Click to Tweet: #SmallBiz Productivity: 25 Tools to Run Your Business More Efficiently
According to a study conducted by OnePoll on behalf of GoDaddy, small business owners spend over 400 hours (that’s 17 full workdays!) a year worrying about their business OUTSIDE of work. Whether it’s getting pulled away from a break to deal with business matters or having trouble “switching off” after hours, it’s no wonder over 70% of the small business owners surveyed feel they do not have a healthy work/life balance.
Thankfully there are dozens of services and software platforms to make your business life easier. These are some of my favorites based on common business needs, ease-of-use, and affordability.
- Bookkeeping, Accounting, & Tax
- Email Management
- Collaboration (Meetings, Files, & More)
- Virtual Assistants & Delegation
- Automation & Time Hacking
Bookkeeping, Accounting, & Tax
Quickbooks Online – The most robust bookkeeping and accounting software out there. It’s all we do. All. Day. Every. Day.
FreshBooks – I love Freshbooks! It’s especially useful if you have a team of contractors and need their time to flow through to client invoices. I don’t recommend it as true accounting software, but it’s better than a shoebox and is quite easy to use.
Gusto – Full-service payroll. Very easy to use! Check out why our clients love it and snag a free setup checklist here.
Expensify – Easy to use expense reporting and receipt scanning
MileIQ – Mileage tracking. I started using it way back in 2015 and even wrote a blog post about it.
Nav – Free credit monitoring for small businesses
Email Management
Boomerang – Schedule emails, even recurring ones, with this tool. Also, keep emails from slipping through the cracks with reminders.
SaneBox – Automagical rules to make your inbox so much more manageable! (FYI: Unfortunately, SaneBox and Boomerang do not work together, so that’s something worth considering.)
Collaboration (Meetings, Files, & More)
Dropbox – Cloud file storage
Evernote – Cloud file storage
HelloSign – E-sign important documents
Confluence – We use this as our internal “Wiki” for our Standard Operating Procedures
Zoom – Screen-sharing and presentation
Camtasia – Screen and video recording, video editing
TimeTrade – Online appointment scheduling
Calendly – Online appointment scheduling
Virtual Assistants & Delegation
Fancy Hands – US-based on-demand virtual assistants
Task Rabbit – Helpers who come to your location to handle tasks (cleaning, putting together furniture, moving, etc.)
Scribie – Audio to text conversion
Automation & Time Hacking
RescueTime – Keep track of where your time is spent
iLovePDF – Manage PDF documents (merge, extract pages, add pages, compress and so much more!)
FileThis – Fetches statements (bank, internet, etc.) and stores them into your desired cloud storage provider. We swear by this for our bookkeeping clients!
TextExpander – My #1 software recommendation! This creates shortcuts for frequently used text – anything from your name to a full on-page of text.
IFTTT – Stands for If This, Then That. Automate tasks with rules.
Zapier – IFTTT on steroids! Zapier is the communication bridge between your apps. Want some ideas? Grab this freebie.
TBA Tip: When shopping for new software, plans that offer annual billing are often less expensive in the long run over monthly billing options.
Of course this isn’t an exhaustive list, but hopefully it gives you some helpful resources to reclaim your time, increase business efficiency, and improve your work/life balance.
Click to Tweet: 25 Tools to Run Your Business More Efficiently