Love in Everything We Do: it was there all along
In her blog post, Laura opens up about how Kirsty and Jon’s vision initially threw her for a loop. After spending over 20 years in healthcare communications, she was taken aback by the idea of bringing something as personal as love into the professional world. It just didn’t seem to fit. But as she let their idea sink in, Laura began to realize it wasn’t as far-fetched as she first thought. Here, she shares how embracing that idea can actually lead to more meaningful and compassionate work.
“Wasn’t love a bit, well, personal? Or at least, not particularly worky?? How would I reconcile it with the professional?”
When Kirsty and Jon first shared their vision with me, I don’t mind saying I felt a bit uneasy. I mean, it was so different! So out there! In the 24 odd years I’d been working for and with healthcare comms agencies, I’d never seen anything quite like it. Love hadn’t been mentioned by anyone! Wasn’t love a bit, well, personal? Or at least, not particularly worky?? How would I reconcile it with the professional?
I listened to their rationale and let it percolate. And over time, it dawned on me. This vision wasn’t actually as ‘out there’ as it had first appeared to me. I thought back to all the times I’ve done great work, for clients I’ve really admired. There was a sense of ‘the personal’ to all of it. Whether that was the extra email/call I’d made to a patient without being asked just to check they were OK after a difficult interview, to the Teams meeting where the client and I decided we could cover the key actions in 10 minutes, leaving 20 to chat about our summer holiday plans and what the hell we’d do with the kids the rest of the time. The difficult conversation I’d had to have when my work had fallen short of the expected mark. The lovely conversation I’d had when my work had exceeded expectations, that left me on a high all day.
I might not love everything I do in a day. Do you? There are always tasks and projects that leave me a little drained, just as there are when I’m wearing my other ‘hats’ of wife, mother, sister, mate. But that’s love, isn’t it? The give, and the take. The highs, the lows, and most of the time, the contented equilibrium. The exciting, the boring and the hilarious. But through it all – the red thread of mutual respect, of compassion, of humanity. Of love.
How I Turned my Unique Interests into a Career I Love
Szonja, one of our fantastic Account Executives, shares how her differences have propelled her into a new direction. From not knowing what MedComms was just over a year ago, to finding a newfound passion in medical writing, Love in Everything We Do resonated with her from day one. Have a read to learn more about her journey.
“I was given projects right off the bat that allowed me to have challenge and autonomy to use my strengths—attention to detail, natural curiosity, critical thinking.”
In my early life, I struggled with fitting in. I always had the tendency to have strange fascinations and to read and talk about them endlessly. The earliest I can remember was kindergarten; I was obsessed with deep-sea creatures. A young kid talking about jellyfish a bit too much was endearing to adults, but as I aged it dawned on me that I was the odd one out, and worse, everybody noticed that before I did.
I knew there was something different about me, but I didn’t know what it was. I communicated in unique ways, had a strong sense of justice, and developed intense interests that I researched extensively, often knowing so much about them that it weirded people out. But stranger things have happened, I thought, and focused on my goals, eventually leading me to medical school due to my love for both literature and science.
At the age of 21, after a particularly difficult time in my life, I was diagnosed with autism. This diagnosis was a turning point, thankfully for the better. Psychiatry had always been a passion of mine, and I quickly focused on autism as my new area of interest and left medical school to shift to a more research-oriented path. By pure chance, I met an autistic professor who became my dissertation supervisor.
Writing my dissertation was a fantastic experience. I dreamed big and conducted original research on a large dataset, exploring how the altered immune system of autistic individuals increases their risk of severe outcomes from COVID-19. I enjoyed every bit of the process—reading research papers, analysing information, identifying patterns, and writing about my findings. It felt like a reward rather than a chore.
Upon graduation, I began looking for a job, unsure of the career options available. I felt anxious, as it was the first time I didn’t have a clear plan for my future. I applied to Mearns & Pike for a seemingly arbitrary reason—I liked their tagline, “Love what you do,” and their heart-shaped logo. I had never heard of MedComms before, but this resonated with my intrinsic motivation to do things because I was passionate about them, not because I was forced to. Having a workplace where this mindset was central seemed like an unattainable dream, but upon meeting Kirsty, Jon, and later, the rest of the team, I felt weirdly like I was in the right place.
