The Best Professional Services Software For 2021

Accelerate your professional services business

Professional service firms have had an interesting year thanks to the digitalization of many industries and the COVID-19 pandemic. Most professional services firms, like consultants and lawyers now use a variety of software to automate activities, manage resources, and track operations in their business processes. This type of software enhances team collaboration and can be used by the employees of all branches of a company, ranging from sales, marketing, accounting, and project management. You can think of them as the single source of truth to help make client management easier.

What is Professional Services Software?

Professional Services Software (PSS) is an amalgam of tools that help services firms plan and manage projects, and measure project performance throughout their lifecycles. PSS, which is the service industry's analog to Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software, combines individual PSA tools for time tracking, project management, resource management, business intelligence, and expense tracking, expense reporting, and more.

Benefits of Professional Services Software

What makes Professional services software so popular among services companies, contractors, and professionals is how the software is customizable and can be tailored to meet the specific needs of industry and clients. They provide much-needed project metrics to ensure the SOWs and key deliverables are met. They can used for project accounting to ensure the project is profitable for your business.

File sharing

Professional services software provides a faster and more secure platform for file-sharing, along with enhanced storage capacities as compared to other means of file-sharing, such as email. This helps service providers perform efficient resource and asset management and makes for a better and more transparent client experience.

Hassle-free billing & invoicing

Professional Services Software provide you with automated expense management, timesheets, and expense tracking with easy billing and invoicing. They also let you track transactions, profit margins, and project financials, allowing you to keep a record of them for safekeeping.

Automate routine tasks

Professional services software allows you to effortlessly automate routine tasks like the management of customer profiles, sales data, and resources. It also provides portfolio and project management along with integrations like billing and accounting software. It tracks projects and resources in real time which increases management visibility and allows for better execution of efficient strategies.

The best professional services software available

To run a modern professional services company, we have created a list of tools we recommend you consider for your firm. Each of these was thoroughly tested and ranked highly in the surveys we conducted.

Virtual Address: Stable

With many businesses going remote-first now, they need a way to read their email without having to visit their offices. A virtual mailbox is a digital mailbox service that gives you login-based access to your storage through most digital devices with internet connections. A virtual address is an equivalent of a mailbox address.

Stable provides a virtual address and mailroom for services firms in remote areas. It provides you with a secure online space where you can receive, send, and store your mail and data which the company scans and sends to you. You can also forward packages and deposit cheques through Stable.

Business phone number: OpenPhone

A dedicated business phone number adds to the credibility of a services firm and builds up customer satisfaction. Through Business phone systems, you can easily track call durations and usage. A business phone number comes with options for call forwarding, call waiting, inbound call routing, and call recording, etc; services you can rarely get with an ordinary number.

OpenPhone takes the lead when it comes to business phone services. It provides reliable and secure texting and talking options on all devices. The use of automation in OpenPhone speeds up workflow. It comes with attractive features like auto-replies, call recording, advanced call routing, and more. OpenPhone is made for teamwork and collaboration; you can share your business number and responsibilities with a team.

Meeting Scheduling: Calendly

Meeting scheduling software take away the hassle of organizing long email chains and coordinating with a large group of people with individual requirements. These tools streamline your scheduling process, let you define your availability, and take away the possibility of double-booking in a certain time slot.

Calendly is the best among the scheduling software in the market. It is a free online solution to your scheduling problems and all you must do is to enter your availability preferences and let the Calendly algorithm do its magic. Calendly allows for Calendar integrations and automates tasks by working with your other apps. The Time Zone Intelligence in Calendly makes it a great option for professional teams.

Internal Chat: Slack

Internal Chat software lets you effortlessly communicate with your team and employees with greater agility. It facilitates seamless team collaboration and encourages better relations between a team.

Slack was designed keeping teamwork and efficiency in mind. It is easy to follow, unlike other means of communication such as email or SMS. Slack also connects to other apps on your phone to provide you with a fulfilling communication experience.

Video Calls: Zoom

The evolution of technology has called for the evolution of meetings as well. Video calling software is becoming increasingly popular with every passing day, and has become a necessity given the current COVID-19 pandemic. Video calling software are perfect for conducting virtual meetings, conferences, and even casual gatherings.

Zoom has time and again proven to be the best video calling software. It gives you consistent quality for its calls, offers excellent technical support, and provides options for file-sharing and cross-platform messaging. The Zoom app takes the video calling experience to a whole new level of accessibility and functions with ease.

Website and Portal: Portal

Firm now understand that it is imperative to have a modern online presence, and this includes both a website that reflects you brand and a client portal where clients can log in. Client portals are exploding in popularity this year among client-centric professional services organizations because firms are starting to move budgets from their office and physical presence towards their online presence instead.

Portal is the leading Client Portal Software and provides an ‘all-in-one commerce solution’ for businesses. With Portal, you can customize your client portal logos, color schemes, and workflows and have the ability to connect a custom domain so that it looks like you have built your own infrastructure. The features are comprehensive and you can choose which modules to enable. Available module include secure file-sharing, secure communication, billing (invoicing and subscriptions) and more.  

Manage your professional services business with Portal

Portal is the technology and infrastructure partner to leading accounting firms, law firms, consulting firms, and more. With us, you don't need to stitch together dozens of B2B SaaS services and can instead give your clients one unified experience.

Get the best client portal solution with Portal today!