Spring Cleaning for Entrepreneurs

Spring is in the air, we can feel it! I don’t know about you, but it makes me want to jump up and get organized and processes in place! Below I list 9 tips for getting your digital space organized and clean and ready for spring!

1. Move files from your desktop into appropriate folders.

This can be hard. I mean things can seriously get lost on your desktop. I recommend every week that you take files and organizing them on your desktop or to your Google Drive or Dropbox so all the files are put away and in their proper place. This is especially helpful for finding important documents you may need to find without searching your computer for them!

2. Delete all that junk from your Downloads folder (where your computer automatically downloads files).

This one gets forgotten quite often. It’s easy to forget something that is out of sight, out of mind. This is another good thing to do once a week to keep it from taking up space on your computer.

3. Wipe down that keyboard and screen.

Wipe down your keyboard and screen. I always made this a Friday thing. Whenever I get done working on Friday afternoons I wipe everything down. It is nice to know that come Monday morning you can start fresh with a clean workspace!

4. Categorize your expenses in your accounting software.

Keeping track of this at a minimum monthly, but weekly is better is key! Tax time is much easier when you do this! I assume most of you might be dealing with that issue now making tax time no fun for you or your accountant! Keeping your taxes organized may be one of the biggest tips you should get out of this article!

5. Back up photos to Dropbox or Google Drive and then delete them from your computer.

You can have this happen automatically. Using IFFT or Zapier. Both great tools! Or you can even download either platform directly to your computer and only keep your folders in Dropbox or Google drive! This way the space on your computer stays free!

6. While you’re in your Dropbox account, or Google Drive, clean that out too!

We forget all the things we keep in our files. It is good to stay on top of that and keep everything organized on a regular basis. Plus it avoids the dreaded disk space full message!

7. Use your computer’s disk clean up tool to get rid of extra files.

Are you seeing a pattern here? Keeping your computer clean and memory from being full allows your computer to operate much better. There are a few free or paid versions of a disk clean up tool. Either is fine, but definitely get one of them. It gets rid of unneeded files and duplicates of the exact same thing, and helps you with some of the work!

8. Inbox ZeroThe fun of your email!

This one can be tricky, it is definitely tough. Keeping a clean inbox is an ongoing task no matter what. But if you stay on top of it it isn’t nearly as bad. I see two popular ways to do this. One is to create an action, processing and completed folder so you can remember what things are where. Two is to organize my names of clients or customers or products and organize that way. Everyone works differently. Some like to keep active emails in their inbox and only move them to a folder once they are done and complete. Either way works.

9. Don’t forget to unsubscribe to those newsletters and retail emails you don’t need before you delete them.

I mean, if you are already in your email you may as well unsubscribe while you are at it. Keeping junk email out of your inbox keeps it much cleaner much faster! And prevents you from spending on things that you don’t need!