Stay Cool, Choose the Right Tool!
One of the biggest challenges faced by young entrepreneurs is staying on top of everything. They have to respond to emails, organize projects, keep in touch with their network and make sure their website or social media works. Juggling so many different tasks can be both exciting and intimidating. Fortunately, there are an abundance of tools and services that have been created to help entrepreneurs to better organize their lives and businesses. Utilizing tools in various areas of your business can lead to enhanced productivity, team comprehension, and team moral!
This week we compile a list highlighting some of the top tools used amongst founders and entrepreneurs for each stage of the business. The focus here is on free or cheap tools. Give them a try!
Conduct market research
The International Trade Centre has developed a suite of online tools to make global trade more transparent and facilitate access to markets. The suite of tools, comprised of Trade Map, Market Access Map, and Export Potential Map provides practical information for entrepreneurs engaged in international trade businesses.A key challenge for exporters is the scarcity of reliable trade information on markets. ITC’s suite uses interactive databases to enables SMEs and startups to make actionable decisions.
Learn more about the Market Analysis Tools here or check out the International Trade Centre (ITC)’s website.
Define and refine your business model
Enloop is an easy and smart online business plan writing software. You can write a business plan and forecast the success of your business thanks to automatically generated text and financial reports, real-time performance score, and financial ratios analysis. Enloop helps you to avoid mistakes and save time guiding you through several steps.
Read more about Enloop here!
Get things done
If you want to get things done on time, share tasks with other people and ensure everyone is focused on the task, add Trello to your business plan. Trello is a free project management tool that helps you get organized. It shows a board on which you can create lists filled with cards. When you open a card, you can add comments, upload files, create checklists, and more. It is super versatile, so it can be used for many different types of things: to organize a specific project, write an ebook, create an email course, etc. It really helps you to keep a bird’s-eye view on your projects.
Learn more about Trello’s key features: here!
Share ideas
Slack is hands down the best way to communicate quickly in teams or 1:1. If you need to organize discussions by topic (i.e. channels) and have everything in one place so it’s easy to find, then Slack is for you. Slack comes with a mobile app and integrates with many other apps you may already be using. Two new features were also recently introduced. Voice and video calling are now available for premium users.
Discover more about Slack: here!
Tool for Design
Creating the right design and look for your business is an important part of your business growth. Canva is a powerful tool for creating visuals, perhaps the easiest design tool you can find. Designs can be created in a few minutes, thanks to its ultra-user-friendliness and a rich database of images and templates. Great for creating posters, social media graphics, or even a web mockup.
What are you waiting for? Get started with Canva here!
Tool for marketing
Buzzsumo helps you analyze and compare your marketing content against those of competitors. You can enter a topic or domain ideas and see how they’ve performed in the past in terms of social media presence, for example.
Check out more information about Buzzsumo: here!
Curious to discover which tools could help you succeed? Don’t miss out the full list highlights some of the top tools used amongst founders and entrepreneurs: here!
Header Image Courtesy of: Max Pixel