Co-create small businesses via a social network. Earn Rewards!
 

Using Your Cell Phone To Remember Posts

written by John Chow on March 24th, 2008

Have you ever had a great post idea come to your mind and then forgot it when you got home? This has happened to me a few times. I normally don’t carry pen and paper with me to write stuff down. Instead, I rely on my super great memory to remember what I want to post about. However, more often than not, the memory isn’t super or great and I end up forgetting what I wanted to blog about. I have since found a solution to this problem by using my cell phone.

The Voice Recorder

While I may not always have pen and paper at the ready, I alway have my cell phone with me. When a really good post idea hits me and I want make sure I remember it, I would use the voice recorder feature that is built into my Moto cell phone and record the post idea. Should I forget about the post, I can just play back the recording.

The Voice Mail

If your cell phone doesn’t have a voice recorder, you can always leave a message on your voice mail. Just call your cell phone and wait for the beep. You can then check your voice mail at home if you forget what you wanted to post about. This is assuming your cell phone plan has a voice mail feature. Most plans do.

The Address Book

If your cell doesn’t have a voice recorder and your plan doesn’t include voice mail, then you can text your post into your cell phone’s address book by saving the post idea as the name. Enter any random phone number and then instead of entering the person’s name, enter your post idea. You can recall it later by looking though your address book.

If you don’t have a cell phone, then I recommend making sure you have pen and paper with you. :mrgreen:

vrempire said on March 24th, 2008 at 11:09 am

Hmmm..maybe I can use the calendar function in my cellphone to do a quick note of the posting in mind. yeah, we seldom carry paper these days, so the nearest object with us is the cellphone :)

Reply to this comment
Nicholas James said on March 24th, 2008 at 11:24 am

Yes this is a good point which can also be used/implemented

Reply to this comment
David Chew said on March 24th, 2008 at 1:05 pm

That is what it suppose to.

Reply to this comment
YouthTax said on March 24th, 2008 at 3:42 pm

Good idea with the calendar! Personally, I e-mail myself ideas from my phone so that when I get home and check my e-mail, a nice list of ideas is sitting in my inbox waiting to be transferred to my “ideas” folder.

Reply to this comment
Terry Tay said on March 24th, 2008 at 5:53 pm

I like the idea of using the calendar in the cell phone.
~Terry

Reply to this comment
Perfect Skin said on March 24th, 2008 at 11:11 am

I use the free handwriting tool on pda toscripple down pages of post or any other ideas I may have.

Mary

Reply to this comment
David Chew said on March 24th, 2008 at 1:13 pm

PDA is more expensive use a cellphone. :mrgreen:

Reply to this comment
Daniel McGonagle @ http://danielmcgonagle said on March 24th, 2008 at 11:20 am

I carry my lpatop around with me wherever I go and write blog posts on text files, Notepad while in car….
Inspired content is usually unqiue and valuable content.

I may have invented car-blogging :smile:

Thanks,

Dan

http://danielmcgonagle.name

Reply to this comment
Alex Shalman said on March 24th, 2008 at 3:11 pm

I used to drive 1 hour and 15 minutes to school while online via cell phone with my verizon wireless card. Dangerous- do not try at home. :twisted:

Reply to this comment
Robert said on March 24th, 2008 at 3:32 pm

I hear ya. I drive and type on my Blackberry and search the net. It’s dangerous….to say the least.

Reply to this comment
Vista Sidebar Gadgets said on March 24th, 2008 at 4:26 pm

Yeah that’s awesome. I wish our EVDO (Wireless Internet) network was evolved enough to do that here… Oh well. I guess there is always pen & paper available…

Reply to this comment
Tyson Williams said on March 24th, 2008 at 11:21 am

I don’t leave without my BlackBerry Curve, you can e-mail yourself and voice record your thoughts at same time. Or simply blog directly over the phone’s browser into the blog.

Reply to this comment
Jamie Harrop said on March 24th, 2008 at 11:33 am

It was just last week that I was craving for a voice recorder. I looked all through my Blackberry but I couldn’t find one.

I just took another look and I found it. Awesome! Thanks for the reminder, John. :)

Reply to this comment
Nicholas James said on March 24th, 2008 at 11:37 am

I either email myself the idea or i’ll save it on my drafts as my mobile phone allows text messages to be saved as drafts which is another useful feature :mrgreen:

Reply to this comment
Shawn Knight said on March 24th, 2008 at 11:39 am

I do this all the time with my iPhone, but I write down a memo in the Notes section instead of doing an audio version. My memory is terrible, so it’s great to have something with me at all times that can allow me to store random ideas before I forget them.

