Small business owners wear a lot of hats. They manage their employees, deal directly with customers, answer sales calls and can sometimes be part of the production team as well. On any given day, they handle every aspect of their business processes. How can they keep track of all the different projects, customer conversations and sales leads they see on a daily basis? Microsoft 365’s business suite answers this question with a great tool: OneNote. OneNote is an all-in-one notetaking, white board brainstorming, project-management-tracking digital notebook that does as much work as the business owners it helps.
OneNote is:
- Versatile
- Collaborative
- User-friendly and Fun
OneNote is Versatile
OneNote is basically a digital notebook. You can create as many notebooks as you want for as many different aspects of your business as you need. Each notebook has sections and each section has pages. If you are managing a project, you can keep track of finished tasks with tags. OneNote also allows you to create calendars within it, so that you can keep track of deadlines. You can click on the Add Meetings feature to connect with your Outlook calendar and access the meeting through OneNote. If your project requires sketching, the app also has a drawing feature.
Some small business owners are constantly educating themselves on the breakthroughs in their industries. OneNote is a great tool for these leaders to conduct and organize their research. You can search the web from the notebook by using the researcher feature. You can also attach links to articles and take notes all from the same screen. Whether you are managing a project or researching for a business venture, you can organize every aspect of the process using OneNote.
OneNote is Collaborative
The best part of OneNote is that you can share your notebooks with anyone you want. They can edit your notes and add to them. It also has an audio recording feature. So, you can leave voice memos for other people sharing the notebook. This is a great feature if you are on the go and want to make sure your notes do not get lost or erased in a text message. This is especially useful if, for example, a business owner is in a meeting with a client or perspective client and needs to reference a particular document. He or she can communicate with a collaborator on the account, ask them to find the document and insert into the notebook, and continue with the meeting because OneNote updates in real time.
OneNote is User-friendly and Fun
Everything you add in OneNote is stored in the cloud. This means that you can access OneNote from your phone, tablet, and laptop. Not all of the features available on the desktop version of OneNote are available in the online version, but most users will have the OneNote downloaded into their phone or tablet anyway. Even if users are not the most tech savvy people, the app is simple enough for anyone to use. It is also fun to use, so it inspires those that would otherwise not want to embrace a new technology to try something different. For example, some people prefer to take handwritten notes. The drawing feature allows for handwritten notes to be converted to text. The immersive reader mode also reads the text aloud. So, a busy small business CEO can listen to notes or information while they go for a much-needed jog.
Conclusion
Small business owners can sometimes feel like an octopus with each tentacle reaching in a different direction at once. Everything is not happening simultaneously, even if it feels that way. No one app will fix that problem. Tools like OneNote streamline projects, assignments, and schedules to ease the stress of having a lot to oversee. If you have any questions about OneNote or other apps in the Microsoft 365 suite, give us a call. We offer a Microsoft training for existing and perspective clients. We can help you get the most out of these tools to make your business more efficient, productive and profitable.
