Running your own business is no easy feat. There are so many things to do. And in the early days, you may well be the only one doing them. But from building your brand, establishing your online presence, to managing your clients, the right tools can make a world of difference to your efficiency and productivity.
However, in today’s world, it can be hard to keep track of everything that’s on offer that can help your business stay on top of its game.
When arming yourself with the right tools can mean the difference between success and failure, you need to be able to separate the wheat from the chaff. To help you avoid wasting valuable time through trial-and-error, this list shares the most essential tools you need to supercharge your productivity and accelerate your business growth.
Website builder
Believe it or not, 41% of small business owners think they don’t need a website. Many think that their customers are not online. But this is far from the truth! Recent global events have accelerated e-commerce four to six years to a 77% increase in revenue year-over-year. Not only that, 97% of people search online to find a business near them.
So if you’re one of the 41% who still thinks you can get by without a website, think again!
There are plenty of options to build websites for users of all levels, from newbies to coding pros. The downside is that the more options out there, the more daunting it can be to choose one. If you choose a solution that’s too simple and limited for your needs, you’ll need to upgrade sooner than expected, wasting your time and money. But if you opt for one with way more functionalities than you need, the learning curve may be too steep and frustrating for you.
Our easy-to-use tool will help you build a high-quality business website in minutes. You can choose one of three beautiful templates or you can create your new website from scratch — no coding and no plug-ins required.
Logo designer
A business website is nothing without company branding! It’s not just big companies who need a logo — even solopreneurs and freelancers benefit from having one.
But why is it so important?
It communicates your brand’s core values
Logos are more than just graphics. They communicate ideas and perspectives to audiences in ways words never could. This is especially important in saturated markets where building trust and showing professionalism can make or break a new business.
The logo should be able to translate your brand’s personality and attributes using visual cues like colors, fonts, symbols, or shapes. And it needs to do this in a way that’s simple enough for your audience to recognize across different mediums, from print ads to social media posts.
It makes your business instantly recognizable
One picture is worth a thousand words, and logos are a great example of this.
The human brain processes visuals much faster than text. While words are important to convey your message, people are 80% more likely to remember images than text. When your audience sees your content, they should know it comes from your company, whether on- or offline.
So, the question isn’t whether or not you need a logo. Rather, how do you create one that tells the story of your business and stands out from the crowd?
You can take advantage of our logo designer tool to reduce the cost of outsourcing to a graphic designer. The process is simple — just follow a few prompts to choose the color, fonts, icons, and placement of your logo to make it perfect.
Document templates
From business plans and legal documents to contracts and proposals, you can’t run a business without the right paperwork.
With so many documents needed to keep your business running, it can be difficult to source relevant or correct document types quickly. You might end up wasting a lot of time creating each new document by hand or looking up a previous version to reuse.
This is where templates come to the rescue. They can save you a ton of time and keep all your written communications consistent and reduce errors.
With OK Launch, you have easy access to a vast library of templates for all the documents your business could ever need.
Invoicing
Any business owner will tell you that sales are the lifeblood of their operation. That’s why it’s essential to have an efficient invoicing process in place. The last thing you want is to be chasing down payments or dealing with late fees.
A clear and concise invoicing system is key to avoiding all of that hassle.
Luckily, gone are the days when you had to create every invoice by hand. With our invoicing tool, generating and keeping track of invoices has never been easier. You can raise, send, and store invoices all in one place to help make sure you’re paid on time, every time.
Contacts manager
Keeping contact details stored among multiple spreadsheets, programs, or devices is incredibly time-consuming. 76% of workers spend 1-3 hours per week simply moving data from one place to another. This doesn’t sound like a lot on its own, but it quickly adds up. 1-3 hours per week equates to almost a full day of work per month. That’s over two full working weeks per year! Think about it, how would you spend those extra days? What could you achieve by reclaiming that time?
OK Launch’s centralized contacts manager enables you to store and manage your leads’, prospects’, and customers’ details all in one place. Plus, you can invoice them directly from inside the tool to save yourself even more time!
Smart scheduling
According to data analyzed by LucidMeetings, senior executives attend 12 meetings per week, on average. Based on this figure, the time spent simply arranging or planning meetings (not attending them) is estimated to be as much as 6 hours per week or 15% of your workweek.
Of course, keeping your calendar up-to-date is crucial for staying organized, and some meetings may prove to be major stepping stones in your success journey. But let’s be honest, as the head of your business, there are far more valuable uses for that 15% of your workweek.
