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.
Calendar Tools
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
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. If you haven’t been using one, here is why you should.
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.
Square
For service professionals who have a website and wants 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.
Project Management
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 projects management tools for freelance professionals. It packs an incredible interface which 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.
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.
Productivity Tools
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.
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.
Paystubsnow – an all-in-one solution for business documentation
Paystubsnow is a pioneer of business documentation. Creating invoices, paystubs, utility bills, and 1099 all from one platform. It’s fast, safe, and just the solution you and your clients need. Clients all over the world have been relying on us for the solutions we provide – Documentation solutions for every business and professional need.
Leave a Reply