Can You Run Your Entire Business From A Smartphone?

Smartphones have definitely changed the way we run businesses today. Whether your company is part of the Information Technology field, or nestled within another niche, chances are your employees use their phones for a great deal of their work. In fact some executives today argue that you can even run your entire business from your smartphone. Though many managers report that the improvements have not brought us all the way to a “laptop-less” business model, we are certainly getting close. Using new applications and technology available at a very low price or even for free, you can use your smartphone to do everything from signing documents to authorizing payments - keeping control of your business while on the move.

Changing Smartphone Technology: New Opportunities for Businesses

In the last three years, we have witnessed an incredible expansion within the field of smartphone technology. With better speed, clearer visuals, and better encryption technologies, business owners have begun to enjoy the conveniences of doing work on a smartphone that before could only be done on a desktop or laptop computer. Consider the new high-quality applications that allow you to process word documents right from your smartphone. Now that touch screen keyboards on smartphones are far more comfortable to use, editing a document on the fly is a breeze, done in a matter of seconds whether or not you are in the office. Smartphone document sharing technologies - from the simple password-protected documents in your Google Drive to heavily-encrypted confidential documents - can be just as secure and effective as the programs you use on your personal computer. Applications are even available to allow you to officially sign documents with a few taps and the swipe of your signature - helping to eliminate some of the “analog” tasks that eat up your office time.

Keeping In Touch With Employees and Clients: Accessibility On the Go

Though a smartphone is already equipped for instant messaging and calling between employees and clients, today’s business world calls for increased communication methods beyond the built-in technologies that come standard with the phone. New applications have exponentially augmented the modes of communication, and many of them are available for free, such as Skype, What’s App, and Google Hangouts. At the same time, engineers behind smartphones such as iPhones and Blackberries have picked up on the need for instant communication between users, and have implemented programs that allow for free back-and-forth messaging between users to promote brand loyalty. Using products such as Google Voice and Skype, you can even use different numbers for personal and business reasons and have them redirected to your smartphone through different channels, such that you can keep your communications separate and organized. Ensuring that all company employees are using the same smartphone make and model for business purposes, you will be able to determine which applications and methods are most efficient for your team to use.

Drowning in Data: Simple Solutions for Your Smartphone

Though it is certainly helpful to obtain new information on one’s cell phone, it is a huge benefit to be able to organize and visualize that information right on a smartphone screen, helping employees to make accurate decisions while on the go or away from the computer. This is where fantastic applications that aggregate and simplify your company’s up-to-the-minute statistics can be incredibly useful. Infographics, visuals, and charts are fantastic for simplifying big data into a concise, accurate representation of the qualitative and quantitative aspects of a business, and smartphone technology allows for easy updating with the click of a refresh button. Removing the need to wait for a statistician to analyze and make visible the data for you, your smartphone can automatically perform these functions in ways that are logical and easy to interpret--even on the small smartphone screen.

 

Author Bio:

This is a guest post by freelance business and tech writer Jeremie Brenton from MD, USA who shares his advice on various blogs.