Fact: the IT budgets of almost half of the companies surveyed by Spiceworks will grow in 2020. This trend will likely be further boosted since many businesses faced new challenges this year. Whether it’s a switch from in-office to remote work or struggling to stay profitable, organizations are looking at ways to adapt to the new reality.
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Fortunately, the landscape of tools available for different types of companies is growing as well. Whatever is your challenge, it’s true that “there’s an app for that”. We’ve decided to compile a list of apps that will be especially helpful for digital agencies, as this is the type of business many of our clients run.
In this blog post, we’ll list over forty apps for digital agencies. Some of them have been specifically designed for creative agencies. Others have multiple use cases, but digital teams appreciate how they simplify their work.
From full-service companies to creative boutiques, agencies come in different shapes and sizes. For our list, we tried to come up with software categories that are useful for most digital agencies. This is why you won’t find very specialized classes, e.g., font creation software or apps for bug tracking. As long as your team works on digital projects, you’re likely to find most of these tools helpful.
Keeping track of projects may easily prove challenging and overwhelming, especially if your team is working on multiple projects at a time. These apps will help you deliver projects on time and save your employees a lot of hassle. Some of them do have Gantt charts, and some of them don’t. Some of them are progress trackings, task dependencies, invoice management, or file-sharing and easy-to-use interface features in the one system.
Basecamp
Basecamp is a great project management tool for agencies, especially when you want to collaborate with the client effectively. BTW if you’re in need of an inspiring read, you can pick up one of Basecamp’s founders’ books.
Teamdeck.io
Without effective resource scheduling and managing your team’s availability (marketing resource management), you risk ending up with failed projects and unhappy employees. Teamdeck is the resource and project planning tool that has been designed and built for teams that work with different clients on different projects. It helps you plan your team’s work and make sure that no employee is overworked or underutilized.
JIRA
JIRA is THE project management app for software development teams. If your team is building web or mobile apps for your client’s campaigns, it might be the best choice for you.
Asana
It’s an app for planning and managing different types of projects: from marketing campaigns to product launches. Asana allows you to set goals, manage tasks, and report on your team’s progress.
ProofHub
ProofHub is a project and task management app that is in use for marketing project planning that also allows your employees to collaborate better. They can review files and share feedback, which is extremely helpful for remote teams.
Workamajig
Workamajig comes with project management features like project scheduling, task management, and communication tracking. On top of that, you can use this app for other purposes like time tracking or generating financial reports.
ActiveCollab
ActiveCollab may prove to be a huge help when it comes to running your agency’s projects. You can manage project tasks, monitor your team’s availability, and invoice your clients when the project is complete.
Wrike
Wrike is a project management tool that allows for a significant dose of customization so you can adapt the workflow to your team’s preferences. To jump-start your work, the app comes with several agency-specific templates.
That’s quite a broad category where we included apps that help agencies to run their business efficiently: CRM software, cost management, tools for accounting, etc. You might easily decide that you need several apps from this section.
Productive
Productive is an app that has been created specifically for agencies. It covers several aspects of agency management: from controlling the sales pipeline to managing projects and monitoring your company’s profitability.
Scoro
Scoro is another tool that offers both project management features and tools for running your business effectively. Among the latter, you’ll find a CRM, quoting and invoicing tools, or financial reports.
Price&Cost
Price&Cost is all about budgeting and cost tracking. You can use it to simulate different options for a budget and then track the project’s actual costs. You can also try out different budget adjustments and check how they affect your bottom line.
Hubstaff
Hubstaff is a time tracking app that’s especially suited for teams that are often on the go, as it offers GPS tracking and geofencing. You can use it also to monitor your team’s activities via screenshots or URL tracking.
Mediaocean
Mediaocean offers a suite of products that cover the whole media management lifecycle. One of their tools, Aura, helps agencies with time and cost management: you can record time, monitor expenses, and keep track of your project’s costs.
Hubspot
Hubspot, a full-stack marketing project management software, offers a free CRM where you can monitor the sales pipeline, record communication with leads, and track deals. It’s a perfect solution for agencies on a budget.
Pipedrive
Pipedrive is a CRM app that can help your agency close more deals. It comes with visual sales pipelines you can filter and customize, plus a chatbot that helps you connect with potential clients in real-time.
Pobuca Connect
Pobuca Connect, a contact manager, enables you to organize your team’s professional network. All of your team members can sign up and import their business contacts to create an agency-wide address book.
Improvado
Improvado is a tool for agency reporting that can save you a lot of manual work. It’s very handy when you need to show your clients the results of your team’s effort, e.g., your campaign’s performance in different countries.
Payhawk
Payhawk is a spending software you can use for managing your team’s expenses. It allows you to issue physical or virtual Visa cards for your team members and set spending limits.
Calendly
Calendly is a tool that greatly simplifies the process of meeting/call scheduling. All you have to do is let the app know when you’re available and share your calendar with the person you want to meet. They will pick an available timeslot that works for them.
FreshBooks
FreshBooks is an accounting app that allows you to automate much of the work. For instance, you can schedule invoice reminders or set recurring payments to charge your long-term clients automatically.
QuickBooks
QuickBooks is another tool that can help you manage your agency’s accounting processes. Manage expenses, invoices, and taxes on your own or hire a bookkeeper via the app.
