Google has a wide range of extra FREE resources as part of its Google Account (or G Suite if you are a business). Most of you will know about Google Photos, Calendar and Drive however a great feature that not as many people know about is Google Keep.

Keep is a note taking app that is available across all devices that are logged in under your google account. 

For example, my PC, my Surface Pro and my Android phone all use the same google account login. Because of this I can add, edit or update my notes on Keep and immediately those updates are available everywhere I'm logged in to Google. 

Google Keep is basically a note taking app, however its features and much more advanced than a basic level.

​Your notes can have:

• different colors assigned (I use different colors for clients or personal notes)
• check boxes so you can see what you've done and mark off completed tasks
• reminders so you never forget anything
• images so you can add something to your note (handy for instagram posts)
• archive ability (so you can archive a note without deleting it)
• pin to top (will always appear at the top of your Keep lists)

under the more tab (the three little dots):

• add a label or drawing
• copy the note
• show tick boxes (so you can mark items off as you go) or 
• ​copy to Google Docs

​

You can see from this screenshot of what my Keep looks like how handy it is when you use the colors and check boxes. I have allocated different colors to clients and subjects and there are so many notes in there that are just one off weird things that I know I can search for and find easily. Oh did I mention you can search for stuff in Keep??

I put everything from Movies I want to see to client lists to travel tips to the KM's I'm allowed to do in my car under my insurance policy. So handy and as long as you have given it time to sync, its also available offline!! So handy at an  airport when I'm travelling. 

You will be aware I've started a new blog category that evolves around Awesome Chrome Browser Extensions. This second one in the list might not be super useful for many of you but I am completely hooked. It makes life so much easier for me and I'm sure once you know what it is you will have some use for it also.

Chrome Extensions are little tools that you add to your browser that enable you to take actions on or within the browser environment. 

​You add them simply and start using them straight away. They are like Apps for Chrome I guess.

Full Page Screen Capture is an amazing extension that enables you to capture a screen shot of your entire screen. It doesn't just capture what you can see on your screen, it captures the entire page, even what you can't currently see. 

​For me, it's ideal. I can do previews for clients and then capture the entire screen shot and send them the image, or upload it to imgr and send them the link. I LOVE this extension and its so simple to use.

Once you've installed it, simply click the little Camera icon and it will capture the entire screen from the page you are on and open it in a new tab as an image. Once the Capture tab has opened click the very obvious download button to save the image. 

Visit the Chrome Extensions page, search for "Full Page Screen Capture" and click the Add To Chrome button.

​Voila!

Chrome is my browser of choice. Primarily I must admit its because Google drives so much of my daily work, however I like it better than Edge, and about the same as Firefox. So Chrome it is.

​One of the best things about Chrome is the extensions you can add. Over the next few weeks I'm going to share my favourite extensions and why they are my faves. Some may be suitable for you, some may not, however I'm sure you will find at least a few great ones in the mix.

Chrome Extensions are little tools that you add to your browser that enable you to take actions on or within the browser environment. 

​You add them simply and start using them straight away. They are like Apps for Chrome I guess.

Keywords everywhere is a great little tool that enables you to see the Cost Per Click (or CPC) for every search term you enter into google. Cool huh?

​Not only can you see the current CPC, however you can see the search volume for the term and also the competition rate.  I realise that sounds confusing however let me explain:

​Search Volume: this is the average number of searches for this term per month (usually averaged over the last 12 months). So if this says 40/mth that means that on average this exact search term is searched for 40 times per month.

​CPC: this is the current cost per click that advertisers are paying for one click on this keyword in Google Adwords.

​Competition: this is a number between 0-1 that tells you the number of advertisers that have ads with Google Adwords for this specific search term. 0 signifies a low number of advertisers and 1 signifies a lot of advertisers.

Check out the image below. I've used a search term that applies to my husbands business, mostly because he works in a very niche market so the volume and advertisers will be low. 

​You can see that the volume is 40/mo - which means that on average only 40 people globally search for this term every month.  The CPC is $1.53 and the competition is 0.94 So a decent score which would indicate that there are more than a few advertisers using this term in Google Adwords. 

Now compare this search term.

​You can see that over ninety thousand people searched for womens shoes on average a month. OK so I'm probably 1000 of those, but even so you can see its a very popular search term. You can see that the cost per click is only 97c but the competition is 1 - which means that a lot of people are using this term in Google Adwords. 

Visit Keywords Everywhere and then click the "Install For Chrome" button and follow the prompts. 

​Once it is installed you can save your search terms as favourites and then monitor them by clicking on the icon. To save just click on the tiny star after the competition number. Easy peasy....