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  • LINGUIX: Best Writing Assistant Tool

    reating Content, Writing Blogs, and Articles, penning down your thoughts, looks like an easy task to do, but when it comes to creating perfect sentences in terms of language, grammar, metaphors, or we can say productive, many of us fail. And it’s alright. No one is born perfect in anything. Practice makes a man perfect. Linguix is that piece of cake that will surely make your content error-free.

    Well, that is obvious. We don’t like to find our grammatical mistakes by anyone else. It might erratically make you feel less. Well, in that anyone would like to have a personal assistant that does detect your semantic errors and also suggests to you the appropriate replacement.

    What is Linguix?

    Linguix is a writing assistant powered by A.I. that helps you in digging out mistakes in your content and also provides you with appropriate grammar, style, vocab recommendation, and punctuations.

    LINGUIX: The Best Writing Assistant Tool
    LINGUIX: The Best Writing Assistant Tool

    Consequently, It supports you in learning from the mistakes you made in your article and speeding your process with exceptional crumbs.

    While working with Linguix you will get notified as you made a mistake in

    your content and also present you various correct options based on 2,000+ rules in context. Despite identifying errors, Linguix also renders alternative words, phrases, and spelling corrections to you. It also does the job of eliminating instances of weak phrases, sentence structures, and typos.

    Tool Name Linguix
    Linguix Developers Textly Inc.
    Founded in November 2018
    Linguix Founder Alex Linguix
    Linguix Contact support@linguix.com
    Best For Marketers & non-native English writers

    Linguix’s AI traces and grasps the ability of its users and also offers you contextual recommendations based on the observations.

    Briefly, all this work done by Linguix made the writer confront all the problems in their work and give a firm hand to become a brilliant Writer and avoid more impreciseness.

    Linguix Features

    1. Examine Pre-Drafted Content
    Linguix offers you to check out the content that was drafted by you earlier and figure out all the mistakes that you’ve made in the article. You just have to put your content and analyze it. Voila! Work is ready to share with others.

    2. Built-in Vocabulary
    We can’t always search for the perfect word for our content on google or in dictionaries. It is a tiresome process. With Linguix, you get a Built-in Vocabulary that layout a lot of words that you can use in your content.

    3. Get Definitions of Words
    Linguix has a feature named “Lookup in Linguix,” where you can seek definitions of any word. Sounds like a golden hello.

    4. Detailed Explanations of Grammatical Mistakes
    Everyone pursues writing well and sound articles. But sometimes we all make mistakes, Linguix will surely provide you the correct answer, but also gives you a bonus as explaining in detail about whatever the mistake you made.

    5. Access Viewers Specific Statistics
    Linguix allows you to get information about the Viewers Specific Statistics to be aware of publishing the content for targeted audiences.

    6. Calculate your Writing Score
    Linguix has this fantastic feature that performs the job of counting your words, average word length, reading time, and final readability score.

    7. Secured System
    Linguix has a purely secured system that keeps all confidential, sensitive, and relevant content as it has a flexible Security setting.

    8.Secret Mode
    This feature of Secret mode helps you in editing a private and sensitive content with complete secrecy.

    9. Integrates with many Platform
    Linguix integrates with multiple platforms for your smooth working like Google Docs, Gmail, WordPress, Medium, and more.

    Benefits of Linguix

    1. You got 2700+ advanced grammar, styles, and spellings reparation.
    2. Useful references for Non-Native Speaker
    3. Calculates Writing statistics, Readability scores, audience-specific Enumerations.
    4. Have Secret Mode that performs like a secret chat section. As soon as you exit the windows, all the information will disappear automatically.
    5. Checks your writings through chrome/firefox everywhere on the web
    6. A content templates library with dozens of texts (press releases, blog posts, essays, etc.) is useful to a writer.

    While communicating in Business documents must be error-free and also free from poor sentence structure, wrong choice of words, and more. With the help of Linguix, you can write agreements, contracts, business letters with confidence, and without any grammatical mistakes.

    Comparison of Linguix And WhiteSmoke

    Basis of comparison Linguix WhiteSmoke
    Best for English learners, native speakers, content creators. Workplace and by corporate professionals writing business reports and documentation.
    The Ideal number of users 1000 1200+
    Ease of use 4.3/5 5.0/5
    Features and Functionality 4.1/5 4.3/5

    Linguix Pricing

    Normal Price Appsumo Deal
    $8 per month $49 for Lifetime

    Linguix Appsumo Deal

    • Lifetime access to Linguix Premium Plan
    • You must redeem your code(s) within 60 days of purchase
    • All future Premium Plan updates
    • Stack unlimited codes
    • GDPR compliant (partner verified)
    • 60-day money-back guarantee, no matter the reason

    Frequently Asked Question (F.A.Q.)

    Q1. What is Linguix?
    Linguix is an AI-powered writing assistant that helps you in creating stylish and error-free content.

    Q2. What is Linguix Premium?
    Besides free trial, Linguix also offers Premium services. It combines several payment options as per the requirement of the user who wishes to get access to the error-free database as well as comprehensive statistics.

    Q3. Can I use Linguix to detect texts in any other language except English?
    No. This feature is currently unavailable in Linguix. It only supports the English Language.

    Q4. How does Linguix work?
    You have to copy and paste the text you want to examine or type it in the Linguix online Editor where hundreds of automatic checks occur. As a result, you will get corrections for grammar, punctuation, word choice, styles, spellings, etc

    Q5. How Linguix Pricing Works?
    Linguix has a feature named as recurring payments, where your subscription automatically renews after the end of the billing period. Plan renewal will be made at the rates stated on the subscription page at the moment of the signup. Your account will be charged monthly, quarterly, or annually depending on your chosen option.

    Q6. What is Linguix AppSumo Deal?
    In linguix Appsumo Deal, you will have to pay $49 for once and can use the Linguix Premium for a lifetime.

    Q7. Where do all the information get stored?
    Data entered in the Linguix is stored in servers in the United States provided by The Digital Ocean.

    Q8. How does data get secured?
    Linguix uses a combination of security measures to secure all the information entered by the user via Encryption, Secure Development Best Practices, Protected Data Transfer. Secure Network Configuration, etc.

    Conclusion

    Professional writers who keep working hard to maintain their streak of professionally-effective articles or authors who want to make sure that their contents are free of typos and other grammatical errors will love Linguix as it keeps their writing at the Vigorous level.

  • Best LinkedIn Automation Tools

    As the world’s largest professional media marketing network, LinkedIn is the go-to service for anyone who wants to connect with prospects under a range of job titles from co-workers to clients. LinkedIn is an essential platform to grow your online business with ease. The platform has grown ever since its launch.

    Boasting of over 106 million people accessing the platform monthly, it clearly shows that there is a lot more going on the platform recently. It will, therefore, take more of your time and effort when trying to do your marketing on LinkedIn. However, thanks to best LinkedIn automation tools, this procedure can be simplified since it helps in automating the various features helping your account to grow.

    LinkedIn automation tools can be your best friend or the worst enemy – depending on the automation tools you’re using and the ways you’re implementing them. Some of the bots have been designed quite well but they function against the policies, terms, and conditions of LinkedIn and they would get your LinkedIn account permanently blocked or suspended. Therefore, as you try them, proceed at your own risk.

    Let’s Explore the 7 Tools to Help you as a Media Marketing Pro

    Zopto

    Zopto is a cloud-based software with full automation. The bot boasts itself in providing its users with a hundred of hot deals with zero advertising cost. The bot helps its users by filtering the ideal consumers of their products using the LinkedIn premium and the sales navigator.

    Zopto
    Zopto

    Features of Zopto:

    • Profile view – The bot will help in viewing the profile of other connections. After viewing the profile, the LinkedIn users will be informed of the users who viewed their accounts; this may make them check thereby viewing your profile. By viewing your profile, the users will see the products you deal with and they might be interested in them.
    • Filter your ideal customers – On Zopto, you can start searching for your ideal customers using LinkedIn Premium or Sales Navigator automation tools. You’ll be able to filter by Location, Industry, Company size, Title, Seniority Level, Technology that the company uses, Number of followers and much more.
    • Connection Invites – The bot will help your account grow by automatically connecting you to the new user. The move will help in saving your time as the bot will help you expand your connection with the least time possible making it easy to market your products to reach new markets.
    Zopto Pricing
    Zopto Pricing

    Pricing: Zopto has three packages; the first plan is the Personal plan which cost $215 per month. The other plan available is the “Grow” charging a monthly fee of $395, the offer has all the available features of the Personal plan and other features including twitter engagement and Zapier integration. The last package is the “Agency plan” charging a monthly fee of $895; the features in the plan includes twitter engagement, Zapier integration, and connection invites. The package will also provide their users with an account manager who will monitor your account and ensure that you will grow your business with ease.

    Also read:

    Crystal

    Crystal is the tool, empowered by AI, that can find anyone’s personality online. It tells you what other people love, what are they doing during the meetings, how they became, on what type of emails are they likely to respond, and many other things. It’s a great resource for anyone who’s looking to get more success on meetings or with cold email campaigns and building relationships on LinkedIn.

