Whatever line of business you are pursuing at home there are software products available that can make every aspect of running your concern a little bit easier and far more efficient. Here are a few that you should definitely consider purchasing;
Microsoft Office: Almost an essential for any home based business. If you do not own it yet, or are considering an upgrade Office 2007 is well worth the investment. In addition to the standard offerings of the 2003 version – Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook – the 2007 version adds Publisher, which is an incredible desk top and web page publishing tool and Access, a powerful database application.
Quickbooks and Quicken – For those who want the most comprehensive control of their home based business QuickBooks is the way to go. In addition to invoicing, customer tracking and inventory control it also handles functions such as credit card processing and payroll. Quicken has less functionality but is a good basic tracking tool and many home businesses just do not need to pay for all the extra bells and whistles featured in Quickbooks.
Worktime – This is a great tool for both time and project management. It helps you keep an accurate record of the time you spend on each individual task during the day and provides analysis and reports to help you utilize your valuable time more efficiently.
Stamps.com – If you send out a good amount of physical ‘snail mail” in connection with your home based business this is a great help. You can print postage directly from your computer, saving a great deal of time running back and forth to the post office every time you need to mail a package and it integrates seamlessly with accounting programs like Quickbooks and Quicken.
Software is not cheap, so you may want to take advantage of a free trial to see how well a certain program works for you and your business before you buy. Free trials are available from the publishers for most of the programs mentioned in this post.
