswoman had me try on just to do something “new”.

I felt completely different (but amazing) in the two dresses – one left me feeling soft, like a princess… and I felt elegant and regal in the other.

I woke up the day after I tried them with one dress in mind, but then it seemed that my family was in favor of the other dress.

I went back to the store, tried them both on, got 4 opinions there… got opinions from my family, friends, a message board that I post on…

And I finally decided.

And I am SO EXCITED!!! I love love love the dress!!!

I’m going to post 5 dresses here to throw you off , but whoever guesses the right dress will win something special. You get one guess each!

Dress 1:

Dress 2:

Dress 3:

Dress 4:

Dress 5:

Today’s post isn’t a huge one… my internet was up and down all day so I had to make this an off-IM posting.

If you guys have any other questions (IM or otherwise), please let me know… I may make a few videos before I head out next week!

I made this last night on my FlipCam but didn’t upload it until today as I had no energy to walk downstairs.

I usually have a VERY high tolerance for pain. In fact, one time I was playing football with a friend and he threw a football at me super hard. It actually broke my finger, but because I didn’t want HIM to feel bad, I didn’t say a word. An hour or two after we stopped hanging out I went to the hospital. hahaha… some logic.

Anyway, this video mentions where I was at last night, but I’m feeling better today. Still nowhere near 100% but WAY better than yesterday and at least I can move without my world spinning.

Trying to decide if I should stay on the cleanse I’m on or just move on to healthy eating!

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BD3b7Yb1Hpc[/youtube]

Just wanted to make a quick video to say “HEY!”, and update what’s been going on lately.

I plan on vlogging a LOT more in the future!

(And by the way, please excuse the poor lighting – I’m in a hotel room. And lost my hair straightener. )

…and I think it’s so beautiful:

—

posted by Anne Thomas on 3/14/2011 11:30 am
A letter from Sendai

Things here in Sendai have been rather surreal. But I am very blessed
to have wonderful friends who are helping me a lot. Since my shack is
even more worthy of that name, I am now staying at a friend’s home. We
share supplies like water, food and a kerosene heater. We sleep lined
up in one room, eat by candlelight, share stories. It is warm,
friendly, and beautiful.

During the day we help each other clean up the mess in our homes.
People sit in their cars, looking at news on their navigation screens,
or line up to get drinking water when a source is open. If someone has
water running in their home, they put out sign so people can come to
fill up their jugs and buckets.

Utterly amazingly where I am there has been no looting, no pushing in
lines. People leave their front door open, as it is safer when an
earthquake strikes. People keep saying, “Oh, this is how it used to be
in the old days when everyone helped one another.”

Quakes keep coming. Last night they struck about every 15 minutes.
Sirens are constant and helicopters pass overhead often.

We got water for a few hours in our homes last night, and now it is
for half a day. Electricity came on this afternoon. Gas has not yet
come on. But all of this is by area. Some people have these things,
others do not. No one has washed for several days. We feel grubby, but
there are so much more important concerns than that for us now. I love
this peeling away of non-essentials. Living fully on the level of
instinct, of intuition, of caring, of what is needed for survival, not
just of me, but of the entire group.

There are strange parallel universes happening. Houses a mess in some
places, yet then a house with futons or laundry out drying in the sun.
People lining up for water and food, and yet a few people out walking
their dogs. All happening at the same time.

Other unexpected touches of beauty are first, the silence at night. No
cars. No one out on the streets. And the heavens at night are
scattered with stars. I usually can see about two, but now the whole
sky is filled. The mountains are Sendai are solid and with the crisp
air we can see them silhouetted against the sky magnificently.

And the Japanese themselves are so wonderful. I come back to my shack
to check on it each day, now to send this e-mail since the electricity
is on, and I find food and water left in my entranceway. I have no
idea from whom, but it is there. Old men in green hats go from door to
door checking to see if everyone is OK. People talk to complete
strangers asking if they need help. I see no signs of fear.
Resignation, yes, but fear or panic, no.

They tell us we can expect aftershocks, and even other major quakes,
for another month or more. And we are getting constant tremors, rolls,
shaking, rumbling. I am blessed in that I live in a part of Sendai
that is a bit elevated, a bit more solid than other parts. So, so far
this area is better off than others. Last night my friend’s husband
came in from the country, bringing food and water. Blessed again.