    Crystal
    Crystal

    Crystal tools enable you to access profiles of top personalities and advise you regarding communication with them. With Crystal, you not only get descriptions of someone’s personality but you also get suggestions on how to approach and convince them. It’s also possible to analyze the personality of a team with Crystal, and see what their dynamic is like so you can choose the best person to get in touch with. For example, Crystal says that if you want to sell something to Bill Gates, you should:

    • Avoid interrupting him
    • Skip the small talk, and speak matter-of-factly
    • Convince him by offering multiple options, use facts and mention best practices
    Crystal Pricing
    Crystal Pricing

    Pricing: Analysis API starts at $99/mo for 100 matches.

    LeadFuze

    One of the biggest benefits of LinkedIn is also a primary challenge for many sales professionals i.e., more than 430 million members. LeadFuze has been the favorite LinkedIn automation tool of many salespeople in the last few years, and for a good reason. It automates lead generation based on a lot of filters and this is why LeadFuze is so popular. It allows you to quickly create a list of leads and target accounts through a simple search.

    LeadFuze
    LeadFuze

    It aggregates leads’ professional information across the web, not just on LinkedIn, and it also supplies contact information if you’re ready to start communicating with your prospects and has integrations for most CRM software, as well as Zapier. If that’s not enough, LeadFuze also helps you automatically send personalized emails and follow-ups. At this time, you’re able to dig up contact information for more than 200 million B2B professionals and premium accounts. And, with customers adding roughly 350,000 prospects each month, it’s easy to see that you’ll always have an endless supply of leads.

    Features of LeadFuze:

    • Search for new potential customers instantly – Using LeadFuze’s lead generation software, you no longer just have to find business contacts one by one on LinkedIn. Instead, search for leads in specific roles and industries, that use certain software, that spend on Adwords, who are hiring, and more. Then, unlock a lot more data like verified emails, phone numbers, social profiles and more!
    • Account Based Selling – Input (or upload) a list of companies or domains. Select the role(s) you’re wanting to target. You can even set the maximum number of people matching that role at a company. Then, let LeadFuze automatically pull in all the right contacts.
    • Meet Fuzebot, Your New Sales Assistant – You can optionally use Fuzebot to build your list for you. Fuzebot is your A.I. powered best friend that brings you the freshest leads, every day. It’s automated lead generation software.
    LeadFuze pricing
    LeadFuze pricing

    Pricing: It provides 3 pricing options – Monthly ($257 per month/1000 leads), Commitment ($231 per month/1200 leads for a year) and Annual ($2467 per year, 1500 leads/month).

    Relevant read:

    LinkedIn Sales Navigator

    LinkedIn sales navigator was launched by LinkedIn itself with an aim to easily connect buyers and sellers. With this tool, you can target the right customers and companies, familiarize yourself with crucial lead changes, and easily engage with your potential buyers.

    LinkedIn Sales Navigator
    LinkedIn Sales Navigator

    Features of LinkedIn Sales Navigator:

    • Advanced algorithm – to connect you with prospects according to their needs
    • Sales insights – provide you required details while making deals
    • Relationship building tools – close sales easily
    • These combined features also perform lead recommendations for you.
    • Recommendations are part of the package.
    • You can filter your updates.
    • It comes with “premium profile” options.

    Pricing: LinkedIn Sales Navigator offers three SMB and enterprise pricing plans for users to choose from – Professional – starts at $64.99/month/annual billing, Team – per seat basis and Enterprise – request a quote.

    Lead Connect

    Lead Connect is a LinkedIn Outreach Automation Platform. You can automate your lead generation efforts with personalized multiple follow-ups and also sync prospect details to Hubspot automatically with a click.

    Lead Connect
    Lead Connect

    You have an option to use LinkedIn search (Basic/Sales Navigator) OR upload CSV to define your target audience. Tool will use same search query for automation, Setup personalized message with placeholders to send upto 100 new invitations, and sync LinkedIn profiles to HubSpot for easy lead nurturing and management. All messages on LinkedIn also gets logged as activity automatically.

    Features of Lead Connect:

    • Response and Acceptance tracking – It’s all valuable information that will help you take actions on right time.
    • Teamwork Security – You and your teammates won’t address the same person twice if you don’t want to. Blacklist is here saving those extra efforts and confusion.
    • Follow-up messages personalization – Contact unlimited* number of prospects daily with personalized auto sequences and build Predictable Revenue.
    • Reply detection – If you get a reply, further follow-ups are automatically stopped.
    • Follow-up automation – Just set a number of days after which you want to automatically send a follow-up, up to 10 times till you receive a response.
    LeadConnect Pricing
    LeadConnect Pricing

    Pricing: It provides 4 different packages – Free forever ($0/month), Professional ($22.95/month), Grow ($40.95/month) and Ultimate ($77.95/month).

    SkyLead

    Engagement has never been closer. Once you filter your ideal prospects, SkyLead allow you to select the desired level of engagement like Connection Invites, Sequential Messaging, Free InMails, or Profile View Generator. It supports LinkedIn Premium, Sales Navigator and Recruiter. You can also upload your own list of leads. With SkyLead, you can track all the metrics that are important for your campaigns and optimize them for the best results. Use dashboard to monitor and compare all campaigns or deep dive into a specific campaign. Its dashboard allows you to track whether you need to take action or take over the conversation through its chat system. Never miss on a message with separate chat screens for every campaign

    SkyLead
    SkyLead

    Features of SkyLead:

    • Cloud based – No more extensions that compromise your account. Cloud based tool guarantees safety since it behaves as a user with a separate proxy IP address from your location and doesn’t require to have a computer turned on.
    • Safe and secure – System is undetectable thanks to its cloud-based infrastructure that behaves as a user without any traceable code. New proxy IP address is assigned to each account and its algorithm mimics the human behavior so there are no suspicious actions that could show these actions are not done by a human.
    • Advanced variables – You can customize your message to make it as personalized as possible. Mention their college name, first job, years in current company or an interest as an ice breaker that will increase your response rate and land you a warm introduction.
    • Account manager – If you need some help with setting up campaign or any other part in the process, you can count on a dedicated Account manager that will guide you through the whole cycle and help you get leads and close deals.
    SkyLead Pricing
    SkyLead Pricing

    Pricing: There are 3 pricing options available – Pro (100$ per LinkedIn account monthly), Premium (200$ per LinkedIn account monthly), and Agency (700$ per LinkedIn account monthly).

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    Elink Pro

    Elink Pro
    Elink Pro

    Elink Pro is a software that helps its users to market their products online. The bot helps its users by connecting them with potential customers of their products making them generate sales. The bot magically attracts new clients for your LinkedIn campaigns. There’s also an option where you can cross-connect with your LinkedIn leads on Twitter, as well, so if you’re considering a multi-channel approach, you can do it with eLink Pro.

    Features of elink Pro:

    • Results & Metrics – Awareness of your profile is higher as prospects first see your profile summary. The Look Back Rate refers to those that decide to take it further and visit your profile. Of these, many then view your website (averages 20%-30% of Look Back’s) and reach out to connect to you (average 5% – 15% of Look Back’s).
    • Campaign Scheduler – A user can use eLink Pro daily or use our simple Search Scheduler. Using search filters (industry, city etc) together with the Campaign Scheduler is a great way to view profiles beyond the 1000 return limit set by LinkedIn.
    • Download prospects to Excel – Targeted clients in LinkedIn, access a huge addressable market and export details to Excel!
    • Auto messaging – The bot is essential in sending messages automatically after your approval. With the messages, people in your connections will be informed about your products and the offers available in the sales. Auto messaging will help you to save time and be productive in doing something else.
    • Attract your target audience – Using the principles of view backs in LinkedIn eLink Pro gets them to engaged with a link back to you.
    • Multiple accounts – Elink Pro enables its users to manage different accounts at the same time. The bot is essential in business organizations that need to manage more than one account. Through the multiple accounts, the users can get more connections thereby managing the business to grow bigger and attract more sales.

    Pricing: Elink pro has two packages; the first package is the “start from” costing a monthly fee of $29, the plan enables its users to view other people’s profile and to export data. The second package is the “Pro plan” charging a monthly fee of $49. The plan helps its users to view profile, auto connecting with other people and auto messaging. The bot has a five, free day trial where their users can get to know how the software operates.

    Conclusion

    There you go! 7 LinkedIn bots and automation tools for your marketing. You can choose to have a number of them as long as you use them right. Most of these bots are designed to increase your social media (LinkedIn) presence. Once your presence is established, your account will grow to a completely new level. From better organizing your contacts in managing the sales funnel, there’s something out there that’ll work for you and help you to become a better decision-maker in the world of media marketing. Do you have any other tools to add to this list? Feel free to share them in the comment section below.

    LinkedIn Automation Tool – FAQs

    What is LinkedIn automation?

    LinkedIn automation frees you to focus on initiating conversations and relationship building interactions. Manually visiting profiles, sending connect requests, and following up with messages are seamlessly organized with best LinkedIn Automation tools.

    Is there a LinkedIn automation tool that is open-source?

    No. There are no LinkedIn automation tools that are open source.

    When should I be using LinkedIn automation tools?

