You know it’s a good blog post when the pictures tell the story.

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By Jason Terry, talking about taking a blog post from good to great through pictures. If you can get the meaning of the story just by looking at the pictures, you’re on the right track.

I was recently doing a blog post with a client when an important idea hit me in the face. I wanted to share that experience with you, minus the pain.

This story was about bringing your kids to work day and how the company makes it a really big deal. To see the blog post on Straub Construction’s website, go here.

Bring Your Kids to Work DayFeatured Image

The first thing you will notice is the featured image. It has ten employees and eleven kids. Imagine what it took to herd so many cats against a wall for this shot. Ernie Straub is flanked by his work family and their kids. That must have been a really cool moment.

I chose to use this as the featured image for the story because it captured the emotion and scope of the moment. Sure, there were lots of other great pictures to choose from, but this simple photo against the wall in their offices just felt right.

Telling the Story Through Images

Bring Your Kids to Work DayAfter the featured image, there’s a series of great pictures of the employees and their kids throughout the day. They start in the conference room reviewing architectural plans.

Next is a drone shot in the parking lot. It’s a really interesting picture because of the perspective. And it’s just different to see what your taking a photo of from 40 feet in the air.

Back into the office for an estimating exercise. The joy on Hannah’s face and Ernie apparently being attacked from all sides by the kids made me smile.

Next, they took the kids to a job site to show them a construction project in process. The first thing that hit me when I saw these pictures is, “wow. They really do take this seriously.” Imagine the planning it took to make this happen. And I’m sure the kids LOVED it. I don’t know of another company in town that goes this far for Bring Your Kids to Work Day. Do you? And I ask that question seriously, because if you work for a company like that, I want to know about it!

Finally, the kids got to build their very own washers game, and spray paint the washers a custom color. At the end of an awesome day, they get to take home something they helped build, an ongoing reminder of what a great day it was.

Bring Your Kids to Work DayLet’s Continue to Focus on Good Pictures For Our Stories!

I’ve written hundreds of blog posts over the past ten years. And I’ve helped clients publish hundreds more. It’s rare to see the pictures tell the story like they did in this particular blog post. Kudos to Matthew Straub for pulling all of these images together, including piloting the drone for the overhead shot. (You can see him in the right side of the picture with his head down over the controller… :)

I am going to renew my focus on capturing images for my stories. If you’re involved in telling stories for your company or organization, I hope you will too!

Choosing the Email Address for Each Person in a Google Contact Group

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By Jason Terry, with another solution to a problem that has been nagging him for a long time! Picking the email address to use for a contact in a Google Contact Group.

Do you use Google Contacts to keep track of all the people you know? If not, then you can move on to the next thing in your day… thanks for reading!. :)

For those of you that DO use Google Contacts, you’re probably aware that you can create a Contact Group. This is really handy when you find yourself emailing the same group of people a lot. For example, I’m involved in a few peer advisory groups. And the blog teams for our clients. These are groups of people that I email on a regular basis. And I’ve set up Google Contact Groups for all of them.

Before I go into picking the email address for each person in a Google Contact Group, I will quickly show you how to set up Google Contact Groups.

Blue Gurus: Google Contact Group

Setting up a Google Contact Group

  1. Log into your Google Contacts
  2. Click on any of your contacts.
  3. You will see a button (like in the screenshot, labeled Groups) that has a three-headed group icon. Click it.
  4. In the drop down, you can create a new group or assign the contact you’re currently looking at to one of the existing groups in the list.
  5. If this is the first group you’ve created, click Create New.
  6. A new dialog pops up where you can type in the Group Name. Do that. Then click OK.
  7. And now the group will show up in your list of groups. Click the checkbox next to the group you just created to add your current contact to the group and click Apply. (This is an easy step to miss… you have to click Apply to actually save the group affiliation.)

Sending a Group Email

Once you’ve set up a Google Contact Group, all you have to do to send a group email is start a new email. In the “To” field start typing the group name, and when it shows up, click on it. The “To” field will then be filled out with all the contacts in your group! It’s that easy. And really useful.

Here’s the Problem…

Many of the people in my contacts have a work email address and a personal email address. And when I send group emails, they usually have a strong preference about which email I use for group communications. But for some reason, Google would just pick an email address. Sometimes it was the right one, and sometimes not. This ended up being a manual process for me to fix… silly, right?

