Busy small business owners need to squeeze more productivity into a day. It’s frequently difficult to find enough time for marketing, networking, business development, and other essential tasks. Often, days go by and the most important tasks on your to-do list remain on that list because you simply don’t have the time to get it done.
Luckily, there are a lot of timesaving apps on the market that can help you get a better grip on your workload. Many are easy to use and won’t waste your time with a steep learning curve. Here are five user-friendly apps created to help busy entrepreneurs like you better manage your time:
1. Evernote
The key to saving time is not doing the same things twice, such as taking notes and leaving reminders in more than one place. Evernote, one of the best-known timesaving apps used across industries, helps by allowing a user to create a project to-do list, write a reminder, or snap a picture of a sketch and have all that information accessible wherever and whenever it’s needed. Evernote syncs the information between tablets, laptops, smartphones, and desktops.
2. Hootsuite
Social media tasks are a time-suck that can eat up your entire day unless you get organized. Hootsuite helps by managing your business’s Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, Google+, and LinkedIn accounts, including posting, scheduling, and checking on click-through rates. The analytics tool lets you know what campaigns are working and where best to focus your energies.
3. LeaveNow
If unpredictable traffic patterns are wasting your time and making you late, check out LeaveNow, a time management app that can help ensure you’re never late to another appointment. The traffic app calculates travel times for different modes of transportation (driving, biking, or public transportation), then sends a reminder to your iPhone, iPod Touch, and/or iPad to tell you exactly when to leave for your appointment so you’ll arrive on time. The app also allows you to send a message to other meeting attendees to tell them you’re on the way.
4. Pocket
The Pocket app helps you stay current with news and trends in spare moments without interrupting your busy schedule. Formerly called Read It Later, Pocket lets you tag an interesting article, video, or web page and save it for another time. Once saved to Pocket, the article or post can be viewed at any time on a smartphone, tablet, or desktop computer. Plus, since the content can be viewed offline once it’s been synced on your device, you can access it without an internet connection.
5. Expensify
Unless your business is accounting or finance-related, you most likely have a hard time keeping track of business expenses and receipts. Expensify is a great timesaving app for this: It takes most of the hassle out of the process by allowing the user to snap a picture of a receipt and then upload it to an Expensify account. The app fills in the expense details, attaches the receipt to the associated credit card account, and imports the information to your accounting program. If you have employees, Expensify makes figuring out expense reports and quick and easy.