    With best LinkedIn automation tools 2020 you can target the right prospects in less time without spamming the wrong ones. Managing 2-3 leads is quite plausible but when the number of leads increases reaching out to each of them can be a task. In such cases, free LinkedIn automation tools come handy.

    Which is the best LinkedIn automation tool?

    Finding the right automation tool depends on your requirements. Some of the good options are Zopto, Crystal, Leadfuze, LinkedIn Sales Navigator, Lead connect, Sky lead, and E-link pro.

    How can you get more leads on LinkedIn without getting banned?

    Automation builds your network while content builds brand awareness and loyalty. So with the right automation tool, you can build relationships and expand your network in the right way — through content. On LinkedIn, that may come in many different forms such as posts, comments, direct messages, your profile page, headlines, profile summaries, etc.

    Best LinkedIn automation tool for marketing?

    Crystal is a great tool that works by analyzing a profile and providing feedback about the person’s personality. With these details in hand, you will make a better communication strategy. Other tools like LeadFuze, SalesLoft LinkedInSales navigator are also some good options.

    What are the problems that can be solved by LinkedIn automation tools?

    LinkedIn automation tools let you focus on things like a valuable conversation with the prospects, building relationships, creating brand awareness rather than performing mundane and repetitive tasks.

  • Aiosell Technologies – Taking the Hospitality Industry to the Next Level!

    Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by the organization it is based on.

    Just when we thought the hospitality industry couldn’t get any better and automized, Siddharth Goenka launched Aiosell Technologies in 2019. This venture is all about automated pricing & revenue management for hotels, combined with an all-in-one integrated hotel marketing platform.

    The hotel industry is still using archaic systems with static prices and independent systems that do not integrate well with each other and leaves money on the table. Aiosell aims to solve the vision of maximizing revenues for the hotel industry, using automation, AI, and integrated technology systems. The owners of the Aiosell are hotel owners themselves, and hence this company was born out of a need in their own business. When they realized, there wasn’t a suitable alternative available in the market solving these issues, they decided to build a technology solution.

    Aiosell Technologies – Company Highlights

    Startup Name Aiosell Technologies
    Headquarters Bangalore
    Sector IT
    Founders Siddharth Goenka
    Founded 2019
    Parent Organization Aiosell Technologies Private Limited
    Website aiosell.com

    About Aiosell Technologies and how it works
    Aiosell Technologies – Target Market Size
    Aiosell Technologies – Founders and Team
    Aiosell Technologies – How did it start?
    Aiosell Technologies – Name, Tagline, and Logo
    Aiosell Technologies – Startup Launch
    Aiosell Technologies – Business Model and Revenue Model
    Aiosell Technologies – Startup Challenges
    Aiosell Technologies – Funding and Investors
    Aiosell Technologies – Growth

    About Aiosell Technologies and how it works

    The product of Aiosell uses several automation and AI algorithms to change prices in real-time to ensure the hotel gets the maximum business. When the demand is high, the price increases and vice versa. The system uses many other unique parameters to adjust these prices, including occupancy, demand, seasons, weekday, booking window, dates, etc.  

    The USP of the product is to use all these products in a very simple, easy to use method to automate dynamic pricing and simplify revenue management. The product also integrates all aspects of hotel marketing together to give a one-stop-shop marketing product for hotels.

    The product started off using a simple pricing automation tool. Today, it includes all technology components of the hotel industry including Rate Shopper, Reviews Manager, Website & Booking Engine, Analytics & Reports, Travel Agent portal, etc. This pivot was made because the team realized that many hotels could not only use one aspect of hotel marketing, it needed to integrate all these aspects to give the best results.

    Success Story of Observe.AI – Voice AI for Customer Care
    With all the buzz about the modern technology with AI and VR that seem to betaking the world by surprise one after another, it has become imperative forcompanies to keep up with these trends and make the most of it. To sufficientlyprovide a solution to this, Akash Singh, Sharath Keshava Narayana,…
    StartupTalkyVidhi Punamiya

    Aiosell Technologies – Target Market Size

    Aiosell’s target market consists of independent and chain hotels of all sizes (5 stars, 3 stars, 1 star) and home-stays & apartments that use online channels to get bookings for the hospitality industry.  

    There are about 6 million hotels only in the organized segment. Adding the unorganized segment and home-stays, this number can go above 10 million. Over the years, this number will only grow with more alternate accommodation being added to the supply.  

    “Since this is a highly fragmented market, our market share targets will be less than 1% of the market, which is a sizable opportunity for a B2B business,” said Siddharth Goenka, founder of Aiosell.  

    Aiosell Technologies – Founders and Team

    Siddharth Goenka is the Founder & CEO of Aiosell Technologies.

    Owner Aiosell Technologies
    Siddharth Goenka – Founder, Aiosell Technologies

    He is a Software Engineer from Purdue University and an MBA from the Indian School of Business, Hyderabad. He has previously worked in Microsoft as Software Developer and in Accenture as Management Consultant. Then, he went to join his family business and conceived Octave Hotels, a business hotel chain that grew to 7 hotels in 3 years. Siddharth brings a mix of software development, hotel owner, and marketing professional experience which is key to Aiosell.

    Team of Aiosell Technologies
    Team of Aiosell Technologies

    The co-founder of Aiosell Technologies is Smriti Singh, whom Siddharth met because her husband was Siddharth’s boarding school friend. She is IHM, Bangalore graduate and was ex Revenue Manager at ITC hotels.  

    Siddharth looks after the overall product development, vision, and overall growth of the business. Smriti looks after client satisfaction and success. The team comprises 15 members, the average age of the team is 23 years. The culture at Aiosell is very young, energetic, flexible, and innovation-driven.

    Hiring funda at this company is based on two pillars – attitude/potential, and honesty/ethics. Competence is given some weight but not very weightage, as that can be developed in other two qualities are present.

    Silversparro Technologies Company Profile | Sparrosense, AI Powered Supervisor For Companies
    Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified and updated information on different organisation. The content in this article has been approved by the organization itself. It will not be wrong to say that technology is ruling our lives. From homes tooffices, to factories, …
    StartupTalkyChayanika Goswami

    Aiosell Technologies – How did it start?

    “Since we were in the hospitality industry, this was a need that was glaringly visible in the industry. The industry was rapidly changing with an increase in internet bookings/smartphone usage and changing customer behavior.” Added Siddharth Goenka, owner of Aiosell Technologies.

    They were first trying this idea out manually using excel sheets, and when they succeeded, the team decided to make an automated product around it. For one year, they ran the concept manually with a service-led model, and when they were confident of the benefits involved, they changed it to a product-based approach.

    The initial people they spoke to were friends and family in the hotel industry, who were new to the online business and had not wrapped their heads around increasing their hotel revenues digitally.

    AIOSELL – AIO means all in one, and also a pun on artificial intelligence ‘o’ttomation. The name and logo for this B2B company were formed based on some initial research and brand name availability.

    Aiosell Logo

    Aiosell Technologies – Startup Launch

    At Aiosell, product first – marketing second is the approach, rather than the other way. Make the product so unique and desirable, that it starts selling itself. Aiosell has several partnerships with other technology companies and revenue management companies, who provide complimentary services or products to its offering.

    The company has formed revenue-sharing arrangements with these companies to grow. The team has now also started attracting leads through traditional product marketing channels like Google, Facebook, Linkedin, and Youtube.

    FindMyHealth Company Profile – Startup that Combines AI and Ayurveda for Health Monitoring
    Artificial Intelligence is now penetrating almost every existing domain.Finance, healthcare, education, transportation and many sectors are witnessingactive use of AI. The idea of this startup was born when Gaurav Bhalotiarealised there is a lot to health beyond medicine, and that our bodies need…
    StartupTalkyRishabh Rathi

    Aiosell Technologies – Business Model and Revenue Model

    The business model of Aiosell is SaaS/subscription-based. The listings at Aiosell are priced anywhere between $5 to $10 per room per month. Like in any Saas model, margins are more than 30%, and currently, it has got the business organically without burning a lot of cash.

    Aiosell Technologies – Startup Challenges

    One major challenge that Aiosell faced was to convince a large chain of hotels to try and use the product. This was accomplished by offering them free trials and personal attention by the founder, Siddhart Goenka. It was also followed by ensuring all their requirements kept getting back into the product development cycle so that the customer was satisfied. Word of mouth references from happy customers is the most relevant marketing channel to grow the business.

    Aiosell Technologies – Funding and Investors

    In June 2019, Aisoell technologies raised an amount of INR 10,00,000 through an early stage self-funded round.

    Aiosell Technologies – Growth

    • 150+ hotels located in 10+ countries and 100+ cities
    • Revenue generation- $20,000 per month ($250,000 per year)
    • Profit margins are as high as 20%.
    • Customers across India, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Philippines, Russia, Kenya, Belarus, Greece, USA, and Canada.

    Aiosell Technologies – Future Plans

    “We want to grow to 500 hotels in 1 year and 5000 hotels in 3 years.” Concluded Siddharth Goenka while talking about his future plan.

  • Best Telephony Software

    Business communication has evolved over the years. Today, companies are replacing their conventional phone systems with modern communication technology known as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). A VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) phone system is an internet-based telephony system that delivers voice calls, video calls, and multimedia using internet connectivity.

