13 tools that every startup needs, by robwebb2k.com

This is a high quality article that tells the story of a common experience in every entrepreneur’s life — asking advice from somebody who’s been there (if this isn’t a common experience in your life yet, this is one of the best ways to learn wisdom without the messy trial and error. Go ask somebody more successful than you are what his/her advice for your startup is!)

March 31, 2008 in Braintree Financial, Google, KnowledgeBid, MediaTemple, My picks, Netvibes, RingCentral, WordPress, blogging, outsourcing, telecom

A friend of mine…I’ll call him Arnold Babar…is in the early stages of starting a company. Over a few beers the other night, Arnold asked me a few general questions about service providers we’ve used for various aspects of building the KnowledgeBid expert network management platform and other projects. A few came to mind immediately…then I thought of a few later that night…then a few more the next day. I’m putting them all into a post in the hopes that I might save someone else the hours of head + wall collisions it took me to find these guys. I’m only going to include services that I use heavily myself and would recommend to a close personal friend. I’ll add to this as more come to me. My top priorities: 1) cost; 2) functionality / flexibility; 3) quality; 4) reliability.

Best Corporate Telephony / PBX / Fax Service: RingCentral
My previous write-up on RingCentral is here. Super flexible PBX, digital fax delivery, digital voice mail delivery, $19.95/month. Can’t beat it. Mac friendly except for the sound recording / uploading feature.

Best Payment Processing Service: Braintree Payment Solutions
My previous write-up on Braintree is here. The payment processing industry is a total mess. The Braintree guys are straight shooters. Save yourself serious pain and go straight to them.

Best Press Release Services: PRZOOM, The Open Press
The web has antiquated the newswire industry. These two providers are free and get your PR messages on sites other than your own, which is all you really need. PRWeb and the others try to get you to pay, but it’s really not worth it.

Best Conference Call Service: Free Conference
My previous write-ups on the free conference call industry are here. The FCC says these guys can stay in business and so long as you just need them to work for your call tomorrow or next week, you’ll be fine. Call quality is good and reliability is good. I would advise against trying to bake them into your app though…you get what you pay for and who knows how long their loophole will be open…

For more information, including best desktop sharing software, best domain registrar, best hosting service, best blog platform, best corporate email solution, best bug tracker, best stock photography, best professional voice recording, and much more give the original author traffic by clicking here.

http://blog.robwebb2k.com/2008/03/31/my-picks-the-best-service-providers-for-startups/