12 Most Useful iPad Apps For Sales Professionals
The laptop has been essential gear for salespeople for a long time. Whether it’s collecting data, communicating, or presenting, the laptop has done the trick. The same has been true of the cellular phone, and it’s even better in its newest form, the smart phone.
Now comes the tablet, the third screen. Apple’s iPad dominates the market for tablets. One of the primary reasons it does so is because of the powerful, useful, and effectiveness of the apps for business.
These 12 Most Useful iPad Apps for Salespeople will make sure your tablet is loaded with what you need to be ready for the great game of sales.
1. Pages:
Pages is Apple’s version of a word processor, like Microsoft Office. You can create documents, print them, convert them to PDF’s, and email them. You can also convert the documents you create to MS Office for your clients, who more than likely don’t use Pages.
2. Keynote:
Keynote is Apple’s version of PowerPoint. The presentations you create can be delivered directly from the iPad, and can also be delivered using an HDMI cable connected to a television. This app makes carrying the laptop a thing of the past.
3. Numbers:
This is the last Apple app, I promise. Numbers is Apple’s version of Excel. It’s not quite as intuitive to use if you have spent your life in Excel. But it creates spreadsheets that you can use to present data or export into Excel for your clients.
4. Evernote:
I didn’t understand how to use this app when I first downloaded it to my computer, my iPad, and my iPhone. This is now the app I use most frequently. Evernote is your outboard brain. The idea is to dump everything you come across into the app, whether it is a note, a receipt, a PDF file, a picture, or anything else. You can put the notes in notebooks, and you can add tags. The search functionality makes it easy to find whatever you need. Oh, and you can record voice notes, too.
5. Dropbox:
One great thing about Evernote is that it gets rid of digital clutter. That said, we still have home computers, office computers, iPad’s, and smartphones. You don’t always have the file you need where you need it. And sometimes you need to share files with members of your company or your clients. Dropbox keeps your files in sync across all of your computers. Ever show up to a sales call and need the last version of a presentation?
6. WSJ:
To succeed in sales, you need business acumen. The Wall Street Journal is THE business paper in the United States. The app is outstanding. When you find yourself arriving early for an appointment, trapped in an airport, or with a few minutes, spend it reading and acquiring knowledge and ideas.
7. Wired:
Reading about sales is essential. Reading about business is essential. But reading widely and capturing ideas outside of sales and business can help to improve your business acumen, as well as your general knowledge and understanding of your world. Wired magazine covers a broad array of stories and ideas, and this app lets you check the box that you don’t only read in your domain.
8. Kindle:
Amazon’s Kindle app is free. More importantly, it drives the cost of a book down to $9.99. You can have the book delivered directly to your iPad. Reading is one the fastest and surest ways to improve business acumen. There isn’t any excuse not to read when it is this cheap and this easy.
9. GoodReader:
GoodReader is a useful little app. It allows you to transfer files from your computer to your iPad. It also allows you to open and view those files. This is helpful if your presentation is in PowerPoint or your spreadsheet is in Excel. You can still access the files and work with them using GoodReader.
10. OmniFocus:
This is an expensive app. It is a professional-grade task management system built to accommodate David Allen’s Getting Things Done methodology. As a salesperson, success means making and keeping your commitments. OmniFocus allows you to capture, track, and manage those commitments.
11. FlightTrack Pro:
If your sales job requires you to travel, you may want to move this app up to the top of the list. You connect this App to TripIt or load in your flight information, and FlightTrack will monitor your flights. It will notify you of delays, give you access to alternate flights, and will inform you of the gate at which you will be arriving and the gate from where you will depart.
12. Yelp:
When you are on the road making deals, you need a good restaurant for a client dinner. Or maybe you just need the closest Starbucks. Yelp lets you find what you need in whatever corner of the country you find yourself. The restaurant reviews give you enough information to make an informed decision. And you can find the nearest drug store to pick up the razor you forgot.
The apps that you can now load on your tablet make travelling and selling quite a bit easier. Take a look at these apps and see if they have a place on your tablet.
What is your essential app and why?
Featured image courtesy of Josh Liba licensed via creative commons.
http://thesalesblog.com/
S. Anthony Iannarino is the President and Chief Sales Officer at SOLUTIONS Staffing, the Managing Director of B2B Sales Coach & Consultancy, and an Adjunct Faculty Member of Capital University’s School of Management and Leadership. He writes a daily blog on sales and sales effectiveness at The Sales Blog.
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