Your creative team needs tools to effectively collaborate on projects, especially if you’re working 100% remotely or from offices dispersed around the globe. These apps will help your employees produce new assets, review them with clients, and efficiently communicate in the process.
Figma
Figma, an interface design application, can greatly improve the efficiency of your team’s design process. Between convenient designing features and options to collaborate on different designs, it’s a great tool for remote agencies.
InVision
InVision is a digital product design platform you can use throughout the design lifecycle. One of its strongest features is prototyping: transform your static UI designs into interactive prototypes with a couple of clicks.
Sketch
Sketch is a design app made with collaboration in mind. Is your team working on web and mobile apps for your clients? Check out Sketch’s Cloud Inspector, a handoff tool that allows programmers to inspect designs and easily copy their attributes.
Notism
Notism is an app that simplifies the feedback and review process. Team members and clients can comment on the designs or even sketch something to get their feedback across effectively.
Conceptboard
Conceptboard, a visual collaboration app, provides your team with a virtual canvas they can use for brainstorming, iterating, reviewing, etc. It’s also perfect for conducting remote design thinking workshops.
Dropmark
Dropmark is a tool that helps your agency organize all materials you might need. Put together mood boards, gather assets for design review, and store project files in one place. Tags help you to find what you’re looking for quickly.
Slack
Fast communication – not only in the agency project management industry – is nowadays something absolutely typical. Slack is a communication tool that enables many organizations to collaborate more effectively and save lots of time. What makes it extra powerful is a large database of apps that can add even more features to your Slack channels.
Loom
Loom, a video messaging app, is a good way to improve your team’s communication. It allows you to record, edit, and share video messages to make sure that you get your thoughts across and feel a little closer to your team members or clients.
When you’re a marketing agency responsible for creating ad campaigns for different brands, you’re likely using specialized tools for media management, analytics, or reporting. It’s not to say that specialized marketing agencies couldn’t use the apps we’ve listed in this section. They could (and they are), but it’s important to note that all agencies may use them to promote their brand online.
Buffer
Buffer is a social media platform that comes with two products: Publish and Analyze. Publish is a tool for preparing and scheduling communication for social channels. Analyze provides you with insights into your social media performance.
Hootsuite
Hootsuite, a social media marketing and management platform help you build a better social media presence. Your marketing team can use this app to collaborate on social media assets, create ads and monitor the results of their work.
Kontentino
Kontentino is a social media management app your team will definitely appreciate if they’re struggling with approval processes. With Kontentino, you assign tasks to particular people and review the assets they create—internally or with a client.
CoSchedule
CoSchedule is a work management app designed specifically for marketing teams. Your marketers can use it to manage the whole marketing calendar, including an editorial schedule for your blog.
Mailchimp
Mailchimp is primarily known for its email marketing tool, but there are more marketing features you might be interested in. From landing pages and sign-up forms to social ads editor, Mailchimp can help you build your brand in many ways. You can also try some Mailchimp alternatives.
Mailerlite
Mailerlite is an email marketing platform perfect for delivering newsletters and automated emails. A powerful editor makes it easy to craft beautiful messages for your audience without having to hire a developer to do the job.
Semplice
Semplice is a WordPress-based tool that allows agencies and freelancers to build customized,visually-stunning portfolios. If you’re looking for a way to showcase your team’s work, this might be a great option for you.
Prowly
Prowly is a PR software that enables you to create a beautiful digital brand newsroom, where you can share all of your agency’s updates. The app comes with a CRM where you can store your media contacts.
So far, we’ve mentioned apps that help agencies plan and deliver projects. Now, let’s focus on people who bring these projects to life. Sure, the #agencylife could get hectic. Still, there are plenty of opportunities for you to take good care of your workforce.
Recruitee
Recruitee is a comprehensive recruitment software that will support your recruiting efforts on every stage of the process, including a custom career page and drag-and-drop candidate pipelines.
Workable
Workable is a recruitment platform you can use to manage job candidates and speed up the sourcing process. It allows you to post your ads on 200+ job sites and search through a large database of potential employees.
Camaradly
Camaradly is an employee growth platform: it enables you to make sure that your employees feel valued through check-in surveys. Team members themselves can also use Camaradly to celebrate each other with shoutouts.
Donut
Donut is a Slack app that helps you build connections between your employees even if they work remotely. For instance, Donut will regularly pair up team members that don’t work together often to grab a coffee—virtual or real.
Officevibe
Officevibe is a very convenient tool for taking the pulse of your team. Timely surveys, distributed via Slack or email, enable your employees to share their feedback and voice any concerns.
Culture Amp
Culture Amp is a tool you can use to measure your workforce’s engagement and plan performance reviews for all team members. Every employee can have personal goals set up and aligned with your team’s overall objectives.
Peakon
Peakon, an employee success platform, helps you to keep track of your team’s well-being and gather valuable feedback in real time. It also allows you to see whether your agency is an inclusive workplace.
Bonusly
Bonusly is a recognition and rewards platform. Team members can grant bonuses for their colleagues in recognition of their contributions. Bonuses can be exchanged for gift cards or charitable donations from the Bonusly catalog.
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