iOrganized Blog

Our theme for the month of September is “Contact Management,” where we’ll be focusing on ways to improve your CRM. But before we get started, let’s all get on the same page. What, exactly, is CRM?

CRM stands for “Customer Relationship Management.” Whether you’re a small business or a multi-billion dollar enterprise, it’s critical that you keep track of all of your contacts. You need some system to store, sort, and reference data about past and current clients, networking contacts, new prospects, etc. For a detailed description of the functionalities of CRM software, we recommend “What is Contact Management Software?”. Basically, CRM software allows companies to “better organize, access, and share data about customers, prospects, and their histories across all departments and functions.”

CRM software does much more beyond simply storing and organizing your contacts. When used correctly, good contact management can improve your sales, consistency, and efficiency. Less time is wasted scrolling through a long Excel document when using automated CRM systems. Many systems can also provide reports, forecasting, and opportunity management. Learn more about the benefits of CRM with “What Can Contact Management Do for Your Sales Force?”.

As explained in “How Customer Relationship Management systems can be of benefit to your business,” “Knowing, understanding and predicting what your customers want - and will want in the future - is vital to the success of small to medium-sized enterprises…and CRM is the key.”

Now that you understand what CRM is, and the importance of good contact management, join us every day this month for tips, product spotlights, interesting articles, and statistics about CRM.

What does CRM mean to you?

Additional resources

Description:

Do you have piles of paper on your desk, on your kitchen counter, in your bag, and at work? Do you know they are all action-items, like forms to reply to or bills to pay, but can’t remember when they are due? Do you sometimes miss deadlines because papers got lost in the clutter and shuffle? These Day of the Week Clips are not only adorable, they are helpful in organizing papers. You can combine all your action-item papers and clip them with the day you should complete them. No more missed deadlines!

You’ll love it for:

Paying bills
Planning a party or event
Homework assignments
Filling out your child’s school forms

Cost: $8.50

Available at: Tahoe Blu

The Young Female Entrepreneurs blog has dedicated this week to Seattle women. The site is “focusing on featuring young women who are building businesses in the city of Seattle for the week of August 29th.” As they explore what “building a business in Seattle as a young woman is really like,” YFE has chosen to spotlight Elizabeth Bowman, president of Innovatively Organized! The article, “Elizabeth Bowman: Seattle Productivity ‘Geek’ Expands Her Organizing Team,” discusses Elizabeth’s motivation for starting IO, her challenges as a young, female, entrepreneur, and her advice to other women. Check it out to learn more about Elizabeth Bowman and Innovatively Organized!

Young Female Entrepreneurs is a “support group for women in their 20s and 30s,” with a mission to help each member “on their path to profitable businesses while building a collective reputation that is philanthropic, successful, multi-faceted, and collaborative.” Thank you, YFE, for highlighting Innovatively Organized!

You’re a busy professional, so sometimes the thought of crafting a tasty dinner after a long day’s work is overwhelming. It’s hard enough going to the grocery store and getting more food during the week, but finding the energy to cook at night can be too much. If you don’t always have time to make dinner, but don’t want to just order takeout all the time, Dream Dinners is a good solution.

At Dream Dinners, you can pre-assemble delicious meals. They have all of the ingredients, instructions, and proportions ready for you to prepare. You package everything up, take it home to the freezer, and pull out your desired meal when you’re ready to cook it. You can pre-assemble every dinner for the next two weeks, or simply store a couple for days when you don’t feel like cooking.

Each month, the menu changes to 14 new recipes, so you don’t have to eat the same meals each week. You simply read over the menu, choose how many servings of each meal you will need, pick a location to prepare your order, and head over when you are available. In just an hour or so, you will have all of your meals put together and ready to take home. It’s also a fun activity to enjoy with your spouse or kids- the people are friendly, the employees are helpful, and food is out to sample.

Description:
Design your perfect notebook with Arc- completely customizable and functional to fit your lifestyle! You can choose poly or leather notebooks in a variety of colors, patterns, and designs. Then complement your notebook with a system that works for you, including dividers, page flags, filler paper, and expansion discs. We especially love the task pads, which you can add to differentiate your action items. Everything can be added, removed, or rearranged within the notebook, making organization a breeze.

