Business owners have a lot on their plate, especially when they’re working with a small team. You have to be on the constant lookout for new revenue, keep customers coming in, and hang on to the ones you’ve got. Then there are all the little admin and logistical tasks that you run around and close out so the rest of your team can focus on high-priority items. One way you can make that a little easier on yourself? Technology. And you don’t need fancy, expensive tools, either. Turns out that some of the best tools are Chrome extensions, designed specifically with small businesses in mind.
Here are 11 of the top Google Chrome extensions for your small business, built to handle everything from customer acquisition to task management.
When you’re a business owner, there’s no shortage of tasks you could be working on and never enough time to do them all. And when you have a team around you, that problem just compounds. If you’re struggling to keep everyone productive, Toggl Track can help you get everyone back, well, on track. It integrates with over 100 tools, and lets you know just how much time is going into specific tasks, which tools your team spends the most time in, and helps you get your productivity back.
HubSpot is a customer relationship management platform (or CRM), meaning it’s a powerhouse that can completely transform your sales and marketing workflows. With a CRM, you can keep a close eye on how many potential customers become actual customers, launch marketing campaigns on a budget, and more. With the HubSpot Sales Chrome extension, anyone in your small business can have access to the contact information they need, when they need it, whether they’re sending emails or scheduling callbacks.
Whether one-on-one conversations are how you build your business or are your business, you need a way to track your many meetings without relying on a paper agenda. With Calendly, you can streamline your appointments, automate your scheduling, and make sure you’re never double-booked again. The Chrome extension gives you the ability to check your calendar from anywhere on the web and book meetings right from LinkedIn.
Unless your business is just you, a van, and a filing cabinet full of paper, you probably rely on email quite a bit. Whether it’s sending quotes, reaching out to potential clients, or getting paid, you want to know that your emails are reaching the right person. With Mailtrack’s Chrome extension, you’ll know when your emails get delivered, when they’re opened, and when your PDF attachments are viewed. No more second-guessing yourself after sending an invoice, and no more “hey did you get that email?” follow-ups.
If you’re used to working with international clients, “CAD to USD” and “Pounds to US Dollars” are probably high in your search history. What if you could save a few clicks on each of these searches? Those clicks add up to minutes and hours that you could spend on something else. With this Chrome extension, you’ll be able to quickly convert currencies from a sidebar, no matter where you are on the web.
Your small business probably doesn’t have as many meetings as a massive corporation, but are the meetings you do have as efficient as they could be? Enter Hypercontext. This Chrome extension streamlines all the additional work that comes from booking meetings, like creating an agenda, coming up with the right brainstorming questions, and following up on next steps.
When you’re running a small business, you want to make sure every single person you recruit is the perfect fit for the role. Without a dedicated HR team, you just don’t have time to scout for talent and manage complex hiring workflows. With this Chrome extension, you can automatically add a profile from any website to a single talent pool. No more copying and pasting phone numbers.
Is cold outreach a big part of your customer acquisition strategy? If so, then you know finding contact information for potential customers can be a huge hassle. Sure, you could buy contact lists, but the sellers are rarely reputable, and you have no guarantee that the people you reach out to are a good fit for your small business. Instead, you can use a Chrome extension like RocketReach, which will allow you to find verified contact information for potential customers anywhere on the web.
When writing isn’t your strong suit, anything from composing an email to creating that perfect LinkedIn post can be a time-consuming nightmare. And even if you’ve got a knack for the keyboard, why not use all the help you can get? That’s where Wordtune comes in. Think of it as an AI-driven writing assistant. It’ll suggest ways to make your writing clearer and more compelling without sacrificing authenticity.
One of the biggest challenges for a business owner is making sure their time goes where it’s needed most. Without a proper task management system in place, there’s no way to know that what you’re getting done right now is the best use of your time. With Todoist’s Chrome extension, you can streamline task management right from your browser. That way, you’ll always know what you’ve done today, what’s next on the list, and what you’ll have to push to another day.
One of the biggest problems for small businesses is finding the right tools. Often, they either don’t do exactly what you need or they’re so expensive that they’re beyond your budget. Wouldn’t it be better if you could build something yourself without hiring a developer?
With PixieBrix, you can.
PixieBrix is a low-code platform you use to build browser mods to automate work, improve productivity, and make your life as a business owner just a bit easier. You can create intelligent overlays that make the tools you already use more interactive, streamline repetitive processes, and get rid of manual work that eats up your day.
Here are just a few examples of Chrome mods your small business could benefit from, all built with PixieBrix:
And these are just a few of the extension templates you’ll find on the PixieBrix marketplace. Go have a look, and you might just find your next time-saving automation.
With the right technology — and the right Chrome extension — you can make repetitive processes run more smoothly with less manual work. Whether you pick something someone’s already built or make your own with PixieBrix, you’ll quickly turn your browser into a productivity powerhouse. Are you a small business owner looking for some help with YouTube? Here are 10 of the Best YouTube Chrome Extensions for Content Creators.