The Solution

There’s an easy fix, that I guess should’ve been obvious to me… but it wasn’t. Refer back to the screenshot above. Do you see the second arrow labeled “Choose Email” that points to a little drop down icon next to the group name? All you have to do to pick exactly what email address you want to use for that group is click the drop down. All of the contact’s email addresses will show up in the list, and you can pick the one you want to use for the group. (Important: You have to click Apply for the change to be saved.)

And that’s it! I’ve gone through all of my contact groups and chosen the correct email addresses for each person in my groups. It’s a small thing, but it was really annoying to manually fix when sending a group email. You might have already known about this solution, but I’m sure some people missed it like I did.

If you didn’t know about this setting in Google Contacts or you found this blog post helpful, I would love to hear from you. Leave a comment or shoot me an email… I would really appreciate it! Thanks for reading!

Want to know how to tell what’s changed between two versions of the same document?

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By Jason Terry, talking about comparing two versions of the same document using Microsoft Word to figure out the differences.

Compare Two Versions of the Same DocumentOne of the things people give me a lot of positive feedback about is when I share technical tips. Not everyone gives a crap about technical tips, so I try not to overdo it. But this week I thought I would share something that made Jim Stuelke, a good friend and client of mine, really happy recently.

Jim gets multiple versions of the same document emailed to him. Usually the documents are Microsoft Word documents, but this tip works for just about any kind of text document. The problem is that the author of the document doesn’t always have Track Changes turned on, so it’s really hard for Jim to tell what’s changed.

I find myself in the same situation occasionally when a client sends me a revised version of a blog post they’ve written. If they haven’t turned on Track Changes, it can be really time consuming (and a bit painful) to figure out what has changed.

Here’s One Solution: Use Microsoft Word’s Compare Feature

Microsoft Word has a nifty feature called Compare. In more recent versions of Microsoft Word, you get to this feature by clicking on the Review tab in the menu ribbon at the top. In the drop down, you can either Compare or Combine. Choose Compare.

Blue Gurus: Microsoft Word's Compare Feature

A dialog box pops up that lets you specify the two files you want to compare. Take a look at the screenshot to see what I’m talking about. On the left, click the drop down and choose Browse to find the first document you are comparing. (You can also click on the folder icon to browse for your first document.) This should be the oldest version of the two documents. On the right, specify the most recent version of the document. Once you have selected the two documents to compare, click OK and let the magic happen.

What happens next might look a little intimidating, but don’t let it scare you. There are different windows showing different versions of the document and the differences that were found. I like to use the Revisions bar that comes up to navigate through the various differences between the two documents. Just play around with it a bit, you will get the hang of it. And trust me, if you are like Jim and have multiple versions of the same document without the ability to Track Changes, this will be a great way to save you a bunch of time.

If you don’t have Microsoft Word, there are lots of other ways to compare docs… here is an online tool called DiffChecker that lets you paste text into two different areas and compare the differences: https://www.diffchecker.com/

That’s it for this blog post… I hope some of you find it helpful! Before I go, I wanted to wrap up with something just for fun…

Just for Fun: What song would you want playing when you walked on stage?

What Song?Jason Moxness asked our peer advisory group that question a few weeks ago and it has stuck with me. My immediate response was Stayin’ Alive by the Bee Gees. But when I took a harder look at the lyrics, I figured that might not be appropriate. And I thought a terrible answer would be It’s the End of the World as we Know It by REM.

Some other good songs would be 500 Miles by the Proclaimers, Tubthumping by Chumbawamba, and The Greatest American Hero theme song if you want to prove to everyone you are at least 45 years old.

What song would you have playing when you’re walking on stage? Let me know in the comments, or tell me next time we run into each other!

Do you have a problem unplugging from work while you’re on vacation?

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By Jason Terry, talking about the importance of being disciplined with your email and unplugging when you take vacation.

I often ask for blog ideas from our subscribers, and last week I got a great email from Tony Sheets, Principal at Umzuzu. Tony and I are in a peer advisory group together, and we refer a lot of business to each other. He’s a good friend and ridiculously smart when it comes to Google and other cloud based technologies. (If you need help with Google Apps, he’s the guy you should talk to.)

Here’s what Tony said in his email:

You have one of the best platforms for sharing things about good people practicing good business. Joe noticed I had vacation on my calendar for next week and took it upon himself to send me this article. (Emailing While You’re on Vacation Is a Quick Way to Ruin Company Culture.)

