EricMillerDesign

Software and Services for a Design Business

I’m often asked what software and services I use that help keep Eric Miller Design running smoothly. Although this list is always evolving, I thought I’d post it on the blog for easy reference. People are generally asking about project management, business tools and utilities as opposed to design software, so this will focus on that. This of course doesn’t encompass everything, but rather what we use frequently that I would consider crucial to our business.

Highrise

We use Highrise as our CRM (Customer Relationship Management) and for project management. While we originally used Basecamp (among others) for project management, it was much easier to move into one system, and Highrise easily handles everything including keeping track of leads, projects, contacts, meetings and tasks.

Billings

Billings takes care of all time tracking and invoicing for the business. The software makes it easy to keep track of expenses and time spent on tasks, and it offers great options for invoice design and statistics reporting. Billings Touch for the iPhone allows for time tracking on-the-go.

Campaign Monitor

Campaign Monitor is our current system of choice for delivering email newsletters, both for our business and for our clients. It’s affordable and reliable, and offers an intuitive interface for setup and delivery. The statistics reporting (that easily ties into Google Analytics) and simple methods of integrating subscription forms with a website round out the package.

Google Voice

Google Voice is the Eric Miller Design phone system. It gives us one number that can ring any or all of our phones, transcribed voicemail so we can read our messages and a great way to keep track of past calls. The Google Voice browser-based app carries the service over to the iPhone.

Google Analytics

We use Google Analytics for website statistics for our site and most projects. The user-friendly interface along with the fact that the service is free allows us to offer powerful reporting to all of our clients.

BBEdit

It’s amazing how powerful text editing software can be, but somehow we find ourselves pasting something into BBEdit at least once a day. We use it for complicated find-and-replaces, HTML editing and pretty much any task that requires changing text.

CSSEdit

CSSEdit does just what it says… edits CSS… and it does it very well. The ability to preview sites in real-time as you edit the code and to easily find styles with the x-ray inspector make the software a powerful tool.

OmniGraffle

A very handy diagramming tool, OmniGraffle is what we use to create wireframes and flowcharts for web projects.

Apple

I’ll round out this list with Apple tools in general… software that comes with the iMac and iPhone that keeps us organized. We use Address Book, iCal, MobileMe accounts, iPhoto, Mail, iChat and other Mac tools on a daily basis.

Are we missing out on something great? Please share in the comments below.