1851

<p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">There&#8217;s good news and there&#8217;s bad news when it comes to running your own business. </p>    <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">The bad news is that it requires a lot of detail-oriented drudgery to properly manage just about every aspect of your company&#8217;s day-to-day operations. </p>    <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">The good news is that there&#8217;s a wealth of cloud-based software and apps to help you stay on top and keep your business running smoothly. And the best part? They&#8217;re all free. </p>    <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Here are 10 tools that can make running your franchise a little bit easier. </p>    <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><strong>Wave</strong></p>  <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">More than one million business owners trust <a href="https://www.waveapps.com/accounting/?utm_source=1851franchise.com&utm_medium=article&utm_campaign=top-10-free-business-tools-franchisees-will-love-5262" target="_blank" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"><span style="&quot;Times New Roman&quot;;Arial; color:windowtext;none windowtext 1.0pt;none windowtext 0in; 0in;none;">Wave</span></a> to track more than $60 billion in income and spending. Wave&#8217;s app suite includes solutions for invoicing, accounting, payroll and payments. It&#8217;s no surprise that their accounting tools are top performers: the accounting app is 100 percent free for entrepreneurs, freelancers and small businesses with nine employees or less.</p>  <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Wave eliminates the need for manual entry; simply connect Wave to your bank account, PayPal account, or other sources of data. Transactions automatically appear in the accounting list. Quickly generate professional reports including balance sheets and sale tax reports. And since Wave&#8217;s tools work seamlessly together, Wave&#8217;s small business payroll with automatically sync with accounting.</p>    <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><strong>Zenefits</strong></p>  <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><a href="https://www.zenefits.com/?utm_source=1851franchise.com&utm_medium=article&utm_campaign=top-10-free-business-tools-franchisees-will-love-5262" target="_blank" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"><span style="&quot;Times New Roman&quot;;Arial; color:windowtext;none windowtext 1.0pt;none windowtext 0in; 0in;none;">Zenefits</span></a> is an all-in-one free, cloud-based software platform that gives your team a single place to manage all HR needs, including benefits, compliance, and payroll. Keep your existing insurance plans, pricing, and carriers, or set up new benefits include FSA, HRA and commuter options in just minutes.</p>  <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Manage workers&#8217; comp and COBRA compliance, safeguard your business with property and casualty insurance and manage retirement plan benefits including matching 401K contributions. Zenefits puts all your benefits together, online and automated, making life easier for you and your employees.</p>    <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><strong>Wrike</strong></p>  <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><a href="https://www.wrike.com/?utm_source=1851franchise.com&utm_medium=article&utm_campaign=top-10-free-business-tools-franchisees-will-love-5262" target="_blank" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"><span style="&quot;Times New Roman&quot;;Arial; color:windowtext;none windowtext 1.0pt;none windowtext 0in; 0in;none;">Wrike</span></a> takes small businesses beyond traditional task and project management with a suite of features that makes team collaboration a piece of cake. Wrike combines project management with a real-time workspace for dynamic discussion and document sharing. Stay on track with a birds-eye-view of your team&#8217;s workload and deadlines. Set priorities and align your team members to work smarter (not harder)&#8212;whether they&#8217;re in the next cubicle or three time zones away.</p>  <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Improve planning by tracking projects and ad hoc assignments all from one place. Even better, Wrike&#8217;s collaboration tools streamline communication and take project accountability to the next level so opportunities don&#8217;t slip through the cracks. </p>    <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><strong>Toggl</strong></p>  <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Let&#8217;s face it: tracking billable hours can be a real pain, especially when you hop from one project to the next. With <a href="https://www.toggl.com/?utm_source=1851franchise.com&utm_medium=article&utm_campaign=top-10-free-business-tools-franchisees-will-love-5262" target="_blank" rel="nofollow"><span style="&quot;Times New Roman&quot;;Arial;color:windowtext;none windowtext 1.0pt;none windowtext 0in;0in;none;">Toggl</span></a>, you&#8217;ll get one-click time tracking so you never lose a minute of billable time. Organize time by projects or tags, color code projects for easy visual time