With the introduction of computers the claim was made that offices would become paperless. Well in my experience there is more paper getting around an office now than every before. But I have found a software product that can help you reduce the paper in your office while also making you more productive.
Evernote
Evernote is an amazing tool that you can use anywhere. It is designed for note taking and archiving. It sync’s between your work computer, your home pc, your phone, tablet, any device really.
If you go to lots of meetings and take notes, either on a physical notepad or on your laptop/tablet, then Evernote could streamline your note taking. You can walk into a meeting with your tablet/iPad and open Evernote, open a new note and start taking notes. If you need to you can take photos and attach them to the note or you can scan other information and also attach it to the notes from that meeting.
Evernote is set up with Notebooks (imagine a physical note book with lots of pages) and Notes (these are the individual pages). You can have as many Notebooks and Notes as you like. So you can have a different Notebook for different regular meetings. It also allows you to tag the note, so that you can easily search for a particular note that you need.
So for example, your Evernote could be set up like the following example.
Meetings with Staff (Notebook)
1st August 2015 (Note)
1st September 2015 (Note)
1st October 2015 (Note)
Meetings with Business Coach (Notebook)
7th August 2015 (Note)
7th September 2015 (Note)
7th October 2015 (Note)
Meetings with Mentor (Notebook)
14th August 2015 (Note)
14th September 2015 (Note)
14th October 2015 (Note)
Meeting with Clients (Notebook)
Client 1 – 20th August 2015 (Note)
Client 2 – 20th September 2015 (Note)
Client 3 – 20th October 2015 (Note)
Evernote can be shared with other people who use Evernote. You can share Notebooks or Notes, it doesn’t have to be the whole of your Evernote content. I share some Notes and Notebooks with my staff so that we are on the same page about things.
You can use Evernote to track your workflow. I have Notes and Notebooks set up to track things at BAS time, I share these with my staff. I have a Notebook called BAS Time and then for each BAS period I duplicate the note from the previous period and re date it and make sure it has all our current clients listed.
This looks like this
BAS Time (Notebook)
July (monthly) BAS (note)
August (monthly) BAS (note)
September (Quarterly) BAS (note)
My notes are set up as follows.
BAS time September (Quarterly) 2015
To Contact
Client 1
Client 2
Client 3
Client 4….
Contacted – No work as yet
Appointments Made
Work In
Work In Progress
Ready to Lodge
BAS’s Lodged
Leaving for now
No BAS Required
Client 5
Client 6
Client 7…
We move clients around under each heading as things happen. Like we have contacted them or they have brought their work in or their BAS has been lodged.
For smaller lists we create checklists within a Note. So we create a Notebook Called Super Lodgements. Then there is a Note for each Super Period and we just make sure it is up to date at the start of each month and then tick of each client as their superannuation has been lodged. For example.
Superannuation – June 2015
To be lodged
☐ Client 1
☐ Client 2
☐ Client 3
☐ Client 4
☐ Client 5
☐ Client 6
☐ Client 7
☐ Client 8
☐ Client 9
If you love reading things and come across something on the Internet that you would like to go back and look at later, then you can save that information in Evernote. I have a Notebook called Idea’s and I put everything I want to go back and look at in that Notebook.
If there are emails you want to keep that are really important or relevant to something, you can email them directly into your Evernote.
You could even establish notes within Evernote for each of your clients. You could put job cards in there or photos of before and after your work, in there.
Evernote can be used for so many things within your business. Please take the time to have a look at it and set it up for your business. Use it extensively for at least and month and then evaluate if it is something that you could use on an ongoing basis for your business..
If you would like to ask me any questions about Evernote please do not hesitate to comment below, or go to my Ask page and find out how else you can ask me directly. Or you can have a look at Evernote yourself by going to www.evernote.com.