Working here has been a fulfilling journey from the start. Without having to ask, I was given projects right off the bat that allowed me to have challenge and autonomy to use my strengths—attention to detail, natural curiosity, critical thinking. Even the directness that has sometimes been a double-edged sword earlier in my life. I feel not just leveraged but genuinely valued. With the great added advantage of working from home, which allows me to stay focused and energized, unlike the noisy and crowded settings that often drain me. I decided fairly quickly that I wanted to be a medical writer, and it was met with nothing but encouragement. It’s great, not having to dread Mondays, and I would be lying if I said I never had to.
Now Mearns & Pike has a new and improved purpose statement, “Love in everything we do”. I was honoured to be around for the beginning of this new chapter, and motivated to embody what it means for me.
To me, love is about getting to know both my colleagues and our clients on a professional, and sometimes even personal level, listening to them, learning from them, and bringing my best self to work every day to achieve what we set out to do together. The company values and encourages individualism, but paradoxically, allowing us to each bring our distinct personalities, dreams, stressors and strengths fosters a culture of collectivism, where collaboration and the creativity naturally flourish.
10 Years On: Kirsty reflects on the journey to Mearns & Pike today
As we approach the launch of our new purpose tomorrow, we are sharing the thoughts of co-founder Kirsty Mearns on the journey so far for Mearns & Pike.
“We have taken risks, employed amazing people with different outlooks and experience, worked on some truly inspiring campaigns and created beautiful, lasting relationships with our clients and partners. Through everything we have listened to our hearts.”
When we started Mearns & Pike Ltd seven years ago we set out to do things differently. We didn’t want to follow the models of other agencies. We wanted to forge our own path based on what we believe is the right thing to do and guided by our purpose to Love What You Do.
Some people labelled us as a ‘lifestyle’ agency and questioned our growth plan and our virtual business model – but we believed that this was the right approach for us and would lead to success.
Seven years on we have achieved much more than we ever imagined we would. We have punched above our weight and outperformed many, much larger agencies. Our work has been recognised for its impact, winning seven prestigious industry awards and shortlisted more than 50 times. We have a client list that includes some of the biggest healthcare companies in the world as well as some smaller, exciting clients with huge potential. We’ve done all this whilst always staying true to our purpose to Love What You Do.
Our virtual model was embraced by clients even before COVID changed the world of work. We have colleagues working from around the world ensuring that talented people who have made life choices that make traditional agency working challenging can continue to thrive. And despite working tremendously hard, we’ve maintained a balance that has enabled us to achieve fulfilment in work and in life.
We have turned down work that doesn’t match our ethos, pulled out of pitches where the chemistry wasn’t there and on rare occasions politely walked away from client relationships that didn’t make us or our team feel good.
We have taken risks, employed amazing people with different outlooks and experience, worked on some truly inspiring campaigns and created beautiful, lasting relationships with our clients and partners that connect at a much greater depth than we have experienced before. Through everything we have listened to our hearts.
Following our hearts is what has led us to define the future direction for Mearns & Pike.
The question of what our future looks like was bugging us for a while. Many agency leaders in our position are by this point exploring a lucrative way out or at least ways to expand and continue to make more and more money. But those traditional measures of success aren’t what drives us and the idea of selling out, whether now or in the future just wasn’t something either of us could stomach.
We enlisted the support of Jon Bircher to challenge us and help us to imagine the future of Mearns & Pike. Together we embarked on a journey of reflection about where had come from, how we define our success and what we want our legacy to be.
This week, on our 10th anniversary of meeting, we will reveal our new Purpose and share what it means for our team, our clients and everyone we work with.
Watch this space...
The Future of Love What You Do: As told by Jon Pike
Approaching this evening’s Communique Awards, Mearns & Pike co-founder Jon Pike reflects on our story so far ahead of turning the page to a new chapter tonight.
“We established Mearns & Pike to do things differently, and that is what we plan to do in the next chapter of our journey.”
Thursday marks ten years since Kirsty Mearns and I first met and started our journey in life together that has given us many wonderful experiences, memories to cherish, an amazing family, a gorgeous little boy and a business – Mearns & Pike – that we are both very proud of.
Mearns & Pike Ltd, the company, has existed for seven years and over that time we have achieved so much. Seven industry awards, countless short-listed projects, growing our company to eleven people, a client list that includes some major healthcare companies with a mixture of passionate patient advocacy groups and nimble start-ups are on the list of our achievements. Perhaps the biggest achievement has been staying true to the purpose we came up with all those years ago, to Love What You Do.
This has been a guiding light for us which has helped us to identify which projects and campaigns we have chosen to work on, to create a working environment that helps others to love what they do and to make sure that our time is spent doing the things that matter.
