Now that you’ve cleared the deck of all your other New Year’s Resolutions, you might consider adding “Get Organized” to your digital to-do list. Every one of these tools will help save you time (and money!) so you can concentrate on your work and get ready for a great year.
Here are 10 tech tools to help you organize several areas of your life to begin the new year with everything in its place.
Organize Your Passwords
LastPass
$0 for the basic version or $12/year for deluxe
If you do nothing else in the new year, at least get a grip on your passwords. LastPass saves all the passwords in its vault so you don’t have to keep using the sticky note system around your computer monitor. Use the Security Challenge button to discover all the usernames and passwords for every site you’ve visited – then let LastPass identify duplicate and weak passwords to replace them with safer choices.
Also check out: 1Password, Dashlane
Organize Your Contacts
Contactually
Starting at $29/month
If your contacts are basically in one big pile in your contacts tab, Contactually can help. With an entertaining game (as entertaining as contact sorting can be), you can quickly toss your contacts into “buckets” to get them organized. Contactually is also a CRM that helps you track leads, find contacts on social media, view opportunities and keep your sales projects organized.
Also check out FullContact, Insight.ly
Organize Your Email
Unroll.me
Free
Between social media notifications and the weekly newsletters and the monthly industry updates, your inbox is clogged with information that may interest you but ends up overwhelming you. Unroll.me sweeps through your web-based inbox to list all your subscriptions. Then it gives you the option of unsubscribing from each one with a click or organizing the ones you want to keep into a daily or weekly digest. That way you can get one email with links to all your subscriptions instead of a stream of inbox-clogging newsletters that you never get around to reading.
Organize Your Bits and Pieces
Evernote
$0 for the basic version or paid plans starting at $34.99/year
Evernote is the ultimate organizer for all the random bits of information you need to save. From photos of your kids to meeting notes, Evernote saves anything that can be stored in electronic format. You can organize information globally into “notebooks” or use tags to link individual items together. Everything you upload is searchable (even handwritten notes!). The free version lets you synchronize across two devices, while the paid versions offer unlimited synchronization, offline access and more.
Also check out: Microsoft OneNote, Google Keep.
Organize Your Photos
Google Photos
Free
Chances are you have approximately 4,532 photos on your phone – everything from photos of your board members to your kids to pictures of your thumb. It’s almost impossible to find what you’re looking for unless you spend hours downloading and organizing… unless you’re using Google Photos. You can set Google Photos to automatically download your photos from your devices. Once your images are in its system, Google uses advanced image recognition technology to automatically organize your images by person, place or thing. If you search for a city, for example, Google will scan your entire image library to display all images from that area. What’s more, Google will store all your media (including video!) for free forever.
Organize Your Monthly Statements
FileThis
$0 for up to six accounts or starting at $2 a month for more
Stop scouring your shoeboxes for that one credit card statement from two years ago. FileThis lets you hook up accounts that have statements, such as bills, credit cards, banking and more. The service automatically collects the statements and organizes them into folders on Dropbox or other cloud-storage services.
Organize Your Medical Information
CareZone
Free
CareZone is the perfect place to organize your health information — and, maybe more importantly, — the health info of someone you care for. The app lets you scan prescriptions to track refills, doses and usage. You can also keep track of symptoms, organize medical appointments and collect critical documents.
Organize Your Travel Plans
TripIt
$0 for the basic version or pro plan for $49/year
If you have ever fumbled in a taxi to find the name of your hotel, TripIt can help. Just forward every electronic travel confirmation you receive to plans@tripit.com, and TripIt will convert all the details into an itinerary at your fingertips, automatically grouped by trip and organized together. When you leave for a client visit, your travel schedule is organized into digital cards you can flip through on your mobile device to see confirmation numbers, flight times, hotel locations and even the weather where you’re headed. The pro version keeps an eye on flight prices and notifies you when the price drops below what you paid.
Also check out TripCase, WorldMate
Organize Your Family Schedules
Cozi Family Organizer
$0 for the basic version or Cozi Gold for $19.99/year
Having trouble keeping track of your busy life, much less your spouse’s and kids? Cozi Family Organizer brings everyone’s schedules together for an at-a-glance look at your busy family so you can focus on your residents. You can also share to-do and grocery lists, as well as a family journal to cherish memories.
Organize Your Finances
Mint
Free
Mint has been one of the top financial organization and budgeting systems for many years. Once you connect your accounts, Mint gives you a snapshot of your finances, helps you create a budget, lets you pay your bills and keeps an eye on your investments. Alerts tell you about suspicious activity, upcoming bills and even bank fees you might overlook. You can even get a heads up when you exceed your budget.
Love that these are, for the most part, FREE! A few short days ago I vowed to take control of my digital clutter and this list provides me with most of the tools needed to complete my 2017 resolution! 🙂 Thanks!!!