What What Are Digital Planners? & How to Use Them
You probably have a lot of questions if you’re thinking about getting started with digital planning. It can seem a bit daunting at first, but not to worry, I will demystify the world of digital planning and you will learn how to use your Digital Planner, so you can reach planner peace. I will do this with the Xodo Windows Desktop app on my Surface Pro, but you can use any other PDF editing app such as Goodnotes, and apply the same information to any other device such as an iPad.
There is also a free sample Digital Planner linked here so you can see if it’s the right fit for you.
What is a Digital Planner?
Just like paper planners, all Digital Planners will have their own unique theme and style, but there are some shared fundamentals. Digital Planners are usually in the form of a PDF, which you can purchase online as an instant download, or you can make your own. But what is a PDF? It is short for “portable document format”.The format is primarily used to make files that cannot be easily modified but still need to be easily shared or printed.
So unlike sending someone a Microsoft word document that anyone else can easily edit, you’ll send a PDF so your original data stays the same. Many people use this for contracts or forms, where you don’t want the wording to change, so you send the PDF that they can print and sign without modifying the contract.
Imagine trying to use a word document as your planner? It might work for some, but if you’re trying to go with any layout with images, charts, “stickers” or various columns on the page, it just will not work, type one character and everything will shift over, (kind of crashes and burns.)
All that to say you cannot easily modify the PDF itself, you cannot move things around that are already there. For instance, in the following planner image below, you cannot move any of these elements. However, you can ADD to it, and that’s where PDF Editing Apps come in. The apps will vary depending on what type of operating system (ie: Apple, iOS, Windows, or Android) you use. If you use iOS such as Apple or Macs, you will lean towards Goodnotes, while if you use Windows OS or Android, you’ll lean towards Xodo, MetaMoji Note, or other apps.
Planner Fundamentals Digital & Paper Planners
The fundamentals of any planner, paper or digital, is that they’ll have a Cover, Months, Weeks and Days (depending on the planner) and usually a notes section.
Every planner will have it’s own theme, some tailored for teachers, students, moms, or finance. S’sync’t Planners in particular, are focused around values, and have bonus pages to help you focus on your values. The bonus pages in this planner can be found on the tabs across the top.
Similarly to paper planners, you’ll have the option of dated or undated set ups.
One benefit to an undated Digital Planner, is you can make a copy of it, and then have that copy be your template to reuse year over year, saving you money.
Setting up your Digital Planner
For setting up your Digital Planner in Xodo, you will start by downloading and opening the Xodo app. Then insert your PDF from your windows computer or Android phone. Xodo will automatically save any changes you make to that location on your computer where you pulled the file from.
How to navigate your Digital Planner
Within the Digital Planner PDF, there are usually hyperlinked tabs, buttons, or areas to navigate the planner. They are usually in the form of tabs like you would find in a paper planner. You can use any of the apps mentioned to navigate those tabs, to go from one page, or section to another. Most Digital Planners will have month tabs, and links for weeks, or daily pages. The linked free planner, has links going from week to week, or you can slide over from one page to the next. Some planners even have navigation via an Index page or table of contents at the beginning of the planner.
This one has all 52 weeks accessible at a glance instead of going from month to week and clicking around in a few places to get to the page you are looking for. I also find that Xodo will recall where you left off, so when I reopen the application, it takes me to the page I left off at, which I find to be convenient and easy to use.
When you get your first planner, check out all the tabs to see where they lead. The layout of your planner might look different, but I want to give you the run-down on how to use it.
How to fill in your Digital Planner
The fun begins when you can start filling it out, making plans, and tracking progress.
Let’s start using the planner. The apps allow you to write and type in it, and even add “digital stickers”.
Text and Writing
You can fill out the cover page if there is a space to personalize it with your name or stickers. In Xodo, you can use the “text box”, or “ink” tool with a stylus to write in your name. You can change the font, color, size, and text box color. You can click the small arrow to modify the style, so you can change the color, size and opacity of the ink tool here. You can copy and paste text boxes. There are some glitches or nuances with that (As of October 2021). For example, if you copy a text box for a repeated task, if you add anything to the new text box, it adds that same text to the original one. So be careful, only copy and paste it if you know that information isn’t going to change. One workaround is to copy the text itself within the text box by highlighting it with your cursor, then exiting that text box and making a new text box and pasting that same information. Sounds tedious, but if you use shortcut commands like Ctrl C & Ctrl V it gets to be pretty fast. I use this for my habit tracker and recurring events. The copy & paste aspect of digital planning will save you time instead of rewriting tasks. I recommend planning monthly so you can just copy and paste recurring.
