Timeneye PRO features: best ways to set up Phases and Tags

To master the art of time tracking with Timeneye, unlock the full potential of our exclusive features, Phases and Tags.

Take control of your project's life cycle by breaking it down into distinct steps and giving each one a meaningful name!

See these features in action, head to your workspace and bring this guide with you.

This guide will focus on:

• What are the Phases;
• What are the Tags;
• Which ones you should use and how;
• What is the best way to set them up (with examples).

What are the Phases? 

Phases are the steps in which you can break down the projects and monitor your project life cycle. They can be the actual phases of the project or the single activities you perform for that client within the project itself. Remember to create at least one Phase per project!

Examples:

• A project called Marketing can have Phases like “Social Media”, or “Email Marketing”, “Market Research”;
• If you build an app, the Phases can be “App 1.0”, “2.0”, and so on;
• Not sure what Phases to use? Select the option “Copy from…” and use our templates!

Best practices to set up Project phases 

• Try to keep your Phases consistent, this also including the name you gave them. Try to avoid having a Phase called “Development” that’s also called “dev”, “Devs”, “dvlplt”. Being as tidy as possible is a great plus;
• If you use similar Phases or tasks for your projects, make use of the copy from option and copy your phases from one project to another;
• Avoid hyper-specific phases. If you need to be extra detailed, use the tags (more on that later on);
• On the other hand, avoid generic names for your phases such as “phase2” or “general” because they would not be useful for analyzing work.

What are Tags? 

You cannot track time if you do not know where you spend it.
With Tags, you can add another level of classification to your time. This feature will help your timesheets to be tidy and understandable and they will also help you to billing your working time accurately.
Plus, when you will need to run reports and measure your productivity, your time data will be easily stored!

How do Tags work? 

Tags have to be assigned to a specific time entry. They cannot be assigned to projects, or phases, or phase categories, or clients.

The best thing about Tags is that they are very flexible: you can create them just to make your work easier and later delete them if you do not need them anymore.
Tag Lists help you manage your Tags and keep them organized.

How to set Tags in Timeneye 

Only Owners and Admins can create Tag lists and Tags. Once created, the rest of the team will be able to select the ones they need and use them in the manner they prefer.
In Management>Tags, there is a dedicated dialog to create and manage Tags.

You can create, manage, and delete your Tags from there.
To keep your timesheet as precise as possible, it would be better to first create a Tag List and then fill in with tags.

How to assign Tags to a Time Entry 

Opening the Register Time Button and, consequently, Project and Phases, you will notice a new Tag field!
If you start typing the name of your Tag, Timeneye will make you appear the one you need from the list you created!

(Note: because of the limited space, the menu only shows 20 Tags at a time. If you do not find the Tag you need on the menu, just start typing the Tag and it will appear as suggestion).

Tag reports and Tag list reports

Time reports are very effective in showing people where their time goes, helping them to see time and costs sync.
Now you can run reports on your Tags and Tags List too!
If you want to know how much time you tracked for a particular Tag you used, simply run a report and see it in detailed!
You can also run reports to see how much time was tracked for whole Tag Lists.

Best practices to tag your time entries 

• Make smart use of the Tag List to group your tags and keep them organized;
• Avoid having rogue Tags that are not really assigned to the correct list;
• Color code! This way you can see the Tags at a glance;
• Do not make the Tags too similar to the Phases, and vice versa. Keep them different as they are distinct features on Timeneye.