    Unlike analog phone systems, VoIP phone systems do not require any dedicated phone hardware. It allows the user to call any landline, mobile or even computer-to-computer with an internet-connected laptop, PC, mobile or tablet. Being a cloud-based technology, VoIP has revolutionized the communication infrastructure across all business sectors. It easily integrates chats, syncs applications, and provides real-time call data and analytics; thus enhancing organizational productivity. In short, the emergence of VoIP has changed the name and face of business communication.

    Top Telephony Service Providers

    Here, we have covered some of the  top telephony service providers that can help your business. So, let’s dive in.

    AVOXI Genius

    Telephony software, also known as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) uses internet-enabled devices to make and receive phone calls. With AVOXI, your VoIP number setup is fast and easy. There are no setup fees or minimum contracts. Every VoIP number includes 20+ features at no additional cost. Get your virtual phone number today for as low as $4.49 per month.

    Avoxi Genius
    Avoxi Genius

    Avoxi Core Cloud PBX is a voice technology system that enables use of legacy systems while decreasing hardware investment and maintenance. The cloud-based system serves the following industries: energy, finance, hospitality, insurance, manufacturing, media and entertainment, nonprofit, retail and transportation. Multiple gateways can accommodate an increase in the number of phone lines as businesses grow. Customer features include a 24/7 support team and password protected access to a secure web where users can view all call detail records.

    Also read:

    CloudTalk

    CloudTalk is a telephony system built for modern companies. CloudTalk simplifies the lives of your sales and customer support teams with 70+ advanced calling features. Improve communication with prospects thanks to the integration with your existing helpdesk, CRM and eCommerce systems as Helpscout, Pipedrive or Shopify.

    Cloud Talk
    Cloud Talk

    CloudTalk is a fully featured Call Center Software designed to serve Agencies, SMEs. CloudTalk provides end-to-end solutions designed for Macintosh. This online Call Center system offers Queue Management, Predictive Dialer, Call Recording, Contact Management, VoIP at one place.
    Price: CloudTalk pricing starts at $15.00 per month, per user. There is not a free version of CloudTalk.

    Aircall

    Aircall is the cloud-based phone system of choice for modern brands of 3+ users. By seamlessly integrating with the most popular CRM and Helpdesk tools, they help sales and support teams communicate clearly and efficiently. Admins can instantly add numbers from 100+ countries, scale their teams according to seasonality, and gain deep insights through real time analytics. Accessible by desktop and mobile app, Aircall is trusted by over 3000 companies worldwide. Aircall is the modern phone solution for sales and support teams.

    Air call
    Aircall

    It is very user friendly and easy to use and setup and integrate with other software, web apps and services when building and testing a UC – Unified Communications Contact Center or OmniChannel.
    Price: Essentials Plan – $30/user per month, billed annually and Professional Plan – $50/user per month, billed annually. Free Trial available.

    Freshcaller

    Freshcaller is a cloud PBX system that enables you to purchase local and toll-free phone numbers in 90+ countries. Engage in contextual conversations with your callers without any hardware nor maintenance costs. Freshcaller is the ideal call center and business phone system for startups and small teams. With Freshcaller businesses can choose to record all their phone conversations and allow supervisors access to live dashboards and even listen and speak to customers in real-time.

    freshcaller
    freshcaller

    As a phone system designed for teams with little/no IT support, Freshcaller allows users to create a new account in minutes and configure rules, business hours, and routing processes that are executed in real-time. Freshcaller enables businesses to scale their usage effortlessly by adding agent licenses, purchasing additional numbers or phone credits, and changing their pricing plan at any time.
    Price: Freshcaller pricing starts at $19.00 per month, per user. There is a free version of Freshcaller available.

    Must read:

    Jive Voice

    Jive voice
    Jive voice

    Give your business a professional boost with Jive Voice. A cloud-based, feature-rich business phone system, Jive helps thousands of organizations across all industries and sizes to streamline their communications and achieve greater success. Jive Hosted VoIP offers a wide array of features designed to replace legacy landline phones, including unlimited voicemail boxes, auto attendants, and local and long-distance phone numbers.
    Starting Price: $19.95/month/user (Free Trial available).

    MyOperator

    MyOperator is a cloud-based business phone system providing solutions like virtual phone numbers (toll free/non-tollfree), IVR, call management features like call tracking, call recording, live call transfer, callers’ database, virtual receptionist and more. It extends the reach of your business 24*7 and routes calls to the right departments for a faster point resolution. It doesn’t require any hardware or software installation. This thereby helps save installation and additional infrastructural costs required while scaling up.

    MyOperator
    MyOperator

    Also, it allows you to work anywhere and anytime. All your phone calls, be it the ones you made, received or missed are tracked. This not only helps you upgrade your customers’ experience but also ensures that no prospect is lost. Facebook and SMS remarketing are the ways that MyOperator offers to help you reconnect with your callers and repeat purchase.
    Price: There are 3 plans available – Office IVR System (Rs. 2,300/month), Cloud Call Center – Desk (Rs. 5,000/month), and Cloud Call Center – Prime (Rs. 20,000/month).

    Flowroute

    Flowroute, the first software-centric carrier, provides communication services and technology for cloud-based platforms. By providing businesses with programmatic access to communications infrastructure services, Flowroute removes the complexity of introducing new communications solutions to the market.

    Flowroute
    Flowroute

    The patented nationwide Flowroute HyperNetwork delivers leading carrier-quality calling and messaging services with unparalleled reliability, reach, and simplicity. Flowroute is a fully featured VOIP Software designed to serve Agencies, Startups. Flowroute provides end-to-end solutions designed for Web App. This online VOIP system offers SIP Trunking at one place.
    Price: Flowroute is a pay as you go SIP Trunking service. There is not a free version of Flowroute. Flowroute does not offer a free trial.

    Relevant read:

    JustCall

    JustCall is a cloud-based phone system that allows businesses to collect phone numbers from 58 countries and make them appear as local digits to their clients. JustCall gives you the platform you need to manage your international customers in a unified location, communicate with them with a simple and straightforward solution.

    JustCall
    JustCall

    JustCall is a cloud phone system that integrates with your CRM or Helpdesk. Make, receive and log all your phone calls and texts directly from your CRM/Helpdesk dashboard.  Using different call distribution settings, you will never miss a customer support call ever. Give easy ways to your customers to reach relevant departments, allow them to remain in queue while waiting for an agent to come on the call or even give them an option to leave voicemails. Apart from basic contact center software solution, JustCall also provides other useful tools like Bulk SMS Campaigns, SMS Bots, Auto Dialer, Predictive Dialer, Dynamic Number Insertion etc.
    Price: There are two plans – Standard ($25/user/month) and Premium ($50/user/month).

    Conclusion

    Telephony Software includes many telecommunication features, from recording calls to creating a complete call center environment. Selecting the best software depends on your needs but the above list can serve as a reference. The software works as a fully featured telephone switch connecting to phone lines and extensions using state-of-the-art virtual PBX and VoIP technology. If you know about any other tool, please let us know in the comments section below.

  • Best Document Management Software

    Document management (DM) software encompasses a wide range of features and functionalities, many of which are critical to effectively running a business. Many small to midsize businesses (SMBs), such as legal firms, creative firms, or media and publishing organizations, aim to go paperless and are looking for the right tool to do so. Businesses generate a lot of data regardless, so choosing a reliable and scalable DM system is key to streamlining and automating workflows.

    For SaaS companies, an efficient DM system can make better overall performance for several reasons. The most basic reason is having a place to store and organize documents. Version control, workflows, access permissions, backup, and data protection can also be handled by a DM solution. It is the starting point for storing, securing, and sharing various business documents. The ability to classify data is another DM capability that can completely change the way your organization maps its workflows.

    Top Document Management Software

    Here, you’ll get to know below the 10 best document management systems that can help you go digital, automated, and paperless.

    Confluence

    Confluence is an open and shared workspace that connects people to the ideas and information they need to build momentum and do their best work. Unlike document and file-sharing tools, Confluence is open and collaborative, helping you create, manage, and collaborate on anything from product launch plans to marketing campaigns. Today all kinds of functional departments of any size use Confluence, from technical teams and project management groups, to marketing, HR, legal, and finance. All teams get work done with Confluence.

    Confluence
    Confluence

    With Confluence you have an environment that is very efficient to work in to add new content, very easy to update articles and manage file attachments. Setting up spaces for various audiences, including a “personal space” allows you to draft documents privately and then move the document over into a space with an audience. The permission scheme is based on spaces, individuals and groups, with flexibility from super-locked-down to wide open on the public internet.

    Price: Confluence pricing starts at $10.00 per month, per user. Confluence does offer a free trial.

    Also read:

    Templafy

    Templafy
    Templafy

    Templafy is one of the best document management tools out there. The system aims to integrate essential office suites and solutions used by businesses on a daily basis. If there’s one thing that can be frustrating, it’s having to create brand documents using different software. This can become time-consuming and fragmented, but Templafy can help. With it, you can create a range of files within the system and manage them from a single feed.

    The software is compatible with a range of devices and uses the cloud to let you access all your documents across computers, tablets and smartphones. There are also automatic compliance checks, and you can give feedback to employees easily, too.

