It’s probably the dream of many: To run your own business and be able to do so from anywhere on the planet – whether it be cruising down the Saint-Martin in Paris or becoming the Master of your kingdom during the War of The Ring (read: Work at home during the pandemic.) The only trouble that comes with such a venture is the HOW?
How can you run a business while without being physically located in a particular place?
Cloud-based solutions are of course the answer. Whether it be managing relationships with your customers, accounting, marketing, content management and targeting, and getting important legally-binding documents signed when closing big deals while on the road.
*Note that most of the software mentioned below offer a 14 – 30 day free trial of their service before you have to lay any money down.
G Suite
You needn’t have to scour the web to find all the individual elements that G Suite can offer your business. You get personalized email @ yourcompany.com, ad-free email, 30 GB of “protected” storage that can easily be expanded as needed, integrations with Microsoft Office and many other third-party software vendors. Going with Google’s business solutions means you can check off a laundry list of needed software in one go.
G Suite offers top-notch collaboration, content and data management, device management, and data migration tools, along with strict user controls so only those you select have access to your sensitive data. Combine this with other necessary tools like Adwords, Analytics, Plus, Drive, Calendar, and various document creation and editing tools.
G Suite covers most of the bases for any small or medium-sized business.
SalesForce
SalesForce is hands-down, the most essential business software to have in your traveling toolkit. It’s a CRM with all the features you’ll ever need for running your business online. Their sales and service modules are second to none – including phone, email, and chat capabilities that can easily scale as your business grows.
Sales, service, marketing, team collaboration, full-spectrum analytics, scheduling, commerce, and a laundry list of proprietary apps and third-party integrations – and more! This software can grow and adapt on-the-fly, as you “fly” from one destination to the next managing and expanding your business!
Bookly
Bookly offers all the bookkeeping and invoicing functionality of all the big players out there, without the huge price tag. Invoicing, inventory, payroll, payment management, and more are all included. You can reconcile all your businesses accounts including yours and your employee’s bank accounts, credit cards and other bookkeeping data.
You’re in full control of who in the company has access to what data, making for the most efficient team collaboration capability with this app. Connect with any device and chat with your team via live chat or email. Bookly offers third-party support with time tracking, POS software, and inventory management systems.
Please note that Bookly is a WordPress plugin, so you need a WordPress-powered website to start benefiting from this app.
Yotpo
Yotpo is designed with the e-commerce businesses in mind. Using this e-commerce platform, you can create, deploy, manage, monitor, and automate virtually any online marketing plan you wish from the cloud. You name it and Yotpo can help you get it done and automate whatever marketing-related task you want: email marketing, analytics, social media, SEO, and mobile marketing.
This software really shines when it comes to managing a complex ecommerce platform, but is so streamlined that any webpreneur can use it too. Yotpo offers online widgets and review tools you can use to make posting reviews easy-peezy. It also integrates with several third party rating tools like Facebook, Twitter and Google Seller Ratings, allowing customers to leave reviews, questions, and comments that immediately appear in your inbox, websites and social media.
BrightInfo
I can barely express just how deeply I love this simple yet effective tool. BrightInfo doesn’t do dozens of tasks like the tools mentioned so far. What it does do is automate one content and lead-gen task very well.
BrightInfo runs seamlessly and anonymously in the background of your site, analyzing user habits and serving up the most relevant content related to their interests. This tool can triple engagement and double conversions – it’s like A/B testing on steroids!
Formstack Sign (Formerly InsureSign)
Last on this list of globetrotter essentials for entrepreneurs is a simple, yet indispensable tool for getting your documents digitally signed wherever your customers or business partners are located. Obviously, you want those digital signatures to be as legally binding as ink is to paper offline.
Formstack Sign allows for an unlimited number of signatures and features drag-and-drop signing for you and your recipients, converts all documents to a sign-able format, automatically backups of all files, and creates audit trails that are 100% legally binding. Free phone support is offered during setup and training.
Wherever and whenever…
Congratulations for being one of the few who dare to run their business wherever you are and whenever you want.
Whether the nature of your work forces you from one destination to the next, or you prefer to live your life on a permanent location funded by your business be it at home or at a vacation spot, the tools mentioned on this page will most likely check all the boxes when it comes to the most essential cloud-based software tools needed to run your business effectively.