If you are reading this post, you’ve probably read a couple of other posts in the same sequence. I am going to go out on a limb and assume that you are also reading posts from all of our blogs: StraightUpSearch, StraightUpSocial, OneUpWeb Reviews and Creative Meat. While blogs can give the latest and greatest in trends, they can also zap hours of productivity.
There are a ton of great productivity tools and programs on the web, but for keeping up with your laundry list of blogs it’s hard to beat Google Reader.
To start utilizing Google Reader, you will need to set up a Gmail web account. This can be a throw away email address if you use a different email. However, it can also be another time saver if you use it as your primary email, because your log in will be the same as the reader. Once in Google Reader, you can begin gathering all your RSS feeds from the blogs you visit. If you are unfamiliar with an RSS feed, short for Really Simple Syndication, it is the little orange icon with three white lines.
Click on the RSS Feed button and it will give you a URL that will continually update new posts from that blog.
Then copy that address and go back to your Google Reader page. On the top left side of the page, click on the “Add a Subscription” button and then paste the URL of the blog.
Then the no frills, all content blog post will be live in front of you. I prefer to categorize my blogs to help further organize my blog reading. By no means are my categories (shown below) for everyone, but they can serve as a guide to get you started.
To place a blog into a folder, click on feed settings and click on the folder you would like it to live in.
Google Reader is easy, fast and makes blog organization simple!
Unfortunately we can’t buy time, but we can save it! I hope that these tips were not only informative, but were also worth your time—something Google Reader and myself understand the importance of.
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