Those who are regular readers of this blog know that I am a big supporter of small businesses many of whom feel that they are at a disadvantage when competing with large corporations. I firmly believe that not only can small businesses compete with their larger rivals,but can beat them at their own game. We showed some of the techniques you can use to beat large competitors in earlier post.
In my view large corporations gain advantage against smaller rivals with economies of scale and having better access to capital and business tools. However, the Internet is changing the playing field in favor of small business owners. SohoOS is one promising start-up that aims to level the playing field in the area of business tools. SohoOS shares our vision of helping small business owners effectively compete with and beat their larger rivals who hold unfair advantage.
SohoOS provides broad set of business tools that small businesses need to use for everyday business transactions. Their target users are small and micro businesses including those operating from home or freelancers. The examples are roofers, designers, computer programmers, private instructors and like. These are the business owners who are working solo or with few employees and are trying to do everything themselves. For these business owners the primary focus is gaining customers and serving them. They do not have time to deal with “mundane” routine business tasks.
SohoOS provides a platform that takes care of these routine tasks with less effort. The set of tools provided by SohoOS include billing and invoicing, contact management, marketing, document management, inventory management and others. According to their website, they are planning to introduce project management and customized report generation modules soon. All these tools can be accessed via web as well as on mobile devices.
The best part of SohoOS is that these basic set of tools are available for free. Not only that, you do not need to download any software on your computer. With their cloud based model all modules can be accessed over the web. The development team at SohoOS has paid lot of attention to usability focusing on those users who do not have time to learn all the complexity of business tools. The tools are very easy to learn and use.
In addition to free tools ShohOS also has a “Pro” version that provides additional functionality as well as the ability to customize it to your business. You can use “Pro” version with their pay-as-you-go plan of $9.95 per month or $24.95 for 3 months. Currently, they are running a special promotion by which you can get 1 year access to “Pro” version for $39.95.
SohoOS has already attracted more than 800,000 customers who are using their tools on a daily basis and they are adding more every day. If you have not looked at them I strongly urge you to visit their web site and give it a try. Hey, what do you have to lose? After all, the basic functionality is available for free. Let us know what you think about them in the comments below after you test drive them.
