Every small business owner has to deal with paper throughout their day. But, not all tasks have to be printed on paper. Here are 5 going paperless apps no small business owner can do without. I know I sure can’t.
Trip travel apps: Such as Tripit: holds all your travel information like a hotel, airline, and car rental information. You can even email your itinerary to a person so they know your information as well. Great for sharing your schedule with your coworkers and clients.
Reward card apps: Such as Keyring or GoogleWallet: These apps hold all your reward cards in one place. Tip: Use your national restaurant rewards cards on the go and save money.
Password protecting apps: Such as Key Pass: This app stores all your password instead of having them written on paper. They help keep your business passwords protected while on the go.
Note taking apps: Such as OneNote, Evernote, Snote. They look like a notebook and can be used like one. I like to use the notebooks for various blog or social media projects and I can even share them with admin clients so they can add to the notebook as well.
GPS apps: This app usually comes with your smartphone, if not, there are many GPS apps to choose from. Store all your client addresses and other locations in your GPS app. This will help if you are in an unfamiliar place and need to get to another client. It will be easy to look up the address if you have it in there already, saving you time on travel and money on gas. I like to save locations that I go to infrequently so I do not need to retype the address in every time.
Here are some general Going Paperless Tips to help you with other areas of your office:
- Paperless Bills: If you do decide to keep bills in PDF form only, make a folder for each payee so you can have all the payee bills in one section if you even need to reference it. Not all sites keep the bills accessible for longer than 6 months so keeping them on your computer will give you a backup.
- Paperless Invoices for Clients: If you keep your copy of the client invoices electronically, make sure each filename has a distinct description of the invoice it holds, such as 2014-Smith-5. Create filenames like the year invoiced, the last name of the client and their assigned invoice number works nicely. If you need to print them out, you can easily find and print it.
Going paperless may be easier these days, but, be careful, not having a system when going paperless can create more of a stressful workplace than having papers stack in your office. Make sure to keep your system easy to use and be sure everyone in your office know and understand the process.
I used these apps in the past and presently, however, if you wish to use any of these apps, be sure to do your research to make sure these apps would work for you as well. Note: I am not getting paid for talking about these apps.
Let me know how you went paperless. I would love to hear from you.
Please note these are affiliate links through Amazon, and at no additional cost to you, I will earn affiliate fees if you decide to make a purchase.
