These days, there are a number of different way to go paperless. Of course, OfficeDrop is one of them, but in this video, Josh Zerkel, a Professional Organizer in San Francisco and founder of Custom Living Solutions, outlines the different options you have when going paperless.
Josh outlines the different types of scanner available, the power of OCR, online backup, text-search, different online applications and mail-in scanning services.
That’s right, OfficeDrop has recently scanned a full print book and converted it to a PDF document that can be viewed and read as an eBook on the Apple iPad. The book is Guy Kawasaki’s The Macintosh Way. Download the book as a text-searchable PDF here: http://freemacway.com/ and you can get the OfficeDrop Paper-to-Go app here.
Here’s the story:
In 1990, Guy Kawasaki published The Macintosh Way. It was a great book that highlighted and outlined the marketing values and techniques of Macintosh back when they were producing and selling the early Mac computers. Sadly, the book went out of print though it had a significant following.
Twenty years later Apple has surpassed Microsoft in value, and Kawasaki’s book is now a way to view the original strategies they employed to get there. After securing the rights to his work, Kawasaki decided to begin distributing his work to his established collection of Twitter followers. The book wasn’t in print anymore, so the only way to do this would be to scan the book and distribute it digitally.
As you might guess, this is where OfficeDrop comes in. Guy approached us with the challenge of turning his print book into an eBook, and we were psyched to attach such an original and exciting project. We scanned the book, organized it in a PDF, and uploaded it to OfficeDrop.
Now, we have our new OfficeDrop iPad app, which lets you open and navigate through scanned pages as you would an eBook on the iPad. With the scanning process complete, Guy Kawasaki was now able to distribute his work digitally, and could even read it on his iPad, the result of the very company his book praised.
The best part - video marketing company, Pixability, took footage of the scanning and conversion process to make a clever video that tells the fascinating story of Guy’s plight from initial problem to finished solution. The video was very well done and is especially entertaining with its feature of various Mac and Apple products that accurately match the chronology of the story.
Web how-to blog, MakeUseOf.com, recently polled their readers with the question “Are you paperless?” Obviously our ears perked up to this since the results could tell us the general reception of the concept on which our company is based.
The results came back (pictured below) and we were actually pretty excited about the outcome.
Why should I be paperless? I don’t care. 8% (23 votes)
Yes 100% paperless. I get all my bills online.23% (65 votes)
I am trying. I have gotten more than half of my bills to stop sending snail mail. 50% (138 votes)
I think I might try to go paperless in the near future. 14% (38 votes)
What do you mean by paperless? 5% (13 votes)
Total Votes: 277
As you can see, the majority answer is that people are working towards a paperless environment which, for us, is a best case scenario.
It shows that people are open to the idea of going paperless, but they are hesitant to get started. OfficeDrop helps with this by providing an easy way to start reducing paper in your office. Since we do all of the scanning for you, our mail-in submission system replaces hours spent scanning with a quick trip to the post office.
Congrats to those who have eliminated paper altogether, and as for those of you that are trying to get there, keep fighting the good fight. Going paperless yields a mountain of benefits, and isn’t nearly as hard as you might think. If you’ve hit a wall trying to get paperless, we encourage you to try our document scanning services which is sure to simplify your conversion process, and get you managing digital documents online in no time.
Have you ever spent your workday hunched over a messy filing cabinet, hunting desperately for a piece of information you aren’t even sure exists? Imagine that same workday spent sitting in a comfy office chair, text-searching and then paging through all your documents from the effortless Multi-Touch display of the iPad.
Doesn’t that sound nice? It’s only a download away with OfficeDrop’s new iPad application. Yep, OfficeDrop is making document management easier than ever before with our new iPad app, OfficeDrop - Paper To Go (*see screenshots below). Do everything you can do on OfficeDrop from the rich graphic display of the iPad. With just a few touches of the screen you can:
Those are only some of the OfficeDrop features you can enjoy from the comfortable, portable iPad, and with your OfficeDrop account, you’re backed with our document scanning service to ensure your new paper documents also become iPad-accessible.
Our new iPad app is ready and waiting on the iTunes store so you’re just a quick download away from finding any document you want from any place you want (especially that comfy chair).
Scoring in the World Cup is no easy feat. Players are up against the best of the best, so to get those goals they need to be skilled and organized.