I’m a firm believer in not “checking in” on the weekends, evenings, and when I’m on vacation. But, I’ve slipped during vacation in the last couple of years. I’m glad Joe sent this as a reminder and thought you might want to share it with your audience.
Tony Sheets, Umzuzu

It’s way too easy to stay glued to your cell phone or iPad while you are on vacation. For some, it’s an addiction.

Do you have a problem unplugging from work while you’re on vacation?

Blue Gurus: Staying unplugged while on vacationI was on vacation last week for Spring Break and had my out of office email response turned on. I had decent internet access where I was at. And we had a laptop with us, so it would have been easy to work at any point during my trip. But over the years, I’ve learned how important it is to unplug as much as possible when I’m on vacation. It’s one of the times I give myself permission to relax and recharge.

I understand that you want to be available to your family, your clients and your team in case there’s an emergency. It’s a tough balance.

A compromise.

Maybe a reasonable compromise is to build some discipline and structure into the way you check your messages while on vacation. I talked to Dan VanDonge at Straub Construction about how he handles email when he’s on vacation. He checks his email once or twice a day and only responds to really important emails; leaving the majority for when he gets back to the office.

That’s how I handled emails on my trip last week. I was scuba diving in the mornings and spending time with my wife Trista in the afternoons. So most evenings I checked my emails, deleted the junk and marked the items that I would need to address when I got home. And yes, I responded to a couple of emails to move some things forward. Funny enough, I was chastised by my good friend Jim Stuelke at Extreme Coating Solutions for not staying unplugged.

I also scheduled an “administrative day” on the Monday after I got back. This allowed me to catch up before getting right back into my normal routine. As a result, I’m still relaxed and have better perspective as I look at the work ahead of me over the next couple of weeks.

If you went somewhere for Spring Break, how did you do? Were you glued to your phone or was it a non-issue? If you’ve got a trip coming up, I hope this story helps you in some way. I hope you’re able to stay in the moment and be present for yourself and for the people you’re traveling with. Mastering this can be life changing… speaking from personal experience.

I hope you’re having a great week!

I hope the guy who invented Auto Correct burns in HELLO!

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By Jason Terry, talking about Pixabay for free images and how to turn off Auto Correct on your phone

I was recently looking for an image on Pixabay for a client, when I stumbled across the following:

Blue Gurus: Auto Correct

It made me laugh out loud. That emotional moment when the sentence switches from an angry rant to a smiley, joyful, “HELLO!” is hilarious to me. I’ve had plenty of funny or embarrassing moments on my cell phone when texting friends and family because Auto Correct does something silly. (I hope you can relate.)

This experience gave me two things to try and help you with this week. First, how to find images for your stories. Second, how to disable Auto Correct on your phone.

1) Finding free images for your stories

In August last year, I wrote a story, “Creative Commons CC0 : Free images without worrying about copyright infringement.” It’s a deeper dive on what CC0 licensing is all about. I also do a roundup of websites with free images you can use for your blog or print materials. It’s definitely worth a read if you missed it.

And here’s an example of how you can use it.

Parker Young at Straub Construction recently sent me a story to publish on their website and social media about peer advisory groups. He didn’t have a current photo of either of his peer groups and was wondering if I could help. I said I could find something on Pixabay for him.

I searched Pixabay for “peers” and found the following picture:

Blue Gurus: Pixabay Search Example

That picture was okay, but then I searched for “group” and found this:

Blue Gurus: Pixabay Search Example

I liked this image a lot. There’s more color and it just “feels” right to me. It better represents Parker’s story. I sent both options and he was really happy with the second one.

So the next time you’re struggling to find a featured image for a story, your website, your print collateral… give Pixabay a shot.

2) How to turn off Auto Correct

I ended up turning off auto correct on my iPhone. Did you know you could do that? I thought you might want to know how to do it on your phone as well.

If you use an iPhone

  1. Open the “Settings” app on the iPhone or iPad.
  2. Go to “General” and then to “Keyboard”
  3. Locate “Auto-Correction” and flip the switch to the OFF position.
  4. Exit the Settings app.

If you use an Android phone

I found a great How To article with pictures here.

And that’s about it for this week. I hope one of these tips was helpful to you. If not, maybe you got a chuckle at the title and picture I wrote the story about!

When was the last time you cleaned out your laptop bag or briefcase?

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By Jason Terry, talking about spring cleaning your laptop bag or briefcase. Especially if it’s been years.

