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Advanced Goal Planning with RTM Trello and Zapier

szganv says:
Hello,

Warning! You need some technical skills to handle this. Not a lot, but some :).

I love how I can manage my tasks in RTM, but where I always had to struggle with was the task planning process. I give you an example.

Let's say I want to reach the goal, to run a marathon. I can start like this "train for a marathon ^today #marathon #goal #...". I have added the task and I am sure it is on my list.

Let's say I want to be more specific. I can start like this "create a training plan ^today #marathon #goal #..." , "first day of training (run:10km) ^today #marathon #goal #week1 #...". You see I usually have to add the same tags to every task I want to organize like this. I am sometimes a bit lazy, when it comes to repetitive tasks where I am sure I can automate them :).
So I first started with a text editor, where I can copy paste everything I like. I also like to be a bit visual and I always loved the possibilities of Trello, which is free and secure. Why don't bring it all together?!

You need a Trello.com account. You need a Zapier.com account and a RTM Account ;) .

First you create a board in Trello, let's name it "Goal: run a marathon". There you Put in a card and give it short name. In the card you can create checklists and give them also short names. Short is important because these will be your tags in RTM later on. Then create some List Items in the Checklist, which will be your Tasks to reach your goal. To learn how it works, please mark one list item as checked. This is how your list item is recognized by the activity stream of Trello.

Then we switch to Zapier. It can take information out of your trello Account and put it into a mail. This mail can then be sent to your RTM Inbox. You might like to learn first how Zapier works. You can use my receipt if you like to: http://zpr.io/g7D4 (instead of Gmail you can also use another mail client or twitter to send the information. Check out the Zapier catalog for all possibilities.). If you create you're own receipt, just make sure to filter it right, otherwise you're RTM Account will be spammed by all the activities, which are tracked in Trello. You can also work with due dates for all tasks in a goal and a lot of more things.

This is how it works:
Zapier takes you Trello Cards Name (spaces between words are deleted) and Checklist Name (spaces between words are counted as new tags), to create tags. The Name of the Checklist Item will be the title for your task in RTM. From there you only have to go to your RTM inbox and give the task a date you like.

I hope it is understandable. I know it is a bit short, for it's complexity. If you might like to add something, please write it down here. I will improve this post due to your feedback.

As I still have to improve my English language, please provide me some feedback on my spelling, grammar and on the comprehensibility of this text. Thank you!
Posted at 8:55am on November 16, 2013
chisha says:
Hi szganv - I also sometimes struggle with using RTM for planning, review and having an overview of all my projects. This is a great post, I think I'll give it a try!
Posted 10 years ago
sgri says:
Thanks. Will try it out
Posted 9 years ago
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