25 Fresh Startups for Online Workers

There are dozens of new startups each day, some of which simply aren’t noticed until years after they were released. One of the services that comes to mind is Twitter. While there were initially some people who liked the service, it wasn’t until this year that it became mainstream, and more than just technology lovers were using the service.

With so many startups, it is hard to sort out those that are really useful and those without a solid backing. In this showcase, we bring together some useful new tools and services that have launched recently, and we tell you why they are so great.

25 Fresh New Startups for Online Workers

The tools below are great for designers, coders, and pretty much anyone who wants to become more productive online while trying new tools.

1. Webvanta

A hosted service that enables you to quickly build database-driven websites without programming. You can use your own tools, such as HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, so there are relatively few limitations.

Additionally, because you’ll be able to build content-rich sites without struggling with back-end code, you have the option to mark-up Webvanta’s low monthly fee and benefit from an automatic source of ongoing revenue. Essentially, you can use this to build your own CMS/database system.

2. Droplr

Not the newest service around, but Droplr allows any Mac user (and there are quite a bit of them in the design community) to share images, create and share notes, share screenshots, and post to Twitter. It’s a simple file sharing and management, with 1GB of storage.

The app requires Mac OS 10.6, Snow Leopard.

3. Squareleaf

Face it, you can’t remember everything. That’s where this service comes in. It is easy to use and makes creating and managing notes and ideas easy. Remember important things, keep to-do lists, organize projects, track work, and everything else that you need to do that you’ve never even thought of. Right now, only free accounts exist, but more cool features will be added with Pro Accounts.

4. Glasnost 21

Glasnot combines contact management, project management, as well as image management into a service that’s great for sales teams, or just for keeping track of all the people you work with. THe platform is intuitive, flexible, and great for increasing productivity. The image management tool lets you create and share any number of galleries with others. The service starts at £15 per month, with a free trial available.

5. Squad

Squad is a web-based collaborative code editor. There are plenty of these around, but they make it simple to open, edit, and share code in real-time. Check out the list of main features below.

• Simple – The simplicity is perfect for novice users and a joy to use for power users. It has everything you need to edit text or source code, and none of the bloat found in most text/code editors.
• On Demand – The service is web-based, so all your settings remain with you, as long as you have an Internet connection. No need to install a clunky desktop application.
• Flexible – Even if you use a desktop text editor, it’s the quickest and easiest way to share code with co-workers or make a quick fix from anywhere.
• Collaborative – If you are new to coding, it’s the perfect way to ask a friend to lend a helping hand. If you’re an experienced developer, it is great for code reviews, on the job training, and pair programming.

6. TeuxDeux

TeuxDeux is a simple, design-oriented browser-based to-do app and has been designed around a bare-bones, but visually compelling and highly usable to-do app based on a great workflow.

Some of the main features include: week overview, check off doe tasks, delete tasks, move tasks, and a “someday” bucket. It is completely free now, but a premium version is in the works (which might offer the ability to save more information, for example).

7. Twitterformats

I tried to minimize the number of Twitter services in this list, but Twitterformats is different. It allows you to add semantics to Twitter conversations and empower the community to evolve Twitter in an organic fashion. Anyone can propose a new Twitterformat by sending a Proposal Ping, and community members can leave comments and rate them.

8. FormSpring

The service is quite simple, but great for developers and designers. You can create a box where friends can ask questions anonymously. They (or you) can post your responses to Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook, or your blog.

9. Was It Up?

If you’re online, there’s a good chance you have a website/blog. You want it to remain “up” as much as possible so you don’t lose visitors who entered from search engines to only discover that none of your content loads. This service is extremely easy to use and best of all, it’s free.

All your monitorings are managed by following a link containing your email and a secret. There are essentially only two things to complete to use the service: your email address, and the site address. You can also use a “contains” and “doesn’t contain” parameter, but this is optional.

10. ClickTime

ClickTime Web Timesheet is an easy-to-use online timesheet system for time tracking, billing, cost accounting, and payroll. There is an intuitive interface, powerful reports, and hands-on customer service that has helped the service earn the praise of large corporations.

11. LiveFyre

This is a real-time service that lets you start and join real-time conversations about nearly any topic. It might not have much to do with developers and designers, but if you’re a blogger, you need to stay up-to-date on the latest events and news.

12. Invoices on the Run

Invoicing shouldn’t be difficult. You can email simple invoices, enter invoice details, choose a template, and then you’re done. There are only two accounts (at this time), with one being free and the other costing just $5/month. Both allow you to send an unlimited number of PDF invoices and allow an unlimited number of clients, but the Small Business Account gives you more tools for managing and customizing your invoices.