I was at a client’s office recently and I needed an HDMI cable to connect my laptop to their wall-mounted big screen TV. I’ve kept an HDMI cable in my bag for years, but it was only 6 feet long. And bulky. And it wouldn’t reach the TV from the conference table we were at.

Blue Gurus: Spring Cleaning Laptop BagI went to my trusted source for just about everything… Amazon.com. And I found a 15 foot slim HDMI cable that was about $10 bucks. Kansas City is one of those lucky cities that can get same day or next day delivery from Amazon.com for free. And the next day, my shiny new cable showed up.

When I started putting the new HDMI cable in my laptop bag, I realized there were a couple of other cables that were past due to be replaced or upgraded. And that’s when I knew it was time to really take stock of what was in my bag.

Time to purge the bag.

I took every single thing out and arranged the items on a table. There were some really old cables that needed to be upgraded. The in-ear headphones had been in my bag for more than 5 years… so time for some new Sony Extra Bass headphones. USB-C is a new cable used with newer devices… and I had none in my bag. Oh, and I remember loaning a client a CAT-6 cable and hadn’t replaced it. And then wondered why the heck I’ve been carrying around a mini LEGO Star Wars tie fighter set in my bag… for years.

I ended up getting rid of almost two-thirds of what was in my laptop bag. Some items were given away… and some thrown away. And I made a list of things that would be useful to have in my newly reorganized bag.

The Shopping List

So for a little over $100, I have all the cables I need when I’m on the go. And better sound. And a little breeze.

When was the last time you went through your laptop bag or briefcase? If it’s been a while, maybe this story will inspire you to go through the same process… and if you do, please tell me about it! I hope my shopping list has given you some good ideas of things to keep in your bag or briefcase.

Home Rental Services Rewards Their Team for Thanking Clients and Vendors in Unique Ways

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By Jason Terry, talking about rewarding your team for thanking clients and vendors in unique ways.

I love it when companies do things differently. And I have the unique opportunity to see what a number of companies are doing internally when I am on site every month. Something happened recently with one of my clients, Home Rental Services, that I just had to share.

HRS Quarterly Award for Thanking Clients

From left to right: Paul, Oretta and Joshua

They’ve recently implemented a quarterly award for the employee that thanks or recognizes a customer in the most unique way. I believe that thanking a customer in a meaningful way is a good step towards having a customer for life. And the ideas that the HRS staff came up with were excellent, funny and creative.

Here were the team members in the running this quarter…

Paul Branton

Paul is the Director of Investor Services for HRS. He did a video interview with Jake Stallman who works for Keller Williams. Jake referred an investor client that has since done two acquisitions and HRS manages the properties.

Jake was willing to spend the time it took to capture a video interview about the value Paul brings to the table. We used the video in a blog post. (Click here to see that story and the video.) The goal was to share a great partnership while showcasing what Paul is doing for investor clients of HRS.

Paul said, “Jake blew our socks off with his trusted referral and the ongoing relationship.” So Paul bought a really nice sock gift basket from Socks 101, a company based in Lee’s Summit. Jake loved the socks and the note about “blowing our socks off!”

Oretta Croushore

Oretta is the assistant property manager for HRS. HRS manages hundreds of homes and does a lot of work with Complete Property Services. Oretta wanted to do something special to recognize Complete Property Services, and came up with mini-Bundt cakes. Why? To go along with the message, “thanks for always working your bundts off for us!” They ordered a bunch of Bundtinis from Nothing Bundt Cakes to send to Complete Property Services.

Joshua Volland

Joshua is the lead property manager for HRS. They had a renter that was patient during an air conditioning maintenance issue. He sent the renter a Carnivore Club Rub and Grilling Salt Set. The message read, “Hopefully your maintenance items haven’t rubbed you the wrong way. Thanks for your patience as we get everything resolved.” Hilarious. And I am sure it went a long way in terms of the relationship the renter has with HRS.

And the winner is…

Oretta was voted the winner of the most creative/funny/thoughtful thank you. But for HRS, everyone wins in this story. The entire process improved team communication and relationship. And it strengthened a guiding principal to thank clients in a meaningful way. I know this best practice will come back around for HRS in the form of repeat business.

This blog post is one of the ways I can thank HRS for being a great customer of Blue Gurus. I love being part of their team, not just a vendor for blogging and website work!

This is scary. Using Google filetype searches to find Excel and Powerpoint files.

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Google filetype searchBy Jason Terry, talking about using Google filetype searches to find excel spreadsheets, powerpoint presentations and more.

