But have you gone ahead and actually utilized it? Whether you operate a small business or your job requires frequent travel, this powerful solution truly helps improve work efficiency and data accuracy for businesses. No matter where you are you can be adding sales prospects into this CRM solution so that others in your organization can access the information immediately.

Still curious about how it works? We’ve pulled together a step-by-step video to help walk you through the process in less than a minute. It’s that simple! Check out the video below and see if this solution is right for you.

Also learn how to Scan to Salesforce Chatter with your ScanSnap N1800 network scanner, here.

Harman Bola
Product Marketing
Fujitsu Computer Products of America

Sit back, relax, and imagine a world without paper clutter. No longer does your office look like it was hit by a mysterious, tiny, indoor tornado. All your important documents and photographs are retrievable with a simple click of a mouse, not strewn about in haphazard piles. You are the mistress of your own domain — oh look, your desk is made out of wood. You know that now because you can see it.

Now open your eyes.  Sigh.

Getting to the place of Zen when it comes to your paper piles is tough.  Between the incoming mail, the receipts, statements, and more, paper can feel like it’s multiplying while you sleep.  Leave it unattended and before you know it, your house is inundated with heaps of clutter and it’s hard to know where to start.  Over time, I’ve developed a mild addiction to scanning (who am I kidding, I can anything that isn’t nailed down!), and it’s made a huge impact on my life.  Read on, and I’ll share a few of my best tips, including exactly what I scan to be more organized and clutter-free.

Tip #1: It’s all how you look at it.

Paper piles are like snowflakes— no two are the same.  The key is to start looking at them through Zen scanning eyes.  Wander your home and let your wayward paper clutter speak to you… The photograph someone took of your book club in which you look skinnier than usual… scan… Your fourth grade son’s report card from second grade that for some reason is still tacked to the fridge… scan… The jar of receipts that you empty your wallet into when it stops being able to close all the way… scan, scan, scan… The ticket stub from that concert at the Greek you didn’t really like but made your husband cry like a little girl… See?

Tip #2: You won’t miss it.

Trust me when I say, you won’t miss most of what’s in those paper piles if you have a digital copy.  It may feel weird to throw out a kid’s report card or an old photo, but think about it— how are you going to enjoy all this stuff if you can’t find it, or it’s in a box in the garage somewhere.  Wouldn’t it be cool if you could dial up that report card or photo on your smartphone whenever you want to take a trip down memory lane?  You can do that with a digital copy.

Tip #3: Ready, settings, go

When you’re ready to scan your way to a more organized, digitized life, just feed in the paper a pile at a time, and allow the soft electronical hum of the scanner fill you with a sense of well being.  Select a scanner that has the ability to scan at a higher resolution for photos you might want to enlarge one day, and the rest should just look great and legible on a computer screen.  And if you have double-sided documents, your scanner should be able to scan both sides at once— less work for you.  For documents, creating a .PDF works best and for photos a .JPG is a great standard format.

Tip #4: Make a home for your scans

It’s important to be clear on where all your scans will live when they’re done.  Your hard drive is a suitable spot, but your files will only be accessible in one place, and they’re one spilled latte away from being gone forever.  An external hard drive is a great solution to provide peace of mind, but I prefer cloud storage solutions like Evernote or Dropbox.  A hard-drive, cloud storage combo is ideal for double safety.  Now I can access my files from anywhere, on any device, and I know they’re safe.

Now that you’ve got the basics down, here’s a glimpse at some of the many things I scan on a regular basis on my path to Scan-nirvana.

Photographs: Scan old photos or ones that people print for you.  Now you can easily sort, tag and share them, upload to social networks and view from anywhere.   Much better than putting them into a photo album that only exists in your living room.

Tearsheets: Inspiration is everywhere. And if you’re like me, you find it primarily in pretty magazines. That Dwell from 2003 with the article on composting was interesting, but the rest of the issue? Weighing me down. Scan what you want and send the rest to the recycle bin.

Business cards: In today’s business world it’s all about networking, and good networking can sure yield lots of business cards. Scanning does the trick and makes it easy to find them in a pinch when I do need them.  Plus scanning software like CardIris makes easy work of getting those contacts into your address book, and if I know I won’t be calling them frequently, I can just scan and store them for later reference.

Handwritten Notes, Christmas Cards and Letters: These kinds of things can often end up in a box never to been seen again (or worse, in the trash). Now I can scan through notes that people cared enough to write to me anytime and clear the shelf for something else where the box used to be.

Notebooks: I still need them for meetings and I’m always making sketches (of remodel ideas, garden plots, website wireframes, etc.) but keeping them usually means they go into a pile and never are browsed again. I scan the pages with the best ideas and tag them so I can find them later.

Rosters: If the thought of painstakingly entering contact information into your address book seems like a daunting task, try scanning school, sports, and work rosters instead. Think of all the time you can save.