tracking, set billable rates for different hours, and instantly get an overview of weekly/monthly productivity with the dashboard. Toggl was built specifically for project teams, so you at one glance you can quickly get an overview of your team&#8217;s performance. </p>    <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><strong>Hootsuite</strong></p>  <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">An oldie but a goodie, <a href="https://hootsuite.com/?utm_source=1851franchise.com&utm_medium=article&utm_campaign=top-10-free-business-tools-franchisees-will-love-5262" target="_blank" rel="nofollow"><span style="&quot;Times New Roman&quot;;Arial;color:windowtext;none windowtext 1.0pt;none windowtext 0in;0in;none;">Hootsuite</span></a> is a must for simplified social media management. Manage social networks, schedule messages, interact with your followers, and measure social media marketing ROI directly from a single dashboard. I&#8217;ve long been a fan of Hootsuite Pro, which is built specifically for small and medium businesses. Manage up to 100 social profiles and keep tabs on your efforts with up to 10 enhanced analytics reports so you know what to tweak for better performance.</p><div><span style="color: windowtext;  "><strong>Groove</strong></span></div><div style="">&nbsp;</div><div style=""><span style="  background-color: white;">Poor customer support can typically be attributed to a business being unorganized. Letting a single support email fall under the radar can lead to upset customers and even unfavorable online reviews. Groove is free software that is extremely simple to use and has all the features you need to stay on top of your customer service tickets. Groove allows you to easily morph your existing email into a professional customer service help desk. This not only keeps you organized, but also makes your business look more professional. Additional features include social media, live chat, phone and SMS integration, allowing you to handle everything customer service related in one easy to manage tool.</span></div><div>&nbsp;</div><div><span style="color: windowtext;   background-color: white;"><strong>Due</strong></span></div><div>&nbsp;</div><div><span style=" ">Due is a free tool for entrepreneurs, providing an end-to-end solution for billing and payments. Helping to speed payment and increase cash flow, Due&#8217;s suite of features includes time tracking and an overview of projects, clients and staff, which helps to create a better understanding of productivity and identify areas for improvement. Due</span><span style="background-color: white;"> </span><span style=" ">also offers customized and branded online invoicing templates and tools to provide a fast, accurate and convenient way to send and receive bills and payment options that include PayPal integration, ACH, eCash transactions, a digital wallet and domestic and international credit card processing.</span></div><div>&nbsp;</div><div><span style="color: windowtext;   background-color: white;"><strong>Slack</strong></span></div><div>&nbsp;</div><div><span style="  background-color: white;">There are plenty of team chat solutions, but where Slack really stands out is its ability to sort and store conversations in separate channels</span><span style="  background-color: white;">&#8212;</span><span style="  background-color: white;">this allows you to quickly find them at a later date without having to sort through chat logs. What&#8217;s the best way to really understand how awesome Slack is? Try it. You really need to dive in and experience it for yourself to see how it can greatly improve your productivity and team communication.</span></div><div>&nbsp;</div><div><span style="color: windowtext;   background-color: white;"><strong>Dropbox</strong></span></div><div>&nbsp;</div><div><span style=" ">Dropbox</span><span style="background-color: white;"> </span><span style=" ">allows you and your team to access files on any device&#8212;desktop, laptop, mobile, tablet, etc.&#8212;from any location and share them with anyone you choose. When you are able to make even the smallest tasks as simple as possible, such as accessing documents and files, it eliminates a lot of wasted time. If you aren&#8217;t already taking advantage of Dropbox&#8217;s free plan, which gives you 2GB of storage space, you&#8217;re missing out.</span></div><div>&nbsp;</div><div><span style="color: windowtext;   background-color: white;"><strong>ZOHO Projects</strong></span></div><div>&nbsp;</div><div><span style=" ">Projects</span> <span style=" ">is just one of the many cloud-based tools offered by ZOHO. It allows teams to easily collaborate and create a more efficient working environment, resulting in tasks being completed faster.</span></div>  <p style=" background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: white; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><span style="minor-latin;minor-latin;Arial">The free option is feature packed, allowing you to organize projects, assign tasks and set priority levels to specific tasks. The reporting feature is on par with most project management tools and there are plenty of integration options, including Dropbox and Google Apps.</span> </p>

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