13. Trakeze

A fully-integrated business management system, it provides CRM, sales, and contract financial tools, as well as employee management and task management. There are many other sub-services apart of Trakeze, so they also have to be checked out.

14. SiteCake

At this time, the service is only available as a technology preview, but three plans will become available, ranging in the number of features. The Free Plan is currently available, but One Site and Reseller Plans will become available sometime early next year. I’ve listed some of the main features of the service below.

• Simple Editing – To make clients lives easier, they developed the service with only basic editing capabilities without a back-end interface. During editing of the page, only relevant UI elements and actions are displayed.
• Fast Editing – You shouldn’t become annoyed with websites that need to consult the server for even the smallest of actions. SiteCake’s editing process is smooth and not interrupted.
• Fast Initialization – The tool/site have a small footprint, at less than 200KB in total, so there will be only short loading times.
• True WYSIWYG – You edit text where you read it – just like on paper.
• Easy Integration – Any valid HTML document augmented by the appropriate class attribute markups can act as a template for editing with SiteCake.
• No Need for Databases – All your content you created and edited on your pages are written into files which means you don’t need to have databases on your server.

15. Convert.io

The smart way to manage large-scale file conversions. You can batch convert hundreds, thousands, or millions of files into archivable formats like PDF, TIFF, or XPS. Additionally, you can create thumbnails, first page previews, and extract text from documents. It can be integrated with your own document management system, scanning operation, website, or application. Plans range from free to $199/month for an Enterprise Account, which provides an unlimited number of conversions, a 25MB maximum file size, and fifty concurrent conversions.

16. Patapage

Add options to your website within a matter of minutes – no editing of HTML, finding widgets, or installing plugins. Currently, plans are free and paid, starting at $39 for an unlimited number of sites. Pricing isn’t clear at this point, but you can try out the service to add interactive features to your site.

17. PagerDuty

PagerDuty is a more complete system for monitoring any tool or service that you may be running. It’ll email and call you if there’s a problem. Share in the pain using the on-call schedules so you can share the responsibility with the rest of your team.

Some of the other features include: 30-day free trial, email-based integration, handle alerts from your mobile phone, user-customizable alert sequences, on-call schedules, complete incident logging, and no install needed (100% browser-based).

18. Injoos Teamware

“Just another” simple online collaboration tool. The service brings together real-time and near real-time collaboration tools in a single easy-to-use platform. You can collaborate with your teams, share files online, build your website in minutes, and create online workspaces for teams.

19. Moobiz

One simple monthly fee gives you complete access to their library of online business software apps, which aim to help you run your business with customer relationship management (CRM), online accounting, invoicing management with shared workspaces, to running a website or e-commerce site.

20. easyTracker

While easyTracker only does one thing, it does it well. It provides online project management, a business management system, and everything you need to be mobile. You can login from your iPhone or other mobile device and manage your staff, time sheets, projects, clients, invoices, and to-do lists.

A 30-day free trial is available, and plans range from $14 to $100 per month, depending on how many users/outstanding invoices/active projects you have and whether you pay up front.

22. Robotir

It can be difficult to get your message across on Twitter when you have to do other things during the day. Therefore, Robotir has been created to make automating your Twitter account. Simply place a list of tweets into the service, and the service will automatically publish them when you tell it to. It makes it easy. There’s nothing we can do to combat Twitter spam, but if you can use some of the same “tools” they use, you’ll be able to promote your brand, too.

23. Layers

A new service that enable you to speak your mind, overlaying videos, images, and texts on top of any web page, and then you have the ability to share it with your friends. Anyone can use the service, and it makes it possible to imitate the “real world” situation where you can write or draw on a sheet of paper and share it with others easily.

23. Outright

Outright is a free online bookkeeping service, with supports these main features: your business’ insights, with income and expense bookkeeping, Schedule C and W-9 submission, and support with deductions, taxes, and successful self-employement.

Save Time with automated bookkeeping software for entrepreneurs and bookkeepers, with the ability to track income and expenses from credit cards, invoices, receipts, or even merchant accounts. Save Money as you know that you will always be on-time with taxes, and you can reduce costly fines from the IRS.

24. Bidsketch

Simple proposal software made for designers. Manage all your clients and proposals, automate your proposal process, communicate with better online sharing, and increase profits and win more proposals.Plans are just $9 and $19 per month, depending on your online storage, number of clients, users, and other features. There is a 30-day free trial.

25. PPMLite

Project portfolio management simplified, with the ability to align strategy from the top down, build project transparency by using portfolio-based metrics, and increase efficiency and streamline execution.

Conclusion

While some of these tools have been around for a while, they have recently gone back into the spotlight. Let us know which of those listed above you have used or plan on using. If you want to see more posts like this in the future, we recommend following us on Twitter.