Productivity tools can help your business grow faster, especially as a small business owner. They are a crucial component for the success of your business. These tools offer the business flexibility to allow remote teams and staff working from home to be more productive. This is achieved by automating repetitive tasks and ensuring that the team spends time on the right tasks.
When choosing the best productivity tool for your small business, you need to consider the cost, ease of use, and ease of implementation. Not every tool will work for your business, and you need to choose one that is ideal for yours.
Google Suite (Google Drive, Google Calendar, Gmail)
Google suite is a collection of productivity tools available through paid subscriptions and designed specifically for business. It contains apps such as Calendar, Google Drive, Hangouts Chat, Gmail, Docs, Forms, Sheets, and Hangouts Meet. Gmail for Business allows you to set up yourself, employees, and teams with custom email addresses at your business domain name. It allows you to add up to 30 emails per user. Email is designed to maximize efficiency and flexibility and use it on your mobile, desktop, or tablet. Some features of Gmail include customizable spam filters, customizable footer text, email recovery for up to 30 days, read receipts, and APIs for further customization. Google Drive is a file sharing, document collaboration, and file storage tool. Its free plan offers 15 GB of storage. It can back up files saved on your computer through the Backup and Sync feature. Hangouts Chat is for messaging, while Hangouts Meet is for video meetings. Docs are used for collaborative word processing, Sheets for Spreadsheets, and Forms for surveys. Google Calendar can be used in the business for scheduling meetings and promotes time management.
Microsoft Planner for Project Management
Microsoft planner is a collaborative, intuitive, and visual project management tool that helps you organize teamwork. This tool will help you get more done and empower your team members to manage tasks better. It is easy to implement with no experience required and offers visualized status insights in the form of bar and pie charts. This tool helps you prioritize tasks (as cards) into different sequences and provide a full view of the progress on the task to all team members. It is part of Microsoft 365, meaning you can connect with other Microsoft apps to share & integrate data better.
Hootsuite for Social Media Management
Hootsuite enables you to schedule posts across all your social networks in less time. With just a simple calendar view, you can automatically schedule and review your posts to track success. It also helps you grow your social following by producing quality content that captivates and reaches more people. You can quickly read comments and respond to any questions. The social analytics dashboard allows you to see what’s working and provides insight into why it’s working.
Slack for Team Communication
Slack can help you improve team communication and efficiency. It integrates real-time messaging with a series of cloud storage, testing, development, analytics, and productivity apps. It also supports video calling, voice, and screen sharing.
FreshBooks for Accounting
FreshBooks is a simple and intuitive tool that helps you create professional invoices, track your time towards projects and capture your expenses. The data is stored securely in the cloud, meaning you can access it from anywhere with any device. FreshBooks saves time on billing and easily captures expenses. It helps you track hours spent on projects, request payments, and provide clients with several secure ways to make payments.
Zapier for Automation
Zapier automation tool connects all your apps and creates fully automated workflows. You get numerous options to connect and build powerful workflows since each app Zapier connects with makes its API available. The tool automates small and repetitive tasks and saves you a lot of time.
Fiverr for Outsourcing
Fiverr is a great tool for outsourcing, ideal for one-off tasks. It is best for every budget and allows quality work to be done quickly. The payments are protected since they are not released until you approve the work. This enables you to have a round-the-clock support team, ready to help anytime, anywhere.
If you’re a small business owner or freelancer, these tools will help automate your tasks and increase your productivity. Some of the tools are free, while others require subscription fees to use them.
7 Productivity Tools for Small Businesses
Productivity tools can help your business grow faster, especially as a small business owner. They are a crucial component for the success of your business. These tools offer the business flexibility to allow remote teams and staff working from home to be more productive. This is achieved by automating repetitive tasks and ensuring that the team spends time on the right tasks.
When choosing the best productivity tool for your small business, you need to consider the cost, ease of use, and ease of implementation. Not every tool will work for your business, and you need to choose one that is ideal for yours.
Contents
Google Suite (Google Drive, Google Calendar, Gmail)
Google suite is a collection of productivity tools available through paid subscriptions and designed specifically for business. It contains apps such as Calendar, Google Drive, Hangouts Chat, Gmail, Docs, Forms, Sheets, and Hangouts Meet. Gmail for Business allows you to set up yourself, employees, and teams with custom email addresses at your business domain name. It allows you to add up to 30 emails per user. Email is designed to maximize efficiency and flexibility and use it on your mobile, desktop, or tablet. Some features of Gmail include customizable spam filters, customizable footer text, email recovery for up to 30 days, read receipts, and APIs for further customization. Google Drive is a file sharing, document collaboration, and file storage tool. Its free plan offers 15 GB of storage. It can back up files saved on your computer through the Backup and Sync feature. Hangouts Chat is for messaging, while Hangouts Meet is for video meetings. Docs are used for collaborative word processing, Sheets for Spreadsheets, and Forms for surveys. Google Calendar can be used in the business for scheduling meetings and promotes time management.
Microsoft Planner for Project Management
Microsoft planner is a collaborative, intuitive, and visual project management tool that helps you organize teamwork. This tool will help you get more done and empower your team members to manage tasks better. It is easy to implement with no experience required and offers visualized status insights in the form of bar and pie charts. This tool helps you prioritize tasks (as cards) into different sequences and provide a full view of the progress on the task to all team members. It is part of Microsoft 365, meaning you can connect with other Microsoft apps to share & integrate data better.
Hootsuite for Social Media Management
Hootsuite enables you to schedule posts across all your social networks in less time. With just a simple calendar view, you can automatically schedule and review your posts to track success. It also helps you grow your social following by producing quality content that captivates and reaches more people. You can quickly read comments and respond to any questions. The social analytics dashboard allows you to see what’s working and provides insight into why it’s working.
Slack for Team Communication
Slack can help you improve team communication and efficiency. It integrates real-time messaging with a series of cloud storage, testing, development, analytics, and productivity apps. It also supports video calling, voice, and screen sharing.
FreshBooks for Accounting
FreshBooks is a simple and intuitive tool that helps you create professional invoices, track your time towards projects and capture your expenses. The data is stored securely in the cloud, meaning you can access it from anywhere with any device. FreshBooks saves time on billing and easily captures expenses. It helps you track hours spent on projects, request payments, and provide clients with several secure ways to make payments.
Zapier for Automation
Zapier automation tool connects all your apps and creates fully automated workflows. You get numerous options to connect and build powerful workflows since each app Zapier connects with makes its API available. The tool automates small and repetitive tasks and saves you a lot of time.
Fiverr for Outsourcing
Fiverr is a great tool for outsourcing, ideal for one-off tasks. It is best for every budget and allows quality work to be done quickly. The payments are protected since they are not released until you approve the work. This enables you to have a round-the-clock support team, ready to help anytime, anywhere.
If you’re a small business owner or freelancer, these tools will help automate your tasks and increase your productivity. Some of the tools are free, while others require subscription fees to use them.