    Price: Contact is required for a pricing quote, and not surprisingly, the exact cost depends on the number of users, features and add-ons chosen.

    PandaDoc

    PandaDoc is a leading online document management platform that lets you create, deliver, and share documents online. It allows for legally binding e-signatures and supports various document formats like PDFs, Docs, and other preexisting digital documents for faster paperless transactions and processes. The software works well with quotes, contracts, agreements, and other sales collateral, and is ideal for use by your HR, sales, marketing, finance, legal, and operations departments. For that matter, any business or organization can reap the benefits of document management software like PandaDoc in terms of document building, sharing, and delivery.

    PandaDoc
    PandaDoc

    The software is an all-around document management platform that enables you to sign documents anywhere at any time with the built-in e-signature function. It comes with a robust but easy to use document creator with drag and drop editor, allowing you to quickly come up with all kinds of business documents such as proposals, business plans, contracts, and quotes, among others.

    NetDocuments

    NetDocuments has been the leader in cloud-based document management since 1999, helping firms to reduce costs and increase productivity with enterprise search, built-in disaster recovery, client, matter, and project-centric workspaces, and any time access on a modern platform that scales to both small and large firms alike.

    NetDocuments
    NetDocuments

    It’s powerful, cloud-based document management system helps your firm effectively store, create and categorize your documents and email. Collaboration tools allow you to easily share individual documents or even entire folders securely with your clients and experts. NetDocuments has made big strides in reliability and customer focus and these areas need to continue to be developed as they were not strong suits in years past.

    Relevant read:

    Dropbox Business

    Dropbox Business is a central workspace that helps teams stay organized and keep their work flowing. All your team’s content is in one place, making it easy to collaborate and focus on the work that matters. Dropbox Business is trusted by over 300,000 business teams worldwide and over 50% of the Fortune 500 for its industry leading file sync, collaboration, and extensive administration and security features that scale as teams grow. Companies of all sizes use Dropbox Business for collaboration, file sharing, online backup, and more.

    Dropbox Business
    Dropbox Business

    Dropbox is a great program to integrate with other programs such as Adobe PDF. It is incredibly easy to save all of your sales proposals straight onto the dropbox app from your iPad Adobe PDF app which saves you time and energy. My number one favorite feature in Dropbox is the ability to share a link to a file with clients and have them make comments right on the file.

    If you’re sharing a video, they can comment at exact spots in the video, and they can markup graphic files. Additionally, Dropbox saves you an incredible amount of time in the office, as you no longer have to request files from various members of your design team. With your shared Dropbox folders, everyone can access everything, and with version control, nothing is ever lost.

    M-Files

    M-Files is an intelligent platform designed to help businesses manage, organize, and track documents and information. It can be used by both small and large companies in a variety of industries. This wide applicability is made possible by a host of features that are bound to benefit any organization such as mobile optimization, version control, e-signature support, document templates, offline access, permission control, and automated workflows. It is equipped with a search engine for finding documents based on document type, names, and keywords, among others. It even lets you search inside the text of documents.

    M-Files
    M-Files

    The solution offers workflow automation capabilities and notifies you whenever document changes need review or approval. Likewise, you can send invites and edit documents simultaneously with its co-authoring feature. M-Files also offers enterprise-grade information management functionality, allowing you to securely share information with stakeholders or team members. The software integrates with leading CRM and office solutions and is available through quote-based pricing.

    Docuware

    Docuware takes a cloud-based approach to document management. It integrates cloud storage and office automation to create a digital workplace. This paperless approach to the full spectrum of office tasks is another example of the digital transformation which is driving many processes these days.

    Docuware
    Docuware

    Docuware offers services to create a ‘cloud workflow’ when it comes to documents. It allows services to be purchased on a small scale as needed, and then as use-case scenarios are created, and reliability is ensured, the service can be scaled up for a larger deployment. Mobile apps that can integrate into this workflow are also offered, facilitating the likes of scanning receipts on the go, approving invoices for speedy payment, and signing forms directly on the device.

    Must read:

    Box

    Box works in any browser and allows you to easily store and manage all your content online. It also lets you share files instantly and access documents from anywhere. No matter what device you choose, get fast, easy access to documents, project plans, presentations and videos. Always have the latest pitch for your customers, on or offline. Box makes it easy for administrators to maintain a central view of all content and users in their account through a powerful admin console.

    Box
    Box

    There are many things to love about Box. For one, its Business plans come with unlimited storage! It’s worth the price especially for small to medium-sized businesses looking for a secure place for storage with tons of extra features for both admin and security. The 5GB upload is enough for the big multimedia and other iso/archive files. For your admin, the integration with your Active Directory saves you from having to require your users to create/maintain an extra account (user/password) for Box. The corporate logo can also be incorporated into the platform to make it personalized according to your company’s branding scheme. Box also offers a ton of possible integrations eg Google Suite (e.g., docs), Salesforce (CRM), and MS Office 365. This makes it easy for users to create content as your usual platforms and then easily save and manage them in Box.

    Price: Box pricing starts at $5.00 per month, per user. There is a free version of Box and Box does offer a free trial.

    Zoho Forms

    Zoho Forms is an online form builder perfect for all business sizes. It helps you create and manage online forms by using a variety of field types and customizable themes. You can start from scratch or choose from the many templates available. The form creator tools, which include an automated calculation field, are also handy in personalizing payment forms. Plus, you can connect your forms to secure payment solutions like Paypal, 2Checkout, and more.

    Zoho forms
    Zoho forms

    The application also supports multi-page forms. By simply adding a page break, you can add and rearrange pages in your forms as needed. Page rules can also be modified to help your respondents navigate to specific pages based on their answers. Moreover, you can use email campaigns, QR codes, and links to share your forms on social media, or you can embed the forms on your website.

    Samepage

    Samepage is an award-winning project collaboration software that brings you collaborative tools, communications solutions, and document management capabilities in one cloud-hosted platform. It’s all about productivity, which Samepage lets you achieve through features and capabilities that include team chat, video conferencing, task management, file sharing, real-time document collaboration, and more. The software is designed to help teams of all sizes manage projects and get more done in a single easy-to-use workspace.

    Samepage
    Samepage

    This comprehensive collaboration solution for business teams gives you functionalities such as scheduling, discussion topics, meeting agendas, files, instant messages, conversations, and task lists. It is ideal for companies and organizations such as educational and non-profit organizations, marketing firms, and real estate agencies. It can be implemented across teams of employees, vendors, partners, consultants, and customers and lets you compile files, images, videos, conversations, and maps, allowing you to maximize the advantages of a collaboration platform.

    Conclusion

    Document management software automates the process of creating, uploading, storing, tracking, and archiving files. It helps users share documents, track comments and changes, and store documents in a centralized repository. To sum up, there’s a wide variety of document management systems that you can choose from. So, you shouldn’t worry about not finding a good option for your operations. Above softwares includes both standalone systems, and broader software suites that offer core document management functionality in addition to other features. You can choose a software that caters to your needs. If you know about some other document management software, please let us know in the comments section below.

  • Tips to Sell your SaaS Product?

    SaaS is a billion-dollar industry. And it’s only going to get bigger. According to TechCrunch, the SaaS industry is at the same stage as “the PC market in 1983, smartphone market in 2003, or the search market in 1998.” There is no better time than now to be in SaaS. But more opportunities mean more competition. If you want to lead the pack, you need to know how to sell SaaS.

    Customer-centric selling is particularly important in the age of social media, where companies and customers engage in an ongoing public dialogue across Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, websites, and blogs. Customer-centric selling starts by encouraging potential customers to tell you about their problems. Then, it continues with guiding them down a path to the right solution. In other words, they’re going to talk about you. Building trust over time by working together leads to promote loyalty, referrals, and positive word-of-mouth. All of this translates into generating more revenue.

    Also read:

    How to Sell your SaaS Product?

    Below are a few points to keep in mind when it comes to selling SaaS products.

    Sell Solutions, Not Products

    Technology companies often struggle with the task of showing what they do for their customers into a box called ‘Product’. People check your website or contact you because they have a problem that needs to be solved. But, often, they don’t clearly understand what they want or need. It’s your job to be the expert. Asking the right questions makes selling an ongoing conversation about customer needs. Questions also help identify how far along they are on the decision path toward buying, which makes the entire process easier to track in a CRM.

    Sell Solution, not Product
    Sell Solution, not Product

    Selling solutions might not even involve making direct references to products. An example of this is ChatBot, a leading chatbot developing SaaS. It emphasizes the benefits of using ChatBot from the perspective of the end user. There is no reference to product features. Simply a clear explanation of how ChatBot can solve customer problems.

    Example of Chatbot
    Example of Chatbot

    Keep your trials short

    At first glance, you might think giving customers a long trial period for your product will increase the chances that they pay for your product. A long trial might seem like a good way to hook your customer, but you’re really just hurting your startup. For 99% of startups, trials shouldn’t be any longer than 14 days. Here’s why.

    • Most people don’t use free trials for the full duration. Take a look at your data and you’ll see that the vast majority of your trial users duck out after about three days.
    • Users take a short trial more seriously. Your prospects will procrastinate, and when they procrastinate, they forget. With a shorter trial period, they’re more likely to try your product immediately.
    • Lower customer acquisition costs. When you shorten your trial, you also shorten your sales cycle. If you’re able to shorten your sales cycle from six weeks to three, you will significantly reduce your customer acquisition costs.

