There are a lot more than just five technology products that can help you run your home-based business, but the five below are not negotiable. If you’ve already started your business and you’re missing one of the below, you should seriously consider making a change right now.

1. Smart Phone ― Don’t roll your eyes if this seems abundantly obvious, because you’d be surprised at how many small business owners are running off last-year’s run-of-the-mill cell phone without any of the bells and whistles. To the savvy business owner, those bells and whistles are actually necessities. Even if your business is based at home, you are going to constantly be on the run. You’ll need to be able to access e-mail, the Internet and more at a moment’s notice. Though we constantly advise you to not forget to balance out your work and private life, having a smart phone is a must. If you’re having an important family dinner, simply shut the phone off.


2. Social Media ― All of the social media options out there can make your head spin and prompt you to simply throw in the towel – don’t. The three main ones to focus on right now are Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook; as other sites gain momentum, we’ll let you know. These three sites are all completely free, and using them is an imperative when it comes to getting attention for your business. Be careful not to waste your time on these sites, as you can easily get sucked in. In fact, if you have money in the budget to hire someone to do your networking, it could be money well spent.  


3. Quality Backup Sever ― Despite how far computers have come over the years, they still sometimes die when you least expect it. For this reason, and due to the dreaded computer virus, you need to make sure that you are properly backing up all of your company’s information on a quality server. There are a number of good products out there to ensure you don’t lose everything of value in one thunderstorm. Also, using a server can often help your computer run faster and smoother.


4. Useful software, including accounting/payroll and antivirus ― Speaking of viruses, the best way to avoid this problem is a quality antivirus program. This, in addition to a few more software products, can give you a lot more time to concentrate on growing your business, rather than focusing on the little things. Antivirus will help you avoid losing all your data, and if you have a great backup server then you’ve now got double the protection. Another important software application to invest in is one that covers accounting/payroll solutions. Don’t waste your time crunching the numbers by hand when there are programs out there that can do it faster and more accurately.


5. A Killer Website ― As we head into the second decade of the new millennium, a killer website is a must. For many of your potential clients, the first way they will even hear of your business opportunity is on the web.  So not only do you need one, you need one that looks impressive and is easy to follow. Even if you don’t have a huge budget, you can still create a great website with a lot of the free tools available on the Web, such as Word Press. Simplicity is fine as long as your clients can easily figure out who you are and what you do, and it never hurts for your website to stand out in some way to nab clients.