Reply to this comment
Joy Smith said on March 24th, 2008 at 11:44 am

I have a notes section on my phone that I use to jot down ideas for articles, reviews, etc. when I have nothing else to do.

Reply to this comment
Kacper said on March 24th, 2008 at 11:45 am

John, let me guest… You came with the idea of this post in the situation when you didn’t have any other possibility to remember it except your cell phone, am I right?

Reply to this comment
Robert said on March 24th, 2008 at 1:10 pm

I would say that’s correct. :cool:

Reply to this comment
Grant D Griffiths said on March 24th, 2008 at 12:22 pm

Even better than that, use your cell phone to call http://jott.com/ and Jott yourself with any idea or to-do you might have. I use it daily and it is a great tool.

Reply to this comment
T.J. Schmitz said on March 25th, 2008 at 5:34 am

Jott (http://jott.com) is indispensable to me. It will transcribe into an email the voice message you leave - with very good accuracy. I use it for both to-do reminders as well as story ideas.

Reply to this comment
Michael Kwan said on March 24th, 2008 at 12:44 pm

I use the Tasks feature in my Windows Mobile phone. There’s always a Task in there that reads “blog ideas” and then the contents are, you guessed it, blog ideas.

Reply to this comment
Matthew said on March 24th, 2008 at 4:15 pm

I do the same as you. I have a huge list of ideas on my task list.

Reply to this comment
Robert said on March 24th, 2008 at 1:05 pm

What a great idea! The other day, in my car, I jotted down some ideas on a parking pass that was hanging from my rearview mirror! But using your cell phone is a great tool for remembering post ideas.

Reply to this comment
David Chew said on March 24th, 2008 at 1:14 pm

You can email to yourself.

Reply to this comment
Robert said on March 24th, 2008 at 3:31 pm

Yes, but speaking directly into your cell phone is faster.

Reply to this comment
Jarel said on March 24th, 2008 at 1:15 pm

I usually just email myself the idea and star it in gmail.

If I’m away from the computer I use Drop.io instead of my verizon voice mail. With Drop.io you get a voice mail number that you can record your message and it will convert it into an mp3 in your account. Plus Drop.io does tons of other crap that is really useful for me at work and sometimes blogging. Heck, you could probably even use it to do podcast blogging.

Reply to this comment
Frugal Dad said on March 24th, 2008 at 1:33 pm

Great idea! I usually find myself trying to dig up a piece of paper and pen to jot down my ideas. Inspiration tends to hit at the most inconvenient times, if you know what I mean!

Reply to this comment
Duncan Lamb said on March 24th, 2008 at 1:43 pm

Ever tried Jott.com? It rocks… free voice transcription up to like 30 seconds… it is a toll free call, and you get an email with your voice message in a couple of minutes. I use it frequently when I want to make a note to myself, have a new idea, etc. Next time im in my email, there those notes are, lined up and typed out for free.

Reply to this comment
Travis said on March 24th, 2008 at 1:51 pm

I use Jott (http://jott.com/). The voice to text transcription has vastly improved over the past year. Eliminates the need entirely of having to write or type your ideas.

I introduced one of my clients to it a while back and their entire organization lives on Jott. You can integrate it with 37signal’s Highrise (CRM) and having to-do’s right in your Highrise dashboard instead of your e-mail.

Reply to this comment
John Esberg said on March 24th, 2008 at 1:51 pm

Personally, I would also recommend a palm with a folding keyboard. You type at lightning speed and its much more easily budgeted. :mrgreen:

Reply to this comment
Lisa said on March 24th, 2008 at 2:11 pm

I do something that is really simple - send a text message to my email address. I use it all the time to send myself reminders! The wonders of technology :)

Reply to this comment
Wade said on March 24th, 2008 at 3:41 pm

I only have a cheap go phone. It doesn’t have all those fancy features. I want a Blackjack II. I can’t really afford a real cell phone service because nobody visits my site :(

Reply to this comment
Internet Business Blogger said on March 24th, 2008 at 4:09 pm

Thankfully I have a blackberry and just have a note setup for each blog. I just add any ideas to that blogs note and then later create a title in wordpress for each blog post idea to be filled out later

Reply to this comment
Simon Lau said on March 24th, 2008 at 4:18 pm

hey thats a great idea! Too bad it’s a pain to type notes on my 8801. I arely even txt message. But the phone does have an option to add notes to the TO-Do or Calendar option

Reply to this comment
Vista Sidebar Gadgets said on March 24th, 2008 at 4:22 pm

Great post.

