How do you organize your business?
Still using file cabinets overflowing with old documents you’ll most likely never read again? I used to save every scrap of paper that crossed my desk,…..just in case I needed it one day. Guess what? One day usually never comes. But what does happen is that my office turns into a disaster of old documents I’ll never need, new documents I might need, and important documents that I can’t find because they’re lost in the sea of mess that is my office.
I was introduced to Evernote a few years ago by a friend and fell in love with it. For an unorganized person like me, it literally changed my life. I ditched the filing cabinet (or waste receptacle, depends how you look at it) and never looked back.
Evernote is an online application that basically becomes your “brain dump”, allowing to store your notes, ideas, documents, etc, in the cloud. It works from your mobile device, your computer and even through email. You can store documents in text, image or audio, and everything is easily searchable as every document is stored into notebooks and tagged for easy reference. If you’re new to Evernote, you can find out more here on their website.
I’ve been using Evernote now for about 3 years and below are 10 ways that I use it to help me organize my business. Hopefully you’ll find some of them useful for your business.
Keep a digital copy of your receipts
I used to keep all of my business receipts in my wallet, when my wallet got too fat, I’d put the excess into an envelope that I left on the front seat of my car until I saw my bookkeeper at the end of the month. I told you I was unorganized. Now however, I have created a notebook in Evernote specifically for my receipts and I share this notebook with my bookkeeper. Whenever I get a new receipt, I scan a copy of it and upload it to the notebook, tagging it with the month and year. What do I use to scan the receipt with? I use my 2nd favorite mobile app, Cam Scanner. It’s an incredibly useful app that uses the camera on your phone to create PDF documents on the fly. You can actually just use your camera to take a picture of the receipt, though I like the ability to crop and lighten the document with Cam Scanner.
Keep files on your employees
Not in an FBI, creepy sort of way, but for keeping a running file for your employees. I have a notebook setup for my employees and tag each employee by name. When they are first hired, I store a copy of their personal data sheet, copies of any pertinent documents they have received, as well as personal notes, like their goals, hobbies, and stuff like that. On an ongoing basis, I keep notes on achievements they have made, concerns they may have, and anything else that might be useful. An example of how I use it is if an employee gets a thank you letter or email from a happy customer, I save it and store as part of their file so it’s doesn’t get forgotten about come employee review time.
Record team meetings notes
I use Evernote to record the minutes of our meetings, as well as image copies of any whiteboard usage we may have had. If someone has something important to say (or just funny), we occasionally record the audio for posterity. The notebook is shared with all employees and anyone that missed the meeting can read over the notes (though they rarely do!).
Checklists
I have checklists setup for office and cleaning supplies needed to run our business. Every month when I do my shopping, I don’t have to take inventory or remember to bring that scrap of paper with me that I wrote everything down on. If someone else is going to get the supplies, great, I can just send the notebook to them and I’m done.
To clean out your file cabinets
Most of the files in your file cabinet will never again see the light of day, but for whatever reason, you feel the need to keep it just in case. Over a year ago I took almost every document I have and scanned it into Evernote. I have never had to reference one of those documents since. Now I only keep a paper copy of really important documents, though I still make a digital copy in Evernote. I use a Fujitsu Snapscanner for scanning a lot of documents, the software integrates with Evernote for seamless file uploading.
Store business cards
I rip up business cards as soon as I snap a picture of it and upload it into Evernote. Even if you don’t add text notes along with the image of the card, Evernote has technology that can read the text inside the image, cool stuff! If you really want to get fancy with business cards, you can use the mobile app Cam Card (same company as Can Scanner). This will let you crop the card image and add the info into your phone’s contact list before sending to Evernote, double cool!
Save marketing collateral and layouts
I keep a notebook with an copy of all of my old marketing materials. I keep the original design files as well as an image capture of the actual ad, like a snapshot of a newspaper where it ran. It helps to look over your old stuff to get ideas on what (and what not to) do next time. If you change store designs, display cases, etc, keeping images of the previous layouts can be useful if you ever need to reference it. Maybe the new display didn’t pan out and you need to revert back to the old one, good thing you remembered what it looked like!
Keep an ideas notebook
This is an important one for the business owner. You never know where a great idea will hit you, usually it’s when you’re driving in the car or running on the treadmill. Just grab your phone, open Evernote, and start recording your ideas via an audio note. Beats grabbing for a pad and pen when you’re on the highway. What if you see a great advertising piece that sparks an idea? Take a picture of it and save it in your ideas notebook. You get the point, you can record your ideas anytime and in any format with Evernote.
A notebook for competitive analysis
What new marketing collateral is your competition using? Have they changed their price points? You don’t need to go crazy here, but it’s useful to have an idea of what your competition is doing. It’s helpful to periodically review what products/services your competitors are promoting and any deals they are offering.
How do you think you can use Evernote for your business?
I outlined 10 ways that I use Evernote to organize my business and create an almost paper free office. There are hundreds of other great business uses for Evernote, how do you think you could use Evernote in your business?
Gary Shouldis
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This is brilliant info Gary. I’ve been using Evernote for a few months but knew I wasn’t using it to it’s full potential. You’ve shared some great ideas here that I will definitely use. Thanks for sharing on Bizsugar.com
Hey Sian, the more I use Evernote, the more uses I find for it. I’ve found that having a your Notebooks setup properly is the key to staying organized with it. Check out the Camcarb app in the article, it’s my #2 most used app after Evernote!
I love Evernote, thanks for the tips! We’re starting to incorporate it into our business, can’t wait to get rid of the paper, thanks!
Evernote has some great business uses, especially for file cabinet sort of stuff. If you add a good scanner that integrates with Evernote, you can pretty much get rid of the paper in your office.
Springpad is another really good note taking app, and it’s free.
SpringPad is a great app, it has a better visual display than Evernote, though I trust that Evernote will be around for the long haul as they have a proven business model. Catch is also a great app.