Highlighter & Comments
This planner has a full year at a glance calendar, you can use the highlighter tool to mark the days. Let’s say you are using this as a mood tracker. You can pick what colors you want to represent what moods. You can look to see if you find patterns in your mood and well being. Maybe you’ll come to some conclusions that you need more sleep, or have medical issues that need tracking. I like to add context to things like this with comments. Let’s say I was angry one day, I won’t likely remember what that red dot means exactly, but I can make a comment and write a note to myself there, or even on the day within the week part of the planner. So if you click on the week, it’ll take you there, and you can have an idea of what was going on, or write a note that you can pull up later.
You can add an image by selecting the “stamper” icon. This gives you the option to pull the picture from your gallery, or to take a picture. My advice if you like to crop or modify your pictures is to do that in another app like Pic Collage, Canva or within your native phone / desktop apps, because once it’s in Xodo, you can’t crop it or add any effects, you can just resize and move it, and that’s it. Adding pictures is perfect for your vision board. There is one odd thing everything gets imported as the same size, so if your digital stickers are 1 x 1 inch in size (like the stickers in my shop) and it imports everything around 4×5 inches, your image will be stretched and just resize it and you’ll be fine, this really shouldn’t cause any issues, but for my stickers I made, that threw me for a loop so I did some testing and I can show you in this video, how it looks when it is sized correctly.
People like to use this “stamper” to add Digital Stickers. If you are a sticker person, you’re going to love this. You can make or purchase stickers, and upload them with this tool. These are some examples of functional stickers in my shop, they match the color scheme of the planners, and you can find plenty of creative and fun stickers from other shops to add to your planners.
I use stickers in my habit tracker, this check mark here. If I try to draw one, it looks like a 5 year old did it, and with the copy & paste feature for images, it’s just so much easier for me and saves me time.
You can also add shapes or lines. I use this on occasion to draw a line through a cancelled event.
One other neat feature is you can copy and paste images and text from one PDF to another. If you get your free sample planner and you fill out the vision board and you decide to go for the full planner, you can copy it over to your new full planner by basically taking a screenshot, copying and pasting it over. Talk about time saving.
Flatten Your Elements
You may want to make some additions to your planner that cannot be changed. You can do this by “Flattening” it. There are two ways to do it in Xodo on Windows. You can use the “Multiselect” or “Lasso” tool, both of those bring up the same 6 actions, one of them being to “Flatten” your selected items.
Remember when we started off with a PDF that you could not edit? That is what flattening does. It makes it so that whatever you added to the PDF, you can now “flatten” or permanently make those additions part of your PDF planner. After you flatten it, you can no longer change the color, shape or size, or delete those additions. It even gives you a warning before it lets you flatten your elements, just to be sure you want to go through with that action.
Saving your changes
Within the Digital Planner PDF, there are usually hyperlinked tabs, buttons, or areas to navigate the planner. They are usually in the form of tabs like you would find in a paper planner. You can use any of the apps mentioned to navigate those tabs, to go from one page, or section to another. Most Digital Planners will have month tabs, and links for weeks, or daily pages. The linked free planner, has links going from week to week, or you can slide over from one page to the next. Some planners even have navigation via an Index page or table of contents at the beginning of the planner.
This one has all 52 weeks accessible at a glance instead of going from month to week and clicking around in a few places to get to the page you are looking for. I also find that Xodo will recall where you left off, so when I reopen the application, it takes me to the page I left off at, which I find to be convenient and easy to use.
When you get your first planner, check out all the tabs to see where they lead. The layout of your planner might look different, but I want to give you the run-down on how to use it.
You made it! Planner Peace is yours
We covered what a Digital Planner is; a PDF. How to navigate and fill them out with a PDF editor. Now, you know how to use text boxes, writing, highlighting, and adding comments. We reviewed how to add “Stickers” and images to your planner. You learned how to add shapes, and reviewed the copy and paste features, and what the limitations there are within Xodo. You learned what “Flattening” the pages will do and how to save a backup of your Digital Planner.
Remember there is no right or wrong way to plan, just ways that work for you. I take elements of various concepts for actual planning such as time batching, habit trackers, and meal planners. If you prefer crossing out tasks vs, highlighting when done, or using checkboxes, those are all your personal planning preferences. The ones that you are going to stick with most easily, I’d say are the “right” ones for you, so that you can FOLLOW Through with your planning.
Now, you can use your Digital Planner with confidence and achieve planner peace. Don’t forget your free Digital Planner sample linked here.
Was there anything you still have questions about? Let me know in the comments below. If you are interested in using Xodo on your Android phone, I have a video linked here that goes in depth on how to use Xodo on Android. What other questions do you have about Digital Planning?
Thanks for your blog, nice to read. Do not stop.
thank you very much
Thnx!