Top 5 Apps for More Efficient Collaboration in Business

This is a guest post by Steve Nicholls. Steve Nicholls is a leading social media strategist, author and international speaker who advises business executives on how to implement effective social media campaigns into their organizations. He has been featured as a social media expert in CNN, Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg BusinessWeek, BBC, Huffington Post, among others.  His website, Social Media for Business, is a great resource for anyone trying to learn how to leverage social media to aid in their business efforts.

Mobile apps are becoming an increasingly important, if not essential tool for enhancing collaboration between business partners. In this age of Internet revolution, mobile apps make it easier to exchange knowledge, share ideas, store information and work together as a team. They allow for cost-effective collaboration to take place across geographical boundaries and time zones, as well as while being on the move through the use of mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets. Whether you forgot to send a report to your colleague or need to make sure to receive an updated database before your meeting, you can coordinate work with others whenever you need, from wherever you are, quickly, efficiently and easily.

Below are 5 mobile applications – and extensions of their respective desktop applications – that provide increased efficiency in business collaboration:

• Elance: Freelance platforms like Elance are increasingly on the rise as the demand for outsourcing is increasing. Freelance platforms have facilitated collaboration greatly as companies can, today, easily find external resources whenever there is a lack of skills or resources at peak times or during one-off projects. Freelance platforms provide an excellent solution to answer these needs easily, quickly and efficiently. Elance is a platform where all kinds of freelancers can be found, from general to technical skills. The site makes it simple for employers to browse and find their ideal freelancer, as well as for freelancers to search for and locate suitable projects. Moreover, employer and freelancer can benefit from Elance’s guaranteed payment system; one that holds the payment agreed upon by both parties and releases it to the freelancer once both parties are satisfied.

• Zoho: with mobile apps, collaborators do not need to limit themselves to the four walls of their offices as collaboration can take place across physical boundaries. Zoho is a collaboration site designed to run business processes and manage information from anywhere, from within or outside the office. The platform offers a range of different applications such as invoicing, web conferring and project management tools. The application thus creates a more flexible collaboration experience by allowing information to be shared, work to be done, projects to be updated and other activities to be coordinated with collaborators from wherever you are and at anytime.

• Wrike: this is a project management platform that allows users to easily manage several projects with different collaborators from one single online workspace. Whichever subscription plan you choose, an unlimited number of projects can be included and managed. All projects can then be accessed, seen, coordinated and worked on from one single workspace. Tools like microblogging, real-time activity streams and instant email notifications allow users to be constantly updated across all projects. These tools also allow you to constantly inform your different teams of changes and updates. The platform also sends daily reminders to team members on tasks, deadlines, schedules and other important project aspects so that all collaborators can keep easily track of these. The platform can also be used to visualize a project’s progress via dynamic Gantt charts – an effective management tool.

• PBworks: this application is one of the several Do-It-Yourself Wiki Platforms available online. A real-time collaborative editing system, PBworks allows companies to create their own internal wikis in order to share information more easily, and manage projects more efficiently. By accumulating user-generated content, collaborators can thus develop an internal encyclopedia made up of information, feedback, documents,  presentations, spreadsheets, images, videos, PDF files, comments on meetings and many other pieces of content for daily use. Basic wikis can be created for free, and users need to upgrade to have access to more features such as increased storage space or enhances security features. Users have the choice to make their wikis either public, or private.

• Ning: this application is an example of Do-It-Yourself Social Networks. Just like Do-It-Yourself Wiki Platforms, Do-It-Yourself Social Networks allow users to create their own customized internal social network. This means that collaborators can interact altogether in this virtual space in real-time to get updates, share knowledge and coordinate work activities. Ning offers user-friendly tools to create a professional and complete internal social network so that even those who do not have much IT experience can easily work around it. Collaborators can choose what features they want in their social network according to their needs, including event organization tools, forum-building, chatting spaces, video-sharing and more. Do-It-Yourself Social Networks are a very good solution for collaborators looking to take advantage of the business benefits provided by social networks, but not wanting to use mainstream platforms like Facebook.

These 5 mobile apps are excellent avenues to achieve cost-effective and efficient ways to collaborate with other parties in your business. By facilitating collaboration, mobile apps thus contribute in developing increased high-performance teams, and thus an increased productive and profitable organization.