If you’re an entrepreneur with your own business, then you’re well aware of how hard it is to get an idea off the ground, and it doesn’t get any easier once you’re running the company. Your attention is constantly split between competing priorities, and it can get overwhelming trying to decide which tasks to deal with first.
Naturally, you’ll have employees to help you out, but there’s only so much each person can do. This is especially true if they aren’t working with the best tools for the job. Here are some modern tools you can use to get your business and your schedule under control.
CRM Integrations
Customer relationship management (CRM) software essentially records and stores information about customer interactions so you can easily refer to it later. This is great for your sales team since they can automatically record sales and pull up any relevant customer data when necessary. This software makes it easy to store lead information like phone numbers and email addresses, and it can also store information on sales and customer preferences. This way, agents can make specialized offers to repeat clients based on available information to help ensure customer retention.
CRM integration is also great for your customer support team. They can quickly pull up important information regarding customer concerns or even check previous issues a returning customer has had to bring calls to quick resolutions. Best of all, modern CRM software has easy integrations with programs you’re already running.
Phone Lookup
Speaking of phones simplifying your business, using a reverse phone lookup service is easy and convenient, and you can find helpful information. You can look up unknown numbers that have called your business, or you can use it to find basic personal information on public records, including arrest records. While these results can’t be used in any hiring decisions, they may give you additional information about potential business partners.
HR Software
Hiring the best people possible should be a top priority for your business, especially when you’re expanding. HR departments are always growing, as are the responsibilities of your employees. Having the best HR software helps your department become more efficient with the hiring process, allocation of benefits, performance management, and more. Some programs allow your employees to easily track applications to move candidates through the steps as efficiently as possible. They may even elt your team access information 24/7 with the use of a mobile app.
Inventory Management Software
Effectively managing your inventory is one of the most important things you have to do as a business owner. Inventory tracking lets you know how many products you have in stock and how many you’ll need to order to keep up with customer demand. It’s crucial for fulfilling customer orders on time, especially for an online business. Depending on the size of your company, it may not be realistic to track inventory manually, or it’s at least too time-consuming. Fortunately, with automated inventory management, you can easily connect to your sales systems and keep inventory under control.
Outsourced Payment Processing
Naturally, payroll is among the most crucial parts of your business, and you can’t afford to get invoices or payments wrong. That’s why you should print and mail checks online. These services can automatically format and write checks as well as provide envelopes and mail them to the proper recipients. You can set mail services to automatically take care of payments every time, and you’ll have a dedicated account number and manager who can assist you with any questions. Additional security measures also protect your business from check fraud.
Accounting Software
It’s hard to think about payments without thinking about accounting in general. Your books need to be kept consistently up to date and free of errors when tax time comes around. Poor money management is also one of the most common reasons small businesses fail. While it’s true that your revenue will most likely be less than your expenses when you start a business, you won’t be able to keep going if you don’t get that problem under control as soon as possible.
With some simple input, a good accounting program can provide valuable insights into your profitability or lack thereof. You can then more easily focus on the areas where you’re losing money and set your business back on the right path.