Somehow at this time I realize from direct experience that there is
indeed an enormous Cosmic evolutionary step that is occurring all over
the world right at this moment. And somehow as I experience the events
happening now in Japan, I can feel my heart opening very wide. My
brother asked me if I felt so small because of all that is happening.
I don’t. Rather, I feel as part of something happening that much
larger than myself. This wave of birthing (worldwide) is hard, and yet
magnificent.

Thank you again for your care and Love of me,

With Love in return, to you all,
Anne

I see myself pulling in a “downward spiral” this morning. To get myself back to normal, I’m creating a list of 101 things I’m grateful for.

1. The knowledge that I can make a list like this and I’ll start to feel WAY better!
2. The conversation I had with Otto last night.
3. The green juice that Sydney makes for me every morning!
4. Raw oatmeal raisin “cookies” in the dehydrator right now, smelling up the house and smelling AMAZING
5. My beautiful white fluffy sweater
6. Joining Rose Cole’s Powerful Woman PowWow
7. The journals my mom and sister just sent me
8. My huge computer monitor
9. Snagit
10. The awesome hiking trails around here
11. The Wet Seal I just found around here
12. My eyelashes
13. Getting back to eating what’s good for my body
14. Patience with my body
15. My new partner for PWP
16. The great mastermind I’m in before the PWP calls
17. Trips
18. Cafes with internet connection
19. My rebounder
20. Playing cards with Otto
21. Catching up with friends
22. Random synchronistic emails
23. The deer that hang out outside
24. Getting back in touch with my dad
25. Not caring how people respond to this
26. Learning new things about myself every day
27. Speaking my truth
28. The fact that I already feel monumentally better
29. The Bachelor – hehehe, what a guilty pleasure
30. The Secret Millionaire! Just saw that and felt so inspired!
31. The internet connection that lets me watch those things.
32. The nonprofit I just started
33. My trip to Ireland in June
34. Our honeymoon
35. The fact that we’re getting married!
36. All of my friends
37. Brian
38. Jaime
39. Jackie
40. Piperlyne
41. Joshua
42. Craig
43. Dennis
44. Jonny
45. My mom
46. Not going back to edit these to put them in an order people might be happier with
47. My car
48. My boots
49. The trash man who walks up the driveway and gets our trash cans if we forget to put them out
50. Beautiful weather
51. A nice, clean home
52. Any time I donate anything, that freeing of energy and onto a better place, woooo!
53. Financial abundance
54. The nutritional supplements on the way here, can’t waiiit to build the body of my dreams
55. The “50 Things I Love About Rachel Rofe” that Otto created for me
56. The “5 Positive Things About Rachel” that Jaime created
57. My office, filled with positive things that make me happy
58. Candles
59. Baths
60. Essential oils
61. Vince and Jinelle
62. Amber and Orion
63. Hot tea in a mug
64. Mother Teresa
65. My engagement ring
66. Books
67. Barnes And Noble
68. Powell’s
69. Indian food
70. Being surrounded by beautiful and empowering women
71. The ability to change my mind at any time
72. How happy I am feeling right now
73. Looking at people through the eyes of love
74. Feedback from friends
75. The fact that I can effortlessly create money
76. Having the brain power to learn a lot and create great products that really benefit people
77. Knowing some incredibly inspirational people
78. For people continually showing me love, even when I don’t think I deserve it
79. For the gift of hindsight
80. Beautiful crystals
81. My purpose mapping class
82. Giovanni
83. Mona
84. My polka dot cups
85. How far I’ve come in life…
86. Fun ideas that get me super excited…
87. Meeting brilliant people who really care, like Ronnie or Jason
88. Keeping integrity
89. Knowing that I could make a list of 1,000 positive things if I wanted
90. Knowing that I can choose to be positive most of the time – not because it alienates other emotions, but because it’s what is really possible.
91. Radical Honesty
92. The Big Leap
93. Secrets of the millionaire mind
94. Warrior Camp
95. Mexico
96. Paris
97. Ashland
98. Stationary stores (notebooks, pens, swoon)
99. My Kindle
100. My library
101. Being a kid with Otto

Wow. I feel AMAZING.

I originally posted this on January 9th but lost a few posts in a hosting transition.

As I mentioned, one of my goals this year is to listen to a lot of the Philosopher’s Notes by Brian Johnson.