    Create Feedback Loops

    When customers hit certain milestones (logging in to your platform for the hundredth time or making a repeat purchase), have your client services team check in with sales and marketing.

    Feedback Loop
    Feedback Loop

    Demonstrate the value of your products and services each step of the way:

    • Generate daily, weekly, and monthly reports on progress and activity.
    • Create snapshots of key wins or success stories, such as a blog post or comment that did particularly well, or a testimonial.
    • Identify key performance indicators (KPIs) that are important to your customers, measuring success against these metrics.
    • Check in with customers who are not meeting certain thresholds of activity (for example, if they haven’t logged in or made a repeat purchase in a month).

    Also, in an effort to continue to build trust and assurance with your clients, regularly ask for feedback. It can come in a monthly service survey or by way of just calling your customer at relevant intervals to ask him or her if there’s anything else you can do.

    Relevant read:

    Find your right SaaS customers

    You need to develop an ‘ideal customer profile’. It‘s a fictitious organization and you need to address the following to create the profile:

    • How are they valuable to your company? In addition to paying for your service, will they provide referrals and testimonials? Can they point you to new opportunities, or provide resources to grow your business?
    • How does your SaaS product help them? Does it improve their revenue, reduce their cost, or improve productivity?
    • You need to build the fictitious customers from real data. To get this real data, talk to your existing customers, and find out what value they actually get from your product.

    When you getting feedback from your existing customers, don’t just contact them once. Their input will be valuable before you sell, after you sell, and after they receive value from your product. Ask them to quantify the value so you can understand how it works and how it doesn’t.

    Optimize your email campaign

    Unless you have a killer email campaign, most of your prospects are going to forget you exist within hours of enrolling in your trial. To get the most out of your drip email campaign, follow these strategies. Use “human” email addresses. Don’t ever send an email from a department. Instead of “Sales@YourBusiness.com”, use “YourName@YourBusiness.com”.

    Optimize your email campaign
    Optimize your email campaign

    Send activity-based emails. Your drip campaign should automatically email your leads at different situations, including when they sign up, if they visit the account or cancellation page, and if their trial is about to end.

    Follow up

    You will rarely close a deal on the first call. Startup sale’s success is dependent on your ability to follow up repeatedly. You want to get either a clear yes or no. A maybe isn’t a no until it’s a no. So, make sure you or your team follow up until your prospect gives you an answer one way or another. If your prospect has ever expressed interest in your product, follow up forever. Don’t settle for silence or “maybe”; maybes kill your startup. Keep calling and emailing until you get a clear “yes” or “no”.

    If the lead is completely cold, follow this 14-day plan:

    • Day 1: Initial contact.
    • Day 3: First follow-up. Reach out at a different time of day with a condensed version of your initial message.
    • Day 7: Second follow-up. Reach out at a different time of day and restate your call to action.
    • Day 14: Third follow-up. If you haven’t received any response from your lead, send the break-up email. This is where response rates skyrocket.

    If you don’t receive a response to your break-up email, move on to more promising leads.

    Must read:

    Build Solid Long-Term Relationships with your Customers

    When your entire business lives online, sometimes it’s hard to build any kind of relationship with your customers. That’s why it’s imperative you and your team have great written and spoken communication skills. You or your sales team should be able to reassure prospects that your business will be around for the long term and is not a fly-by-night operation. When a customer decides to use your software, they should see it as a long-term investment in their own business. When you have a high level of rapport with your customer base, it makes it easier to increase your revenue through upsells or add-ons, or even bring in new business through referrals and testimonials.

    Be Proactive

    There is no “one solution” that is right for every company to use with its customers. Focus on identifying similar types of customer needs, and be proactive in creating solutions that can be standardized for similar types of customers. Patterns will start to emerge over time, and you will be able to create solution types that can be repeated and scaled. Using tracking software allows you to know what your customer is examining and for how long. This way, you can predict his or her objections upfront and notice trends among your customers.

    Conclusion

    SaaS sales is hard, but it isn’t impossible. If you incorporate these strategies into your sales cycle, you’ll drastically increase your chances of success. It’s important to remember when you are running your business not to get totally caught up with the operations and forget about working on your sales process. Automated sales are great, but sometimes you need to add that personal touch to really take your business to the next level. Do you have any other strategies to sell your product? Please let us know in the comments section below.

  • Chatbot – Perfect SaaS Business Tool

    Software as a Service (SaaS) is a high engagement affair with its users. Modern businesses face crucial challenges related to customer retention and business development. Due to a shift in focus from primarily sales-driven organizations to more service-driven systems, businesses are trying to improve revenues by engaging customers in better ways. With the rise in popularity of communication services such as Facebook Messenger, LiveChat, Whatsapp, and others, it has changed the way consumers interact, both in their personal and professional lives.

    Chatbot
    Chatbot

    Research shows that customers become angry when businesses do not satisfy or provide proper customer support. By improving customer support functions, businesses can build brand loyalty and boost revenue in a short time.

    Also read:

    What is a Chatbot?

    In short, a chatbot is a computer program which mimics conversation between users, usually powered by artificial intelligence. A user could ask the chatbot a question or provide it with an instruction and the chatbot will respond. Chatbots are the new-age tool for helping businesses improve customer satisfaction, thereby, improving sales.  They’re typically considered either an informational bot or a utility bot; a utility bot is generally one that takes instructions such as scheduling an appointment, and an informational bot is one which is pretty self-explanatory – it provides the user with information, usually about the website they’re on.

    How Chatbot Works?
    How Chatbot Works?

    Why use chatbots?

    Chatbots are becoming an effective tool for lead capturing and are being integrated into websites to help businesses get prospects in efficient and cost-effective ways. They are more than simply a traditional live chat. They have assisted the startup world with scaling operations, building customer bases and boosting revenues.
    Users tend to favour an interactive medium for making their online purchases, and ultimately users want their information as quickly as possible. Chatbots allow your user to get their answer straight away, and if the bot is integrated with an app such as Facebook Messenger, there’s no need for them to download an additional app or keep changing between screens.

    Use cases for chatbot
    Use cases for chatbot

    A chatbots’ ability to understand and respond to customers’ questions make them a popular and powerful application. Chatbots help companies by offering better customer engagement. In turn, this drives companies to grow stronger globally through their outreach. Benefits also include saving time and money as well as optimally use human resources.
    SaaS businesses would not exist without the invention of the internet. Over the last 30 years, though, the playing field has been levelled. It is time for SaaS platforms to find a new differentiator, not only against other businesses but also against other SaaS. Chatbots are the perfect tool to bring that differentiation.

    Relevant read:

    Here are six ways chatbots can positively impact your SaaS business.

    They’re fast

    One of the biggest things that chatbots bring to the table is their ability to take a huge burden off customer support. Unlike executives who cannot handle more than 3 or 4 customers at a time in real-time conversations, chatbots can tackle many customers at once.
    Conventional CRM forces customers to wait to have their grievances addressed. In addition to the problems they’re facing, the long wait adds to a customer’s anxiety. By dropping a (knowledgeable) chatbot on your website or within your platform, you instantly give your audience what they want: help, now.

    Lead Filtering and Identification

    If you run an ecommerce business or a sales website, you may be receiving significant traffic due to promotional expenditure, but does it convert into tangible sales? The answer is, highly unlikely. Even a sales funnel will only work if the user follows through with the content. However, when you position a Chatbot, it prompts the user when looking for something specific. You feed the Chatbot with keywords and once the user responds, the Chatbot connects them with an actual salesperson.
    You may be unsure about retaining a 24/7 sales representative because you don’t want to waste resources on casual ‘digital dwellers’ who have no intention to purchase. This is where the Chatbot can help you identify the lead at the right time, putting your sales team into action just when you need them.

    Benefits of Chatbot
    Benefits of Chatbot

    They’re Smart and Quick

    Customers prefer quick and immediate responses as opposed to slow and tedious email threads. The fact that customers can get quick responses gives credence to chatbots. Chatbots are a better alternative to both Interactive Voice Response mechanism and email resolution methods. Chatbots are trained to respond with relevant and precise answers in an instant.

    Information Gathering and Recording

    Data shows that people talk more freely when they know who they are interacting with, whether it be with Apple’s Siri, Microsoft’s Cortana, Google’s Home or Amazon’s Echo. This same principle applies to Chatbots. When posting casual comments, most users can provide vital information showing their importance to your business. The data voluntarily provided by consumers regarding recent purchases, hobbies, likenesses and residential areas can be leveraged by the sales team to reach out to specific buyers. While human sales personnel may miss these red flags, a pre-programmed Chatbot will not.

    Must read:

    Branding and first mover

    Finally, being a first mover. The first mover advantage, which gives the upper hand to the first company to adopt a new piece of technology, doesn’t last. Chatbots are super early. There aren’t that many SaaS companies leveraging them just yet. You can still be a first mover. You probably have a couple of years tops, though, so you might have to act fast.
    Being a first mover has several advantages beyond just ‘being first’ and grabbing all the money. Namely, being a first mover offers a branding advantage. Position your company as an innovator in your field and reap the beautiful branding rewards.