But, how about pen & paper?

I always keep a mini-sized notepad and pen in my coat pockets. It takes me only 1/100th of the time to just jott down some keywords on paper, than type it in a phone or blackberry (of course, I have never mastered the are of speedtyping on a number pad either).

Reply to this comment
Hannah said on March 24th, 2008 at 4:26 pm

Good post John!

Now if only there was a solution to the problem I have with forgetting posts: I tend to think up the most ideas in the shower, where there really is nothing to use to remember, other than writing down the idea in shampoo.

Reply to this comment
Hannah said on March 24th, 2008 at 4:31 pm

I should also add that a lot of phones have a “memo” feature these days too. I only use mine to input flight confirmation numbers so that I have them when I’m at the airport, but it would work pretty well for ideas, too, I imagine!

Reply to this comment
Terra Andersen said on March 24th, 2008 at 5:23 pm

I always use the voice record method of remember stuff on my phone. It’s the bEST! I love using it when I am driving, as this is generally when I think of some of the best stuff. Or just as I am falling asleep. haha

Reply to this comment
Art of Webhosting - Jeremy said on March 24th, 2008 at 5:32 pm

Fortunately I’ve got a PDA so I can write full blog posts on my “mobile phone”. :cool:

Reply to this comment
Syed Balkhi said on March 25th, 2008 at 4:39 am

oo I can’t stand that keyboard … I will never write a full blog post on the PDA unless i have my laptop or some real keyboard.

Reply to this comment
Affiliate Confession said on March 24th, 2008 at 5:41 pm

My cell does all sorts of junk I never use, but I will remember this one. I messed around with it when I first got it, but haven’t used the recorder for several months.

Reply to this comment
Kevin @ Change Your Tree said on March 24th, 2008 at 7:36 pm

I already do this and it’s a great way for me to remember blog ideas. It’s saved me from forgetting more than a few times.

Reply to this comment
Milo said on March 24th, 2008 at 8:01 pm

I type a short note on the SMS and save it as draft for reminder.

Milo

Reply to this comment
Michelle said on March 24th, 2008 at 9:19 pm

Nice! for me what works best is the notepad on my blackberry curve!!! I get so many emails and txts on phone that txting to me would def take a while to find it!!! and calling my voicemail will not give me the time to say everything I wanna say :lol: … I tent to speak more than write :razz: so def voice recorders and memopads are the best tools for me!!!!

Michelle
from
http://www.FaceySpacey.com

Reply to this comment
The Manager said on March 25th, 2008 at 2:02 am

now this was a serious post! Secrets of rich people now being shared with the masses! thank you!

Reply to this comment
Johan Cyprich said on March 25th, 2008 at 3:23 am

This is why its a good idea for every blogger to have a PDA. If you get ideas for a post, you can write it down or create the blog post.

Reply to this comment
Syed Balkhi said on March 25th, 2008 at 4:37 am

I have used the cellphone text editor … never thought about recording myself … Good idea

Reply to this comment
Chetan said on March 25th, 2008 at 5:59 pm

Syed, voice mail option is a good one which i used a couple times, and thought no one else would be doing the same!

Reply to this comment
Chris Guthrie said on March 25th, 2008 at 6:56 am

Yes it’s very important not to forget the ideas you come up with. I wrote about the steps I use to not suffer from writers block (see below) and using the cell phone voice recorder is definetely one of them.

http://www.chrisguthrie.net/simple-steps-to-never-suffer-from-writers-block-again/

If you aren’t doing this now I highly recommend it.

Reply to this comment
Chetan said on March 25th, 2008 at 5:56 pm

You use mobile to remember posts but i blog through mobile. And the comment am writing now is also through my Nokia N70. It has a good notes software where i can write pretty easily and fast :)

Reply to this comment
BML said on March 30th, 2008 at 11:42 am

Better One - Use Jott.com with Google Calendar and Sync it to Outlook. Take a look - http://www.abitgeek.com/time-management/make-appointments-in-outlook-and-google-calendar-by-phone.html

Reply to this comment
ListenToLeon said on April 1st, 2008 at 1:30 pm

This is definitely a good idea…I’ve sent text messages to myself, but since they’re not free on my crappy phone plan, I started carrying around a notepad. I’m going to start putting notes in my contact list like you suggested, because people can tell that you’re writing about them and getting blog material when you actually use a pen and pad! :lol:

Reply to this comment
Caleb said on April 1st, 2008 at 4:20 pm

I write a post about this sme thing…especially on using the voice recorder.

Reply to this comment

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.