Useful apps & websites when working remotely

As a business owner you may already have mastered the art of working from home. But here is a quick reminder along with some recommendations of the apps available out there to help you stay organised when at home.

Note – We are not affiliated with the brands below, they are simply our helpful suggestions.

Digital storage

Whether you are a blogger, take client work or sell a product, you will have documents to store.  Now you can save them on your computer or laptop hard drive, but this slows everything down. The digital storage options are gradually replacing hard drives due to the speed, ease of access and affordability of them. Here are some of our recommendations to get you started.

Google Drive

If you have a free Gmail account, you can use Google Drive, or you can upgrade to G Suite which is around £6 a month.  This gives you a lot more storage and there is even a higher tier for £9 a month that gives you unlimited.  Lastly, features allow you to  share a file with a customer to work together on a project.

iCloud

Is more useful when working with a Mac computer and also having an iPhone as it lets you sync the two easily.  You get 5GB free with your Apple device and you can upgrade for a small amount –You can easily transfer files and images between devices, including accessing it from a desktop.

Dropbox

Dropbox is another digital storage option that has a reasonable free plan and upgrade options available.  Dropbox is easy to use and anyone can access this tool by connecting to the Internet. A major advantage of this app is you can access and work on files from Android or IOS.

Evernote

This it is a bit like a digital library to organise things.  It calls itself a note-taking app so you can use it to jot down notes, business and personal.  You can also create folders like Google Drive but also make notes and other features.  There is a feature that allows you to save articles .

LastPass

LastPass is a secure digital password storage app that is a lifesaver when it comes to remembering passwords. You have one central login password to remember along with your email address then all other passwords and usernames are stored in it. It is also handy to share passwords safely with clients or them with you – you can even set it up so they can log into a site but not actually see the password.

Read later app

There is  plenty of content out there and as you start to learn more about your area of business, you start to find stuff you want to save for later. Instead of having 50 windows open on your laptop.  That’s where read later apps come in.  One part of adjusting to working at home is learning when to switch off and these apps can let you store stuff to read later and resist the urge to do another half hour’s business reading before bed!

Pocket

Pocket is a simple and effective read later app which has a browser extension to easily save articles or blog posts.  You can add tags as well to later search by if you can’t remember the exact article. Also, when you start using it a bit more, it will even start making suggestions based on your chosen articles.  It has a good free plan or if you want to upgrade to add more features, it is either £3.95/month or £35.99/year. It also integrates with a few scheduling tools such as Buffer to help with curated content.

Reminder and calendar apps

Keeping a routine is one of the key parts of working from home. Scheduling reminders for webinars and calls during your busy life can help with this. There some good apps to assist organising working from home.

Todoist

Todoist is a to do list app and a task manager that is one of the top-rated apps of its kind.  It lets you create folders to store different types of tasks.  You can integrate it with your smartphone to easily add and view tasks and it is great if you want something simple and easy to use.  Most of the features are available for free and there is a premium level for £3 a month (billed annually) that includes things like templates and automatic reminders.

Wunderlist

Wunderlist is very similar to Todoist with a simple interface and ease of use.  You can create to do lists, add items with dates and other information on it and access it from your smartphone.  You can also share the list with other work members or family and even print or email a list.  It is also completely free !

Google Calendar

Like Google Drive, Google Calendar is an automatic feature with any Gmail account or G Suite upgrade.  And when it comes to a simple calendar to keep track of what’s happening to master how to make working from home work, you can’t go wrong.  You can create various calendars for home and work life, even for projects and more.  You can invite people, share appointments and integrate it with a ton of different apps to get more advanced features.

Getting stuff done apps

Digital organisation is one thing but what do you do to organise the other side of working from home – getting stuff done?  All of these apps above will help you get organised and that digital organisation will then prepare you for the actual work.

Asana

On there you can organise work into projects, add dates, sub-tasks and even add other people to it – then you can leave each other messages inside the tasks. We recommend this platform for collaboration work within your team. Most of the best Asana features  are free.  Their upgrade plan is a little complex as you have to add a minimum of 5 users, and it does add extra features.

Trello

Trello is a project management tool that works on a Kanban system, so you have boards with lists and cards on them for each thing you want to do.  Cards can have checklists, add images or files and even add other cards or boards to them.

Airtable

The final piece of my digital organisation puzzle is Airtable.  This is a brilliant tool that can be used for a range of tasks, but I primarily use it as a database. You can store blog post information, details about client work and also statistics for blogs.  It uses a system called Bases which can be list form, Kanban style, grids or even calendars.  There are extra features called Blocks which add more abilities under the paid plans, but I just use the free features currently.

We hope that you found something new or reminded yourself of new platforms to aid working from home. Don’t forget to check them out!

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