You’re a busy business owner. Hey, I can relate. You have money to manage, meetings and travel to schedule and trips to take, tasks to prioritize, emails to write, people to administer—and then there’s your family, your friends, and your personal life to squeeze in there too!
How do successful business owners stay on top of it all? They think mobile! Many of your favorite time, money, and people management tools are already available as apps for your phone. And if you don’t have these tools already in place, there’s no time like the present to start somewhere—and mobile is the way to go.
You Need Mobile
Manage Your Money
We’ve already talked about great apps like Harvest, Mint, and Intuit GoPayment. Two more to try:
OfficeTime
OfficeTime for iPad and iPhone makes tracking time and money easy on the go. Everything syncs back to the full version for Windows or Mac, making it easy to track projects and billable hours wherever, whenever! More easily tracked billable hours means more money in your pocket.
Google Wallet
Who needs a wallet filled with paper and plastic? Integrate your finances and your smartphone with Google Wallet. Load your real credit card data right into your phone for easy, quick paying on the go. Don’t worry: the app is lockable and secure. You can even disable your credit cards remotely, in case you lose your phone.
File Storage & Collaboration
Oh no! You forgot your documents for an important meeting. Sound familiar? Get to the cloud! You’ll never worry about where your documents are located again with these handy apps:
Documents To Go
With Documents To Go, all your documents stay in one place. What’s really cool about this app? File format retention. Never again be surprised when a document looks different on your mobile phone than it does in your email or on your desktop computer. Handy!
Evernote
Sync all types of files (video, snapshots, voice recordings, text documents—you name it) in a cloud-based collaborative space with Evernote. Easily organize all types of files and watch your team’s creativity soar.
We also love DropBox! Read more about DropBox here. Please be sure to scroll down and see other wonderful apps in a comprehensive infographic by Salesforce Desk.
Your Customers Need Mobile
What about your business? Is your website accessible on the go? Can your customers and clients reach your website from their tablets and their smartphones? If your answer is no (or if you don’t know), it’s time to look into going mobile. Your clients are busy business owners just like you. Sooner rather than later, mobile access to your website will be expected. Don’t miss the boat!
You don’t necessarily need to hire a team to design your very own mobile app (although it doesn’t hurt to keep that eventuality in mind). Instead, be sure your website design is responsive. Responsive web design simply means that your website will automatically adjust to accommodate the browser in which it’s viewed. Employ responsive design so when your customers access your website via smartphone, they can not only do so, but they won’t need to pan around, resize or otherwise mess with your website to view it accurately. Now, I like to see the full website graphics and have no problem with resizing on my smartphone, but the experts say, I am in the minority. So, don’t forget about us minority peeps and make sure you put an easy to find link to be able to go to the full website.
So think mobile! Your business and your customers will thank you!
Want more cool mobile (and web-based) tools? Check out Cool Tools: Must-See Websites and Apps for Business Owners and 6 More Cool Tools: Own Your Productivity!
