Owning a small business and forging ahead as an entrepreneur in South Africa is no easy feat. From pitching your product and sourcing funding, to scaling up in a weak economy, it comes with its fair share of trials and tribulations. 

With so much to create, schedule, monitor and plan for, getting yourself organised, inspired and efficient can fall to the wayside. Apps are extremely useful for counteracting this, but there are thousands to choose from. Just skimming through your app store alone can make the process of finding the right one for your needs overwhelming, and force you to abandon your efforts.

As a small business owner, we understand that your time is limited and precious. That’s why we’ve done the research for you, and found the best apps for entrepreneurs to consider.

1. Spotify

While this platform originally made its name as a music streaming service, it is also home to a wealth of podcasts hosted by industry giants and experts. Split up by categories to help you find the right podcast you’re after, you can tap into hours worth of discussions, debates and hot topics from those you admire or would like to learn from. There’s even a business and technology category aimed at entrepreneurs and business owners.

Whether you’re struggling with motivation and inspiration, or not, Spotify plays host to a number of podcasts that are worth listening to in your car, during your gym session or even at home before your day starts to get you thinking and ideas flowing.

2. 1password 

The more tools and platforms you purchase to help scale your business, the more passwords and login credentials you have to remember, right? Wrong. Gone are the days of scribbling down a list of login details or clicking ‘forgot password’ for the umpteenth time. 

With 1password, you can sync and encrypt logins across multiple websites, and across multiple devices. You’ll never have to keep a mental note of all your passwords again.

3. Asana

Whether your team consists of 10 people, or 50 people, it can get tricky to manage everyone’s workflow when multiple things are happening at once. From delegation to task oversight, Asana allows you to create a project, plan the schedule and ensure everyone sticks to it. What’s even more handy is that it allows you to duplicate a project, and customise it. No need to create a brand new project every week or every month.

With remote work no longer a pipe dream for many businesses, apps like Asana come in handy when trying to understand how far your team is with certain tasks, without having to check up with them constantly on email.

4. Grammarly

If you haven’t seen the ads on YouTube by now, Grammarly is a tool that checks both your grammar and spelling in emails, documents and even social media posts. If you haven’t got the time or inclination to do these checks yourself, this tool is the perfect solution to make sure your writing is as professional and error-free as possible.

Not all of us are wordsmiths, and Grammarly is the ideal helper for those who struggle to get the message across and don’t have the time to have their work proofed and edited.

5. Pocket

Have you ever found yourself scrolling through social media or news sites, finding a list of interesting articles to read, but you never get to reading them? Or is your bookmark list on your laptop filled to its limit with must-reads from months ago? Finding the time to sit down and read all the industry insights or the latest trends you know you should, can seem almost impossible when you’re taking care of your day-to-day business needs.

In comes Pocket. This app lets you save all the content you’ve been meaning to read, or watch, in a simple interface, for you to access on any device when you have a moment to yourself. You can even listen to articles instead of reading them, for when you don’t have access to a screen.

Apps are there to make our lives easier, but often the choices can get overwhelming. From time-management, to creativity, we hope these considerations will help get you and your business on track.