Often at this stage of their journey agencies like ours start to think about what next – what does the next chapter for our business look like? For many it is about profitability and sustaining growth with a view to seeking or attracting someone who might purchase the agency and take it to new places. For many agency owners that is absolutely the right thing to do.
What is clear to us, seven years into our journey, is that it is not the right thing for us. We established Mearns & Pike to do things differently and that is what we plan to do for the next chapter of our journey.
On Thursday we will be sharing what’s next for us. On paper it is a subtle change in words but in reality it will be a significant and deliberate shift in our outlook and focus. The ‘What’ we do will not change: we will continue to deliver high quality, impactful programmes that really matter, with clients and partners that share our values. We’ll still focus on finding the sweet spot between healthcare clients and their audiences with campaigns that appeal to the heart, not just the head. However, 'How' we do it is where the difference will be.
To be honest, we’ve probably been working in this way for a while now. Which is what makes it feel so right for us and for the people we work with. We have followed our hearts to this point and we will continue to do so.
First Steps into MedComms: a Work Experience Placement with Mearns & Pike
“Starting my work experience at Mearns & Pike was both exciting and a bit scary (at the start). But what I discovered and learned here has been amazing. Here’s a glimpse into my incredible experience and the valuable lessons I’ve learned”
Last week was a Mearns & Pike first, as we opened our doors (laptops?) to a Year 10 work experience student, who joined us to learn a bit more about the diverse and collaborative world of PR and communications. A learning experience for all of us as well, we were so impressed at her approach to taking on the very same work that makes up our day-to-day, as she tackled a range of tasks within our current projects.
In this blog post, she shares her first impressions and thoughts from her week with us. Her fresh and enthusiastic perspective gives a great insight into what it's like to step into Medical Communications for the first time, something that is so valuable to be reminded of. We’re so pleased that she enjoyed her week with us, and hope that by sharing her experiences it may spark interest in others who are curious about a future in this field. Who knows – maybe we’ll see her again someday as a new Account Executive!
My Journey and Learnings at Mearns and Pike
Starting my work experience at Mearns & Pike was both exciting and a bit scary (at the start). But what I discovered and learned here has been amazing. Here’s a glimpse into my incredible experience and the valuable lessons I’ve learned.
Freedom and Teamwork:
One of the first things that struck me at Mearns & Pike was the freedom compared to school. Here, I can work with team members and ask for help whenever needed. Everyone was super supportive, and I felt like I belonged right away. Plus, I got to wake up later than I need to for school which was great!
Overcoming Initial Nerves:
At the beginning, joining calls and meeting new people was quite daunting. However, the team were so chatty and friendly that I soon forgot about my nerves. The calls soon became one of my favourite parts of the experience. I loved learning about everyone’s roles and chatting with them about all kinds of things. It was fascinating to learn about their jobs and career journeys.
Exploring Different Roles and Tasks:
Mearns & Pike provided me with loads of opportunities to learn about different aspects of the business, allowing me to discover what I truly enjoyed. Each task was different, which kept things interesting. I realized that this industry might be something I want to explore more in the future.
The Power of Teamwork:
One big thing I learned is how important teamwork is. Working with others makes the job easier and more fun. Sharing ideas, combining knowledge and listening to everyone’s point of view helps everyone understand things better and complete tasks more effectively.
The Necessity of Communication:
Regular communication is super important, especially for people working from home. Catching up with the team ensures everyone is on the same page and helps track progress on various tasks. This is important when everyone is working towards the same goal.
The Importance of Taking Breaks:
Staring at a computer screen for hours is neither healthy nor productive. I learned how important it is to take breaks and get some fresh air. Sitting in front of a computer all day isn’t good for anyone. Taking a break helps recharge and stay focused.
Client Care and Respect:
Treating clients with respect and caring for them is really important. Each client deserves the same level of attention and respect. This not only builds strong relationships but also trust and satisfaction.
Time Management Skills:
Effective time management was another critical skill I learned during my time at Mearns & Pike. Balancing multiple tasks and ensuring they are completed to the best of my ability required careful planning and prioritization. This skill will definitely be important in my future.
A Heartfelt Thank You:
I want to say a huge thank you to everyone at Mearns & Pike for their warm welcome, guidance, and patience. But especially a massive thank you to Kirsty and Jon for providing me with this amazing opportunity. My work experience here has been interesting, insightful and exciting! It has offered me a sneak peek into the working world and I can’t wait to get started.
