5 Tools I Use Everyday

1. Trello

The ultimate planning tool that is equally impressive for managing business teams and your own personal to-dos. It’s basically a virtual bulletin board – you create and pin cards to your board. The cards are organized in columns and each column has a title. You can easily have a stationary list like a shopping list where you are steadily adding items as you think of them. You can also have columns to progress a card. For example, you have three lists: to start, in progress, completed. You create your task card and can then track the task’s progress. Your boards can also be shared with others which helps when collaborating.

2. Planoly

Such a big fan of this app for its obvious functionality but also for the content Planoly produces. You should definitely follow them on Insta because they are always sharing helpful information and hosting free events to teach and connect with their community. But back to the functionality part – Planoly is completely necessary if you’re focused on creating a cohesive grid. The hashtag management feature is also priceless especially when dealing with specific campaigns. Using Planaly for your business allows the business owner to keep their direct messages private while still letting team members help them plan. Planoly is also breaking ground in the Pinterest world, and that’s a whole other blog post!

3. Canva

No matter if you’re an InDesign wizard or not, it’s still nice to rely on Canva time-to-time. This app was such a welcomed helping hand when it came to the scene and it has expanded and grown to be a serious player in content creation and other areas like resume building. Canva still delivers cool and fresh designs that can help anyone when on a creative time crunch. It’s also a great place to go for design inspiration.

4. VSCO

VSCO was a thing way before it became “a thing” in 2019. In terms of app pricing, it is expensive at $20/year, but it will always remain a cult favorite because of the capabilities. You can easily edit photos and videos, and you can also create your favorite presets to have readily available. For those that really understand the complexities of editing, VSCO allows you to go deep into the properties of the pic to achieve your desired look. And for the novice, VSCO does a great job recommending presets based on each pic and they break it down into warm, cool, vibrant, etc. suggestions. It’s helpful, but also a great way to discover new looks.

5. Unsplash

Creating content including the visuals is always encouraged but sometimes it just doesn’t make sense – maybe you don’t have the time or the budget or the resources. Unsplash is a great place for a few free pics. It is a photography only site so no icons or cartoons, but they still have an impressive collection. As with most things, make sure your search criteria is very specific to find the good stuff.