A Guest Post by Kate Simpson
Owning and running a small business on your own is becoming easier and easier because of the sheer number of tools and apps out there for small business owners. A single person may now complete tasks the used to require staff attention within a relatively short space of time. Here are seven tools you should seriously consider using to make yourself more productive.
1 – Skitch
If you have ever had a project where you need to monitor or track your progress, then you will know how time consuming taking screen prints is. There are often times when you need screenshots and screen prints very quickly, and yet if you have a PC, you probably have to press the screen print button, then open a paint file, paste the screenshot, and then save the file. Doing this over and over again can be very inefficient and time consuming, which is why the Skitch tool is so handy. You can have your screenshots done in no time.
2 – Drop Box
Another convenience tool is the Drop Box tool. You may use this on your PC or on your mobile device. If you have just finished a file, you may drag it to the Drop Box item and drop it. The tool will then upload your file to your cloud storage right away. If you do not have an Internet connection, you may have it hold onto your document until you do have a connection, whereupon it will send your file to your cloud storage. It makes saving things to the cloud a lot easier and faster, which is probably the reason that Drop Box has been so successful.
3 – Assignment Masters
Here is a company that is staffed to the brim with different professional experts. They have people with degrees in various college subjects, and people that have had years of experience in different industries. The website offers you a chance to hire them for a short period of time to complete a project you have. They apply their expertise, qualifications and knowledge to your project. In most cases, you pay them by the page, unless another deal is struck with the company. Their prices are reasonable to high, but that is mostly because they are using genuinely qualified experts rather than freelancers.
4 – Trello
This is a tool that is commonly used by people that like to organize things in a very simple way. You may create lists that set out and organize your day. It is a tool for people that like to stay in control of every little detail. The tool requires a lot of commitment because it becomes useless if you stop updating it with your information. Create boards and add cards in a manner that helps you organize your day, week and month.
5 – Feedly
Some people use Google Alerts to help keep them updated with what is going on in their industry. If you would like something that is not as current, but a little more sophisticated, then try Feedly. It does the same thing as Google Alerts, except that you can tailor what notifications you receive to make your notifications a little more useful. You may be able to find new content and news more efficiently if you use both Google Alerts and Feedly. Receive news feeds from them both and it may save you a lot of research every day.
6 – Buffer
This is a very popular app that many people use to streamline and optimize their social media posting. It puts your four favorite social media platforms (Google+, Twitter, LinkedIN and Facebook) into one place and allows you to publish content from one GUI. Another reason it is popular is because it has a series of strong analytic functions that many small business owners find useful. There is rarely a need to delve deeper into your analytics. There is little more that an analytics program cannot tell you that doesn’t sit within the realms of common sense. For example, if you are not getting many Google+ likes, then it is probably because your content is of a poor quality and not because you misspelled a keyword.
7 – Drobo
Drobo allows for simple backups for your personal network without having to wait for the cloud and it’s perfect for people who deal with lots of data. Their website helps you choose which solution is best for you. They even have a migration system, a drive selector and a capacity calculator. It offers smart storage that grows with your usage amounts and protects you. It is a productivity tool that works well for small businesses and people that work with increasing amounts of data.
