Our top 5 free business tools for startups

Setting up a new business can be full of outgoings, not least all the coffees fuelling you as you bring your business to market! It’s a delicate balance between getting the right tools for the job that make your life easy and create slick processes that impress your clients, while keeping costs down. 

Most of our recommended tools start with a free basic plan, and can be scaled with more features on paid plans as your business grows. So you won’t have to worry about introducing new systems and processes as you develop; you’re already set up for success.

It’s Small Business Saturday this weekend, so here are our top 5 free tools for a start up business:

Calendly

A scheduling tool that you can link to your Google account, Calendly means you can avoid back and forth emails arranging calls, and instead just send a link with your availability already programmed in. The meeting will appear in your calendar with Google meet enabled and you’re good to go! 

Asana

Asana’s free plan has a range of features to help you and up to 15 team members be as organised as possible! A project management tool, you can assign tasks and deadlines to your team and track activity across your live projects, as well as integrate it with time trackers and up to 100 other apps.

LastPass

The personal plan allows you unlimited password autofill on one device, so your passwords are all kept securely and you never have to worry about forgetting your Fort Knox worthy keys. You can share your passwords with your Virtual Assistant when you’re ready to start growing the business and need an extra set of hands to help out.

MailChimp

The basic Mailchimp plan allows for 500 contacts which will more than cover your nascent contacts list as a start up business. With 2500 available emails a month, you’ll be able to send your marketing emails on personalised and easy to build, branded templates. It even has basic analytics, so you can see who your active and engaged audience is and tailor your content accordingly.

HelloSign

Nothing is more reassuring to a new client than a tight contract and signature process. With HelloSign you can request signatures on 3 contracts a month, with reminders and notifications to nudge anyone still to complete and PDFs available to all signatories as soon as the contract is sealed.
Let us know if you think we’ve missed a great free tool that you’d like to share! And if you’re at the point where you can take on some help, contact Caroline to be matched with your perfect Virtual Assistant.