My journey at Mearns & Pike has been incredibly rewarding. The lessons I've learned and the experiences I've had will stay with me into the future. Thank you for making this such a memorable and enriching experience.
Returning to Work – Reflections from a Mother and Business Owner
“I have never felt as energised, motivated or focused as I do now”
Last week I returned to work after taking 18 months off with our new son. Working in my own business I never switched off completely during that time, but I did step back from the majority of our client work. That was an uncomfortable transition at first. I had to learn to let others do things their way and know when to ask questions or offer advice and when to stay quiet. I didn’t always get that right. I had to adjust to feeling valuable in different ways – not judging my value as productivity or output, but in terms of the insight and perspective I could offer. At times work was an escape from the routine of motherhood. Other times I felt conflicted and then work tasks would become more of a chore. I learned that those feelings of conflict were my signal that work and life had become unbalanced. I have become much better at setting boundaries and also respecting them in others.
I am proud that we have built a business that is strong enough for me to be able to feel I could take that time to spend with our son. After 18 months I feel ready to come back to work. I am excited to be here, getting to know our new team members and working with clients on projects that I am passionate about. It gives me energy that I can take to the rest of my life. I’ve become much better at spending my time on the work that I find meaningful and unapologetically letting go of the things (or people) that drag me down.
I know from experience that companies can lose sight of the value that returning mothers can bring. They might view them as less committed, more easily distracted, or less financially productive. More fool them. I have never felt as energised, motivated or focused as I do now. It’s so good to be back.
Student House to Black-Tie Dinner: My First Week with Mearns & Pike
My professional career began at my kitchen table, just four days after hauling the contents of my student room back home through a train station. Freshly out of a university life tainted by numerous lockdowns, I knew I couldn’t wait to get stuck into something bigger and better – which is where Mearns & Pike comes in. Having enjoyed a lot of media and communications tasks throughout my degree, I knew this was an industry I was really interested in, but was keen to retain my scientific background. In the process of browsing through job sites (excellent exam procrastination, if I do say so myself) they instantly stood out from other agencies, and it was obvious how passionate they were about their projects and clients. As their newest addition as a Graduate Account Executive, I was looking forward to getting underway.
Despite this, as my start date neared ever closer, I found myself, as I’m sure is the case with many new graduates, increasingly daunted by the prospect of working life. I was simultaneously so ready to get going, yet apprehensive about what to expect. The fact that it was remote work was also initially a very strange feeling (a sense of me and my laptop against the world!) and in all honesty, I wasn’t sure how I could ever get the hang of things while not in a traditional office environment. I need not have worried; I was instantly made to feel so welcome, and my new team were happy to involve me in anything they had going on. Hearing all about the projects that were in progress reminded me why I was so drawn to Mearns & Pike in the first place. What particularly inspired me is that many seemed to have the individual consumer in mind, striving to improve their experiences with the healthcare industry however this presented itself to them. There was also a great deal more consideration for the social implications that the methods of healthcare communication can have than I had ever considered before. This felt like a very refreshing perspective, especially given the impersonal exterior that I have felt can be commonplace in many scientific industries.
An unexpected highlight to my first week with Mearns & Pike, I finish writing this on my journey home from the Communiqué awards – a prestigious event celebrating the greatest achievements within healthcare communications. Despite a last-minute invitation on just day four of my new position, I dug a dress out of my wardrobe and made my way to London for what turned out to be a fantastic evening, with Mearns & Pike winning one of their nominated categories and receiving a high commendation in the other. Their deserved win was for the incredible work they had undertaken in collaboration with fertility clinic IVI, aiming to boost their recognisability in the medical media landscape as well as targeting the way that fertility struggles are talked about through their ‘Language of Fertility’ campaign. On top of such a successful night for the company, it was an incredibly surreal induction to the industry. Finally getting to meet members of the team face to face, as well as getting to know some of our clients, really allowed a more comprehensive understanding of what I can expect to be involved in in the future. I couldn’t be more excited for what this may bring and am so grateful to have had this experience so early on in my career at Mearns & Pike. I hope that I too am one day able to make such a contribution to the world of healthcare communications.
Top 5 Work From Home Work Hacks
As a virtual agency, Mearns & Pike has always been work-from-home since its inception, meaning we earned the right to call ourselves experts on the matter long before COVID. As the world begins to go back to normal and people are now more open to working from home permanently, we’re sharing some of our favourite work from home hacks to turn the last two-year novelty into an effective lifestyle for everyone.
