The Visual Alternative to Notion and Trello

Trello and Notion are both great apps for managing ideas, tasks, and projects. But sometimes you may feel restricted or intimated by how things are displayed. Walling is a more visual alternative that gives you greater freedom when it comes to organizing your tasks and ideas. In this video, Scott Friesen gives you a full tour of Walling and compares it to Notion and Trello.

Transcript:
​Trello is great and so is Notion, but sometimes you may feel a little boxed in by either of those applications. So, in this video, I'm going to give you a tour of Walling, and show you why it may be a better solution when it comes to managing all of your ideas, tasks, and projects. Here I am within my Walling account, and I've just created a new wall which is really the equivalent of a project or a workspace. But I really like that terminology because just like a blank wall in your office or in a room, you don't have to start in the top left and move your way to the right. You don't have to start at the top and move your way down either. Like a blank canvas, I can start anywhere. If I just double-click in the middle of my screen, I can start with a new task, and then within that task, I can add as little or as much detail as I like. If I want to add some notes or bullet points, I can easily get started with new things, and notes, and everything else that I want to add here. But I also don't have to display it all the time, so if I want to hide that information, I can do so. If I want to expand it I can do so here as well. And maybe, I don't want to see it there in the middle 'cause I've got a new idea to add, well, I can just drag things around. Here's my second task, for example, the next thing that I want to do in my list, but I've got some other information that I want to include. Perhaps, in this case, the task is to review the following video. And all I have to do is, well, paste the link to that video and it will automatically embed it right in here. And the great thing is that I can start to play and interact with this content directly from within the brick itself. Yes, that's right, these components are referred to as bricks because you can place them anywhere that you want. I'm going to drag this one over to the left here, and let's just add a few more as an example. Now, Walling also makes it super easy for us to drag and drop other content into our walls. For example, if I want this image, I just need to click and drag it into my wall, I got to place it there. And now, I've got access to that. I can turn this, and keep notes, and assign it, and give it a due date if I want to as well. In this case, perhaps I want to add this article to my wall, I just need to grab the address, drag it to my tab. And yes, I'm going to put it here within this first area so now I've got direct access as well. Of course, keeping in mind that Walling is not going to box you in. If you want to grab and drag things to certain areas, keep them in a certain order, it is so easy to do so. In addition, we can highlight certain bricks in a variety of ways. If I want this to stand out maybe with a particular yellow shade here, and if I want to assign some task management, I can do so as well. In this case, maybe I want to accomplish these tasks by the end of the week, and I can assign them either to myself or to other people that I'm collaborating with. So, a very flexible way of keeping all of those ideas and all of those tasks on the same page, and unlike Trello or Notion, I can see all of those details on the same screen. Here you can see I've got a fair amount of text, I've also got a checklist within this particular brick. But if I don't want to see all of that information, I can collapse it while I'm still staying on this page. If I need to expand it, I can still see it in the context of my other bricks and pieces of information here. So I don't have to be going in and out, or looking at the back of a cart and going back and forth all the time. I can have all of that information available to me, and I can minimize it whenever I need to. But perhaps one of the most helpful features within Walling is creating multiple sections on the same screen. Here, you can see at the top, I'm going to give this section the title of, Ideas. But down below, I'm going to create a new section called, Tasks. I can keep this as very much a brainstorming area where myself or other members of my team can freely add those ideas. But if I want to graduate something, I can move it down into the Task section down below, let's move that blog article idea down here as well. But unlike just having two canvas areas, we can also change the way we view that information. If I do prefer more of a kanban style, I can do so. Here, maybe this is, In Review, maybe that's the first stage within Tasks. And here, we can say that this is the Approved stage for example so I can have that kanban feel. But on the very same screen, I can still brainstorm and reference that information up above. You can see here on the right-hand side, the multiple types of views that we can add or change through. If I want a calendar view, I can do that here as well, and here I can move things to maybe a little later in the week where that particular article is going to land. So, not only can we get access to multiple views, but we can view them on the very same screen. If you want multiple kanban boards you can do that here. If you want to drag some creative images in one section and had that show up on a marketing calendar for example, you can do that right here as well. Now, one of the issues that I hear from many Notion users is just how linear of a system it is. Notion will force you to basically start out in a document format, and start to list ideas top to bottom, very much like a bullet point system. But as you can see here within Walling, it gives us so much more flexibility regardless of the type of content that we have. If I want to move things around and group things together regardless if some have video or images and others do not, I can always do that and have that flexibility. In addition, Notion creates everything inside of a database, which if you're working with numbers and you like that type of format, that may be okay. But again, we have a lot more flexibility here. Another complaint that I hear far too frequently among Notion users is that they have to embed pages within another page, within another page. And suddenly, on the left-hand side of their Notion account, they've got way too many things going on. Getting back to our example here, we've generated some ideas. But instead of embedding another page, I can bring it down to this additional section where I can set it up any way that I want. And if I have another step to bring it to, no problem, I can now drag it into my calendar all without having to link or embed, or add some new content here on the left hand-side of my menu. Now, if you have more experience coming from Trello, you'll appreciate how Walling can give you faster access to the information you need. In this example, I've got a kanban style board. But you can see I've got a variety of checklists, I've got links, I even got a file which is attached over here, and I can get direct access to them without having to click in and out of cards. So if I need to start checking things off of this checklist, I can do so from the front. If I need to access information, I don't have to go in and out, in and out to access that information. But perhaps, the greatest advantage when comparing to Trello is the ability to manage your information and manage multiple boards on the exact same screen. Within Trello, you can send information, you can send a card to another board, but you can never see two boards at the exact same time. In this case, if I need to graduate or move this particular piece of information, I can just drag it down below into my board here. And I can quickly view and move information back and forth, something that makes it a lot more flexible, especially if you want a certain section or a certain board for different purposes. You can manage your entire workflow within one screen, not having to jump back and forth or click through different menu options on the left-hand side. In addition, Walling makes it easy for us to manage all of our reference information. If you're a Trello user, you're probably familiar with creating a card or multiple cards just to stuff full of links and documents, something that's not actually going to move or be accomplished but you have to stick it somewhere. Here within Walling, we can create our own section where I can include files, and links, and other things that I want to reference, but something that is separate from the board itself. And I can view this in a variety of different ways as well. Perhaps, I want more of a database view as we would be used to within Notion, I can access that down here below as well. A great way to manage multiple types of information but on the same page. If you'd like a more flexible and easier way to manage all of your ideas and projects, be sure to check out Walling. Go to walling.app, or click the link in the description down below. And if you're looking for more great apps that will help you save time, be sure to watch this video next. Remember, being productive does not need to be difficult, in fact, it's very simple.