Starting a new business is not an easy thing to do. Beyond selling your products or services, you will need to manage all the other aspects of your company, like admin, marketing, networking, planning budgets and so much more. Staying on top of all this work can be tricky. Thankfully, we live in the modern era, filled with tons of useful mobile and desktop apps that make running a small business with a lean team much easier.
Here’s a list of our top 10 favourite business apps for entrepreneurs and small business owners.
Zoiper
Communication is key when it comes to running a business, but constant phone calls will hike up your phone bill. Zoiper is a VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) software phone (softphone) application, allowing you to text, call and video call via your internet connection. You will need a dedicate phone number to use Zoiper, which you can easily obtain from the ARC Technology VoIP team right here. ARC Technology will even help you set up Zoiper on your desktop and sync it with your mobile app, allowing you to make VoIP phone calls through your computer. Definitely a must-have if your business relies on making numerous call each day, while running on a tight budget.
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Trello
Keeping track of all your tasks, duties, projects, campaigns, and various other business endeavours can be a time-consuming challenge. Face it, the old day planner just does not cut it when it comes to running a business. That is where Trello comes in. Essentially a list-making application for the whole team, Trello has fast grown as one of the best project management apps. Trello allows everyone involved to see the brief, what is done, what needs to be done, and any other steps needed to complete a project. You can create a new board for each project (like launching your business, adding a new service, or even mundane office management tasks like buying ink for the printer). Each board can have list with task or “cards” to complete, and each task can be assigned to specific team members. Members will be notified if they have received a new task or feedback on a task, as well as be reminded of outstanding tasks.
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Sage One Accounting
Unless you are an accountant or bookkeeper, it’s so easy to forget to keep track of your business finances. Most freelances and sole proprietors tend to use their personal accounts to pay for business expenses, which can make Annual Tax Submissions a huge and expensive pain. Employing a dedicated accountant is always advised but can be costly when launching a new business. Enter Sage One Accounting, the accounting app that aims to be the one stop for all your financial needs. You can connect your business bank account, create budgets, add and manage recurring expenses and income sources, prepare recurring invoices, record all business transactions, and review transaction histories as needed. Whenever you want your finances reviewed by a professional, you can easily and remotely grant your accountant access to your Sage One account, eliminating the need to keep track of and carry around hard copies of bank statements and receipts.
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Hootsuite
Social media plays an important role in marketing your brand, but when you are busy filling orders and hustling for more sales, you will have little time to log on to your brand’s various social media accounts to make posts and respond to comments and messages. Hootsuite allows you to add all your social media accounts so you can schedule posts in advance as well as set up streams to review your posts, scheduled posts, mentions, comments and messages all in one place. The user-friendly calendar view is especially great when scheduling posts, and there is even an Analytics section where you can track the performance of all your social posts. Hootsuite will allow you to keep your social media accounts active and engaging, while saving you time for other business endeavours.
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Google Drive
You will need to share files and other content with colleagues or outsourced services at some point, and while having them safely stored on your personal computer or external hard drive is great, you should also have backups on the cloud. Google Drive is a cloud-based file storage service, meaning that your uploads are stored on offsite servers owned by Google, allowing you to login to your account and access them from anywhere and any device. You can even create or synchronise and edit existing Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint documents from the Google Drive applications. Once a file or folder is added to your Google Drive account, you can create a sharable link that you can email to others for quick and easy access to files without upload or download delays.
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Canva
It can be costly hiring a professional graphic design for all your branded material when launching a new business. Canva is a graphic design application that offers a bunch of templates for various layouts. You can quickly upload your logo and create beautiful social media posts, newsletters, adverts, Facebook covers, Instagram Stories, letterheads, and more. The drag-and-drop user interface and their vast library of design elements ensures that anyone can create quite unique and quality layouts without breaking the bank or lengthy design turnarounds.
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Zoom
Meetings are part of every business, but they can easily waste time and money. Instead of driving all over the place and buying coffees at every café meeting, rather opt for online meetings. Zoom is a high-quality video communications application that has become the popular choice for business meetings. Aside from offering high quality video, and cross-platform access, Zoom also allows you to record your meetings, eliminating the distraction of trying to write down every tedious meeting note. Zoom uses VoIP, a cost-friendly way to chat to your business partners, and even has fun additions like beautification filters and being able to set up a background to ensure you look professional for your meeting.
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DocuSign
Gone are the days filled with printing, signing, and scanning documents. Who has the time for all that? With DocuSign you can upload your document or use a template to create a new document, drag in boxes for signatures, initials, text, dates and checkboxes, and then send it off and track it through the app. You will receive an email to confirm the signature request you sent, as well as be able to track the request in the DocuSign app to see when it has been received. A quick, transparent, and eco-friendly to get client signatures.
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SnapScan
There are many ways for customer to pay for your services and goods, but one of the most cost-effective options is SnapScan. While cash is king, few people walk around with notes in their wallets, and setting up a card facility or PayPal account can be expensive for a South African startup. SnapScan is an application that allows you to make and receive payments quickly and safely by using a phone’s camera to scan a unique QR code that is linked with the specific transaction or business account. Using SnapScan, you can upload one card to you and your colleagues’ SnapScan app, eliminating the need to carry around the business’ credit card, and recording all related expenses in one spot to review later. On the flip-side, you can setup your own SnapScan account and integrate it where needed for customers to use, whether it be at till points, in print media, on your online store, or on-the-go with a print-out of your QR code.
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1Password
At this point, you should have an email, business bank account, website, social media accounts, various applications, and a bunch of subscription. All of these require usernames and passwords to keep them safe, but trying to remember all of them can lead to frustrating, time-wasting moments. 1Password is a password management application, where you can store all your unique account login details, software licences and other sensitive information. It uses a PBKDF-2-guarded (a function used to create derived keys from your passwords) master password, and you can effectively make your existing passwords stronger to secure against hacking. Once stored, passwords and login details can then be automatically filled where needed using either your fingerprint or the master password you have created.
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There are tons of apps that can make your workday a bit breezier. At ARC Technology, we enjoy finding savvy solutions for small businesses, we are always on the lookout for awesome business applications and resources that we can help our clients integrate into their workflow. Get in touch if you are starting a new business and need to set up internet and infrastructure solutions.
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