Everyone has used Google to search for something. But you may not realize the advanced kinds of searches you can do with Google. Sure, you’ve probably figured out how to switch the search mode from regular web page results to image results that have the keywords you type in associated with them. (If not, click here and try out a Google Image search. But be careful, most of the images are copyrighted. If you’re trying to find images you can use for your blog or website, check out my recent blog post about safe images websites.)

Here are real world examples of what I’ve found using a Google filetype search:

  • Your top salesperson’s client and prospect list in an excel spreadsheet that included email addresses
  • That lawsuit against your company last year in a PDF document
  • A list of the people that you laid off last year in a Word document that included names and addresses

Google filetype search can be scary.Scary, right? Some of this stuff is public record, and some of it is posted to the internet by people that don’t understand the potential consequences. The big secret here is that you can use Google to search the internet for Word Documents, Excel spreadsheets (my favorite), PowerPoint presentations and more. What people don’t understand about Google’s technology is that it searches and archives EVERYTHING it finds on the internet. If you add a new page to your web site, it will be in Google’s index and showing up in search results within hours. Crazy concept, right?

How do I find Excel Spreadsheets using Google filetype searches?

Just add “filetype:xls” to the end of your search.  Let’s say for example that I wanted to find any excel spreadsheets on the internet that have “kansas city” in them. I would open my browser, go to www.google.com and type in the following: “kansas city” filetype:xls.  Give that a try by clicking here.  You will get a list of links to EXCEL SPREADSHEETS that have “kansas city” in them.

At the time I did this search, I got 16,300 results.  Think about that. 16,300 Excel Spreadsheets that have “kansas city” in them, and I can go look at any of them. If that doesn’t surprise you, try searching for your company name and see what kind of results you get. It might knock you out of your seat. Then try searches with your competitors company name. Sometimes the things you find are worthless… but sometimes, they can be really interesting.

There are a lot of other filetype search options that you can use as well.
Click here for a complete list of file types that Google supports in their search results.

Use quotes to return more focused results.

If you type blue gurus for your search (without quotes), you will get results with “blue” in them as well as results with “gurus” in them. If you want to return results with both words, all you have to do is put quotes around the search terms. So “blue gurus” or “multiple sclerosis society.” You get the idea. This tip will definitely improve the relevance of your Google searches.

Have fun with your newly acquired search skills. Remember, this information is not good or evil in nature. It’s just information. How you use the information is what matters. I personally use the information I find using these techniques ethically, and when I find something damaging about a company I tell them about it so they are at least aware that their information is visible to the public. Maybe that’s why Google’s motto is “Do No Evil.” They know how extensive, personal and far reaching the information they collect can be.

Did you learn anything? Want me to cover something in a future blog post? I would love to hear from you in the comments!

Creative Commons CC0 : Free images without worrying about copyright infringement.

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By Jason Terry, talking about free images you can use commercially under Creative Commons CC0 licensing.

CopyrightLet me start out by saying that this story is about copyright law. And your first instinct might be to move on. But what I am about to tell you could save you a lot of headache and expense.

Over the past couple of years, I’ve seen an increase in the number of lawsuits or legal nasty-grams that companies have gotten for using an image on their website or blog without permission. Sometimes, taking the image down is all that is required to make the problem go away. Other times, it can costs hundreds or even thousands of dollars to settle the issue.

When someone takes a photograph or creates original imagery on their computer, they have copyright protection for their work. And that’s a good thing. Often, they will upload their original work to “free” image sites like Wikimedia Commons for you to use. But it’s only free if you include the correct attribution link.

If you didn’t know, attribution is a web link back to the photographer or artist that created the image you would like to use. If you forget to include the attribution link, the creator can sue you for copyright infringement. Most people wouldn’t do this, especially if they were making their work available to you on Wikimedia Commons in the first place. But there are Copyright Trolls out there making a living doing this very thing.

When you go to the home page of Wikimedia Commons, you will see the text, “a collection of 41,141,913 freely usable media files to which anyone can contribute.” But you’ve got to read the fine print. The images have complicated rules on how you can use them, where you can use them (print, websites, etc.) and how often.

A big part of the problem is that the current copyright laws are complicated.

Creative Commons CC0

Creative Commons CC0Creative Commons CC0 is the answer! It allows creators to donate their work to the public domain for anyone to use. And CC0 allows you to download and use images for commercial use.

