Redundant tasks abound in work life, no matter the industry or specific nature of your business. However, there are many resources available to minimize the impact of these redundancies on your daily operations and protect your team’s productivity and, ultimately, your business’s profitability.
Digital workflow management tools are one such resource. They can facilitate more efficient work and keep your team aware of how their efforts fit into the big picture of your business goals.
Let’s review why key processes should be in place before you decide to adopt new software, then take a look at the best workflow management tools for business users in various functions.
Before deciding on a specific platform, it’s best to have a deep understanding of the business processes your team engages in regularly and whether they require simple or complex workflows.
Even if you haven’t identified them as such, nearly every process your team takes part in can be represented in workflow form. For example:
You could lose out on major opportunities to connect essential stages of your client’s journey from prospect to payment if you silo these single actions. Deciding how best to connect them in your business before you add workflow management software to the mix is critical.
If you need to start from scratch in developing business processes, TechTarget recommends following eight essential steps:
Workflow management software can help with the execution steps, replacing manual processes and offering new, more efficient ways to complete tasks. Below, we’ll dive into the best workflow management tools for some of the core business functions in professional services: sales, project management, billing and overall client work.
Sales is a department that can benefit tremendously from tightening up workflows. It’s especially important for busy sales teams to automate repetitive processes so they can focus on fully engaging with prospects.
Here are three popular, effective platforms that can help.
HubSpot CRM is a pipeline management tool that provides real-time visibility into your firm’s sales pipeline. The free tier offers additional tools to assist sales, along with marketing, customer service and operations professionals. HubSpot CRM is well-known for helping business owners and their teams nurture existing client relationships.
Salesforce is a web-based CRM solution that helps companies manage their customers, partners and employees. The platform has multiple pricing levels and features that can scale to enterprise level, making it a great choice for rapidly growing service firms that need a solution to expand to meet their needs.
Zoho CRM is a platform built to help businesses of all sizes manage customer relationships. It equips companies with the quality customer data they need to develop longer-term relationships and build sustainable revenue. Zoho has a number of features that help sales representatives engage with leads and predict revenue from upcoming deals.
Top 3 Tips for Making the Most of a Workflow Tool for Sales
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If your team has already mapped out workflows and primarily requires a task management and team collaboration solution to help simplify the project management stage, the three platforms below may work well. They provide advanced task organization and broad visibility, plus mobile apps for teams that need to work with clients in the field.
Asana is a work management platform built to help teams organize, assign and track projects. Featuring templates, automation and reporting tools, Asana helps teams manage task lists, collaborate across projects and improve visibility into project progress.
ClickUp is a productivity platform that helps professional services teams plan, organize and collaborate on work using tasks, Docs, Chat, Goals, Whiteboards and more. The customizable platform can fit the needs of teams of all types and sizes.
READ NEXT: Accelo vs. ClickUp
Smartsheet is a more powerful, intuitive version of an Excel spreadsheet. The platform has built-in project management tools like Gantt charts, file sharing and collaborative features that are popular among project managers at small businesses and enterprise organizations alike.
No-code automations support custom workflows
Charts with percentage readouts to track goals
Top 3 Tips for Effective Use of Workflow Tools for Project Management
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Another key function of your business that stands to benefit from better workflows is billing. While many accounting software platforms include billing functionality, they may not sufficiently allow for workflow optimization. The platforms below are not exclusive to billing, but offer the option to connect billing to other parts of your service business.
BigTime is a professional services automation (PSA) software that offers project management, time tracking, billing and more for accounting and consulting firms, creative agencies, IT providers and other professional services businesses. This platform was built to connect teams and offer company-wide visibility and detailed reporting in a modern user interface.
READ NEXT: Accelo vs. BigTime
Sage Intacct is a cloud-based accounting software with planning and finance-related workflow automation tools to streamline business processes. The platform helps businesses manage projects, resources and budgets and increase visibility.
SubscriptionFlow is a revenue management platform designed to optimize subscription management for a variety of industries, including service-based businesses. It supports various billing types, including flat-fee and usage-based. Billing can be automated, saving service businesses from spending time on redundant invoicing tasks, and customers can use the client portal to make payments.
Top 3 Tips for Using Workflow Automation Software for Billing and Invoicing
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While you could go with one of the above nine platforms for managing workflows in a particular facet of your business, we find it’s often a wiser choice for service businesses to use one centralized platform that can set up and attach workflows in sales, project management, billing, ticketing and more.
How do we know? See how one tax consultancy increased its profits by 93% after consolidating its workflows with Accelo.
Accelo is a cloud-based client work management platform that combines all of the above areas that require workflow management: sales, project management and billing, plus additional products for ticketing, reports and retainer management. Designed to help professional services firms, including agencies of all sizes, Accelo gives your team the power to manage client relationships from prospect to payment in one unified space. This powerful tool provides customizable workflow management solutions across all stages of the client journey to expand visibility, improve collaboration and increase profits.
Setting up a custom event-based trigger in Accelo
Start a free trial or schedule a demo to see how Accelo could be the workflow management software you’ve been searching for.
Hive is a productivity tool that helps teams manage projects and processes with flexible project layouts, native email, resourcing, group messaging and file sharing. Specifically made with hybrid and remote teams in mind, the platform supports collaborative work with communication tools like video chats and shareable notes.
Automatic and manual time tracking and timesheet reporting
Custom action statuses to help users track progress and urgency levels
Goals tracking helps teams set, track and monitor team and organization goals
Custom project and action templates to simplify recurring work
A free version is available for individual users
A library of pre-built workflows are available to customize
Some users share that the platform can be slow at times
Other users claim they need more detailed analytics
READ NEXT: Accelo vs. Hive
Kintone is a work management platform with a customizable, drag-and-drop interface. It provides data management, project management, CRM and recruitment solutions for various industries. Kintone is a viable option for small businesses or non-profits that need to track customer data and manage basic projects.
Workflow management
No-code automation
Inventory management
CRM database
Top 3 Tips for Maximizing Efficiency With Software for Custom Workflows
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There are certain types of workflows that apply to many businesses, but there will be some nuances that apply to your industry or business alone. No matter which workflow software you choose, be sure to check out the wide range of integrations and templates available to verify whether you can achieve exactly what you want.
Ready to experiment with what could be possible if your team were to perfect workflow management?
Accelo helps agencies, consultancies, IT businesses, accounting firms and other professional services businesses set up custom automations to save time, maximize efficiency and boost profitability. Try it out via a free trial or click below to set up a demo.