Art and Schoolwork: Let’s face it, this stuff can pile up. And while you may want to hold on to and cherish every phase of Junior’s developmental process, keeping every scrap of construction paper isn’t realistic. Scanning can immortalize your young scholar digitally, while keeping your home free of clutter.

Mementos: Ticket stubs, postcards, vacation mementos, the little things that you just don’t have the heart to trash because they are tied to a memory. Now you can save them without saving them.

Taxes: Everyone loves taxes, so why not make the process even more amazing by scanning your deductible receipts as you get them? That way, when it comes time to pay the piper, you can easily create spreadsheets. Your accountant will thank you — maybe with a note — and you can scan that too.

Home Documents and Inventory: Scanning insurance documents, warranties, appraisals repair history and receipts, as well as keeping digital photo records of the valuables in your home is a great way to keep a record of your belongings in the event of a natural disaster or burglary.

Remember, while the power of scanning can be addicting, sometimes it’s not worth the trouble. Don’t start scanning all your tax receipts and records going back to 1975 — best to put that in storage until they’re no longer needed and then toss ‘em out.

So, you’ve scanned — your mind, soul, and home are clear and peaceful, but your recycle bin is full. Before you toss it all out, it’s a good idea to shred that paper, especially if it contains personal or private information. Shredding scissors or investing in an electric shredder is advisable.  Now revel in how clean and uncluttered your environment is, and marvel at how much (paper)weight you’ve lost.

Namaste.

Carley Knobloch (@digitwirl) is a life coach, personal tech expert, web show host, and Chief Twirler at Digitwirl.com.

**Note: ScanSnap scanners are not designed as photo scanners.  Fujitsu recommends using a carrier sheet when scanning photos to protect your originals.

MaxxConnect and Fujitsu make any imaging job a (Scan)Snap!

With the touch of a button you can scan directly to the user, department or workflow folders. Users can also be given the freedom to scan to a location of their choice.

Users can preview the scan and can add, delete or rotate pages in the document. When the document is approved the user can also index the document using the Network ScanSnap’s keyboard.

Once documents are successfully digitized using the fi-6010N Network ScanSnap, MaxxConnect provides the bridge to MaxxVault Enterprise. Once in MaxxVault, documents captured from the Network ScanSnap are easy to find and access, can be processed through a structured and auditable workflow and are eventually archived according to legal requirements.

For more information about MaxxVault MaxxConnect and other MaxxVault solutions visit: www.maxxvault.com.

Kim Hogan
Business Development Manager
Fujitsu Computer Products of America, Inc.
@ScanSnapKim

STEP 1:

Download the free Shoeboxed Desktop Uploader (available for Windows and Mac) and install it on your computer. If you’re a Windows user you can also download and install the free Fujitsu Shoeboxed Profile Maker, which will integrate seamlessly with your ScanSnap Manager and allow you to scan documents directly into your Shoeboxed account.

STEP 2:

Open your ScanSnap Manager and you will be prompted to log in to your Shoeboxed account. Once this is complete, select “Shoeboxed.com” from the list of Profile options in your ScanSnap Manager.

STEP 3:

Begin scanning files through your ScanSnap scanner as you normally would and they will be automatically pushed into your Shoeboxed account for data extraction and human verification.

Detailed How To: Windows ScanSnap Users

1. Download and install the free Shoeboxed Desktop Uploader.

2. Once you’ve installed the Shoeboxed Uploader, download and install the Fujitsu Shoeboxed Profile Maker.

3. Open your ScanSnap Manager and navigate to the “Save” tab. Ensure that “Use Quick Menu” is unchecked and then choose “Shoeboxed.com” from the “Profile” drop-down list. Click “OK”.

4. Begin scanning your documents with your ScanSnap as you normally would and they will automatically be sent into your Shoeboxed account. You will be prompted by the Shoeboxed Desktop Uploader to enter your Shoeboxed username and password, but you will only have to enter this information once.

5. Any document scanned and sent to Shoeboxed will go through our data extraction and human verification process and will be available to you anytime in your online account at www.shoeboxed.com.

Detailed How To: Mac ScanSnap Users

1. Download and install the free Shoeboxed Uploader.

2. Open the Shoeboxed Uploader and log in with your Shoeboxed username and password.

3. Begin scanning your documents with your ScanSnap as you normally would. Once these files have been scanned to your computer simply drag and drop the files into the Shoeboxed Uploader. The Shoeboxed Desktop Uploader can accept multiple file submissions at once and accepts all ScanSnap file types, including: PDF, .png, .jpg and .gif.

4. Any document scanned and sent to Shoeboxed will go through our data extraction and human verification process and will be available to you anytime in your online account at www.shoeboxed.com.

Derek Flower
Senior Account Manager
Fujitsu Computer Products of America, Inc.

In this video, Brooks Duncan, DocumentSnap, shows you how you can use ABBYY FineReader to OCR your documents AFTER you scan them – thanks Brooks! You’ll have to check the video out if you want to learn more, but please keep in mind that this tutorial is designed specifically for the Mac platform.

Jordyn Russell
Marketing Communications Manager
Fujitsu Computer Products of America, Inc.

