The Organizational Tools You Need for Your Small Business

Whether you’re running a multi-million dollar corporation or a small storefront, running a business is a tough task. Most larger companies have departments to handle various aspects of daily operations and the funds to cover large operating costs. 

As a small business owner, you might be your company’s only employee – or one of very few. You might not have room in your budget for costly business solutions or hiring numerous people to head up every division. 

Luckily, there are a number of tools that you can use to help your business run like a well-oiled machine while still meeting your budget. We’re going to discuss which services are available to you and why you might need them; keep reading to learn more! 

VoIP Phone Services

VoIP stands for Voice over Internet Protocol. If you’re not familiar with this type of service, it is basically a way to use the internet to make and receive phone calls. 

The great thing about these services is that you can conduct business from anywhere in the world as long as you have an internet connection, without the need for bulky office phone equipment. Additionally, the cost of making calls is typically far less expensive than traditional phone services – especially if you are dealing with international calling. 

With these phone services, there is no need for multiple lines; several calls can be handled at once but it is dependent on the speed of your internet. You also have access to better technology features, including voicemail-to-text, forwarding voicemails to the correct recipient, and the ability to have video phone conferences. 

Because there are so many choices when it comes to VoIP phone services, it can be difficult to know which one best suits your needs. This is where using a VoIP phone service buyer’s guide comes in. These guides will help you compare the features that your company needs and avoid paying for extra services that you won’t use.

Proposal Software

Creating and formatting job proposals is generally time-consuming and can become frustrating. You may have created a format that you love for one job but it isn’t practical to use for another client. 

Instead of spending countless hours creating new formats and designs, you should consider using a pre-formatted proposal template. A consistent proposal format gives your business a polished and professional look without having to worry about finding or keeping a blank master copy. 

Also, a professional-looking template can lead to higher sales conversions and show repeat customers that your company is consistent in how business is handled. Of course, having access to a set of proposal templates will save your team time and plenty of aggravation!

Team Communication

Whether your company consists of 3, 30, or 300 people, you must have a way to communicate with everyone quickly. Text messaging and email isn’t necessarily a bad way to do this, however, you should know that there are other options available! 

Team chat apps are becoming popular and for good reason! They function similarly to regular text messaging but aren’t quite as annoying as a huge group text, allowing you to address your whole team or just a few members with a click of a button. 

Chat apps are helpful in that they allow for instant communication without crossing personal/professional lines that texting can and won’t bog down your email account with short messages that can easily be overlooked. It also helps remote employees to feel part of your company’s culture by opening up the ability to join in on the general threads. 

The other benefit of a team communication app? You can avoid most of the lengthy phone calls and pointless meetings that often get off track or take away from your team’s productive day!. Also find out which HR solution is best for your business by checking out review pages and making the choice between companies like Zenefits or Rippling.

Social Media Automation

Creating interesting and engaging content takes time and effort, there is no doubt about that. Unfortunately, if you post your content at the wrong time or without any real consistency, it may fall by the wayside and be buried under thousands of other pieces of content. 

The key to getting the engagement on your social media posts is knowing when to post and how often. These factors will vary from platform to platform and also with the industry of your business. 

Certain fields require far more frequent postings than others, while many businesses can get away with posting to Facebook only twice per week. However often you choose to post, be sure that the number of your posts and the times at which they are posted stay relatively similar. 

In order to be sure you are keeping up with your social media frequency and posting at the optimal times, you should consider using a social media automation service. These services are more along the lines of an app or software that allow you to schedule your posts accordingly. 

You or an employee will still have to create content, but you can basically upload several days to a weeks’ worth of postings at once and let the service share at the correct times. Aside from the fact that you won’t have to worry about the timing of your posts, all of your common hashtags will also be stored for easy access.

Choosing to Implement These Tools

Some of these tools might not be the perfect fit for your business while others may be causing you to ask yourself why you didn’t know about them sooner. 

Regardless of the case, if you choose to implement one, multiple, or all of these organizational tools that we have mentioned, you will find that your business runs smoother and you have fewer issues to handle. Each of these tools is designed to help you keep your company organized and ensure that all bases are covered when it comes to running your small business. 

Ultimately, these tools will help increase the productivity of your team at a minimal cost to you!