5 Little-Known iPhone and iPad Apps for Startups
Mobile tools for all of your administrative tasks from invoicing to shipping.
By Cynthia Boris • Nov 2, 2012
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Being a small business owner can be like playing in a one-man band. Accounting, shipping, sales and administrative tasks all fall on you. With this in mind, Apple has put together a collection of apps designed to help any new business owner work faster and more efficiently.
Here's a look at five new or recently updated iOS apps that you might have missed:
1. Invoice2Go: This app helps you create invoices and estimates on your iPhone or iPad. You can create a master list of regular billable items, or use the Receipts2go plugin to bill for client-specific supplies. Completed invoices can be emailed or printed right from the app.
Invoice2Go also has a reporting tool that lays out your financial situation at a glance. You can create three invoices for free. Paid plans start at $24.99 a year for up to 100 invoices.
Related: 4 Simple iPhone Apps for Creating and Editing Documents
2. Docusign Ink: Eliminate printing and scanning with this app, which lets you sign all kinds of documents electronically. Import documents from a cloud drive or take a picture with your device's camera. Docusign Ink converts the document so you can drag your pre-set signature into place. Then save and send.
Need a client to sign off on a work order, sale or contract? You can use Docusign Ink to request a signature by email or have clients sign off digitally in person. You can sign unlimited documents for free, but there is a limit of five additional signatories before you'll be asked to purchase a yearly plan starting at $15 a month.
Doucsign Ink is also available on Android.
3. Bento 4 for iPad: This personal database app was recently redesigned for the iPad making it even easier to organize and present data. What makes Bento 4 different from the average spreadsheet tool is that it allows you to combine your tables with text fields and images by simply dragging and dropping boxes on to one of 40 free templates.
Use Bento 4 to create a product catalog for sales meetings, to manage multi-step projects or build a detailed contact list. The iPad app costs $9.99 and syncs with Bento's desktop software for the Mac.
4. Concur: This app is an organizational tool for frequent travelers. Use it to book hotel rooms, check airline reservations and manage your itinerary. Once you're on the move, use Concur to track your expenses as they occur. You can type information by hand, scan receipts or use e-receipts to add data. At the end of your trip, Concur combines all of the information into a finished expense report. Also available on Android, the app is free for iPhone and iPad but you'll need to link it to a desktop Concur account. Subscriptions start at $8 per person, per month.
5. Delivery Status Touch: If you send or receive a lot of packages each month, Delivery Status Touch can help keep track of them.
For $4.99, the app works with the major delivery services and pulls information automatically from Amazon, Apple and Google Checkout. Once you input a package, it gets added to the home screen. From there, you can see the progress of every item -- coming or going.
