Six web tools to transform your start-up in 2012

Starting up a business is so exciting because you get the freedom to choose when and where you work.

Here are six web tools that allow you to stay in control of your business:

1. Google Apps

If you’ve ever wanted to access your email, calendar or documents while you’ve been away from your computer, you know how frustrating it is. With Google Apps you can access all your vital information via an internet connection. So you have total flexibility while you are travelling or simply on your iPad or iPhone.

2. Eventbrite

Teaching sells, so why not run an educational event for your clients or prospective clients? Eventbrite makes it really easy for you to set up online ticket sales and you only get charged a small fee whenever you actually sell tickets. You don’t even need to have a website, but if you do it integrates smoothly.

3. PayPal

If you need an easy way to accepts credit card payments online, look no further than PayPal. All money can easily be transferred into your everyday business account at the click of a button too.

4. Skype

If you’ve got clients, staff or suppliers in a different location to you, it’s now easy and free to get face time with them. Skype lets you make free video calls to people anywhere in the world.

5. Dropbox

Do you need to send files that are too big to attach to an email? Dropbox is a free tool that lets you upload large documents (over 10MB) and then send an email link to whoever needs to download the file.

6. Carbonite

What would happen if you lost everything on your computer? It’s a terrifying thought. Carbonite eliminates this risk by automatically backing everything to the cloud. So all your files can easily be restored should anything happen to your computer.

I use all these tools in my business and I hope you find them useful too.