This is why smart scheduling tools should be every business owner’s best friend. Those endless back-and-forth emails checking each other’s availability can be left firmly in the past.
Simply share a link to your calendar and the recipient can book time with you based on your availability that is clearly displayed to them.
OK Launch’s smart scheduling tool goes one step further to help protect your valuable time. You have the option to add screening questions to your calendar to avoid pointless meetings from being booked in the first place.
For example, let’s say you only wish to work with clients with a certain budget, or who meet certain requirements. Adding these screening questions to your scheduling link means that those who do not meet your specifications (i.e. projects that are not a good return on investment and would not help you push your business forward) will not be able to book time with you. This way, you can be safe in the knowledge that any time you spend in meetings will be worthwhile.
Time-tracking
From CEOs to executives, managers, and team members, all professionals can benefit from time-tracking.
Having a clear picture of how long you spend on each task enables you to be more self-aware and responsible for your time. Let’s say you recorded a task as taking four hours to complete. You can ask yourself, was that task important enough to take up that amount of time? Could those four hours have been spent more effectively? Did that task need four hours to complete, or are there ways to make it more efficient next time?
These insights help you make sure you’re getting the most out of every hour you spend at work. You’ll be less likely to procrastinate, you’ll find it easier to accurately estimate project timelines, and you can be sure you’re compensated for all the work you do. For example, let’s say you complete 10 client jobs per week on average. If every job took just 20 minutes longer than you originally estimated, you’d be losing out on more than 170 billable hours every year!
You can use OK Lauch’s in-built time tracker to create detailed records of your time spent on every task with a single click.
Smart task tools
One of the biggest reasons why many businesses fail to achieve success is that business owners spend too much time on the wrong tasks.
When it comes to the biggest threat to our productivity and business success, it’s death by a thousand cuts. The majority of tasks that we encounter every day can make us feel busy, but they do little to help us move closer to our goals or push our business forward.
Most business owners only spend around 32% of their time on work that directly leads to increased profitability and growth. But if you want to see the best results, you need to turn that ratio on its head.
If you’re not sure which tasks are the best use of your energy, OK Launch’s smart tasks tool will tell you.
Productivity tools
Knowing which tasks you should be working on is one thing. Being able to focus on them can be a whole other thing entirely.
Whenever your mind drifts from the task at hand, it takes valuable time and energy to bring it back. It takes people an average of 25 minutes and 26 seconds to get back on track after an interruption. Even just one interruption a day can mean two hours per week are lost.
And if you think you can make up for lost time by multitasking, experts have found this does much more harm than good. Multitasking during cognitive tasks can reduce IQ by up to 15 points, which has the same impact as working on zero hours of sleep the night before. As a result, your speed and efficiency when completing tasks are likely to be significantly reduced.
Focusing on one task at a time is the key to doing more high-quality work in less time.
If you struggle to stay focused, OK Launch’s in-built productivity timer encourages you to fully focus on the task at hand for 25-minute bursts, similar to the Pomodoro technique.
If the opposite is true and you find it much harder to stop working, the timer will encourage you to take regular, necessary breaks. While non-stop work may help you get done more temporarily, it’s not a viable approach in the long term. It’s easy for healthy habits to fall by the wayside when you’re busy, but regular breaks can ensure you always have time to eat meals, get some fresh air, exercise, or even just give your eyes a rest from your computer screen. Giving yourself time to recharge will make sure you’re always on top form for doing your best work.
Goal-setting tools
Many business owners don’t realize just how important goal-setting is for achieving success.
Goals give you the all-important focus and motivation to keep going every day and do what needs to be done. Without a clear sense of direction, it’s easy to get lost in the day-to-day. Goals are the driving force behind innovation, standing out from your competitors, going further for your customers, higher profits, or however you define success.
With OK Launch, you can set, measure, and achieve your goals faster and more effectively than ever before.
Final Thoughts
As a business owner, it’s vital to make sure you’re using your time and energy wisely and investing in the right tools to set your business up for success. The 10 tools listed above are essential for any entrepreneur who wants to take their business to the next level.
OK Launch has everything you need to stay organized, productive, and on track towards your goals. Website builders, invoicing platforms, task managers, and productivity timers are just some of the tools you can take advantage of through our platform, and at a fraction of the cost of purchasing them individually from separate providers.
Find out more here, or get started for free today.
