Spring is now here! And keeping in line with our spring cleaning week on WomenOnTheFence.com, I wanted to share how Microsoft Office can help you in your spring cleanup and organization!

photo credit: dailymom.com
photo credit: dailymom.com

If you’re looking to start spring cleaning, and especially digital spring cleaning, allow me to help. Microsoft Office 365 has been helping me spring clean my life for almost two decades. So if you’re ready to get started, allow me to make some fun suggestions:

Outlook for iPhone, iPad and Android

You can finally spring clean your inbox effortlessly while waiting at the doctor’s office with Outlook for iPhone, iPad and Android (Outlook for Android currently in Preview). You can even have your Gmail sync up too! Take a look….

AND MY MOST FAVORITE FEATURE…. SCANNING BUSINESS CARDS TO OUTLOOK! You can spring clean your contacts and easily transfer all those business cards right into Outlook. Read more: http://blogs.office.com/2014/12/08/office-lens-gets-networking-scan-business-cards-onenote-contacts-outlook/ 

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Office 2016 for Mac in coming!

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Once we’re talking Outlook updates, let’s talk Office 2016! This is most exciting for a Mac girl like me. Office 2016 for Mac is coming!

The new Office 2016 for Mac Preview includes updated versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote and Outlook–and the moment you open any one of the apps, you’ll immediately feel the difference. Office has modernized the user experience and made it easier to get things done.  The redesigned ribbon intuitively organizes features so you can quickly find what you need. A refreshed task pane interface makes positioning, resizing, or rotating graphics easy so you can create exactly the layout you want.  And new themes and styles help you pull it all together to produce stunning, professional documents.

Check out the preview for yourself here!

Office templates help you get organized for Spring

Check out what Office Templates can do for you.

  • Scan and save your recipes and organize them using this Recipe Tracker, or customizable OneNote recipe book. You’ll never have to dig through that pile of old recipes again, and thanks to OneDrive and Office Online, if a friend asks you for your famous lemon bar recipe, you’ll always have it in the cloud!

Here are mine in OneNote! 😉

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  • Weekly Chore List & Weekly Chore Schedule– Use this schedule and list to keep you on track with daily and weekly chores; so you are never drowning in laundry or spending hours cleaning your house again!
  • To Do List– Make a list, and check things off; it’s that easy! We all know it’s not, but let Microsoft help you get that list started. Before you know it you will be checking things off and finding time to sit in a hammock with your favorite book, in no time. We can dream, right?
  • Vacation Items Checklist– Get you and your family organized for all your travel plans this Spring.

Easy Tax Season Preparation in Excel

Preparing your taxes is so simple – one click requesting the tax season template, and your tax file is up and running! Simple to use, and yet powerful in organizing and preparing everything you need for tax season.

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In fact, Excel makes everything simple. I recently needed an updated travel expense report to submit for a speaking gig, and with one click, Excel found me the perfect form.

Here is the form right in Excel on my computer!

Excel expense

OneNote

Firstly, let me be the first to tell you that I have been loving using OneNote on my iPhone, iPad and Mac! Yes, OneNote is on all the platforms you love including PC, Mac, Windows Tablets, Windows Phone, iPad, iPhone, Android and Web (phew!) Even if you don’t have an Office 365 subscription, you can enjoy OneNote anywhere and everywhere. I’ve gotta admit, this one is my new fave.

So how will I be using OneNote for spring cleaning? Well, I have been transferring my invoices, receipts and all paper business expenses right into OneNote. This makes my life super easy for preparing my taxes this year. Also, Office 365‘s tracker for charitable donations is also super helpful for taxes preparation. It’s a total digital Spring Clean with OneNote.

You can also organize your office by digitizing your kid’s documents & artwork in OneNote

  • If you have kids, you know they often create quite the paper trail. Things like report cards, medical histories, basketball schedules and school calendars can pile up on your kitchen counter or desk and be hard to find when you need them most. Use OneNote to organize these documents in searchable, organized tabs. The perfect spring cleanse!
  • Does it break your heart to get rid of that turkey day painting or macaroni art? Do you have boxes of artwork and craft projects in your office or in storage? De-clutter by taking pictures of or scanning the art and storing it in OneNote. You can keep the physical pieces that are most important, and have digital copies of the rest! You can then access and share your stuff on-the-go with OneNote Online and OneDrive. I have been doing this and loving it!!
  • This winter, I always had the latest outdoor arena free-skate schedule on me because I simply snapped a picture of it from the wall and popped it right into OneNote! Anytime the boys asked when we can go free skating outdoors, I had the schedule on me at all times without having to surf online. Handy!!

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The new intelligent Clipper is the coolest for collecting recipes and more!

People clip all kinds of things to OneNote, but articles, recipes and products top the charts. OneNote has built a more intelligent Clipper—able to automatically detect that the site you want to clip contains an article, recipe or product. For these web pages, the OneNote Clipper cleans up the page to show you only that content in a neat, organized format, and then shows you a preview.

You simply click the ArticleRecipe or Product button on the right side of the Clipper, preview the article, recipe or product, and select Clip to send it to OneNote.

Here’s a glimpse of what the intelligent Clipper can do: https://www.onenote.com/Clipper/OneNote

Office for the iPad® still rocks for Digital Spring Cleaning

Now, you can actually print documents from your iPad to an AirPrint printer (this was the number one customer request!).  There are also now Standalone Word, Excel, and PowerPoint apps for iPhone plus updates to the iPad apps.

And Office for Android is available as of January and it includes Word, Excel and PowerPoint!

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So, I invite you to try Microsoft Office 365 today. You will notice the difference immediately. Happy Spring Cleaning ladies!

Erica3

 Disclosure: I’m proud to be a paid Microsoft Office Brand Ambassador. All opinions are my own.