Running a business requires a large magnitude of organization, time, and management. This doesn’t include the time spent creating the work for your clients. To take the work out of, well, work, I discovered five apps that have helped me in numerous areas of my business. Each app helps me with a different need, such as, organization, time management and conciseness.
Asana
If you’re not using a task management software, I highly recommend you start. Asana not only lets me make individual groups for each client, but I can add each task that needs to be completed. Within each task I can add a due date, assign a member of my team to complete it, files that correspond with the task, and a description of what needs to be done. If there are questions from members of my team, they can comment within the certain task and Asana will send me an email, alerting me of their comment. There is a calendar complete with all tasks for each client and their due date. Each week Asana sends me an email with the upcoming deadlines, which keeps me organized and able to better prioritize tasks.
Toggl
Toggl is a time tracking management tool. I’m able to put in which task I’m working on for each client. This is critical when it comes to billing time. I’m able to correctly bill my client for the number of hours completed. The other thing I’ve really enjoyed about Toggl is that it gives me an estimate of how long it takes me to do specific tasks, i.e. social media calendars, so I can provide potential clients an accurate estimate of costs.
Grammarly
We’re all in a hurry and we’re all human. Combine these two and mistakes are bound to happen. Grammarly is an app for Chrome that allows you to write better, faster, and more concise. It finds words that you spell incorrectly, incomplete sentences, keeps your writing concise, and more! It allows you to still provide your professional input but moving at that fast rate of speed you’re used to.
Google Calendar
This is one that many of you already use, but with COVID-19 I’ve realized just how important this tool is. With all meetings and conferences taking place online, it’s easy to lose track of all the dates and times. Google Calendar has an alert option that sends me an email and text a few minutes before the meeting so I’m not late and, just in case I forgot to write it in my planner, a great reminder of an upcoming event.
Dropbox
Once again, this is a program many of us use already, but I thoroughly love the ability to share the same files with my team members. It’s nice to be able to share files, instantly, with other team members, especially since many of us aren’t able to work in the same office right now. Dropbox serves as an asset to me as well because I can have all the files on my phone or bring up a file from any computer I’m working on. It has proven to be a lifesaver repeatedly.
All these apps serve a different purpose, don’t require a large amount of investment, and keep my business running smoothly!
