7 Best Online Tools for Comfortable Work: If you add up all the years that I worked with any kind of business automation, you get 7 years and a tail. And all this time, the same picture struck me: people choosing screwdrivers for 12-15 thousand rubles for a banal home repair.
And original spare parts for a car for tens or even hundreds of thousands of rubles, they absolutely do not like their job and even their personal business. They don’t just save on it – they huddle: they huddle to pay employees, huddle to pay for high-speed Internet and avoid buying CRM, ERP, and other systems that make work efficient.
And this is completely incomprehensible – doesn’t your work, your work, and even more so your business deserve tools that can make work easier, increase the efficiency of each employee and affect profits?
In general, you do whatever you want, and I will tell you about my favorite tools that helped me as a marketer, sales manager, analyst, and department head.
7 Best Online Tools for Comfortable Work
1. GoogleDocs
GoogleDocs is an online suite for editing documents, spreadsheets, presentations, and creating surveys. The beauty of GoogleDocs is the ability to co-author. Let’s say you’re working on a letter and a sales proposal, and your colleague and boss need to help correct the text or add their part.
You open the document, and the rest of you make edits in the advice mode (you will see everything and you can reject or accept). There is also a handy tool for comments, inserting pictures, checking literacy – everything is like in adults. This is the only application that has managed to break my love for Microsoft Word.
Tables in GoogleDocs are frankly weak – you are tormented with formulas, you go crazy with pivot tables, and you will yearn for the sight of ugly charts. If you are used to MS Excel, Google Spreadsheets will give you the impression that you are using spreadsheets for the first time. But to calculate, draw up a budget, etc., come down completely. And if you get carried away and study scripts, you can do some very interesting things.
Presentations in GoogleDocs are basic, and creating slides is relatively convenient, but again, you should not expect Microsoft’s beauty, functionality, and engineering forethought. But, in principle, it will do.
Polls are also quite linear but convenient, and they are easily integrated into the web, emails, sites, etc. With other survey services, you should be very confused.
2. Microsoft PowerPoint
Microsoft PowerPoint is a great tool that everyone who has ever done multimedia presentations is familiar with. It develops almost more progressively than all other products, and there is almost no unnecessary stuff in it. Put your head down, and it will open for presentations, diagrams, drawings, manuals, and even a training video.
A small note: if you use animations and transitions, be sure to test the presentation on the terminal from which you will conduct the “run”: there are problems that will give you unpleasant moments. Better yet, have a static version with you, without transitions, and a PDF version. By the way, I personally prefer not to use transitions and animations for performances – minus one reason for experiencing on stage.
3. ToDo-lists
ToDo-lists – can be different but better synchronized between devices if sending notifications (possible even within CRM). Create lists of personal and work to-dos, books to read, places to visit in a new city, etc., and cross them off as you go. It helps a lot to free your head from information rubbish and not to forget both the most important and minor details.
A small handy feature: in modern phones, you can assign an event in relation to a specific place or geographic coordinates. So you can set up a list of products to visit a specific store, remember to go to a pharmacy, or ask questions to the right customer in his territory. Be sure to find this feature or an application with it.
4. Messengers and Telegram
It is probably difficult to find a person who does not have messengers, but it is easy to find a person who is difficult to find in these messengers. Get all the essential apps so your customers, bosses, and co-workers can find you with your phone number in a chat that’s convenient for them.
When communicating in messengers, do not forget about three important rules: the correspondence is saved, and even if you use the “delete from yourself and from the interlocutor” function.
the conversation log can be saved (including a screenshot of the opponent) write as quickly as possible, without unnecessary ellipsis and other accents remember that the person reads your message in his perception and your tone is wrong, but nothing can be done about it, so be prepared to be misunderstood.
Copy important messages or take a screenshot – in case of loss of information, you will restore it. However, you should not count on messengers especially – this method of storing important data is even worse than email.
If you are going to have a voice conversation, and the Internet connection is unstable, it is better to turn off the video, or even better, use a landline or cellular connection – in business conversations, there are no important nuances that can be ignored due to interference.
But the long-suffering Telegram can be used for business tasks, in particular, to run your own channel with interesting posts, links, and even discussions. Again, you all read the news and know that this channel should not be the only channel of communication with your audience.
5. CRM systems and project management systems
Not the first in the list, but the most important tool for every salesperson, marketer, or manager. I emphasize that this is not only about salespeople because CRM has gone beyond the program for sales and transformed into universal solutions that provide automation at all stages of customer development.
It’s the same with project management systems: they grew out of the Gantt schedule and group planning and became real case management consoles. Again, I will not open America if I say that management systems can be part of CRM systems, and CRM elements can be included in project applications. If you are a modern salesperson and you don’t have a CRM system, you are not a modern salesperson.
6. Handy apps on your phone and a voice recorder
Whatever you need, it’s most likely already available as a mobile app. Use these features to automate your work and especially your routine even more. Here is a list of applications that you will definitely need:
- RDP client – to have access to a remote desktop (for example, to CRM or reports in a folder on your PC). A file manager like Total Commander – to instantly navigate files on your smartphone, documents, and presentations
- GoogleDocs – to make changes to documents and presentations on the fly at any convenient time
- Translator – to clarify some terms or incomprehensible words if the work is related to other languages, etc.
A separate important thing is a voice recorder, and you can record the details of the negotiations on it (rule of good form: ask the interlocutor’s consent before starting the recording!) so as not to forget anything.
Tip: check the quality of the recording beforehand and make sure you have enough memory for future recordings. Please note that not all phones can record a two-way conversation using a voice recorder. It is better to use a special application. However, they all work using the Internet, so make sure that the mobile Internet is connected and working at a stable speed (if the speed is low, there will be a lot of voice distortion).
7. IP-telephony
Well, who is a salesman without a phone?! A salesman without a phone is some kind of marketer! Your employer (or you as an employer) probably provided employees with IP telephony. What is there to talk about? And here, everything is not so simple. Pay attention to:
the reputation of the company – it must guarantee the stability and quality of communication prices – IP telephony is good because it is inexpensive, so compare the corporate rates of different companies do not buy IP telephony services from corporate system vendors: as a rule, such calls will cost you more due to the vendor’s agency markup pay attention to the presence of a virtual PBX, which will expand your possibilities; sometimes, a virtual PBX can be contacted, for example, by your CRM or other enterprise software provider.
In general, friends, take a look at the calendar – there is the 21st century, 2019. And if you refuse the obvious benefits of our techno civilization, think about how efficient you are. And if your employees refuse, think about something else: maybe they are afraid of technology because they have something to hide. However, this is speculation. The main thing is to be on the cutting edge of techno – and the work will be more efficient.
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