Generally speaking, every business, regardless of the industry, would need apps that enable them to start and promote their business. And they don’t have to be expensive. In fact, many apps are free these days.
Of course, compared to the paid versions, free versions tend to have limited features. But something is better than nothing and often we don’t even need the features that are offered in the paid versions.
Below are 8 free, essential apps for any startups:
1. Graphic Design
Graphic design tools have become crucial for startups to help launch and promote their business.
Canva is one of the most popular, easy to use graphic design apps available for free. They have the paid version, but their free version is usually enough as the free version already offers a lot of design varieties and options.
PicsArt is also free and easy to use, especially to those who often work with their tablets or phones. Like Canva, PicsArt has the paid version, which is $8 per month, or if you want to save money, get the yearly subscription, which is $47.88 for unlimited access to everything they have.
2. Picture Editor
Basic functions like cropping, adding colours, adjusting the warmth, and adding a vignette to a picture can be done with Instagram. But if you want to remove a background, you’ll need Photoshop. But it costs AU$343 per year. What to do if you have a very limited budget?
The closest to Photoshop, yet free, is GIMP. It has similar functions to Photoshop and learning the basic is easy as there are numerous tutorial in Youtube. Logos by Nick is one of my favourites as his step by step instructions are very clear and easy to understand.
And if you mainly work on tablets or phones, PicsArt and Snapseed are the best free alternatives for editing pictures.
3. Video Editor
Video editing skill is always useful for any type of business to promote their product or service. While some video editors, like Vegas, cost around AU$159, there are free alternatives that are just as useful as Vegas Movie Studio, especially when what we need are just the basic things like cropping, trimming, cutting and joining videos with our own background music.
The best, easy to use free video editors are Openshot and Active Presenter. There are plenty of tutorials on Youtube how to use them.
4. Spelling and Grammar Checker
Before sending out a flyer, an email for potential clients, or even a simple post for your social media, you must check your spelling and grammar to maintain professionalism. The most popular one for spelling and grammar checker is Grammarly. This is actually my favourite. The second one is Google Docs. They have a built-in spelling and grammar checker under the ‘Tools’ function.
5. Spreadsheet
Spreadsheet has many functions for startups (and for everyone!). From scheduling activities, visualising numbers into charts and graphics, to the calculation of various data.
Microsoft Excel costs AU$159 for ONE computer. Google Sheet and LibreCalc are the best free alternatives when it comes to spreadsheet. I personally like Google Sheet because to me it works just like Excel BUT Google Sheet is better because anyone that I give access to, can read or even edit (depends on the level of the permission that I set) the spreadsheet at the same time no matter where they live.
6. Accounting Software
You may hate accounting but you may want to know the basics of accounting if you are starting a business.
Equip yourself with some basic knowledge like what expenses and revenues are, the differences between revenues and profits, what assets, liabilities and equities are, and how they are entered in the system, which in the end, make it easy for you to understand how to judge if your business is performing well by looking at the Profit and Loss report as well as the Balance Sheet.
Understanding basic accounting doesn’t just stop at looking at Profit and Loss but also useful for taxation should you need or want to do it yourself.
There are plenty of free accounting software these days. My favourite one is the Australian Free Accounting Software while a friend of mine likes the American ZipBooks.
7. Productivity Checklist
When you start a business, especially when you start by yourself, you’ll have tons of things to do and a never-ending task list.
Rather than handwriting and crossing the same task, again and again, every day, why not do it electronically. Roubit is one of the best free tools to help manage routines. You just put all your tasks in the list, when you’re done with one,
8. Note Taker
This Note taking is particularly useful when an idea suddenly pops up in the middle of non-business activities.
Rather than bringing a notepad and a book wherever you go, why not take notes digitally with your mobile phones.
Two of the most famous, free digital note taking apps are Microsoft OneNote and Google Keep.
