I once heard someone say “my love language is resources” and I instantly resonated! In conversations you’ll often hear me recommending books, blog posts, programs, or apps that I swear will solve all of your problems. I’m convinced that with the right resources I could take over the world.
But in all honesty, having the right tools on board has changed everything in my business! I learned about a year into business that I couldn’t keep everything in my head anymore! It took both time and trial and error to get everything organized (and things are always growing and changing), but I am so thankful for the tools we now use! Systems and processes keep our business running, clients organized, and details accounted for. These programs keep our team all on the same page and makes sure nothing gets missed!
Gmail – Free for standard, $5 a month for hosted
This may seem simple, but my love for gmail has no end! I could do a whole blog post on how I organize my inbox! The gist of it is this, nothing is in my inbox unless it needs a response. I have folders for every client, big projects, finances, admin, etc. I even have one that is titled, “Get out of my inbox.” When I log into my email in the morning everything gets a response and gets filed out of sight or gets deleted! If I have an email that will take longer to respond to it sits in my inbox until I have the time so that it doesn’t get missed. With this system, most days I make it to inbox zero!
The best part of Gmail is the search box! At any time I can seach a topic, name, or email account and pull up all history involving that! With having folders for each client I can do the same, pull up their folder, and review all our interactions!
The free vs paid version is just so that you can have your own domain. For example, my email is [email protected], not @gmail.com. I think the $5 a month is worth it for business, but the free version has all the same capabilities.
17 Hats – $37 monthly or $199 per year
This is the bread and butter to my client work! I noticed a difference the very first day I had this installed! As far as CRMs go, I would highly recommend it! It has a few glitches here and there, and I actually even tried HoneyBook instead for a bit and ended up switching back to 17 Hats! The glitches are worth it for the amount this program can do!
This program hosts all my contacts, invoices, questionnaire, meeting notes, and client related details! I couldn’t function without it!
Asana – Free or $30+ a month with premium version
This project management software is a new member of the family, but I’m already wondering how I went so long without it! Gone are the days of making a to-do list every day or week. In Asana every part of our system and processes are documented and scheduled. This goes for every client, blog post, mentoring session, goal, big picture project, ect! Everything! In this program I can schedule due dates and even assign tasks to Meg or my Mom. When I login every morning it tells ME what to do! It has cleared up a crazy amount of mental space for me not having to keep track of everything that has to be done on paper or just in my brain!
Granted, I still write that to-do list down in my planner every day, but thats just because I like the satisfying feeling of crossing things off!
Oh, and did I mention that when you check things off your list it sends Narwhals and unicorns across the screen? Yep. You need this program in your life. I used all of Lauren’s tutorials for setting it up!
I am using the free version and have been thrilled! With the size of our team (4 people) free works just fine! The only thing about the paid version that I long for is the search bar, not enough to pay for it yet!
iCal – Free
iCal is my boo.
I know everyone is all fancy and uses Google Calendar, but I just can’t seem to make the switch! I hold everything in ical. . . and I mean everything. I color code every last thing and list as many details as possibly. I have separate calendars for…
- KGP related shoots, meetings, etc
- Personal plans
- A shared calendar with Dan for things we are doing together or want the other one to know about (THIS IS SO HANDY!)
- Birthdays (again Dan and I share this so we have both families listed)
- Blog posts
And I think I even have a couple more random calendars! All of them have colors so I can see at a glance what my week looks like! It is the best! I add locations and notes into most of the events so that it is all in one place!
I can access iCal from either of my computers and my phone without internet access which makes it so handy!
For now, that’s the list! I use the notes app on my phone like a maniac, and obviously there are things like social media (our number 1 marketing tool!), but if it came down to picking my favorite programs, these would hands down be the winners! There are a couple other tools that I use that are more specific to photography, would you like to see a post on those guys?
Wishing you a wonderfully organized workflow!
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