Small Business Tools to Grow Your Business

Online Store

You can set up an online website in a matter of minutes. If you have a blog already set up, you can create a store in a matter of a few minutes. The store will be integrated into your site and will also open up as a type of overlay when your visitors click the button. There are stores that will offer a free trial, and there are many features that you can find with these stores to help make tracking and managing easier.

Press Releases

Writing a press release can inform the Internet world about your business and what your plans are. Many new businesses do these, and there are many places online where you can add them in order to be seen. These are great to inform your local community as well about your site and business.

Social Media

There are many social sites that are rapidly being used for expansion of businesses. You can create fan pages as well as bookmarks and share them with others. This is great for getting traffic in more ways than just the traditional ways. Social sites have become more and more popular over time, and there are many businesses looking into them and taking advantage of them.

Google Applications

Startup costs for getting an office outfitted with computing and networking equipment are high enough; let's not even get started on the software and maintenance expenses! This is why it pays to cut costs where you can, especially in the area of emailing, calendaring, and documentation. This is where Google applications enter the picture. You don't have to hire an IT staff just to set up, maintain, and host your company's mail servers. Google's domains applications can handle this quite efficiently, using your own business' URL!

If you're on a truly tight budget, go for the free version which includes just the basic email features, calendaring, Google documents, and Google sites. The Premier Edition will set you back $50 a year per user.

Small business tools can make or break your business, as no website can succeed by itself. You need to work at it and spend both time and eventually money in order to remain successful. No website succeeds without traffic and other essential marketing efforts, and even the best site won't succeed unless it's seen online. Apply these and other tools and see your business transform.