Many Evernote Users are doing it wrong

It took a firestorm to learn something about how many people use Evernote.

Three weeks ago Evernote announced changes to their service tiers. The Premium price went up, and the Free Basic level was restricted to two logged in devices at one time.

Those changes set off a firestorm on Evernote's Forum filling 139 pages in three weeks with complaints, recriminations and threats to move elsewhere.

A common pronouncement among the dissatisfied was

"I am an active user of Evernote. I've created 3000 notes in five years!"

They expect Evernote corporate to be impressed by their spirited use of Evernote. Instead, they underwhelmed me with their Notes per Month rate.

I am probably not the typical user. I have 24,000 notes accumulated over eight years. That is 3,000 notes a year, or 250 a month.

So anyone accumulating 3000 in 5 years is only doing 50 notes a month.

I'm going to assume most of these people pay their bills online. Where are they putting their receipts?

I assume they have insurance. Where are they putting their insurance papers?

Where are they capturing their investment transactions?

When they research something for work, or a home improvement, or buying a home for that matter, where do they store their research?

I am believing those capturing only 50 notes a month, are not even coming close to using Evernote to its full potential.

I believe those under-users are thinking before they capture "Will I need to see this again?"

That's the wrong question to ask. Instead, they should ask "Is there even a remote chance I might need this again? Maybe for a lawsuit, or a payment dispute, or because I might have to do something like this again?"

In a previous blog post a little over a year ago, I summarized my attitude towards what to capture :

IF IT COMES INTO YOUR LIFE, AND THERE IS THE SMALLEST CHANCE YOU'LL WANT TO SEE IT AGAIN, THEN TYPE IT, SCAN IT, PHOTOGRAPH IT, IMPORT IT, WEB CAPTURE, SCREEN CAPTURE, AUDIO RECORD IT, INTO EVERNOTE.

The Shorter version was :

IF YOU ENCOUNTER SOMETHING YOU MIGHT REMOTELY WANT TO SEE AGAIN,

IT GOES INTO EVERNOTE.

If you are capturing 250 notes a month, you are getting excellent value out of Evernote, and will not mind paying for it.

Comments

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