There’s a lot of talk in the small business/entrepreneurship world of getting attracted to the ‘shiny things’, i.e investing a large proportion of your time, energy and money into the latest or most talked about software without knowing if it’s really right for you.

But don’t worry, I’ve got you covered! We’ll be going through my favourite digital tools for running a small online business. By the way, all of the platform listed here can be used for free.

Also, notice here how I mentioned digital tools. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge lover of (sometimes unnecessary) stationary - but I want this to be a guide complete of tools that if you only had your laptop, tablet and even phone to hand, you’d have everything you need.

Project management software: Asana

I've recently switched over to Asana within the last couple months myself and I couldn’t be happier! I have previously used the likes of Monday.com and Trello, but Asana is definitely my favourite - it’s where I manage all my personal tasks, content calendar and client projects.

Reasons why I love Asana:

• Although there’s paid subscriptions you get really amazing features with the free package
• Set teams, projects, sections and tasks until you’re heart’s content - which can be all colour coded, add descriptions, due dates/times, upload documents and images - the list goes on
• View all these tasks in list, board (if you’re used to Trello) or calendar view, you’ll even be able to see all tasks from every project on the main calendar all colour coded (my inner geek is so happy).
• Tick off tasks and see completed tasks greyed out - how satisfying!
• For an exceptional customer experience, create a new team for each client and invite them to their own project board complete with assigned tasks for each person and deadlines.
• Manage your time and projects on the go with the mobile app

Social media post creation: Canva

I’ve been using Canva for years. Of course as a designer I’m always using the Adobe suite but I still use Canva regularly, especially for social media posts.

Their free package is jam packed with everything you might need including pre-defined canvas sizes for different social platforms, animations, graphics and royalty free images. Add in your own photo and branding uploads along with changing design elements to your colours and there you have it - Easy, slick imagery for your business.

Social media scheduling tool: Later.com

Alongside branding, I have worked as in digital marketing for years and have tried my fair share of scheduling tools. For those a little unsure, a scheduling tool literally schedules your social media posts as and when you want them - use this alongside creating your posts in Canva and you’ll have consistent, beautiful content going out on your channels.

Now, each scheduling platform has pros and cons and it does ultimately come down to what you’re looking for. But I needed something that could schedule to all platforms I used, was Instagram friendly, had a simple interface and affordable.

Reasons why I love Later.com

• The free version is really great to trial the platform, rather than having to jump  in for the paid version with all the features - which you can upgrade to from only £6 per month!
• Sync your profiles to instagram, Pinterest, Facebook and Twitter - perfect for creative entrepreneurs
• For Instagram, you can upload media and see all your unused images/videos and plan your instagram feed for the beautiful curated look (see image above). Once scheduled, have them post automatically or get a notification via the phone app to post manually.
• Upgrade to the paid plan and you can schedule videos, multi-photo posts, insta stories, add your location and even add a first comment for your hashtags
• So clean and easy to navigate - you’d be surprised how clunky some can be

Email sender: Mailchimp

Ok, so if you’re growing your small business and you haven’t got a software to curate and send emails to your subscribers - please action this asap! I’ll go through in another post why..

I actually have tried and loved a few email providers - but I’m bring mailchimp to your attention today because you can get your email list started with all the necessary tools, for FREE.

Create a list, automate a welcome email, personalise your GDPR confirmation emails, easy drag and drop editor, segment lists. If you learn the basics of email marketing, there’s no better way to grow know, like and trust with your customers/clients.

Update: Although Mailchimp is a good option for new business owners, it's even the one I started with. I've recently moved to a new email provider: Flodesk. I've been so happy with the move and would recommend it to anyone - read the blog post I've written about it.

Allow clients to book themselves in your diary: Calendly

Automating as much of your business as possible is key to your productivity and don’t you just hate back and forth emails and manually sending invites to schedule  meeting with new or exciting customers?

Calendly literally is the best solution to this problem, especially if you’re running a service based business. With the free version you can have 1 appointment type (I have my 15 minute complimentary clarity call), add in the choices how you can be contacted, for how long, on what dates, within what times.

Add your Calendly link as a call to action on your website and social media and voila, customers can see what slots are free and just book themselves in.

Add a chatbot to your website: Chatra or Drift

You know when you’re on a website and the only way to enquire is an info email or to fill in a form… Yeah, it’s not only annoying, but you’re more likely to click off than complete it, at least the majority of us.

We live in a world of Insta stories and Whatsapp and if we’re being really honest, many of us don’t like our first contact with a brand or person to be a phone call. This is why you NEED a chatbot.

I’ve used both Chatra and Drift and would recommend either - I personally think the usability of Chatra is slightly better, but Drift tells you where the person came from and what page of your website the visitor was on when they started the chat. But you can upload both for free to your website with a little snippet of code.

You can have notifications come through via your desktop or the mobile app to answer queries during your online hours and you can show a message for when you’re offline.

Whether it’s someone with a questions or maybe they just want to book you faster, what better way than instant communication with your clients?

Easy online finance management and accounting: Wave

I agree, business accounting isn’t the sexiest topic in the world, but actually I think the reason a lot of us avoid looking at/talking about it, is because it’s complicated and scary.

But it really doesn’t have to be. I’ve gone from being someone with (in all honesty) a negative relationship with money management to running an online business and feeling confident and happy with the process.

Wave lets you create invoices, pricing estimates, capture and store your receipts and track income/expenses and you can start this with a free account. Get a software like this and dedicate some time 1 day a month to bookkeeping and you wont feel overwhelmed again!

Final Thoughts

There you have it, if you made it to the end, you’re a trooper!

I really do think if you sign up to the 7 platforms on this list, you’ve got a fantastic starting point in streamlining and automating your online business and it can all be started for free, so no excuses.

Let me know which ones you know about, already use, or which ones you want to go and explore. Please, please also let me know if there’s any other platforms you couldn’t live without as I always want to improve my processes too.