My last blog outlined some tips to help you work from home successfully having worked remotely for several years myself.
This week, I wanted to share some Apps with you that I use to make my day as productive as possible and hope some of them help you whilst you're working remotely.
Communicating with your team is the most important aspect of working from home successfully, so we’ll start with some Apps that empower you to stay in contact with your team throughout the day.
Milanote
A new find that I had to add to my list of recommended Apps as a bonus for you all!
Having recently discovered Milanote, I've started using the App on Mac for creating dashboards when developing ideas for client projects. It's a very visual way of staying organised or to generate ideas / moodboards so it would be the perfect tool for any creative professional. I find the boards are really easy to use and has a great selection of tools that you can use to develop your desired board. I've mainly been using Milanote for developing ideas for client projects but I don't see any limitations to what you can create with these boards. I'm looking forward to exploring this new find more with my team in the months to come.
Prices: Free plan available. Paid plan starts from $9.99 per month, per user.
Slack
Slack is by far one of the most popular apps on the market for team communication. The App can be used by teams of all sizes and is designed to take you away from the everyday inbox and email culture we have in today’s working society and move you towards a team collaboration approach with focussed channels. Offering teams the ability to create channels, in-App voice and video calls and the ability to integrate with most online platforms. It’s no wonder it’s proven to be such a success on the market and one platform I enjoy using with some clients.
Prices from: Free plan available. Paid plans start from £5.25 per month.
G Suite
Before I switched over to G Suite I was using spark for my emails, Microsoft for creating documents and Dropbox for sharing files. 3 platforms for simple everyday tasks so I signed up for G Suite and haven’t looked back since. G Suite is essentially Gmail for businesses, offering a powerful email App with built-in calendar functionality and with full access to Google Drive, Docs, Sheets and Slides. You really don’t need to pay for anything else to do the basics of your day to day.
Prices from: £4.14 per user, per month.
Zoom
Video conferencing Apps is a very crowded marketplace so it’s definitely worth doing some homework to see which App is most suitable for your use. Over the years I’ve used everything from Cisco Webex Meetings, Zoom, GoToMeeting, Skype, Google Hangouts and Blue Jeans and they all have their pros and cons. I’m currently using Zoom and find the video conferencing and group collaboration features exactly what I need to communicate effectively with my clients based around the UK and Europe.
Prices from: Zoom offers a free plan. Paid plans start from £11.99 per month, per host.
Now that we’ve nailed down some Apps to help you stay in contact with your team, the next set of Apps will help you manage your time and activity efficiently.
Trello
If you're not already using Trello, where have you been?! It’s an App that is constantly left on my Mac. It’s user-friendly dashboard style task management platform allows you to create boards for every client or project you’re working on and assign yourself or your team tasks to complete in priority order with notes, due dates and so on. If you're a planner, why not try using it to outline your social media posts for the week or for your monthly email campaigns, templates are really simple to create!
Prices from: Free plan available. Paid plans start from $9.99 per month, per user.
Basecamp
I was first introduced to Basecamp in 2014 and at that time the company I was working with was trying to move away from a very heavy email culture (receiving over a 100 emails a day was seen as the norm). Basecamp was introduced to save people time from reading endless amounts of emails everyday and move towards collaborating effectively on projects within departments or even wider organisational structures. Similar to Slack’s channels, you can create boards with a wealth of options available from uploading documents, a messaging facility plus a group chat, to do lists and schedules for the board participants.
Prices from: Free plan available. Paid plan is $99 per month, flat rate.
This next App is one I encourage all of my clients to sign up to!
LastPass
When we’re working in teams to contribute on social media channels or collaborating on projects in various softwares it can be so easy to share passwords through insecure means. This tool will essentially become your vault of passwords that only you can access and decide on who to share any passwords with in a secure manner. Definitely one to check out and doesn’t have to be just for business!
Prices from: Free plan available. Paid plans start from £2.30 per month, per user.
This is a pretty uncommon App amongst lists that are shared online but if you have any repetitive tasks like copying and pasting, this is THE tool to have.
CopyClip
How many times have you copied something you need to send on, but before doing so you’ve copied something else and lost the information you needed? I probably do this on a daily basis and found this gem of an App that records my latest history that I’ve copied so that I can recover it when needed.
Prices from: Free on Mac App Store.
Thanks for reading and if you’ve got any great Apps that you’d like to share with me, head over to my Facebook page and let me know.
*This is not a paid advertisement for any of the Apps listed above nor are any of the links an affiliation. Prices were as of 14.04.2020.