Basically, his deal is he goes through 100 of the BEST personal growth books and gives you the “Big Ideas” from each of them.

It’s super-awesome because he has .pdf formats AND audios, so you can look at both to really integrate them (or just one, depending on your time).

I’ve been listening to the audios as I’ve been cellercising in the mornings.

Anyway, one of the books I just listened to was “Authentic Happiness” by Martin Seligman. It’s a book by a dude who has been working to make the state of happiness a SCIENCE… and he’s come really, really far.

You can use his information in either your personal life or in your business.

Seligman talks about how there are certain virtues or characteristics that exist to make people happy. There are 12 in total I think, and they range from things like curiousity, love, justice, wisdom, etc. His premise is we ALL have a core set of 5 strengths, and the more we use them, the happier we will be.

He also believes we should spend time working on what we’re strong at, not trying to fix what we’re weak at. A LOT of top thought leaders subscribe to that thought and I totally agree. Unless a weakness is really hurting your quality of life, why not just outsource it to someone else?

Anyway… the book mentions a FREE test you can look at to find out what YOUR 5 core strengths are. From there, you can use them to mold your life, business plan, whatever.

Click Me For The FREE Test! (No upsells or anything. )

Here’s What To Do With Them:

In the Philosopher’s Notes, Brian went through his top 5 (well, he had 6) and explained how he was using each one in his business. You can do the same thing for YOURS (and also in your life).

I’ll give you an example with mine. Here they are:

• Forgiveness & Mercy
• Fairness, Equity, And Justice
• Gratitude
• Love Of Learning
• Capacity To Love And Be Loved

So to take those with my business plan, I guess I could do something like:

I use forgiveness and mercy in my business as I understand that not everyone is going to “get it” right away. I will treat them with love and work patiently as they come to results of their own.

I believe in fairness, equity, and justice… so I am moral and ethical with my pricing of things, will only put out quality products, and will treat everyone I work with with respect. I listen to other people’s ideas and try to make everyone feel as if they’re my equal (because we ALL have stuff to teach each other).

I am a totally grateful person. I remember to count my blessings every day. I have an amazing fiance, business partner, best friends, client base… an amazing life, really… and the more I remember to count my blessings, the more of them will come into my life. I make it a point to thank customers by offering excellent values and really doing what I can to make sure that they get benefit from my products.

To support my love of learning. I will continue dabbling in lots of different business models, as well as take myself offline a bit. This is integral to me and I know I’m so much more productive and better at what I do when I get to go learn new things.

As far as my capacity to love and be loved, I will continue to love people I work with, even when it’s not the easiest. I will understand that people are normally cranky because there’s an underlying issue, and I will look at everyone as innocent children doing the best they can with the resources they have.

Well… that’s my first shot, at least. I’ll continue to improve upon it.

I’d Love To Know What YOURS Are!

If you don’t want to do the full exercise (though it does make you think!), just shoot down your 5.

This is so super-fascinating to me, so please leave a comment and let me know!

I originally posted this on December 31st but lost a few posts in a hosting transition.

Wow… it’s been an absolutely incredible year this year. I’ve really loved 2010 and think 2011 is going to be even better.

I’ve been reflecting back on this past year and I’m just so grateful for some of the things that have happened.

First, Dennis and I partnered, which has been amazing, to say the very least. I remember when Otto and I were driving up to Ashland back in August. We were moving into our new house and I told him “We’re driving up to a new life. Everything will be different from here on out.”

Sure enough, it has been.

Before Dennis, I always the classic entrepreneur up and down income. It’d be feast or famine. With a consistent income now, there’s a huge weight off of my shoulders. I feel freer than I ever have before. I’ve been able to do some absolutely AMAZING things, like:

* Rent an incredible 4 bedroom home with absolutely stunning views…
* Hire a chef to come in every day and make Otto and I fresh juices, smoothies, and salads
* Give my family Christmas presents of $2,000 each to just blow… and then an extra $5k to my parents for bills (the best $15k I ever spent)
* Take Otto and I on an amazing trip to Paris and Amsterdam… we had such a beautiful time…
* Tell my mom to quit her second job

It’s not necessarily about the money, though that has been great. It means so much to me to know that I’m helping people. REAL people. To be honest, I still don’t know that the “make money” niche is who I am and what my greatest gift to the world is… and I plan on doing more with my meditation site, juice feasting stuff, etc… but I do know that at the very least, people have been doing better in part to the information I give, which I am 100% grateful for.