    A Happy Customer Stays

    Customers whose problems are solved are more likely to stay loyal to the company, instead of migrating to the competitor. In fact, customers will be receptive to receive information about new offers and products. Developers are training chatbots to interact with customers like a friend.
    This informality is likely to create a shift from conventional marketing techniques towards revolutionary methods. These are times where going ‘mobile and digital first’ is the order of the day. Companies use chatbots during aggressive marketing campaigns to out maneuver their competition.

    AI and chatbots

    Chatbots can do much more than just customer service, the list of use cases grows every day. Besides basic script-based customer support, chatbots using NLP and machine learning are being used across industries to enable support in different functions. For example –

    • Chatbots can provide virtual assistance – One can reserve events, doctor appointments, restaurant reservations, movie tickets and more. E-commerce chatbots help in ordering food and just about anything from websites. Chatbots can help manage a person’s health, grocery etc.
    • Chatbots can help in content delivery for news updates and sports content. Some chatbots exist to give basic diagnosis advice based on symptoms. The bot can then refer users to a live doctor for further consulting.
    • Additionally, Chatbots are used in real estate to identify and convert leads. The chatbot field is diverse and rapidly growing and has since surpassed the realm of customer service.

    Conclusion

    Organizations all over the globe are trying to come up with new initiatives to make their workplaces more productive. Chatbots can help here too. Automation can create a lot of free time to enhance efficiency or allow people to devote that time for creative work. Chatbots are here to stay and are growing in intelligence to support different functions in multiple industries. It is essential that organizations understand chatbots and their usage at the primary level. There is little doubt that the number of complex tasks that will be handled by chatbots will also grow exponentially in the future. What do you think about the use of Chatbot in SaaS industry? Please let us know in the comments section.

  • Top Time Tracking Softwares for SaaS

    Time tracking software tracks the total time spent by employees on tasks and projects. This software captures employee time, hourly wages, and client billing rates and uses this information to automate invoicing and payroll management functions. This software is used by employees and employers in many industries and helps small- and mid-sized business owners stay organized and up-to-date in managing their employees’ time. Time tracking software increases productivity in employees because it allows for accountability, helps to discover which activities or events cause time wasting, and keeps all time data in one location.

    Benefits of Time-Tracking Software

    Here are some of the prominent benefits of time-tracking software:

    Effective Tracking for Freelancers and Remote Workers

    As businesses increasingly move toward mobile workforces, this trend poses multiple time-tracking challenges. It is frustrating to track attendance and time worked for each freelancer or remote employee separately. Time tracking software records attendance and time worked for employees and collects it on a dashboard for managers. Some time-tracking tool also offers automated screen capture, which enables users to monitor the total time spent on non-work activities by remote workers and freelancers.

    Efficient Payroll Management

    Payroll calculation is a time-consuming process. Payroll managers need to coordinate with employees and their managers to collect a series of information such as timesheets, hourly wages, leave records, and overtime pay to calculate employee compensation. Time tracking tool captures in and out-time for employees and provides users with reports on total hours worked and leave taken. The software also incorporates other payroll calculation factors such as differential wages and employee incentives.

    Mobile Access

    Due to an increasing trend of remote workforces, mobile access has become a necessity in today’s software market. A time-tracking mobile application allows remote workers to record their schedules, submit time-off requests, and view changes to their schedules on the go. Some products also offer GPS tracking, which enables managers to track the time spent by their field staff at a client location.

    Compliance Requirements

    Today’s businesses are subject to a number of payroll and wage-related compliances. They mandate strict standards regarding minimum wages and overtime pay and imposes severe penalties on business that do not comply. A time-tracking tool that tracks these compliances alerts managers when employee hours go beyond the recommended levels and ensures that overtime pay is incorporated into the employee payroll. Time tracking tool also provides standard reports related to these compliances.

    Also read:

    Typical Features of Time-Tracking Software

    1. Billable and non-billable hours: Track billable and non-billable hours related to a project.
    2. Online time tracking: Capture employee and task times using online applications that can be accessed and synced through a browser, mobile app, or desktop application.
    3. Automatic time capture: Record in and out-time of employees and calculate the number of hours worked. Users can also capture time using biometrics and other electronic time-capture methods.
    4. Employee database: Store staff contact information and project statuses.
    5. Overtime calculation: Record and manage overtime hours for employees.

    Top SaaS Products for Tracking Time and Activity

    Here is our list of top SaaS products that can effectively help you track the time and activities of your employees.

    Celoxis

    Celoxis
    Celoxis

    Celoxis’ project management software integrates seamlessly with over 400 popular business applications and it’s easy to use and powerful API makes it easy to integrate with any custom or in-house software that you use. With Celoxis, you can identify project requests that boost business value, build project plans that adapt to the real-world and visually monitor progress to fix problems before they start. You can also optimally allocate resources based on skills and availability and make pro-active hiring decisions based on future capacity and demand.

    Some of the features of Celoxis are:

    • Get automatic cost and revenue estimates from your project plans.
    • Monitor profits in real-time.
    • Stop billing leaks by invoicing your clients without delay.
    • Share files, apprise progress and exchange ideas with your team and your clients.
    • With fully customizable client portal, clients can do a whole lot more.
    • Customize prebuilt workflow apps to track issues, bugs, risks, change requests and approvals, or create your own unique app from scratch.
    • You will never go back to spreadsheets again. Slice, dice and visualize data your way.
    • Create and share dashboards that save time and accelerate decision making.
    • Schedule reports directly to your CEO’s inbox.
    Celoxis pricing
    Celoxis pricing

    Pricing: Celoxis has 2 pricing options – Cloud (US $25 per user/month) and On-premise (US $450 per user).

    Relevant read:

    Trackabi

    Trackabi is a perfect web-based tool for time tracking and leave management for freelancers, small and medium-sized companies.

    Trackabi
    Trackabi

    With trackabi, you can report time worked manually or use a timer and configure your timesheet with custom fields. You can also generate reports from timesheet, export them into PDF or Excel, print, or share with your clients via a link.

    Some of the features of trackabi are:

    • Prepare a vacation schedule. Approve or reject leave requests from employees.
    • Maintain a directory of current and former employees with their contact details.
    • Apply flexible access permissions via roles assigned to users.
    • Group employees into teams to assign to projects and manage access roles on the team level.
    • Invite your clients to join and gain access to time reports for their projects.
    • Get an extract of what is happening in your company every day, week, or month.
    • Import data from the most popular time trackers, project management, and source control systems.
    Trackabi pricing
    Trackabi pricing

    Pricing: Trackabi has 3 pricing options – Starter which costs $0 for 5 users, Business which costs $16/month for every 5 users, and Business Plus which costs $20/month for every 5 users. It also provides a 30 days free trial.

    TSheets

    TSheets is an employee time tracking and scheduling solution that saves business owners time and money. Get rid of that old punch clock or spreadsheet and simplify payroll, invoicing, and job costing. Whether they’re in the office or on the road, your employees can track time from any location—using a smartphone, tablet, desktop or laptop—in real time.

    TSheets
    TSheets

    Plus, TSheets is the only time tracking system embedded inside QuickBooks. You can review and approve employee time cards to run payroll, do job costing, or create invoices—without ever leaving QuickBooks!

    Some of the features of TSheets are:

    • Accurate time for client invoicing and painless payroll
    • Track billable time against customers, projects or jobs, classes, and service items.
    • GPS time tracking and timesheet compliance
    • Managers can assign workers to jobs or shifts to keep the workforce in sync
    • Time tracking and scheduling work in perfect harmony
    • Mobile time tracking with GPS and geofencing
    • Real-time project tracking
    • Customer support that lives up to the hype
    TSheets pricing
    TSheets pricing

    Pricing: There are two plans available – Premium ($8/user/month + $20 base fee/month) and Elite ($10/user/month + $40 base fee/month).

    Must read:

    ProofHub

    ProofHub
    ProofHub

    ProofHub helps you to plan and collaborate while having a seamless user experience that keeps everyone in the loop and focuses on the necessary with little to no learning curve. It can Integrate with the apps you already use. You can access Freshbooks, Google Calendar, iCal, Box, Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive and Outlook, bringing them all together within ProofHub.

    Some of the features of ProofHub are:

    • Create discussion topics and bring all your team and client discussions at one place eliminating long email threads.
    • Prioritize tasks with clear deadlines and set tasks to recur to never miss the ones that need to be done regularly.
    • Plan and visualize how pieces of your project fit together in a timeline view.
    • Define custom roles and stay in ultimate control of who gets access to what according to your organizational workflow.
    • You can get answers to where’s the team’s time going and what are the billable hours of projects
    • In ProofHub, you can choose who manages which project. A project manager will receive all the important notifications for the missed deadlines and overdue tasks and stay accountable.
    • Stay updated with all the activities happening in ProofHub through real-time in-app, desktop, email, and mobile notifications.
    Proofhub pricing
    Proofhub pricing

    Pricing: ProofHub provides you two different options – Ultimate control which is charged $89/month billed annually ($99/m billed monthly) and Essential which is charged $45/month billed annually ($50/m billed monthly). It also provides you with a 14-day free trial.

