Businesses need useful, efficient and fun tools to create their magic.
Work is not always just about the user, because if the tool is easy to use, intuitive, and has an awesome user interface and experience, then the user’s job just got a whole lot easier.
My business could not run without these magic business tools.
Just a heads up this list includes some affiliate links.
But I honestly only recommend tools I have personally used & love.
ACTIVE CAMPAIGN
Impressive Email Automation & Marketing
ActiveCampaign gives you the email marketing, marketing automation, and CRM tools you need to create incredible customer experiences.
I use ActiveCampaign for my mail list as well as managing my downloadables and email sequences.
Adobe / Creative Cloud
Professional Design Tools & Community
Discover and express your creativity through photography, design, video, animation, web and mobile user experience and more with powerful tools to get the most from your creativity.
Apple
Awesome Devices.
Your either a Mac person or you’re not!
Personally I am, and have been for over 20 years.
I have heaps of their computers and devices and I love that they all connect seamlessly, are incredibly intuitive to use and look damn sexy!
BEAR
Write, style & organise notes & writing with ease
Bear is a beautiful, flexible writing app for crafting notes and prose.
I have the pro version so I can sync across my devices, however the free version is equally as useful.
BENDIGO BANK
Best. Bank. Ever.
I love that they are friendly, accessible and pro-active with my business banking. All incredibly important and essential features in my eyes, and they hit them bang on!
CLICKUP
Beautiful planner, tracker and workflow CRM
A beautiful and powerful CRM platform which I use to manage my workflow, jobs, and tasks as well as my goals, focus tasks, training and onboarding.
DROPBOX
Fantastic storage and file-transfer solution.
I pay for Dropbox Plus to give me the extra storage capabilities, which allows me to access my workfolders on any device, backup seamlessly, and give my customers a secure and accessible file-transfer option.
HARVEST
Time Keeping on Steroids.
With the ability to track time with different rates, and categories, easily go between different jobs, generate detailed invoices and integrate with ClickUp for a seamless project workflow, Harvest just works brilliantly for me.
ISTOCK PHOTO
Extensive Stock Image Library
An incredibly comprehensive range of royalty-free images, illustrations and videos to give amazing impact on all my creative projects.
MYOB
Accounting software even a designer can use!
I currently use Essentials, it is so easy to use and the dashboard looks great. It also has great automated features and my accountant has her own access which saves me so much time!
SPARK
Email management across devices
A really intelligent, attractive (and FREE) email program which prioritizes your email, reduces noise, has some great features and integrations and has been more stable than any default mail program, which is the kicker!
SUITCASE
Powerful font management program with style
As you can imagine, as a designer I have access to thousands of fonts, and if I had them all active at the same time my computer would probably crash. Amazing viewer options, auto-activation ability and super easy integration with Adobe and Google Fonts, mean Extensis Suitcase is my preferred font management program hand-down.
VENTRA IP
Aussie Website Hosting Provider
Great Australian website hosting provider, offering fantastic support, hosting plans and services. As a Melbourne-based, local business I am more than happy to support and recommend.
WACOM
Absolute bestest designer friend!
Only last on the list for alphabetical reasons, my Wacom is a life saver in so many ways. As a designer I find a natural tendency to like to handdraw much of my designs and edits, and the Wacom Cintiq screen I use allows me to draw right on my screen!!! Ah-may-zing!
