New year, new start! Are you one of the 57% of people in the US making a New Year’s resolution? Perhaps you’re one of the 21% of people determined to save more money this year, or one of the 19% of people looking to eat more healthily. (*1)
And while the beginning of a new year is a great time to reorganise your priorities – whether that’s financial, time, or energy – it’s also the perfect time to organise your digital life. Perhaps not the most exciting of tasks, but a bit of time spent now could save you time and stress later on. Plus, you’ve got all that New Year’s energy and motivation to tap into to help you get the task done!
Top tips for organising your digital life like a pro:
- Break the task up into smaller chunks to make it more manageable, and to give you a sense of achievement as you tick each item off. Create a list of all the tasks you want to achieve. ✅
- Prioritise the tasks by urgency. Is anything especially critical? Perhaps you’ve run out of storage space on your smartphone, so need to deal with this first as your top concern. Tackle these tasks first. 🚨
- Prioritise by cost. Are there certain tasks that will save you money? Perhaps freeing up space in your cloud storage account will save you having to pay to upgrade the account. 💰
- Prioritise by what will save you time. Which tasks will save you time in the long run if you tackle them now? Maybe organising the apps on your phone home screen will help you find what you need more quickly when you’re on the go, or sorting your work documents into clearly-labelled folders will help you locate that critical presentation when you’re pressed for time in the office. ⏰
- Prioritise by what will bring you joy. Are there items on your task list that will increase your quality of life, even just in small ways? Maybe you received a new ereader for Christmas and need to convert your ebooks to a compatible format so you can enjoy reading them on the new device. 😊
- Create a schedule to ensure you tick off all the tasks. For example, could you tackle one item on the list each week? 📆
- Combine mundane tasks with other activities to multitask like a pro. Could you sort your photos while watching Netflix, or organise the apps on your phone while listening to a podcast? 🎧
- Decide whether you need any new tools to complete the tasks. For instance, if you have nowhere to back up your files to, perhaps you need to create a cloud storage account, or invest in an external hard drive. 🛠️
How to organise your digital life
So where do you start when you want to bring order to your digital life? What kinds of tasks should you think about? We’ve created a list of activities to get you started:
Back up your data
Has it been a while since you backed up your smartphone? What about the files on your laptop? Now’s a great time to ensure your data is backed up – whether that’s to a cloud storage platform like Dropbox or OneDrive, or on a physical external hard drive or USB flash drive. With more than 10 million people in the US losing their cell phones each year (*2), don’t run the risk of losing your photos, documents or files if anything happens to your device.
Organise your file storage
However you back up your data, ensure everything is organised into folders and sub-folders so that it’s easy for you to find what you need later on. Remember to name folders and files clearly so that you don’t have to waste time checking ‘Folder 1’, ‘Folder 2’, etc. when you need to locate that presentation for work, or that embarrassing photo of your brother for a personalised birthday card.
Tidy up your computer desktop
If your computer desktop is covered in a deluge of files, now’s a great time to declutter so that you go into the new year with a clear screen. Move files you want to keep into storage folders, and delete what’s no longer needed. While you’re at it, take a couple of minutes to delete unwanted files from your Downloads folder (a sure source of space-hogging!) and then empty your Trash folder.
Optimise cloud storage accounts
There are several different cloud storage platforms to choose from – popular ones include Dropbox, OneDrive, Google Drive and iCloud. These platforms usually come with storage limits, and while these limits may seem generous to start with, once you start backing up photos, videos and other ‘heavy’ files, it’s easy to quickly fill your allotted space. Upgrading usually comes with a price tag, so it makes sense to only be storing the files you actually need. Do you have old documents or images that are no longer useful? Take some time to check through your folders and delete anything that’s no longer relevant. If you have large files you want to keep, why not compress the files to reduce their file size and save space – we have a handy file compression tool for that.
Remove unused apps
It’s easy to accumulate apps, especially on your smartphone, but you’ll probably find there are plenty you don’t use anymore. Delete the apps that you don’t need and free up storage space on your device. Then organise the ones you want to keep into folders (social media, travel, health, finances, tools, etc.), to keep your home screen neat and uncluttered, and to ensure everything is easy to find later on.
Sort your email
If your email account has been lacking some TLC, spending a bit of time organising everything can do wonders for your sense of satisfaction and productivity. File emails you want to keep into clearly labelled folders so they’re easy to find later. Delete unwanted emails and spam – and take a couple of minutes to unsubscribe from any no-longer-needed email lists while you’re doing that. Consider backing up important emails in another format to store in your cloud account. You can easily convert EML files and convert MSG files to other formats like Word files, PDF, rich text files and simple text files.
Organise your photos and videos
Photos and videos can quickly consume a lot of storage space on your devices and in your cloud storage accounts. Instead of just backing up your files and then forgetting about them, take some time to sort through and delete duplicates, poor-quality images, and media you don’t need anymore. Then sort the rest into folders that will help you locate specific images quickly later on. Your future self will thank you!
Ensure files are compatible with your device
Whether you got a new e-reader or tablet for Christmas or have recently invested in a fresh laptop or desktop computer, ensure your files are in formats that are compatible with your device. Moving from a Mac to a Windows computer? Convert your Pages files to Word documents, and your Numbers files to Excel spreadsheets, so you can open them easily on your new machine. Want to transfer your ebooks to your new Kindle device? Simply convert old MOBI files to EPUB format first before porting the files over.
Preserve old files
Whether it’s documents, presentations or images, if your files have been around for more than a few years, it’s worth checking whether they’re still in supported formats. If they use outdated file types, it’s sensible to update them to modern formats that are more widely supported to ensure you can continue to access the contents of the files. For example, convert old WordPerfect WPD files to Microsoft DOCX format, or old PowerPoint PPT presentations to the newer PPTX file type.
Where possible, store your files in standard and open formats (like PNG or JPG for images), instead of proprietary ones (like PSD, an Adobe Photoshop image format), so you aren’t tied to a specific software application when you want to access the files later. You can use batch-conversion tools, like Zamzar, to convert multiple files at once, saving you time.
So what are you waiting for? Start the new year as the organised person you always hoped you’d be, and let us know if you manage to get some of those items ticked off before the month ends. We’re rooting for you!
*1. https://www.statista.com/chart/29019/most-common-new-years-resolutions-us/
*2. https://www.lostings.com/lost-and-found-statistics/
[Cover photo by Jakub Żerdzicki]
