As home business owners, there’s always a need to make our businesses more
efficient. The less time we spend on administrative duties, the more time we can
spend on our clients and marketing efforts.
Depending on the type of business you run, a variety of products and services
can help you streamline and become more efficient. Talk to others in your
industry to learn what products and services have been most advantageous for
them.
1AutomationWiz.com
is a service that has been very helpful to me. It is a shopping cart with
several modules I take advantage of, including an affiliate program,
auto-responders for each product, client and prospect databases, e-mail
broadcasts, sales reports and many other features that help me automate and work
more efficiently. I also recently discovered
Google Docs, which allows you to upload documents and share them with
others. This is particularly helpful when others need to add comments and edits
to the document. It is instantly accessible from any computer connected to the
internet. You also have the option to discuss the document live with the other
participants.
Dahlia Benaroya, president of
Dahlia Web Designs
LLC, shares some of the tools that enable her to work more effectively, as
well as support her customers.
"For quick access to clients’ systems, a remote
software tool is critical. There are many available applications that allow
support personnel to remotely access and support their clients for tasks such as
troubleshooting, implementations, training support and more. I currently use
pcAnywhere.
For business and personal tracking, I use
Excel, which enables me to streamline tracking under one umbrella tool. The
power of Excel supports flexibility, multiple worksheets within one workbook,
customization of columns and rows, formulas to speed up data entry and smart
fill-in to reduce typing. Having Excel on most computers these days helps me
access my data anywhere I go as long as I have a copy of my data with me. And a
wonderful tool that allows me to easily take my data with me is a
SanDisk flash card.
I also utilize
Constant
Contact for more than just e-newsletters. The product and others like it
offer a wonderfully efficient way to maintain customer e-mail lists and customer
information automatically. Customers can type in their information on their
own."
Virtual assistants work with a wide variety of clients and industries, so I
asked one virtual assistant what tools and tips work well in her business.
Andrea Bloch, owner of
e-volve
virtual solutions, offered this:
"We prefer
Simply Accounting
for bookkeeping because it is easy to use and true to the accounting process.
We also create a lot of printed materials. We find
that sending proofs back and forth via e-mail to clients is a snap with
Adobe Acrobat. This way,
clients who do not necessarily use vector-based drawing programs are able to
view the artwork without compatibility and file-size issues.
It is also a handy tool if you do not want live
files to be edited easily. And as virtual assistants, we rely heavily on our
Blackberrys. We are virtually there for our clients and able to receive, view
and forward time sensitive requests at any time."
No matter your industry or business, there are likely new tools available to
help you streamline and automate your business. Take some time today to talk to
others and do some quick research for yourself.