Here’s an excerpt from the Creative Commons FAQ:

A person using CC0 (called the “affirmer” in the legal code) dedicates a work to the public domain by waiving all of his or her copyright and neighboring and related rights, if any, in a work, to the fullest extent permitted by law. If the waiver isn’t effective for any reason, then CC0 acts as a license from the affirmer granting the public an unconditional, irrevocable, non exclusive, royalty free license to use the work for any purpose.
– CreativeCommons.org

So basically, if you find an image on a website that uses Creative Commons CC0 licensing, you can do whatever you want with it. And you don’t have to worry about some crazy legal issue down the road for using the image.

I wanted to give you 5 sites to consider. If you find an image you want to use, make sure it’s covered by CC0 licensing. Many of these websites use ads to pay for their hosting expenses. Often the ads are for iStockPhoto or other paid image sites. So you need to pay attention as you are clicking around.

CC0

Top 5 Sites with CC0 Licensed Images

  1. Pixabay.com
  2. Gratisography.com
  3. Pexels.com
  4. NegativeSpace.co
  5. FoodiesFeed.com

Let me know what you think! Was this totally boring? Was it super helpful? Have you had a situation where an image you used from a website became a problem? My hope is that you learned something.

Thank you so much for reading this story. If you don’t already get new stories emailed to you as they become available, consider signing up for our newsletter. We’re one of the few companies in Kansas City that create original stories every week!

Tech Tip: Wi-Fi Calling Next Time You’re At The Lake!

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By Jason Terry, talking about Wi-Fi Calling

Recently I went to the lake with some of my business friends. We’re part of a peer advisory group together and go to the lake a couple of times a year. The goal is to have more focused time together. To strengthen our relationships. But most importantly, to have some fun.

One of the challenges when going to the lake is that cell reception is spotty at best. In many places, there’s no service at all. I mentioned this to Jason Moxness and he gave me a solution to my problem. (Kudos to Moxness for inspiring this blog post!)

Wi-Fi Calling

Blue Gurus: WiFi CallingDid you know that newer phones can make and receive calls and texts using an internet connection? Normally, your phone is using a cellular connection to handle calls and texts, but everything stops when your cell coverage is low or non-existent. All you need to make this work is a phone that supports Wi-Fi calling and a Wi-Fi internet connection.

The house we were staying at had great Wi-Fi, so once I made the setting change in my phone, I was able to call and text like normal. Awesome.

It was a bit embarrassing that a banker taught me something technical.

I am usually the technical one solving his problems. Case in point, he had an email sync problem that involved IMAP settings and Google Email Folder view settings that I fixed for him earlier that day. It’s a good reminder that nobody has all the answers and it’s important to ask for help when you are struggling with something.

911 Calls

The only thing that’s a bit weird about switching from cellular calling to Wi-Fi calling is how 911 calls are handled. Normally, when you make a 911 call and you’re connected to a cell tower, the operator has a very good idea of where you are physically located. That changes drastically when you are calling over Wi-Fi because your location depends on your internet service provider network. In layman’s terms, I could be calling from the Lake of the Ozarks and it look like I am calling from St. Louis.

As a result, when you switch to Wi-Fi calling on your phone, you have to accept some terms and conditions related to 911 calls. You also have to specify the physical address that you would want 911 responders to go to in the case of an emergency. It’s something to be mindful of and understand if you start using Wi-Fi calling a lot.

(I decided to turn Wi-Fi calling off when I got back to Kansas City. In the event of an emergency, I don’t want responders going to my house!)

Setting Wi-Fi Calling up on an iPhone

Go to Settings | Phone | Wi-Fi Calling. Drag the little slider to the ON position and follow the prompts.

Setting Wi-Fi Calling up on Android Phones

Open the Settings app on your Android phone and tap the “More” or “More Settings” button under Wireless & network. You’ll see a “Wi-Fi Calling” option on the next screen – activate it to enable the feature. If you don’t want to use Wi-FI calling, you can disable it from here, too. This option won’t show up unless you’re using a phone with Wi-Fi calling support..

I hope this was a helpful tip… I’ve asked quite a few people if they knew about this capability on their phones. Based on a survey of about 20 people, more than half of them were aware this was possible. I was in the minority that DIDN’T know. It was really useful to learn that Wi-Fi calling was available on my iPhone!

P.S. If you were wondering how my step discipline is going, I’m still walking at least 10,000 steps every day. I walked a total of 36 miles last week.