Starting a career as freelance professionals can be an exhilarating feeling. The freedom, the pay, control, and just about everything it comes with the job. However, it can be easy to get lost in this stage and not equip yourself with the tools you need to make the ride smooth. If you are wondering about the type of tools you need, read on. The best part is, the majority of these can be used for free.
Being freelance professionals has several benefits, including flexibility and the ability to manage your own time in projects. But when you first start working freelance, not everything is perfect. You’ll discover that there are numerous challenges to overcome as you make the switch from a 9 to 5 job to freelancing. There are still challenges to face in order to get started if you’re performing freelance work as a side business. The contemporary environment also presents additional difficulties when working completely remotely with clients.
Working for yourself may seem like a pipe dream come true. Freelancers have flexible schedules, fresh and fascinating work, and do not have to go to a corporate office, which is appealing to anyone who is self-motivated. However, it is not without its difficulties. Working through and overcoming these obstacles can be made simpler with the correct tools.
This post will walk you through different freelancing tools and how they may help you with your work.
Calendar Tools for Freelance Professionals
This is perhaps the most important tool you need as a service professional. Starting up, you can decide to wing it. I mean there aren’t too many clients so why not. However, with time you might start missing meetings and ultimately losing clients, especially when you work with clients in different time zones. No one wants to work with someone who can’t manage their time properly. A tool that can help you sort this out is :
Google Meet
Google meet is perhaps the gold standard for calendar tools. Since the majority of today’s users use Google. This makes syncing into device calendars easy. Ensuring you do not miss anything.
Finance Tools for Freelance Professionals
While this might not be the most important type of tool, they are fairly important. From being able to create invoices, paystubs, track expenses, and more. Financial tools are how you track expenses. For freelance professionals, the financial tool that is a must-have is an invoice creator. One that takes a few seconds to create and you can use over and over again. While many new entrepreneurs and professionals go after invoice templates, there are better and more efficient ways.
Paystubsnow invoice creator
This is a free invoice creator that allows you to create a customizable invoice in a few seconds. In 3 simple clicks, your invoice is ready. It includes the ability to add a logo, discount type, tax, business, and client details.
Paypal
While passion is a great motivator for choosing a career, a paycheque is what makes it worth it. This is why a payment method is so important. As a service provider freelancing, it is more than likely you have clients all over the globe. Paypal makes receiving payments from over 200 countries possible. Although fees might be steep, their security and convenience make it worth their fee.
If you need to get paid and cannot use direct deposit, PayPal is the solution. PayPal is one of several online payment systems that individuals use to send money to one another, but it has a lengthy history of use.
You may use your debit card, bank account, or credit card to make quick transfers, 1-to-3-day transfers to your credit card or debit card, or acquire a PayPal card to bank straight from your account.
PayPal allows you to safely make online transactions and transfer money. PayPal can be relied on to deliver on its promises because it is utilized by over 377 million individuals worldwide and many freelance professionals.
Square
For service professionals who have a website and want to accept payment and perform processing such as refunds, taxes, and discount, this is perhaps the best tool. In comparison, others who offer the same service such as stripe, Square is quite a decent tool.
Square enables you to take credit card payments and receive deposits the next day.
If you run an eCommerce store, Square also provides a POS system that handles inventory, refunds, taxes, and discounts, as well as sales reporting tools. Check out our detailed Square for freelance professionals.
Project Management for Freelance Professionals
Product management tools are used by teams and even individuals to manage tasks and teams. As a one-man business, you can also use this tool with clients to update them on project progress. While some clients or teams will typically invite you to the one they already use, here are a few recommendations.
Asana
Asana is currently one of the most popular project management tools for freelance professionals. It packs an incredible interface with a robust number of features. For professionals new to the tool, it might even get confusing to use.
Slack
Slack is another amazing tool for teams. Here you can join a number of projects or team rooms where you work with multiple clients simultaneously. Although, joggling between room to room can be a tad complicated. In all, Slack is a great management tool that every service professional ought to have.
Because it is such a time saver, the instant messaging program Slack has become a highly popular tool for professional interactions in recent years. Slack conversations are completely searchable and may be organized into channels based on project, subject, remote team, or whatever makes sense for you. And it’s far more natural than sifting through countless, unnecessary messages in your email inbox.
Trello
Trello was perhaps built for those who like a lot of designs, colors, and features. It can be a little bit much for the average user. However, if you appreciate fine colors and art, this tool is for you.
The secret to growing your business is productivity. Trello is the only platform we are aware of that can boost team productivity more effectively. Let’s say you wish to streamline the project management system in order to arrange and monitor your projects. In that case, you ought to look into Trello. Trello offers a free account signup option, but if you want to upgrade to Business Class, the cost is $9.99 per month, per user. Download here for Android, Mac, iOS, and the web. For independent contractors who want to organize their workload and lead a team, Trello is a fantastic tool. For ease of usage, they are also incorporated into the RemoteHQ platform.
Productivity Tools for Freelance Professionals
While some tools are there to help you manage. Some help you to be more productive – helping you achieve more in less time.
How many times have you run into a link or online resource you were sure you will need to visit again? Pretty often I suppose. Instead of leaving tabs open so you can get back to them or bookmarking them, use Pocket instead. Pocket lets you save useful resources in one place while allowing you access across all devices. So you can toss out your bookmark now.
Have you ever seen or read anything amazing online and then been unable to locate it when you needed it? We all do, which is why we should all use Pocket. This clever tool lets you store articles, movies, and stories from any newspaper, page, or app with a single click so you may read them later at your leisure.
TextExpander
This is for pitch writing, proposals, email, and even article writers who are freelance professionals. The tool lets you assign shortcuts to your commonly-used phrases. Similar to suggestions Gmail provides when typing out a mail. This saves you time and effort in writing.
Having the correct tools can help you succeed in your freelancing business. Tools for freelance professionals promoting your work, communicating with customers and integrating with their current CRMs, and keeping track of invoicing and bookkeeping allow you to focus on doing what you love while minimizing the inconveniences.
You may locate the greatest freelancing opportunities on our work marketplace by reading job ads or searching keywords, categories, or skill sets, whether you’re a new startup or have been freelancing for years. Join today and begin expanding your business.
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