Mar 17, 2020
How Can Writers Manage Their Freelance Writing With Trello?
And I should have been doing this from the beginning of my freelance writing journey.
When I started freelance writing for the first time, I always thought I could manage my freelancing stuff just by jotting down on everything I want to do in my notebook. At first, it was okay. But when all of a sudden, I have an overflow of ideas and tasks in hand, I started to lose track of everything I intend to do.
I was pretty disorganized and almost want to give up freelancing until I encountered a post on the WriteTo1K Success Facebook group by Kate Doster. She was on the live-streaming session in which she explained how to use Trello to run the freelance business in her recording. It made me intrigued somehow since I never used or even got to know about Trello before, so I watched the whole recording.
Immediately, I started to fall in love with the app and kick start using it hereafter. Even now, I use Trello to organize beyond the freelance writing stuff, and it’s pretty much a must-have app anywhere I go. With that, you might be wondering how Trello can help you organize your freelance writing stuff.
But first, what is Trello?
Trello is a web-based list-making application that enables you to create and manage boards, lists, and cards to organize and prioritize the work you want to do. The layout is pretty much Kanban-style, meaning it visually depicts work at various stages of a process. It uses cards to represent a specific task or item and columns, which represents the stage of the process. Cards can be moved to any lists within the board to show the progress of those tasks.
What makes Trello unique?
One big plus of using Trello is it is free! They do have plans for businesses and enterprises, but for basic functionalities and features, the free version is more than sufficient.
You can create unlimited boards, lists, and cards in the free version. So if you have multiple tasks and lists to organize, you can create them from scratch within Trello’s dashboard. If you have a team and want all the members to collaborate in a single board, you just assigned them with a link to access that board. That way, every team member can collaborate and list out all the things they want to do, and everyone can see the progress in a single place.
You can even automate the tasks on the board through the use of Butler commands. There’s an introductory article by Trello on how to use Butler for the first time right here. Plus, you can even access Trello on the desktop and mobile devices too!
How can I use Trello to manage my writing?
Once you have created your Trello account, you can start creating a new board, and it will lead to the new board, plain empty. Put the name for the board and select whether you want the board to be private or public. You can also choose the background of the board according to your liking.
Bear in mind that anyone can access the board on the web if you set the board public as long as anyone can search it, even if you don’t share the board link. Otherwise, set it as private. Then, add a new list by typing in the list title, and click the green “Add List” button. For a start, you can start adding three lists by naming them as “To-Do,” “Doing,” and “Done” as shown in the screenshot below.
Basically, “To-Do” means the tasks you are intending or planning to do, “Doing” means the tasks you are currently pursuing right now, and “Done” means the tasks that you have been completed. As mentioned before, you can create an unlimited amount of lists on a board. But I created three lists for the purpose of showing the example here.
Once the lists have been created, you can start typing in and adding the cards on the list. A card represents a task that you want to pursue. So let’s say you have three tasks to do, which are “article writing,” “WordPress website,” and “guest post.” You will create three cards each in the “To-Do” list, as shown below.
Do you know that you can add more details inside the card you have created? It is a great way to make sure that you are not doing wrong with what you intend to do for a particular task. When you click on a card, it will show several things, including the description, labels, checklist, due date, attachment, and so on.
I’m sure you don’t want to lose track of what I suppose to do for that task. Therefore, you can add in the details on how you would perform the task. If you are planning to write a post or an article, you can draft your outline there too.
You can even attach documents or photos in the card in case you need something to refer to later on. Bear in mind, however, that you can only upload the attachment with the maximum file size of 10MB.
Moving on, you can utilize labels to represent a particular task by, for example, client, publication, or the writing type. You have the ability to choose how you would want to label your card, whether by the colors or terms. There are ten label colors to choose from, and you can even add and customize the new label if you want to have wordings in it.
If you already have a due date to rush on, it is handy to set one using the due date feature within the card. When you click on the “Due Date” button, you can set the date and time, either by typing on the date and time textbox or by choosing the date on the calendar. You can even set a reminder for the due date so that you would not miss it! When you place a reminder notification, it will get notified through the bell button in the Trello app, or you can choose to receive it by email or desktop (if you use Google Chrome, Firefox, or Safari web browsers).
Lastly, if you noticed the “Power-Ups” feature in the card, you can utilize it to automate tasks by connecting and integrating with other web apps such as Google Drive or Evernote. There are many power-ups you can choose from, but in my case, I use the calendar power-up so that I can view the cards I created in the calendar format, like the ones below.
To wrap up
There are so many project management tools on the web, but in the end, I’m still sticking with Trello as my personal favorite. There are lots more features that you can explore within Trello and use them to boost your productivity and manage your multiple writing tasks efficiently.
Have you ever used Trello? Or do you know any tips and tricks to use it more efficiently? Let me know in the comments!
