Find free or dirt cheap tools online for your small business

Share This October 28th, 2009 Antowan

If you run a small or even medium sized business you will know that finding tools that can make a difference to your business can be tough. What exactly do you need and how do you apply it? Perhaps you are not too tech savvy and find yourself stuck in a pool of really off putting dredgeware (my word) that doesn’t cost much but also doesn’t do all that much. Finding financial management software is probably the biggest issue and unfortunately the best solution often is to fork out a couple of thousand Rand and get a decent package that can make it easier for you.

In my experience there are two things you do not want to be without in business and that is a good accountant to do your legally obliged financial necessities and a decent book keeping system for yourself. Small business tends to have less hassle with these things, but streamlining invoices and keeping track of expenses are really important to keep accurate yet simple.

When it comes to finance management you can look for free solutions at the bigger software makers. They are nearly always web based and always available to you even when you are on the road. Quickbooks.com is a good place to start trying INTUIT’s offering. Microsoft has a great offering of Office Accounting Express for their US customers, and I am yet to find a South African version. If you have a link to something like it for South Africans by Microsoft, please do email me at antowan@myadsl.co.za

If you have a little web savvy and do know your way around installing PHP and database driven website apps then I would seriously point you in the direction of software like COMPIERE. It is a bit heavy but there are tons of free competitors to this system that you will be able to hammer out (with a little effort) something suitable for your business. Look at its features here.

Another source of brilliantly useful little software nuggets for business is www.sourceforge.net, which can be sifted through quite easily using their business categories. Just type in your need and see what the software genie pops out. It is important to take time to experiment with solutions to optimize your business processes. If you have employees then web based solutions are not bad if you have the skills to implement them. There are some on SourceForge as well.

From a marketing point of view, social media could well be the key. You want to learn more about how to use Facebook (and your existing network of friends) as well as Twitter to communicate with those interested in your business…

Some links that could be of use:

• Wikipedia accounting software comparison.
• Web based scripts useful to most business sites (only if you know how to use them)

Entry Filed under: General, Software, World Wide Web