Would you buy Plannerisms Planners?

I've had several people over the years ask me to design and publish my own Plannerisms planners, based on my experience using and reviewing so many different planners.

Well I'm happy to report that plans are in the works to make this happen! I have designed Plannerisms weekly planners with features like goal setting and recording pages, space each week to log daily goals, weekly space for lists and notes, monthly calendars, and more.  I've also designed daily planners with similar features.

I'm trying to gauge interest in these planners.  Would you be interested in buying planners engineered by me, with all my favorite planner features?

Please vote in the poll in the sidebar!

Thanks!!

Pre-Move Planner Preparation

Today is my last packing day before the movers come tomorrow to take it all away!  We have to pack our luggage today too, even though we're not leaving for a few days yet, to make sure everything will fit in our luggage. One time when we moved, we vastly overestimated how much would fit in our bags, and after the movers left we had to mail several boxes to ourselves! Not an option from here, so we have to be careful with how much we pack.

We have several levels of priority of our possessions:

1) Most important and/ or irreplaceable items go in our carryons.

2) Things we'll need immediately go in our luggage.

3) Air shipment (to arrive in about a month): Things we'll need within the first month (like bedding and non-breakable kitchen stuff) goes in our air shipment. We get 700 pounds for this, which fills up quicker than you'd think.

4) The rest of everything goes on a ship which takes 3-4 months to arrive.

So, I have to decide what I can live without for a quarter of the year, what I need sooner, and what I can't part with at all.

Here's what's going where, planner-wise:

My Ivory Deco and Holborn Zip Filofaxes are going in my carry-on bag. So are my self-drawn weekly planner and my pocket daily Moleskine.

In my luggage are my Aston Filofax, my Moleskine monthly notebooks for this year and next year, my Quo Vadis Notor, and a blank Uncalendar Monthly planner (which I plan to use to record how many books my kids read over the summer). I've also packed two Alwych notebooks (one Large one Pocket) and my Scotland reference Filofax. And, I'm bringing my Woman's Success Choice Address Book in my luggage as a possible info, reference and address book because it is very slim and light in my bag.

In my air shipment I'm bringing a ton of stuff:

Filofax: my A5 and personal size purple Finsbury binders and my personal Buckingham.

Moleskine: the Star Wars planners and large daily Magenta.

Quo Vadis: the (weekly) Hebdo, Trinote, and Executive and my new (daily) 2012-2013 Textagenda

Uncalendar: Half Size and Full Size Weekly planners and another Monthly

Woman's Success Planner: Quarters 3 and 4 2012 and Quarter 1 2013, plus the soft leather cover.

My Dodo Pad desk diary

Undercover UK diary

Personal Planner UK

Paperblanks Ventaglio Rosso journal

 Several Clairefontaine notebooks just in case.

The rest, unfortunately, has to go in the sea shipment.

I'll be offline for a couple of days while the movers are here packing up everything and loading the truck. I hate being without my stuff so packout is always a bit traumatic!  Wish me luck!

Why do we keep buying Moleskines?

I mean the collective We here. I buy tons of Moleskine planners and notebooks. Why do we keep coming back for more?  I've come up with a few explanations:

1. You know what you're going to get. This is the same reason why my husband's grandparents eat at McDonald's when they are traveling in foreign countries. They know what to expect, and they know they're going to like it. When you buy a Moleskine, you know it's going to be well made, good quality, and generally pleasant to use.

2. You can get them everywhere. At the airport, online, at Target, in other countries. No matter where you are, you know you can get your hands on a Moleskine. It reduces the intimidation of writing in one when it's not so rare you'll never find another one.

3. It's appropriate in any situation.  You don't have to worry about busting out your screaming pink Hello Kitty planner in a board meeting.  The black cover might be boring, but it can go from a meeting with the CEO to getting spit up on at playgroup. The solid construction looks like quality, and I have to admit it's just a classy-looking book. 

4. They keep coming out with exciting new stuff.  This is what has me gagging for more Moleskines.  I mean, how can I pass up Star Wars planners?  Colored covers? New formats? Endless sizes from teeny to huge?  I'm always chomping at the bit to see what they'll come out with next.

Those of you who buy Moleskine planners and/ or notebooks, why do you keep returning to the brand?

All Daycraft products available with free worldwide shipping!

Many of you who have read my reviews of Daycraft notebooks and planners have been frustrated when you couldn't find the products you want in a store near you, or that overseas shipping was too costly.

Great news!  Now you can order directly from Daycraft with free worldwide shipping.

Don't freak out when you see the prices in Hong Kong dollars, just use a converter and you'll see they are actually normal prices.