DIY Standing desk
I’m sure since being at home we have all developed some bad habits of sitting at our kitchen, dining or bedside table and the thought has occurred to us “maybe I should buy a standing desk?” – unless you’re prepared to spend an eye-watering amount of money you might want to try a few of these DIY tips first, just to check that it really is something you want!
My personal favourite is to stick a dining room chair on a table and put my laptop on it. It lets me stand, exercise and feel like I’m delivering a really important lecture in zoom calls! Win win! Alternatively, if you want a slightly more hygienic option and you’re more of a book worm, stack some books as high as you like on a table and place your ironing board on it.
Set yourself a schedule
Sure, working from home is convenient, but there’s also a lot of distractions. My workspace is right next to the kitchen, for example. I can practically smell last nights Chinese leftovers from here as I write this. Working from home also means dealing with distractions and you have to be disciplined in working. At the end of every day I spend about 15 to 20 minutes writing out my schedule for the next day, making sure I set myself no more than an hour at a time per project, and if I can, no more than two separate hours per project in a day. What makes this work for me is setting alarms. My phone goes off all and is constantly reminding me to do something. Sure, it sounds annoying so maybe it doesn’t have to be a permanent change, but if it helps you set some good habits, then why not?
Do the hard stuff first
Of course this depends on when you’re most productive but for me I find if I can do the hard stuff that really takes the effort (maybe I need to send a really long email) then I can relax in the afternoon with a slightly easier task (maybe someone needs a video editing or I need to write the bi-monthly blog post…) and it really makes the afternoons a lot easier! There’s nothing worse than knowing you’ve got a really big job waiting for you in the afternoon.
To tie work hack 2 and 3 together, If you’ve spent all morning at your desk doing some really hard emails maybe try and sit on the sofa in the afternoon to do some lighter shorter emails. It might seem like a small change but the slight change in scenery and just the sitting in a different chair can really liven up your day. Thanks to the last work hack you’ll be able to schedule your day so that the easy stuff falls in the afternoon, and the harder stuff in the morning.
Listen to your work
Everyone knows it’s quite difficult to proof-read what a document really says, especially if you’re the one who’s written it. You could send it to a colleague, a friend or your parents (if you want to suddenly find out your dad is a closet professor…). But there is a better way. Microsoft Word has a built-in feature that will read your document aloud, meaning you can just listen to what it says and this way you’ll pick up if something isn’t quite sounding right, or if something is spelled wrong and your spellcheck hasn’t noticed. Working from home means you don’t even need to use earphones!
For those of you without a Microsoft office subscription, you could copy your document into Google Translate and have it speak what you’ve typed.
Write in White
I’m sure you can relate, one of the biggest struggles I have when writing a document is getting all of my ideas on the page. I find that as soon as I’ve written something, I want to go back, change or edit it because I’ve thought of a better way to say it, which makes the whole process a lot longer. Writing in white means you can’t do that and helps to establish a much better state of flow. Since you can’t read what you’ve written you have to trust your instinct and just move onto the next sentence.
For more of our work from home hacks and our thoughts follow us on Instagram and Twitter.
We've got a podcast!
We’ve launched our very own podcast! Loving What You Do is our brand new podcast series in which we talk to partners we work with and people we admire. As this week is National Storytelling Week, our first series focusses on the importance of Story Telling interviewing authors, film makers and social media marketers as well as people who have incorporated storytelling into fields you may not expect such as teaching and graphic design.
Our first episode is an interview with Martin Hill (Autumn Films), an expert in making short-form documentaries. Martin shares with us insights such as the most important things to consider when telling someone else’s story, how to get stories from people and what he thinks the future of storytelling will be. Sprinkled among these insights are lots of useful tips for budding film makers from being on set to editing in post-production.
You can watch the video here:
Or you can listen to the full length audio-only version here on Spotify, Apple or Google Podcasts:
8 Digital Tools We Love!
Throughout university, I accumulated a whole bunch of digital tools to help me do my work. I have found that these tools have also been really helpful to me since kicking off my healthcare PR career. So, I thought I’d write a blog about it! Here are 8 of the most useful digital tools I have come across and use on a day-to-day basis. Just a caveat before we start: Although some of the tools have paid versions that offer more functionality, they all have incredibly capable free versions and my experiences below are the free versions.