    Zoho People

    Zoho People
    Zoho People

    Zoho people is a 360-degree HR solution. It takes care of your HR processes while you take care of your employees. From onboarding and attendance management to time tracking and appraisals, it has all the features. One of the best things about Zoho People is its flexibility. It is not used just by HR department but also can be used by Delivery Leaders, Office Management, Training Department and Finance Departments

    Some features of Zoho People are:

    • Streamline both your data collection and secure storage with our employee database management system.
    • Set up your organization and maintain all your employee records in one central location.
    • Zoho People provides all the tools you need to help your HR staff and employees stay efficient, up-to-date, and productive, even on the go.
    • Set your organization’s hours, track your employee attendance, and make your payday stress-free.
    • Add clients, break down your projects into smaller tasks, and record hours in a timesheet.
    • Invoicing projects is a breeze because Zoho People is fully integrated with Zoho Books, Zoho Invoice, and Quickbooks.
    • Zoho People’s LMS is an intuitive platform to easily create and manage your organization’s training programs. Create courses, track employee progress, and help your team master new skills.
    Zoho People pricing
    Zoho People pricing

    Pricing: Zoho People gives you four different pricing options – Essential HR (₹42 /user/month billed annually), Professional (₹83 /user/month billed annually), Premium (₹125 /user/month billed annually), and Enterprise (₹167 /user/month billed annually). It also provides a feature of 15-day free trial.

    Conclusion

    Ideally, time-tracking software can tweak discrepancies in workflows to fix what is and isn’t working to increase profits and automate companies’ payroll and billing operations. Many time tracking software solutions work with other softwares like workforce management software, as well as payroll software and talent management suites. Time tracking software can be integrated either directly into time clock hardware or deployed in the cloud. Above is a list of tools that can be treated as a reference. You can choose a tool which suits your needs. How are you tracking the time of your employees? Please let us know in the comments section below.

  • All About Accounting Software for SaaS

    How many of us really like dealing with the nitty-gritty of running the accounting and bookkeeping operations of our companies? Unless you’ve got a passion for numbers (or you’re the founder of an accounting startup), you probably look at accounting as the least engaging, most time-consuming part of your day-to-day as an entrepreneur.

    Accounting Software for SaaS
    Accounting Software for SaaS

    So how do you keep track of your daily business accounting while also gearing up your business for future growth? You pick the best accounting software for SaaS companies. Implementation of the proper systems, processes and technology stack as early as possible is the solution. With the right accounting software for SaaS businesses, you can achieve a seamless flow of data between all financial processes in your business which would ultimately enter your cloud accounting system, ideally automatically.

    Also read:

    Spreadsheets vs. SaaS accounting software

    When you start making your first purchases for your startup, it’s easy to record them in an Excel or a Google Docs spreadsheet. Excel spreadsheets may seem perfect for the first weeks, or even months, as you’re getting your business off the ground, but continuing to manage your books that way — and not using real SaaS accounting software for your startup — is simply the wrong thing to do. This is true especially when you seek investments or venture capital to grow your business; when you show potential backers your financials in a handful of spreadsheets, chances of errors are higher and it looks unprofessional.

    Spreadsheets vs. SaaS accounting software
    Spreadsheets vs. SaaS accounting software

    There are certainly people who could maintain their financials for their SaaS startup in this manner. In these cases, they’d have to create very detailed spreadsheets with all the accounts and reporting elements of standard accounting. Spreadsheets like this would look a lot like accounting software, and the amount of time they’d take to set up and verify would be better spent on growing their business. The disadvantages of using Excel for accounting for your SaaS startup is about a lot more than just the way figures look in a spreadsheet. There is so much that can be wrong in a spreadsheet that investors can’t take that sort of financial data seriously.

    What SaaS accounting software offers?

    SaaS accounting software offers so much more than Excel that it’s really a no-brainer. Here are some of the best features that most accounting software provides:

    • Contact and project management: Set up your contacts, create projects, and manage your clients, all without having to copy and paste rows and columns.
    • Time tracking: If you bill your clients by the hour, most accounting software includes the capability to do this automatically. Create time sheets, then add them up when it’s time to issue invoices.
    • Invoicing: This is one of the most practical features of accounting software. You can easily invoice your clients, according to what you’ve sold them, how much time you’ve spent on their projects, and more. You can also create estimates, which you can then convert to invoices with a few clicks.
    • Price database: Depending on what your business sells — services, hardware, etc. — you can have a price database and update it as needed. You’ll always be charging your clients the correct prices. And you won’t need multiple calculations for sales tax; the software will handle that too.
    • Expenses: Accounting software handles expenses very well. Each team member has a role in the accounting software, and you can see, at any time, how much has been spent, and reimburse people accordingly.
    • Apply purchases and expenses to the appropriate accounts: Some of your expenses are for payroll, others for office equipment, and others for capital assets. Try separating those correctly in an Excel spreadsheet, especially when you need to calculate depreciation. Accounting software does this for you, and helps ensure best practices are followed in recording expenses.
    • Payroll and benefits: Handle payroll, payroll takes, reporting, and all the related expenses without breaking a sweat.
    • Bank feeds and reconciliation: With accounting software, you can have your bank transactions update automatically, and apply their expenditures to the correct accounts with a few clicks. Accounting software handles multiple bank accounts easily, and some software handles multiple currencies, so you don’t even have to look up exchange rates.
    • Cash flow projections: You can do this with Excel, with complicated formulae, but accounting software lets you see the big picture at any time.
    • Sharing: You may have a number of principals in your startup who need access to your accounts. With an Excel spreadsheet, you won’t all have access at the same time. Plus, you’ll never know if anyone has made a mistake. With accounting software, your accountant or CFO can check your books easily, and you can even give potential investors limited access to view your accounts.
    • Pretty printouts: Whenever you are seeking investments, you’ll need to show how healthy your business is. Accounting software prints out easy to read, standardized reports: your trial balance, profit & loss account, balance sheet, and more. You’ll look a lot more serious with accounts that investors can understand at a glance.
    • Audit trail: No one wants to get audited, but if you ever do face the scrutiny of the IRS, accounting software makes the process a lot simpler.
    • Support: When that person who set up the Excel spreadsheet leaves your startup for a different gig, who will be able to help out when something goes wrong? Accounting software includes support so when you don’t understand something, an answer is just a phone call away.

    Relevant read:

    Why are good accounting systems important for SaaS?

    The difficulty with SaaS businesses is that they are typically high transaction volume businesses, especially on the revenue side of things. It’s not uncommon to have thousands of transactions per month happening due to the recurring revenue model. When you have old, archaic accounting software (or even worse, spreadsheets), managing this high transaction load, it means that it’s very manual to reconcile and categorize your financial data on an on-going basis. You would need to enter every single one of these transactions 1 by 1 into your accounting system or spreadsheet in order to handle the accounting properly.

    Some SaaS businesses that we encounter even have 1 full time employee at the company just to handle data entry. Using this approach usually ends up with the company wasting time, wasting resources and not getting the data they need when they need it. With the right accounting software for SaaS businesses, much of this manual data entry and categorization process can be greatly alleviated.

    Focus on These Features

    Ok, you have decided that it is time to find a new accounting solution. Here are a few accounting-specific modules that you should ask about when assessing new software.

    Features
    Features

    Revenue Recognition

    Recurring revenue is the heart of your business. The revenue recognition process must be bullet-proof. Ask the vendor if they have specifically addressed ASC 606 or IFRS 15. Reporting is also key. Can you produce a report that shows recognized revenue by month by customer by product? Reports are also needed to prove out your deferred balances by customer. Your auditor will ask for this!

    Payment Integration

    If you invoice customers and receive a check or ACH in return, payment integration may not be relevant to you. But if your customers pay only by credit card, you’ll want a solid integration to Stripe or PayPal, for example, into your software. It must be able to track the meta data related to these transactions so that revenue recognition can be performed.

    Must read:

    Sales Tax

    This seems to be changing every year, and sales tax treatment on SaaS varies wildly from state to state. An out-of-the box integration that connects your accounting software to sales tax compliance software is necessary.

    Fixed Assets

    Software companies are typically not capital intensive in fixed assets (servers, expensive laptops, phone systems, etc.), but you do need a module for this. And it is a bonus if it also tracks the multiple “tax books” for GAAP, federal, and state purposes.

    Travel and Expense

    Does the software offer its own module to track and submit employee expense reports? And a mobile app? If it’s clunky, you may want to consider an outside T&E software vendor that integrates into your accounting system.

    CRM Integration

    Where does your quote and order begin? Integrating that information into your accounting system removes manual work, reduces errors, and most importantly, allows you to invoice faster so that can you accelerate cash flow. And cash is paramount in running any business.

    Conclusion

    If you’re going to eliminate the administrative nightmare of your accounting and start getting timely, accurate data, it all revolves in having the right accounting software for SaaS businesses in place, though choosing the right apps is just 50% of the equation to achieving stress-free accounting. The proper system architecture needs to be assembled, processes need to be defined so that everyone knows how data will flow between all apps and the right team has to be in place to maintain the integrity of the data on an on-going basis.