The five tools that changed my business
/2022 was a darn exciting year at Cake.
No, I don’t mean the usual you hear from every second infomercial on social: ‘I turned $24 into a $24m business in 12 months’...wouldn’t that be nice. Ha!
Instead, 2022 was the year that we invested behind the scenes. We focused on getting the systems, processes and small business tools right so that we have a really solid foundation for our business going forward.
These are five tools I use every day, and can’t live without. They have really moved the needle in our business, providing us with greater visibility, efficiencies, and ultimately, they have helped eliminate many day-to-day growing pains and stressors.
Here I share with you the five small business tools that changed our business.
SKED SOCIAL - Sked is all of your dream social media management tools in one.
You wanna schedule Reels, it does it. You want your clients to be able to review, edit and approve content, it does it.
You want an inbox, it’s got it.
It’s the Instagram business tool of every social media managers dream!
You want LinkedIn and Instagram management, alongside Facebook and Pinterest, Sked does it.
You want an asset library and collaboration tools, it’s got both. You want reporting that doesn’t cause your head to ache, Sked has it.
I have tried so many social media management tools and apps over the years, and nothing compares to Sked Social.
Yes, I am swooning over Sked Social. The best social media scheduling tool in our world.
Now, before you commit to a long term relationship, I recommend that you date Sked. Not just for the week free trial but for three months. It can be alluring to sign up to something for twelve months and receive a sweet discount, but in my experience it has cost me, locking me into a year with a provider that doesn’t meet my needs, paying out contracts and then starting again.
Instead, pay by the month for the first three months for Sked. This is enough time for you to trial the social media scheduling app features so you can make a proper assessment and determine if Sked is the social media scheduling tool for you.
By using our referral link, you receive 20% off your first month.
Full disclosure, if you use this link we get 20% of the first invoice and 10% recurring commission for each month thereafter on your first 12 months of Sked Social. Sign Up Now.
Asana is the best project management tool for our business.
After using the free project management tool of Asana for some time, we upgraded to give us greater capabilities across the multiple clients and projects.
The interface of Asana project management tool is easy to use and follow, the search functionality is excellent and the ability to loop in clients so we can share documents, updates and give them visibility of a project’s deliverables, sets it apart from other free project management tool available.
I love the reporting features, workflow, daily morning emails with your task list for the day, and how it integrates seamlessly with our time tracker, Harvest.
It was like meeting The One. Harvest was the time tracker of my dreams, I just didn’t know it could be our reality. One day it came into my life and after dating for a month, I made a long term commitment to include this in our digital tools stack for our business.
In the first month, Harvest revolutionised our business model by providing accurate information so we can make informed decisions which generated more value for our clients.
Its oh-so-simple integration with the Asana project management tool allowed us to enter budgets, hourly rates, billable and non billable tasks and track all of this in real time with clear reports - all in one place!
Cake is no longer a one-person show, and as our team was growing we needed a secure way to store our projects, but also allow us to work on them simultaneously, and share with clients and other contractors. Google Workspace was the answer and we haven’t looked back.
The Google Docs, Worksheets, Slides and other apps give us the functionality we knew from Microsoft. Our team members who work remotely have access from anywhere, anytime.
The real time editing capabilities is especially useful when several team members of our client’s are reviewing a document simultaneously allowing them to comment with ease, and ensuring we can turn around projects more efficiently. An amazing online collaboration tool.
Google Workspace for the win!
Last, but certainly not least, is Xero. I had previously used MYOB and to be honest, it was the dark ages for business financial management. Each month, reconciling accounts and transactions was cumbersome and time consuming. I loathed it.
Enter Xero. It had me at ‘hello’.
The intuitive interface makes my weekly or monthly finances a breeze be it managing staff leave and payroll, reconciling bills, invoicing or running reports. I feel so assured now about the health of my business and have greater visibility and control over the finances allowing me to make decisions easily, quickly and confidently.
I’d love to hear your thoughts and what you have found changed the way you do business.