Clockify.me
I didn’t realise the number of projects I could possibly have on at one go. Since starting my new job at Mearns & Pike I’ve been pulled in all kinds of different and exciting directions on a whole bunch of different projects and it can be really hard to know how long I’m spending on each one. Luckily for me, I found Clockify.me. It’s super simple to set up, you just type the name of the project, assign it to a custom-made client and then press start and watch the time increase one second at a time! By the end of the day, you know how long you’ve spent on each project and it displays all your work in a handy graph so you can easily see how long you’ve spent! Super handy for filling in a time-sheet at the end of the week (or even month)!
2. Google Alerts
If like me, you’ve ever Googled your own name, you’ll know that it is possible to set up an email alert for any time your name is mentioned online. Well did you know, you can change this so that Google will email you about any phrase? For me, this is useful to know when/if a story I’ve pitched has been published! But those of you who have interests in pop culture, you could just as easily set up an alert for your favourite films, artists or actors and get emails every day telling you where and when they’ve been mentioned! Simply go to google.com/alerts to set it up! This can also be super useful if you want to know how much online conversation there is about your product or brand on any given day.
3. I Love PDF
Is anyone else frustrated by PDFs? Sure they maintain the structure and flow of a document, but what if I need to edit it in the future? Even worse, what if I only have the PDF and I need to edit that? Unless you’re willing to fork out money to Adobe for the privilege of editing PDFs you’re going to have looked around for the perfect PDF to Word converters and I bet, come up short every time with free trials(* keep reading to the end for a solution to that particular problem) that don’t last quite long enough. Well, worry no more, I have found the perfect PDF file converter that not only allows you to convert PDF to Word, but it also allows you to edit PDFs in the browser with a whole bunch of extra tools. Go to ILovePDF.com
4. Unsplash
This one has been incredibly useful for lots of projects. Unsplash.com not only has some of the best stock photos I have ever seen but also some of the most high-quality images I have ever come across, and even better they’re completely free of charge! These photos are amazing for PowerPoint backgrounds, social media posts, headers and banners or basically anything you can think of, I honestly can’t recommend this website enough!
5. Pexels.com
Similar to above, in creating videos I have had to rely on my fair share of stock footage but (especially when studying) lacked the budget to pay for it. The best free, legal, public domain video footage I have found comes from Pexels.com. As with Unsplash you simply have to credit the originator of the video but in my opinion, that is a small price to pay for such high-quality footage for free!
6. DaVinci Resolve
One of the best, and (mostly) free video editors I have ever used! It is so much more than just a video editor, as before last month I had only used it to edit podcasts. That’s right it has a fully capable audio editor built-in. It combines the workflow functionality of Final Cut Pro with the affordability of Windows Movie Maker. It is free. There is a paid version of course which has some extra features but I have found the free version more than suitable for all of my personal and professional needs. I have used it for adding subtitles to videos as well as editing whole videos together. It has lots of great transitions, effects, and animations built-in as well as a fully functional colour corrector for the more capable video editors among you. You can download DaVinci Resolve for free from their website.
Here is a small (and quick!) flavour of something I edited together in DaVinci Resolve for one of our clients:
7. The Noun Project
If like me you’ve had to create websites or logos then you’ve probably wanted to have some lovely icons on there. If you also lack the Adobe Illustrator skills to make icons yourself (like me), well luckily this is where TheNounProject.org comes in! It has plenty of free to use icons that are easily customisable in wannabe-professional-graphic-designer’s mate PowerPoint. Just search for what you want and it will return thousands of results! As with most things on this list it is free to use as long as you credit the originators in some way.
8. Snapdrop
I’m sure we’ve all sent emails to ourselves in order to send files from one device to another, right? Well, what if I told you, there was another way? For years iPhone and Mac users have laughed at us mere Windows and Android luddites with their fancy AirDrop and copy and paste that transfers between devices. Well, I can only offer you an alternative to the former. Try Snapdrop.net. Open it on both your computer and your phone. On your phone, you’ll see your computer’s name, and on your computer, you’ll see your phone’s name! You can send instant messages or share files to any device on the same network. At last, we can finally do away with sending ourselves emails all the time!
*Bonus tool: 10minutemail
Free trials were always the bane of my life until I came across 10minutemail.com. As the name suggests you simply go to the website and it offers you an email address that is only valid for 10 minutes. 10 minutes of course being the perfect amount of time to sign up for a free trial! Once your free trial ends, get a new 10minutemail address, sign up and you can use the service again! Also perfect for when you’re buying something from a new shop and you don’t want to give them your real details!