In this post, I will provide an overview of the tech stack we use at Grafikr to manage our business operations effectively.

Over the past eight years, we've invested heavily in software and various systems. Having the right tech stack is crucial for our business as it streamlines workflows and enhances visibility. We continuously reassess our software to ensure we're cutting unnecessary costs, as even small amounts can add up over time.

I won't delve into our technical development setup in this post, but I might save that for a future article.

Operations

• Forecast: For project planning and resource management.
• Notion: Our all-in-one workspace for note-taking, task management, and collaboration.
• G-Suite: Essential tools for email, document creation, and cloud storage, but more of this moves to Notion.

Administration

• Zenegy: Our payroll management system.
• Scaleup Finance: For managing financial data and metrics - external CFO.
• E-conomic: Our accounting software.
• Pleo: Simplifies expense management
• Various add-ons like Officebot for additional administrative tasks related to finance

Sales

• Pipedrive: Our CRM tool to manage sales pipelines.
• Pitch: For creating compelling presentations.
• Better Proposals: Helps us create and manage proposals efficiently.

HR

• Zoios: For employee engagement and feedback.
• Corelation: For employee and client feedback

Communication

• Slack: Our primary platform for team communication.
• Spark or Superhuman: Email client to manage our communications.
• Loom: For creating quick video messages and tutorials.
• Zendesk: Our customer support software.

Design

• Figma: For collaborative design and prototyping.
• Adobe Creative Cloud: Comprehensive design and creative tools.
• Baymard Institute: Not a specific tool, but a ressource: Provides UX research insights to inform our design decisions.

Miscellaneous

• 1Password: Securely manages our passwords.
• Trello & Monday.com: Project management tools for different needs in collarboration with our clients
• Marts.io: Inventory management.

By utilizing this diverse range of tools, we're able to maintain efficient workflows and keep our business running smoothly. In future posts, I'll delve into other aspects of our tech stack and how they contribute to our success.

And to end this post, I have a little rant:

As an agency owner, I get pitched new tools every day 🥵— through cold calls, LinkedIn messages, emails, and even suggestions from my colleagues.

There are two kinds of tools:

• Internal tools (e.g., the ones I've written about in this post)
• External apps/tools, often from the Shopify ecosystem, where developers want us to recommend their app to our merchants...

I might be a bit conservative, but I believe it's important to keep things simple and avoid overloading your tech stack. It’s easy to chase shiny new objects and fall in love with new apps/systems, but you need to stay focused on the core issues.

When your agency grows to over 20 people, you have to be very selective before introducing a new tool at the organizational level. It impacts the team's daily workflow if it's something they have to use regularly.

Something that has worked well for us is assigning an owner to a new tool: It can be someone who works closely with the relevant teams and can ensure smooth implementation and adoption across the organization.