Companies are increasingly shifting towards the online trend. Most of their operations, including bookkeeping, are now being conducted online. The two main factors that have driven companies towards adopting the ‘paperless’ office trend are environmental concerns and low setup costs encountered when going virtual.
However, the biggest obstacle to overcome when running a virtual company is efficiently managing remote teams. Michael Watkins of Harvard Business Review states, “Communication on virtual teams is often less frequent and is always less rich than face-to-face interaction, which provides more contextual cues and information about emotional states — such as engagement or lack thereof. The only way to avoid the pitfalls is to be extremely clear and disciplined about how the team will communicate.”
Thanks to technological advancements, you can now effectively manage and communicate with your teams and ensure smooth work operations using several handy tools available online. Here, we have compiled a list of the best tools for keeping all your team members in sync when running a virtual company.
Google Applications for Business
Google Apps enable small business owners to manage their teams and collaborate remotely using Google Docs, Gmail, Calendar, and Chat. Business owners upgrade their email storage when getting a paid subscription to Google Apps. They can better manage contacts, improve security for their online data, and control multiple domains associated with one account and mobile access. Moreover, you can schedule meetings using Google Calendar and easily access documents through Gmail’s inbox-sharing feature.
Highrise
Highrise is an outstanding application that allows you to manage your contacts effectively. It offers smooth tracking of your business proposals and deals and will effectively organize your notes and emails. Moreover, you will receive a text or email when you need to follow up with a particular contact. So, it turns into your virtual secretary.
Highrise is an ideal choice if you are looking for a tool to help you track your conversations efficiently. The Productive Flourishing and Lift Off Retreat co-founder claims, “So much of our business is based upon real interactions with real people, and it’s hard to know who’s talking to whom sometimes. Highrise lets us keep track of conversations across the team using the tools we already use, rather than going to a dedicated CRM and sending emails from it.”
Yammer
Yammer is ‘the boss’ for connecting virtual teams to social media platforms. Giant corporations like 7-Eleven, Groupon, and eBay use Yammer to unite all their groups in different countries and keep them engaged. Engagement, however, does not mean it will not be suitable for small businesses, as Yammer offers a free general subscription while the advanced features come at a small price of around $5 per month.
Yammer comprises the following features:
- Creation of profiles
- Private Messaging
- Creation of groups
- Microblogging
- Enhanced Security for Online Data
The Director of Communications at LauraRoeder.com, Sarah Burns, states, “LauraRoeder.com is a completely virtual company with team members working around the globe. With Yammer, we instantly all know what is going on, what we are working on, what is finished, and what needs to happen next. It is our internal status update tool. Best of all, it is very much like one of our favorite social media tools, Twitter, so it’s familiar and easy to use.”
GoToMeeting
If you manage virtual teams and need to meet them frequently to communicate ideas, have tutorials, or conduct training sessions, GoToMeeting will be the perfect choice for your company. GoToMeeting allows you to organize online meetings of up to 15 people simultaneously. You can share applications with your contacts in real time using the web conferencing tools it offers and can save those sessions to view later.
The co-founder of Meylah (a social platform for users to showcase their creativity), Jason Dirks, relies extensively on GoToMeeting to arrange meetings. Jason says, “Our favorite tool that we use to manage our virtual team, other than Dropbox, is GoToMeeting. GoToMeeting allows us to connect and collaborate with our team anytime on the phone or computer.”
Dropbox
Dropbox is an essential tool for virtual companies to effectively manage and share their documents, photos, videos, and audio files with other team members. With the Dropbox application installed on your mobile phone, these files will remain with you wherever you go. Whether using your laptop, computer, iPad, or mobile phone, you can easily access all files – you need an internet connection.
Moreover, your Dropbox storage will be upgraded by getting a paid subscription, allowing you to store massive files without any restrictions. Tina Su, who manages the ‘Think Simple Now’ and ‘Work Awesome’ blogs, states, “I love Dropbox. It is free (for the first few gigs), quick to set up, easy to share, automatically backs up, and mounts like a hard drive. We use it to store and share documents, software codes, and resources like graphics.”
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