TIP: Fast and Easy sales pipeline using Trello

I am so lazy that it can be a superpower. Now before you roll your eyes, especially if you know me, let me define what I mean by LAZY but more how Bill Gates defines lazy. Bill says that if you want a difficult task done, have a lazy person do it because they will find the fastest and easiest way to do it. That is how I define lazy. Others may call it efficient.

I am also a business owner who doesn’t have time for a simple task to take too long. So I need FAST and EASY!

SEVERAL years ago, Windows had a neat little option called Active Desktop and it allowed you to make a website your desktop. You could interact with the website ALL THE TIME. No need to create shortcuts, login, or any of the other many steps it takes to use a simple web-based tool. Did I mention I love FAST AND EASY tools. Sadly, this doesn’t appear to exist so I needed something else.

While I am only talking about using Trello here, I also use this method for other websites that I need to access fast.

Ok, to the real useful stuff.

Trello, in case you didn’t know, is a “fun, flexible, and free way to organize plans, projects and more.” I think of it as Post-It-Notes on a computer, but it is more.

Recently my sales pipeline started getting bigger and harder to manage so I needed a way to track who was were in the process, so I brought up Trello and TADA, they have an already made template called “Sales Pipeline”. Requirement #1 accomplished, easy! Now how do I make this fast.

While Active Desktop doesn’t exist anymore there IS a WAY BETTER FEATURE (in my opinion) available and that is “Install This Site as an APP” in Microsoft Edge. This allows the website to be saved as an application which is PINNABLE TO THE TASK BAR (Easy!). 

How To:

1. Open Trello in Microsoft Edge (Has to be done in Edge)
2. Login in to or create your Trello account (which is free).
3. Create or use an existing Workspace.
4. Select Sales CRM as the workspace Type if you are creating a new one.
5. Skip inviting your team at this time.
6. Select the Sales Pipeline Template.
7. Edit the template to meet your needs.
8. Install the Site as an App. (There are a lot of step by step instructions on this on the web so I won’t go into it here. Just know it is a couple of clicks)
9. Pin the App to your taskbar.
10. Revel in your accomplishment.

Some may ask, how is this different that a shortcut. In MY experience it varies for 2 MAIN reasons. 1. I DON’T HAVE TO KEEP LOGGING IN which helps with the FAST and EASY requirement. 2. If you try to pin a shortcut it pins it as PART OF THE BROWSER instead of by itself which means there is another step which doesn’t help with the FAST requirement.

So Ron Swanson is a HERO and I enjoy his quote “I’d work all night if it mean nothing got done.” His devotion to working LESS can be inspiring if used for good. I spent a lot of time coming up with this as a method to make this part of my sales process fast and easy because it meant that I could and WOULD use it and not get bogged down by it and eventually abandon it.