In addition to the creative work we do helping businesses with their digital and design needs, we also spend a good percentage of our time training our clients and helping them integrate new technology solutions into their businesses day to day for remote working and collaboration.
It would seem – with current affairs being what they are – that businesses of all shapes and sizes are going to need to start utilising all sorts of different tools to help them continue to do their work over the coming weeks and months as disruption looks like it will lead to an increase in home and remote working.
With that in mind, we have rounded up a list of some of our favourite tools for collaborating and working with clients remotely that you might want to take advantage of and start making use of over the coming weeks and months. All of these tools are ones that we regularly recommend and implement with our clients and we hope might be of use. Please feel free to contact us if we can help you to roll these solutions out and future-proof your business over the coming months…
- Whereby: Whereby is a really useful video conferencing app that is free to use on its entry level. The platform runs from within Chrome or Firefox (within laptops or desktops) or from the dedicated IOS and Android apps available and allows user to create virtual ROOMS instantly with no need for account sign up. Simply share the room name with the person at the other end and users can quickly set up video conferencing for up to 4 members. The paid level of the software allows for additional features such as up to 12 members for larger teams, screensharing and screen recording as well. Get started and find out more at whereby.com
- Asana: Asana is a really useful project management tool that we have used to co-ordinate with clients all over the world. In Asana, you are able to create specific project groups with invited members. Projects can then be mapped across calendars with tasks being assigned and monitored, notifications and reminders being sent out and easy collaboration using an interface fairly similar to that of Linkedin. With Asana, you can map out each step of a projects completion and its really easy for staff to collaborate and complete projects remotely with additional features like file storage and even reusable templates for project plans. All told – even on the free level, this is a really powerful project management tool that offers a number of interactions with other software as well for complete transparency and up to date information. Find out more at asana.com
- Google Suite: So many businesses are already taking advantage of the Google suite of tools but if you aren’t now is the time! In addition to the free software available to create and manage files through Google Docs, there are a range of other tools available for you including Google Hangouts for collaborating and conversing with team members,Calendar for keeping teams organised and Google Drive for cloud based storage. Be sure to head to Google now and sign up for your account now to start making the most of some of these tools.
- Tawk: Tawk is more of a tool for communicating with your customers than collaborating and communicating internally but its one that could potentially come into its own over the coming months if businesses don’t have staff in offices to man phones or are looking to maintain contact with users during retail shutdowns. Tawk is a fantastic piece of software that offers FREE live chat to businesses looking to integrate it into their website. The software is incredibly straightforward to setup and operate and even comes with a great little app to answer live queries from your mobile phone handset. As well as being a great new channel of communication for businesses, its also a great way of driving up enquiries from your existing website visitors as well. The system integrates with loads of different website content management systems – find out more at Tawk.to
We hope that some of these tools prove to be of some use – if any businesses out there would like to talk to us about how they could introduce these tools to try and facilitate remote working for workers and hopefully combat some of the disruption to business please be sure to get in touch with us today – we will be more than happy to assist you!