How do you manage a distributed team of consultants based around multiple countries? We don't know either, so we had to find out what tools you should use. Everyone has to use technology tools as a way to enhance their productivity and capabilities in managing a team. In this section, we have business leaders, mavericks and leaders sharing the tools that they use to make it work.
In today's segment, we have Terng Shing Chen, who is a communications professional, startup founder and porcaster. In his current position as the CEO of SYNC PR, a regional communications startup agency, Terng is focused on business development and strategy.
Prior to starting SYNC, Terng worked as the CMO for a healthtech startup and has been in leadership positions in PR agencies, tech companies like Razer and more. He has over 16 years of experience in communications, training, crisis management and content marketing, having led teams in 3 continents.
SYNC is a PR and content marketing startup, with teams in Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and India, as well as a strong network in Southeast Asia and North Asia. The company continues to expand and has worked with over 350 startups, VCs, SMEs and corporations in over 13 markets since 2018.
Streamlining communication and collaboration with Slack (Paid)
All our internal (and some of our external) communication happens on Slack. We use the messaging platform as a way to streamline information about projects and updates without getting overwhelmed. It's not just about sending messages; the channels feature allows us to create dedicated spaces for specific projects, departments, or even casual conversations, helping us keep everything organized. This has been especially useful in managing cross-functional projects where input from various team members is crucial.
We really love the integration with other tools we use. For instance, we can link our project management software, Google Drive, and even calendar apps directly into Slack. This means we can share files, set up meetings, and track project progress without having to switch between multiple platforms.
Moreover, Slack's ability to facilitate asynchronous communication has been vital for us. With team members in different time zones, it's unrealistic to expect everyone to be online simultaneously. Slack allows us to leave messages, updates, or questions for teammates who can then respond when they're online. This flexibility ensures that our projects keep moving forward, even when some of us are offline.
Buffer for social media management (Paid)
We have clients around the region who use us to manage their social media channels. We have used numerous tools, but Buffer has proven to be pretty good overall. We can schedule posts for various time zones, ensuring that our content reaches the right audience at the optimal time. This has been particularly useful for us when launching region-specific campaigns, allowing us to maintain a consistent presence across different markets.
The analytics are another key feature that we use a lot. We can track the performance of our posts in real-time, which allows us to adjust our content strategy based on what resonates most with our audience.
Buffer's team collaboration features also enhance our ability to work together effectively despite being in different locations. We can easily assign roles, leave notes, and approve content before it goes live, ensuring that our social media presence is aligned with our brand's voice and objectives.
ChatGPT 4.0 for research and content review (Paid)
One of the biggest challenges we face as a content marketing agency is the need to generate high-quality content quickly. Let's get this straight, we do not use AI tools to create the content, but they are very useful research and summarization tools. Through our own experience, we find the AI's ability to understand context and provide well-structured summaries to be pretty much on point, allowing us to reduce the time spent by around 30-35%.
We do sometimes use ChatGPT as a sounding board, which allows us to feed it our content and get it to review, critique and often give us decent enough suggestions. This allows us to use when we're in a rush or we need simple feedback quickly.
Video editing made easy with CapCut (Paid)
Simplicity is key when you need to produce good quality video, so CapCut has become an essential tool for our team. We like the platform's user-friendly interface and decent editing capabilities, which has enabled most of us capable of simple edits and quick turnarounds. CapCut's built-in templates and effects made it easy for us to produce trendy, visually appealing videos that aligned with the latest social media trends.
Capcut can actually be used collaboratively allowing us to create teams and work on projects together. We can easily share projects, provide feedback, and make edits without having to send large files back and forth.
Canva for most of our design needs (Paid)
Though our design team hates me saying this, Canva has been an indispensable tool for our team. Its drag-and-drop interface and vast library of templates, fonts, and images make it easy for anyone on our team to create high-quality graphics quickly. With Canva, we can maintain a consistent brand identity across all our visual content, regardless of who is creating it.
We especially like its ability to cater to various local tastes and preferences. We combine our ability to provide the localized images, text and video, using Canva to develop assets that suit each of our client needs. Canva's collaboration features have also been really useful. We can share design projects, leave comments, and make real-time edits, ensuring that everyone is on the same page, regardless of their location.
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