You made a new years resolution to start a business, but you don’t have alot of money. Below is a list of quality, free applications you can use to help run your business. Many of these apps are web based so you may want to read my post Cloud Computing: the good, the bad and the ugly before you dive in.

Free Office Suites

 (Word Processing, Spreadheet, Presentations, and more)

1. OpenOffice.org–Full function office suite similar to Microsoft office
2. Google Documents – Online office suite from google
3. Zoho – Online office applications and more

Free Productivity software

(Calendar, Address Book, Task Manager, Email)

1. Yahoo (Online)
2. Google (Online, tasks are experimental apps in email)

Free Accouting Software

(Full featured basic accounting sofware for the small business)

1. QuickBooks Simple Start
2. Microsoft Office Accounting Express

Free Web Hosting

1. Microsoft Office Live 
2. Google Sites

Free Email Client

1. Thunderbird

Free “Everthing-but-the-kitchen-sink”

1. Google Apps

  

In my business, a lot of what I do is on the Internet.  I do research, and download information and programs both for my day job, and for this blog. One thing that I rarely, if ever worry about is the amount of data  that I transfer. So my interest was piqued when I saw that three of the four major Internet providers (Time Warner (Cable), Comcast(Cable) and AT&T(DSL) are all looking at some type of data transfer regulation and/or additional charges for data transfer. Time Warner is already testing the idea in Texas, Comcast is now slowing high volume users, and ATT has talked about implementing metering in the near future. In my experience, when  one member of the telecom industry can get away with a new pricing structure, all of the others will follow. So expect to pay for your usage soon. This change is going to effect small and home businesses in negative way.

 

As you can tell from this blog, I advocate using the Internet to make your business more efficient and to save money. Metered Internet is going to cut into those savings. Currently the proposed limits where billing will start are at about 5 GB per month. (That’s about 10 Cd’s worth of data). While this seems high,  if you are in a business that emails lots of documents and high-res pictures, or depends on web conferencing to meet with customers and vendors, your bottom line could be effected; either you are going to have to pay-as-you-go, or pay a higher monthly fee for your data.

 

This change is probably inevitable. You need to start factoring some type of extra  Internet cost into your long term plans, to accommodate this change. Also look at your Terms and Conditions frequently (especially those mailings that they send you about changes), because this change may be slipped into your billing plan with out a lot of fanfare.