PS I recently got an email from Daycraft letting me know they are running a Father's Day special: When you buy The Moneywrap online before 18 June you'll receive 20% off your next Daycraft purchase.

What I'm currently using update: back to daily pocket Moleskine

For the backstory, along with descriptions of why I've used (and stopped using) various day per page planners, and even speculation on what DPP I might use next year, see my video Daily Diary Litany here.

Helen's amazing Moleskine blog planner!

Helen at Fennell Books recently contacted me to show me how she converted her Moleskine weekly planner into a supercool blog planner with cut-out photos. I asked her if she would be interested in doing a guest post here on Plannerisms about it and she graciously agreed.

But unfortunately I had technical difficulties while loading her images, and my pre-move frazzled brain just couldn't sort it out. So I apologized and asked if she would please post it on her own (excellent) blog.

After all that, here is her wonderful post with lots of photos of her creative and beautiful Moleskine blog planner!

Thank you Helen for sharing this with all of us!  It's very inspiring!

Planner shopping online

For most of the past 8 years I've bought all my planners online, because I've been living in places where I can't buy planners locally (except for when I briefly lived in Scotland). So, I have a lot of experience with planner websites, and I have certain expectations of what my online shopping experience should be.

For example, if I can't find what I'm looking for in about 20 seconds or less, I'm outta there. Similarly, if there are no photos of the interior layout of the planner, there's no way I'm going to buy it. (This happens shockingly often!)

I've purchased from many different websites over the years. Just some that come to mind are Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk, Dodopad.com, Moleskineus.com, Letts.co.uk, Filofax.co.uk and Filofaxusa.com, CollinsDebden.co.uk, TheSuccessChoice.com, Uncalendar.com, Quovadis-diaries.co.uk, Organised-mum.co.uk, WeekDate.com, PlannerPads.com,  UndercoverUK.com, TheDailyPlanner.com, LoveNotebooks.com and Alkos.com, just to name a few.

I've also shopped via brand websites that don't sell directly themselves but direct you to retail sites, such as QuoVadisPlanners.com and Paperblanks.com.

It's been interesting to see how these websites have changed and evolved over the years. Designs change, features change, and some things come and go. For example, it seems like most planner websites have planner ratings or reviews at some point, then most eventually get rid of them because they become a confusing jumble of positive and negative reviews. I've noticed most often the negative reviews have nothing to do with the planner itself and are usually about a delivery problem. I prefer customer testimonials (such as here on Uncalendar), I find those much more useful because they give me ideas on how to use the planner.

Another thing I like in a planner website is an associated blog. I've been reading the Quo Vadis blog for many years, and I love the mix of posts about the products as well as topics of general interest to planner users.  The Quo Vadis blog creates a dialogue directly with customers, asks for feedback, and announces product launches and changes. It is my gold standard for what a planner brand's blog should be.

The number one feature a planner retail site must have is an effective search engine. Like I said above, I give it about 20 seconds and if I haven't found what I'm looking for I move on. When I visit a site, I usually have a good idea of what I'm looking for (a day per page planner, for example, or a weekly desk planner).  Letts UK's diary page has an excellent Search feature that allows you to narrow down your search by format, size, price and even color so you can easily find what you are looking for.

In addition to a search feature, I want to know as much about the inside of the planner as possible. Ironically, I want to find the format and style I'm looking for quickly, but once I find what I'm looking for I'll spend hours comparing features before deciding on which planner I'll buy.

I want close-up photos of the daily or weekly layout. I want to know if holidays are printed on the days. Are there also month calendars, and if so what is the format? I want to know if the paper is white or cream, and the weight (gsm). Are there any international information pages? Sunrise and sunset times? Maps? Notes pages? It's all important. Usually I'm comparing one planner to another of a different brand, and I almost always go with the one that has more features. Again, Letts UK's website is excellent because it lists all the interior features of the diaires and shows photos of the layout (here is an example (when you choose a color it shows you the interior layout)). Another excellent example is Organised Mum, with lots of photos of the interior features. I pore over photos like this when deciding whether to purchase a planner. The more photos and more information, the better.

There are some planner website features that are nice, but aren't as important to me. Many sites hold your information so later you can reorder with just one click. Because I move so frequently, I have to enter my new address anyway so one-click ordering doesn't make any difference to me, but many people find it very convenient.

Also I've noticed a trend lately that some sites have too much going on in the home page. Moving images and cluttery layouts just make it harder for me to find what I'm looking for.

And, more and more planner brands are on social media with Twitter and Facebook where they can communicate directly with customers and even run contests.

What do you like in a planner website? What features make you come back again to the same website? And, what features turn you off and make you move on to a different website?