If you’re a “corporate entrepreneur”, you know how challenging it can be to build and run your business, while holding down the fort at your day job, in addition to dealing with the rest of Life. You know how limited your time is, and how much there is to do all around. And that cutting on your sleep isn’t going to help with your sanity or those pesky under-eye circles either…This is where apps comes into play…
When I started blogging while working full-time, I was frankly overwhelmed. As my caffeine consumption shot up, so did whatever sanity I had left at the time (in addition to there not being enough concealer in the whole wide world to fix that look of exhaustion). Something had to give…
If you can relate to late nights, early mornings, and constant bursts of caffeine, here are 10 apps that can help running your business while working full-time, keeping some of your sanity, and even finding time to shoe-shop online:
- Evernote: This is my “backup brain”, as I like to call it. You can literally store all kinds of information into Evernote, in the form of notes organized in notebooks with tags and references. This app helps you sync notes across your mobile and desktop platforms. Great app if you’re bombarded with information and want to keep all of it in one safe place!
- Fuze: Videoconference much? This app helps you host online meetings for all devices and operating systems. It’s free for up to 25 participants, and jumps to less than $15/month for up to 125 participants. There’s also a free 30-day trial period available.
- Pomodoro: This productivity app has changed my life! It incorporates the principles of the Comodoro technique, and helps you create tasks, set up breaks, and track your entire productivity throughout the day, week or month! Ah-mazing!
- Skype: Despite all the competition, Skype is still the Queen of videoconferencing. It lets you hold calls all over the world, share files and photos, as well as your computer screen, with groups of up to 25 people. The basic plan is also still free!
- Paypal: This app is really convenient to process payments from customers on the go. It lets you link your debit, credit and other bank accounts to your Paypal platform. Now, it also lets you use a tablet or other device, as well as Paypal’s card reader as a portable register (mostly as a way to compete with Square).
- Wave: Accounting and invoicing giving you headaches? This easy app helps you do it conveniently, and for free!
- Dropbox: No room to store and share files? Dropbox helps you do just that by storing your files on the cloud. Especially useful for telecommuters who need to access their files on the go, or share them in one central location. The basic plan is free, and there are trial periods available as well.
- Wunderlist: If you’re a fan of to-do lists and checking things off like myself, then Wanderlust is your go-to app. It’s an oldie but a goodie, that helps you check off the holiday vacation planning just as well as that big contract to draft!
- Facebook Messenger: A lot of business is being done on Facebook these days. This app lets you communicate with your Facebook contacts without having to be on the social media network (read: no excess browsing). Talk about effective and time-saving!
- Mail chimp: If you’re looking to use email marketing in your business (and you should), this app helps you create easy newsletters, manage your mailing lists and track your subscribers. You can use this information to learn more about your customer base, and market to them more effectively!
What tools do you use to run your business while working full-time?
PS: Like this post? Click HERE to get The Corporate Sister’s career, lifestyle and entrepreneurship, bi-weekly updates!
To your success,
The Corporate Sister.
