Trello 101 – How to Use it to Organise Your Business

You’ve heard this loads of times I bet – Trello is a brilliant tool to use as an online business owner.  That’s nice, you think – but what is it?  And what kind of things can I do with it? 

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I use Trello for a few different jobs in my business and even some stuff in my personal life so I thought I would write a Trello 101 to show how to use it organise your business.  Let’s jump right in.

Trello 101 – what is Trello?

Trello for me is a bit like a pinboard or a whiteboard.  You know, one of those places where you would stick or pin loads of notes about stuff you want to do?  Then you take them down and trash them when they are done or add little notes to them to remind you to do specific jobs in that job?

That’s Trello – only it is digital rather than taking up wall space in your home.  It is available on both desktop and as a mobile app and there’s a huge amount you can do with it without a single sticky note in sight.

Trello also has features that allow you to collaborate with others.  So if you have a VA, work with a Pinterest manager or have other team members, you can add them to boards and this opens up a whole new range of features.

Free or paid?

There’s a lot you can do with the free version of Trello and this is what I use.  You get unlimited personal boards and can also make teams that are allowed 10 boards each.  So I have a team for each blog as well as business area and personal stuff.  The free option allows unlimited cards and lists plus 1 power up per board and 50 commands a month through Butler.

There is a business class where you pay $12.50 per user per month for a range of extra features and an Enterprise level for bigger companies.  The other way to extend features is to use Trello Gold which is per team and costs $5 a month.  This allows you up to three more Power Ups per board and a range of extra decorative features.  It also allows you to add larger files than the free plan.

Tips on using Trello

A good Trello 101 starts with the basics of how to use Trello so that’s where we will start. 

Trello is a Kanban board system which means you have a board and within it you have lists.  On those lists you add cards and within cards there is a whole range of features you can use including adding links, checklists, dates and more.

One of the first things to get to grips with when using Trello is creating lists and cards and moving them around.  You can simply click on a card and change it between lists or within the list.  You can reorder lists too on the board.  There are features to copy and move between boards but that’s a little further on.

Within each card, there are also lots of features to use.  Here’s an example from my editorial calendar of the card for this post.  There’s a checklist to remind me of jobs to do, a list of keywords to use in the post, the blog category in the coloured label and the date the post is to publish.

How to use Trello to organise your business

For me, one of the best ways to learn Trello and decide how I can use it is to dive in.  I have had some great templates to give me ideas and Trello supply a whole range of them you can use.  Over time, you make changes, adapt and amend these to get just what you need. 

Here are a few examples of the ones I use.

Trello weekly planner

I do use ClickUp when it comes to ticking off regular jobs.  But I have a Trello weekly planner that helps me look at the whole of the week in one place. 

These are regular jobs that I do every week or fortnight and that remains largely unchanged.  It includes things like:

• Scheduling content to Pinterest
• Scheduling content to social media and my Facebook Group
• Writing new blog posts
• Doing post graphics 

This board doesn’t change much unless I change the jobs or when they are done.

Editorial calendar

I’ve tried a few different ways to create an editorial calendar and came back to Trello.  Last year I tried to plan a whole year’s content in January, and this has worked well although I might try just doing three or six months at a time next year.

With the editorial calendar,  I have a list for each month and a card for each blog post.  I also have a bank of posts that I want to write but haven’t allocated a date yet in the ‘on hold’ section.  Plus I have slots where I want to write for a particular category but haven’t quite decided what yet. 

On my food blog, this is similar but there’s gaps for those seasonal content pieces so I can see when they need to be planned and created to get them out in plenty of time for the holiday.

To do list

My Ultimate To Do List is more like a dump board of things I’m working on that I want to keep track of.  I also use a paper bullet journal where I jot down jobs that I want to get done each week.  The to do list for me is like a library of information so it includes courses and memberships I’m working through, things I want to buy ASAP and other notes.

You can also use a more traditional to do list with something like a Get Things Done Trello board.  This is a board template you can copy and then make your own.  It uses the concepts of GTD and gives you tips on how to make the most of the system – then you can customise it as you like.

Customer relationship management

You can easily use Trello as a customer relationship management tool or CRM.  I have a board for both sides of my business where I record customer information, dates and other relevant details.  I set it up with a template card that can be copied and completed with each customer’s information.  You can do the same with leads and note down what is happening.

With the email linking feature, you can also set it up so that emails between you and a client are automatically copied into the Trello card so you always know what stage the project is at.

Yearly or goal planning

Trello works well for goal planning in any format.  Maybe you set yearly goals, maybe you work quarterly or even monthly.  You can set up a board in any format you want and use it to track progress.  You can even use it as an ultimate goals planner where you are looking far ahead for your business and want to see how you are doing.

Trello as a bullet journal?

The bullet journal phenomena are one that has gripped me.  While I am a very digital person, I still love nice notebooks, coloured pens and writing things down.  That’s why I have my own bullet journal although it is more of a jobs list than a traditional approach – that’s good though as it works and that’s the important part.

But what about using Trello as a bullet journal? 

There’s no reason at all that you can’t because it is completely adaptable.  You can even pretty it up by adding pictures or graphics.  Plus it goes wherever you need it because you can access everything on your phone so if you find you have left your physical BuJo at home, it isn’t a problem.  Or you can use both in the way that I do!

Trello automations and integrations

Trello also integrates with a large number of other tools to help to make it exactly what you need it for.  These integrates sometimes are free and other times are part of an upgrade known as a Power Up.  For example, you can use the Gmail integration to easily make an email into a Trello card which is free.  Integrations with things like Dropbox, Google Drive and Evernote are Power Ups.

Butler for Trello

In addition to integrations, there are also automations you can set up for Trello using the Butler bot.  Butler is an add-on app that allows you to set up repeatable tasks within boards, lists and cards.  I’ll admit I’ve only dabbled a little with it but know people who swear by using it.  Once you have enabled the Butler Power Up and given it permission to access boards (it prompts you to do this) you can start setting up automations.  A few examples of automations could be:

• Copy a new card when a new blog post is created on the editorial calendar
• Add a reusable checklist to new cards
• Add a specific card to a to-do list every Monday
• Move a card to a different list once a checklist is complete

There are hundreds of different automations you can use.  For me, I just need to see what I need to automate then learn how to do it!

Other tips to using Trello

As well as active things like a CRM and editorial calendar, you can also use Trello for more passive things.  And it doesn’t have to all be business.  Here are a few examples of things I use it for:

• Store courses – I have boards for things like Genius Blogger’s Toolkits where I have a card for each course or eBook.  I can add files of notes I’ve made, login info and more
• Keep track of email challenges – if you are taking email challenges, use the email integration to add them to a list to keep them all in one place
• Create a useful information board – have stuff you constantly refer to?  Codes to add descriptions to Pinterest?  Your own website information?  Create cards for them all on a useful information board
• Menu planning – you can even use it for menu planning or to track what’s in your freezer to help plan meals

A key online tool

For me, Trello is one of my key tools alongside ClickUp and Airtable.  These are crucial in running my business, my blogs and lots of home stuff too.  Trello is the glue that keeps everything together and there’s no limit to the things you can do with it.

Are you a Trello fan?  Tell us in the comments your favourite uses for it!