There’s always an app for that — whether it’s the one that fits your needs or not is a whole other story! Generally speaking though, my three most used apps are must-haves for any business owner right out the gate!
All three of these apps are affordable and worth the subscription in the infancy of starting your business. Can you run your business without them? Yep!
But trust me, the time you save using them is MORE than worth it and is the first step in prioritizing your business efforts.
CANVA
Canva is the number one must-have application for a business owner. Though a free version does exist, the pro-plan is worth the extra money and really does offer a well rounded tool for designing and sustaining a professional business. Below are a few of my favorite features!
You can share your design (like a client wardrobe guide) as a read-only link (to show your friends your designs), as a template link (where other creatives can use your design to make their own), or a catalog link (where your clients can view the latest, most up-to-date information, in a polish way).
You can load your brand characteristics like colors, fonts, paragraph forms, etc — and you can load more than one brand!
You can download a PNG with a transparent background (like for your logo or watermark).
The mobile app is a breeze to edit on the move!
Literally thousands of high quality templates for anything you’ll ever need to design.
PLANOLY
Planoly is an app that allows you to schedule your posts ahead on multiple applications. Though a free version does exist, you’ll need to upgrade to be able to post different content to multiple social media accounts. My favorite features of Planoly follow.
Planoly analyzes your audience’s engagement times on each day which allows you to choose the very best time to schedule your post.
They make it easy to load several groups of hashtags for use in both captions & to post as the first comment under the post.
I can see what my Instagram grid will look like ahead of time!
You can schedule out carousel, reels, and also stories as well!
MILE IQ (or QUICKBOOKS)
If you aren’t already using Quickbooks to track your expenses, you’ll want to invest in MileIQ. Both of these apps will auto-track your drives, remind you to classify your drives, and send you reporting for end of the year taxes. Here are some notes you’ll want to consider on this.
MileIQ is notably better at tracking miles and making assumptions. It will load assumptions based off of frequent patterns — like when you always go to your office’s address you always classify it as work. However, it’s not SO much better that I can warrant paying for both, so I now use Quickbooks for mile tracking.
Try to classify your drives as often as possible! It’s easy for them to get away from you and you’re left overwhelmed trying to classify 284959392 drives from the year.
As you identify needs in your business, you’ll be investing in a ton of different apps. However, if you’re just starting out, you’re going to want to invest in these three right out the gate!