We can’t help you with your soccer skills, but we can help you with your office organization. Going paperless is a great way to meet your organization goals, but as with the world’s most popular sport, you can’t just start taking pot shots and expect those goals to be met. Here are some tips for meeting your organization goals and winning the paperless game.
When you set goals for getting organized or going paperless, be realistic. A goal like “eliminate all my paper in one week” is probably too ambitious for most. To start, pick one document store to organize, like a single filing cabinet. Developing an effective method on a small scale will build confidence, and get you ready for the big game.
If you’re ever going to meet your organization goals, you need an attack plan. Decide exactly how you want to organize, how much paper you want to eliminate, and a timeline for your plan before you start scanning documents. That way, you have a strategy to put you in scoring position.
Once you’ve developed your organizational protocols, keep it up! It’s easy to slip back into old habits while your paper starts to pile up again and you become less organized. Don’t let all your hard work go to waste. Once you’ve met your goal you have to play defense to keep your lead against paper.
As always, look to OfficeDrop for any coaching tips when it comes to document scanning and organization. Shoot your documents to us in the mail and we’ll give you the assist to hitting all of your paperless and organizational goals.
OfficeDrop is teaming up with organizational mastermind, Josh Zerkel, to bring you two free webinars to teach you how to go paperless and keep all of your documents organized. For seven years Josh’s company, Custom Living Solutions, has been helping people optimize their workspaces so that they can lower stress, be more effective, and minimize costs.
With this single registration, you’re signed up to benefit from these two informative webinars:
In this webinar we outline the many benefits of the paperless office and tell you how to get started.
In the second webinar, we let you know how to get the most out of your paperless office, how to maintain low paper volume, and offer helpful tools to make everything easier.
If you manage a small business or home office, don’t pass up on this opportunity to learn everything you need to know about reducing paper and staying organized. Registration only takes a moment, so we hope you take that moment and that you join us July 15th and 29th.
Josh Zerkel, a Professional Organizer and CEO of Custom Living Solutions, will give an online talk tomorrow as part of Intuit’s Get Organized Get Rewarded campaign. He will be discussing various technology strategies for realizing the paperless office dream. You can sign up for his talk at: http://community.intuit.com/small_business_events
He has also written a post on Intuit’s small business blog on using technologies to start on the path to the paperless office. Read it here: http://smallbusiness.intuit.com/blog/where-small-is-now/2010/05/tech-tools-to-boost-productivity-–-part-1.html
We’re proud to announce that OfficeDrop has been featured as one of the workplace apps featured on Intuit’s “Get Organized. Get Rewarded” campaign. Designed to get businesses started with helpful organization apps, OfficeDrop and other helpful tools will offer free trials and other limited-time offers for a one month period.
Ok so here’s the kindle part: As part of the campaign, Intuit is giving away a Kindle to users who will increase their chances of winning the more they sign up for apps and use them. You are automatically eligible once you sign up for a workplace app, so be sure to sign up for your OfficeDrop free trial through Intuit to give yourself the chance to win.
If you find yourself wading through paper, or struggling to utilize information around your office, now is the perfect opportunity to sign up for the apps that can save your sanity. OfficeDrop and other featured apps will require little to no commitment and will be sure to get you organized quickly and easily. If that wasn’t enough, you might win a kindle too. What’s not to love?
OfficeDrop and Intuit, the nation’s number one selling accounting software package, want small business owners to know that getting organized and going paperless is easier than you think! OfficeDrop will be showcased among the Intuit Marketplace’s best organizational tools in Intuit’s “Get Organized. Get Rewarded.” event this month. OfficeDrop’s mail-in scanning service and online document management are offering a free trial through the Intuit Partner Program.
The Intuit “Get Organized. Get Rewarded” Campaign offers customers limited-time deals on web apps focusing on office organization. OfficeDrop’s free trial is a great opportunity to see how document scanning and online document management can save money and improve productivity. In addition to the exclusive deals featured with the individual apps, those who sign up for an app will have a chance at winning a free Kindle e-reader.
We’ll be updating our blog with more organizational tips and tricks and more happenings as the “Get Organized. Get Rewarded” event continues this month!
As a company that promotes the reduction of paper waste and consequently the preservation of trees, we would like to wish everyone a happy Earth Day. As you quest to find ways to preserve the environment, and fight pollution, we urge you to consider paper scanning as a green initiative. Not only does document s scanning reduce your dependence on paper, it makes it fast and easy to locate and manage your information.
This Earth Day, consider going paperless, Arnold will thank you for it.
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