Bookkeeping:
It depends on whether you are asking about a software program for your own personal business use or for client use. If you are inquiring about a bookkeeping program for client use, I would hold off until you have a bookkeeping client and then use what your client prefers. If you are asking about software for you own VA business, then use whatever you are comfortable with. Mostly this program is just for your own reporting/tracking. If you have a website, there is a free program called FrontAccounting that you can install on the root of your website (even if you use a hosting company).
http://frontaccounting.com/wb3/ This is actually a good little bookkeeping program. It gives you access to your books online from anywhere. (Personally I do not like Freshbooks. It is very limited in functionality.)
Invoicing/Project Management/Collaboration:
I really like myIntervals (
http://www.myintervals.com/). It is like Basecamp but it has a much more robust time tracking and invoicing module. It is $20 / month. I have found this program to be the most suited to the VA industry. I find this program quite invaluable.
Electronic Signatures:
I like Echosign, but I do not see a need for you to spend money on this program right away. I have been a VA for a few years and I have never had the need for an electronic signature service for my internal business. (I use this program for one of my client's business needs, but they pay for the subscription and give me a user logon.) If a clients has a business that requires you to request electronic signatures from their clients then they should be paying for the service.
E-Fax:
An e-fax is useful but not necessary. You could just use an old fashion paper fax machine with a regular phone line to send and receive faxes from clients. There are several "paper" fax machine that connect to your computer and give you the ability to fax documents from your computer. However, if you want an e-fax I would recommend RingCentral. I use RingCentral for my business phone line and it includes e-fax capabilities. (
http://www.ringcentral.com/) Most of their plans are quite reasonable and you get a lot of features. (I do not like giving out my personal phone number /cell number to clients. I only use my VoIP business number with clients. I think it is a good idea to have a separate business number.)
Calendar:
I would suggest utilizing Google Calendars to sync with your clients. It is a free service and works quite well. (Set-up a free Google Apps account under your business name.) If your client does not wish to use Google, then you could check into OfficeCalendar (
https://www.officecalendar.com/Default.aspx). It is a paid service, but it connects/syncs Outlook calendars, email, contacts, tasks, etc. It runs $99 per year per user. (I usually pay for the annual subscription then bill my clients $11 per month per user.) If you do not have a static IP address then you may also need to use a service like TZO (
http://www.tzo.com/).
Online File Sharing:
I HIGHLY recommend Dropbox (
http://www.dropbox.com/). Dropbox is a free service (up to 2 GB). I use it with all my clients to share files and send information. I also use it with some of my bookkeeping clients to share access to accounting programs. (i.e., Both the client and myself have a copy of the accounting program installed on our local computers, then I place the database for the accounting program on Dropbox. With this set-up we can both access the same database without the need to set-up an expensive VPN.) Most anything you need to send or receive from a client can be scanned then placed in Dropbox.
Hope this helps.
Best of Luck,
Julie
Software Checklist for a Startup
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