And of course just knowing Dennis has been incredible. I’m so grateful that he accepts who I am. He’s OK with my traveling, with my weird quirks, with listening to me… there have been so many times that I’ve been scared to tell him something, and he was just 100% ok with it.

I appreciate that so, so much.

They say you’re the average of the 5 people closest to you and I’m glad Dennis is one of them.

Then there was an absolutely incredible year with Otto. Ever since we got back together, it’s been like Relationship 2.0. We’re a completely different couple. Our communication has been absolutely incredible and I know we’ll be able to get through anything together.

Otto gave me a Commitment Ring over Christmas. I’ll be honest — at first, I was upset. I was hoping for more of an engagement ring (I know I said I didn’t want to get married, but my emotions tell a different story). I still would love the engagement ring… but you know, thinking back on it… he was SO excited to give me the ring. He went through such an ordeal of putting in a box in another box in another box, with other gifts along the way so I wouldn’t know… calling my mom to tell her about it… video taping it… he’s just such a good man. He loves me so much, and I love him so much too. I feel really blessed to have him in my life.

There were some other great highlights in this year. I visited my family a few times. I got to go visit Jaime for her birthday in Las Vegas, which was awesome. I love her so much. Every time I’m around her I feel inspired. Brian came out and visited me for a week or so, which was awesome. He’s always laughing… it makes me feel funny. Hehehe… I love him too.

I’ve joined an awesome “Goddess Mastermind” with some incredible people. One of those is a wonderful woman named Jena, and I’m so glad to have gotten to know her.

I made some amazing friends – both in Scottsdale (Piperlyne! Joshua! Chris!) and here in Ashland. I’ve also met some incredible people through the Eben Pagan seminar circuit and I’m afraid to list any names because I don’t want to forget any… but I will say I’m ridiculously thankful for everyone.

I sold BYTDL, which I’m really happy about. The new owner hasn’t had the 100% easiest time adjusting, which I don’t love, though I’ve made it clear I’m happy to help him however I can. That business was not for me. He’s done such a better job than I ever could have done as far as making sure work is done in a timely manner and expecting great performance from people.

I think this year I’ve gotten even more comfortable with speaking my truth, and I know that will continue even more.

I also just got off a fantastic juice feast that I ended with a renewed passion to learning more and figuring out even more what my greatest gifts to the world are.

Overall, 2010 was absolutely fantastic.

I’ve started writing out my goals for 2011 and I’m very excited for them. I can’t wait to make this the best year ever.

Here’s what I have so far:

* Incorporate a daily routine that includes deep breathing, meditating, reading/listening to a different Philosopher’s Note, and rebounding.

* Become fluent in face reading (how to tell people’s personalities by their faces, how to read people’s emotions, and even how to look at their face and tell what ailments they may have…there’s a LOT of wisdom in the face.)

* Rent a villa in Italy with friends

* Have a 7 figure business (without putting any junk on the web. Dennis and I also want to make sure we have a lot of our own products from now on. We both think we were mailing too much without enough content and want to find the right balance. I trust we will.)

* Drop to a comfortable size 6 (I’m an 8 now)

* Go back to Europe

* Go to the Monroe Institute

* Have a week without internet

* Earn $83,333 every month or more consistently

* Start my 7-12 lifestyle again, where I work from 7am to 12pm and spend the rest of the day learning, reading, going out, doing whatever… and maybe working more at night. That’s been sporadic lately and I’d love to get it back so I can have my balance again.

I also want to spend a lot of this year figuring out more about who I am and what gifts I have for the world. It’s been an interesting year. I’ve started remembering things I’d unconsciously blacked out for 20+ years… things that I’m so glad I blacked out, but I am grateful for, because I know they’ll eventually be a big part of my message.

I’m going to invest in a high end mastermind this year, which is a big step for me. I’m considering two different ones right now (and I might end up getting both of them) – Marie Forleo and Bryan Franklin. Both of them seem to have an incredible sense of self, and I really think they’ll help me uncover what my greatest gifts are.

Anyway… that’s what I have for now. If you’ve read this far, thank you. I’d love to hear what YOUR goals are for this year, and any key takeaways you had from 2010… so please leave a comment!

Either way, I wish you the best year of your life this year… you deserve it.