You’ll love it for:
• Busy families- you can make a section for each member of the family
• Business owners
• Every profession- architects, event planners, graphic designers, bakers, etc.
• Taking notes in a meeting
• Planning a wedding
• Students- college, high school

Cost: $14.99+

Available at: Staples

Have you ever been sitting in your car during traffic thinking, “I wish I had a bottle of water right now, I am so thirsty”? Or do you ever find yourself looking for a few extra quarters to pay for parking? If you’ve ever had a spontaneous picnic and wished you had a blanket in your car, this list is for you! Our list of must-haves in your car includes everything you need for daily convenience and in cases of emergencies. You spend so much time in your car, but usually transport important items to and from your house. This helpful guide is a list of things you should always have in your car, to make sure you never get caught in a difficult or uncomfortable situation. Just go through this list once a month to re-stock and replenish items that have been used, like snacks and spare change.

Get organized now with our Must-haves in your Car Checklist!

And for more Innovatively Organized checklists, visit our page of Organizing Checklists!

Congratulations to Jennifer Smith for winning our Facebook Raffle! Jennifer received our Office Organizing Gift Basket in the mail, including an inbox tray, a desktop file bin, a pencil cup, a Freedom Filer file organization system, a business card organizer box, and two white storage boxes. Jennifer said she plans on using her new office organizing tools as she prepares for two exciting events: she and her husband are expecting their first child in the next few weeks and they are later moving to a new home! We wish Jennifer and her husband best of luck as these exciting journeys begin in their lives!

We would like to thank everyone for “liking” our Facebook Page, including those who had already “liked” us before the raffle. This raffle helped us increase our “likes” by 10%! We truly appreciate all of your support as we continue to grow and expand as a company.

Description:
Some apps are absolute life-savers. However, sometimes the old-fashioned, most basic tools on your phones can help you stay organized. One trick is to use your calendar event notifications capability on your phone (included in every cell phone). For example, you can set your phone to remind you every morning at 8 am to take your multi-vitamin with breakfast. Or you can schedule reminders every day at 3:45 pm to go to the gym after work, to keep you motivated. If you have recurring events each week, you can schedule notifications to repeat each week, so you never forget your commitments.

Abilities:
-   Can repeat recurring events (daily, weekly, monthly, yearly)
-   Snooze button to remind you in a few minutes

Great for:
-   Birthday reminders
-   Remembering important tasks
-   Notifying you twenty minutes before your favorite shows air on TV
-   Positive messages to keep you uplifted during the day

Cost: Free!

Almost our whole team gathered last Saturday at Eastlake Bar & Grill to celebrate another year with Innovatively Organized. Our Second Annual Summer Party was full of great people, amazing Seattle weather, and delicious food (hummus and pita bread, calamari, flourless chocolate cake!). We had almost as many accountants in attendance as we did professional organizers, plus a handful of Virginia Tech Hokies.

It was a great night spent celebrating our company growth and successes this past year. We are so thankful for our hardworking, enthusiastic team- including our organizers, technology coordinator, intern, marketing consultant, graphic designer, and handy-man. And we cannot wait for another year of organizing!

For more photos of our summer party, you can check out our Facebook album!

Before and After of the Week

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08.15.2011

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Service: Residential Organizing

Challenge:
Though this room was intended to be a home office, there were piles of paper and assorted household items on every surface in this space. The room had no clear, defined purpose and wasn't being used for anything other than storage.

Solution:
We sorted through the items in this space to determine what the client really felt was important in his life. Together, we purged the items that were unnecessary and kept what would add value. The client painted and picked out furniture according to suggestions we made. All furniture that was to go back into the space needed to have a defined purpose.

Result:
Upon completion of the furniture and décor selection, we were able to come back into the space and set up an appropriate paper management system. The client now has a way to process paper and a place to store it.

For even more Innovatively Organized before and after photos, visit our Facebook album!

iOrganized Blog

Thought: What is CRM?

Additional resources

Product Spotlight: Day of the Week Clips

Article: IO Featured on Young Female Entrepreneurs Blog

Innovative Idea: Dream Dinners

Product Spotlight: Arc Notebooks

Checklist: Must-haves in your Car

Congratulations to our raffle winner!

App of the Week: Basic Phone Notifications

IO Annual Summer Party

Before and After of the Week

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