Answer: This is a simple settings fix. Through the ‘S’ button on your ScanSnap Manager, you’ll see that ‘Show scanning results’ will be checked. In order to prevent this pop up, simply uncheck this feature.   You should no longer see the pop up, after you’ve scanned.

Happy scanning!

Angela Onstott
Marketing Specialist
Fujitsu Computer Products of America

As a Mac person I know the importance of communication. Why? Well, for years and years very few software developers would take the time to make Mac platform software for us. They just “assumed” that we were all using PCs and living in a Windows-only environment. Many of us kept reminding developers that we are indeed Mac users and needed them to support us.

One of the biggest supporters of the Mac platform is indeed ScanSnap. Better yet, they feel we are important enough to have a Mac ambassador just for the ScanSnap Sqaud. Hee hee, that’s me!

I published a post on ScanSnap Community recently and guess what? Someone connected soon after the message was posted. How’s that for communication? The first person to respond to my posting was Victoria from Northern California. Here’s what she asked:

“I also love Macs, Evernote, and ScanSnap S1300!

In your article, you mentioned that you place your scans in two places: your desktop and Evernote.

I do the same thing, but I’m frustrated by an aspect of it. When it gets automatically filed into the desktop folder of my choice, it has the automatic date title, which tells me nothing about the subject. But before it goes into Evernote, I’m able to rename it something more meaningful.

My question is this: How can I get the copy that is sent to the desktop to ALSO show that more meaningful title, automatically?”

First off, thank you for such a great question, Victoria. When I scan, I have my profile set to automatically go to my Evernote account (for safe keeping). I have it set up to go into my “inbox” which is where I initially put anything I put into Evernote, then I move it where I want to store it. The first thing that happens is you have the chance to change the subject line.

Word and pdf, for the desktop, are not as simple, but there is an easy work around to change it. Simply tap on the icon (make sure not to open it) and the name will highlight and you can change it to what you want.

To answer your question more specifically, I had to go directly to ScanSnap tech support. What I discovered is that the ability to rename a file scanned directly to a desktop folder and have that same file appear in Evernote on Mac is not currently supported by the Mac version of Evernote. There is a workaround you can setup via an AppleScript, and while you’ll need some sort of technical knowhow, you’ll find helpful step-by-step instructions on IFormattable.

To be honest, I eventually delete the desktop version and just keep a copy in Evernote for easy access from my Macbook, iPad, iPhone and any browser. I do not always have my laptop with me.

Thank you, Victoria, for asking this great question. It’s folks like you who have questions and are not afraid to ask them that make things change. I think it will be great to have an Applescript made to make this an easy transition.

Lorene Romero (@lorener) is the President of the North Coast Mac Users Group in Santa Rosa, CA. She is also a full-time Travel Agent.

Step 1:  Create a new Profile in ScanSnap Manager

• Double-click on the ScanSnap icon in the task tray

• De-select Quick Menu. (Quick menu will not have a check mark next to it when it is disabled.)
• In the profile dropdown menu select [Add Profile…]

• Enter in a Name for your new profile (example: Adobe PhotoShop)

• Click [OK].

Step 2:  Add a new Program to your new Profile

• On the Application tab, click [Add or Remove…]

• In the Add and Remove Application dialog click [Add…]
• The Application Settings dialog will appear click [Browse…]
• Browse and locate the Photoshop exe file (example: C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CS5.1)
• Click [Open]

• In the Application Settings dialog name the application and click [OK] (example: Adobe Photoshop)
• Close the Add and Remove Application dialog
• On the Application tab, use the drop down arrow and choose the Adobe Photoshop application

• Make any other settings you would like to save to the profile (example: file-format, quality, etc.)
• Click [Apply] to save your new profile
• Close the ScanSnap Manager

Step 3:  Select the new Profile and Scan

• Now that you have created your Photoshop profile, you can quickly select it by left-clicking once on the ScanSnap Manager icon in the tray and choosing the Photoshop profile

• Load paper in the scanner
• Press the scan button
• After all your pages have been scanned Adobe Photoshop will Launch and the image will appear

Now that your documents are scanned into Photoshop, you can easily edit your documents.

Michael Sidejas
Product Marketing Manager
Fujitsu Computer Product of America, Inc.

1. Double click to open document
2. Click properties
3. Click Security tab
4. Change Document open password to YES
5. Enter password and confirm
6. Close document
7. Dialog box appears, “The file has been modified.  Save anyway?”  Click Yes

Same steps would apply if they wanted to create a password on a PDF document, scanned but not necessarily in Organizer.  Only works if document has not been encrypted/signed.

1. Open PDF
2. Click Properties
3. Go to Security tab
4. Securtiy Method field, change to ‘Password Security’
5. Password Security Window will pop up
6. Then check the ‘Require a password to open the document’
7. Enter a password
8. Click OK

It’s as easy as that!

Angela Onstott
Marketing Specialist
Fujitsu Computer Products of America