While these insights are beneficial, especially for those with an entrepreneurial goal, there are other essential business tools that are often overlooked.

Continue reading to learn about more essential tools you need to run a successful business.

Be Prepared for All of Mother Nature’s Elements

Depending on where in the world you are located, your business maintenance operators will undoubtedly require specialized equipment to have on hand. It is always important to be prepared for all situations, just in case. 

You do not want your staff, clients, or customers to have an undue impact on their work or personal lives due to a lack of planning on your part. And worse, you do not want the weather conditions or elements to keep people away.

That is why it is essential to invest in the best maintenance tools based on your company’s unique location. If you are in a climate that sees a light amount of snow, for example, a reliable electric snow shovel will be an ideal solution to remove it.

This device is easy to use and quickly recharges for another go when it inevitably snows once again. Always keep basic groundskeeping supplies on hand, just in case. A shovel, brooms, rakes, and a power washer, along with personal protective gear, such as long work gloves and snow coveralls, will make your maintenance staff’s work much easier.

Ensure Your Team is Comfortable

The furniture you have in your workplace can make or break your team’s morale. Further, poor-quality furniture can lead to lower productivity.

If you disagree, consider this: When you have just gotten off a long flight and are dealing with a stiff body and aching back, that pain and discomfort are the main focus of your mind.

No matter how much you try to focus on whatever comes next, that nagging feeling of pain continues to distract you.

You can fix this problem in your workplace by investing in quality furniture. From regular desks to standing desks, offering your team the freedom to move around their respective workspaces will help them feel better and stay focused on their important work. Seating is essential, as well.

An ergonomic chair will do wonders to keep people in one place. After all, if you sit in an uncomfortable chair, you probably move around constantly in an effort to alleviate your discomfort.

You do not want your employees doing that. Investing in good office chairs might be a greater upfront expenditure than you had planned on making, but the payoff in productivity and employee wellness will be worth it.

Streamline Your Communication Tools

In any business, communication amongst co-workers and management is vital. How to ensure it does not take time away from the mission of the company and each employee’s work is a goal every business owner should consider.

With today’s crowded field of communication tools being touted from every corner with the promise of keeping everyone in the loop, on task, or constantly connected for better outcomes, you might want to rethink your communication tools.

There are many great communication tools available, but your team does not need them all to stay on task or facilitate collaboration.

Take stock of what everyone is using now. Ask them what platforms and specific features work best for each team member. Take your own communication style into account in the process.

Look at sites, such as Techeconomy, for further insight into the latest communication news and reviews.

Create a Strong Human Resources Department

Your Human Resources personnel do more than field questions from your team about company benefits. The HR department is a one-stop shop for a multitude of business needs. That is why it is essential to have one.

However, if you are still at the beginning stages of your business venture and do not have the capital to hire one HR employee, let alone an entire department, you should consider outsourcing this vital role.

To further the importance of Human Resources in your company, it is helpful to gain a greater understanding of what they do. HR employees are involved in everything from crafting and posting job descriptions, sourcing employees, and vetting them, to conducting job interviews.

From there, they walk new hires through their onboarding paperwork that will include tax forms, and healthcare and insurance documents. They ensure the employee handbook is well-written and up to date while tracking each employee’s respective training completions and outcomes. HR is a busy department and should always be considered an essential tool.

Build an Engaging Business Website

Your website is the window into your company. Anyone with an internet connection and a piece of technology can log on and see the essence of your business.

With the intense competition for consumers’ attention these days, it is vital for your company’s existence to have a website that is easy to use, seamlessly navigable, and that avoids barriers for people to learn more about your company. 

Website creation is another area where you can, and probably should, outsource the task. Leave this one to the professional marketers and web designers who are trained in the best practices to highlight your business while increasing consumer engagement. 

When discussing goals and outcomes for the website, ensure all pages have an easy way to contact your team and return to the home page. Keep the menu easily accessible and avoid creating visually loud webpages that are distracting and hard to read.

Use clean graphics with a readable font. These small details will keep users on your website longer, which may lead to further engagement, appointment setting, or purchases.

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Your goal as a business owner is to increase revenue while providing excellence in products and services at every turn. Getting to that point, however, requires the utilization of many tools that range from tried and true products to ones that are often overlooked.

Ensure your company has the best chance for success by implementing these essential business tools and ideas in your workplace today.

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This quarter’s session, which is the second for 2025, will hold on Thursday, July 10, 2025 at the UBA House, Marina, Lagos, and is part of the bank’s broader commitment towards business development and financial inclusion.

The UBA Business Series aims to equip small business owners and entrepreneurs with practical strategies to build resilient partnerships, unlock funding opportunities, and navigate the evolving business landscape.

With the theme, “Stronger Together: Building Powerful Business Partnerships for Progress,” this edition of the Business Series will bring together seasoned business leaders, industry experts, and successful entrepreneurs who will share insights on how collaboration and strategic alliances can help MSMEs overcome growth barriers.

An exciting lineup of seasoned business owners including Beauty Entrepreneur, Dabota Lawson; Real Estate Mogul and Entrepreneur, Wale Ayilara; Fashion Entrepreneur, Mai Atafo, and Journalist and TV producer Peace Hyde, will be on ground to arm participants with the tools and network they need to thrive in today’s competitive environment.

Banking: UBA Named Nigeria’s Strongest Brand, Access Bank Most Valuable in 2025

The session will be accessible both physically and virtually, allowing broader participation from the business community as interested participants can register ahead via the link.

Speaking ahead of the event, UBA’s Group Head, Retail and Digital Banking, Shamsideen Fashola, highlighted the critical role of partnerships in today’s dynamic business environment. 

“In an increasingly interconnected world, the power of collaboration cannot be overstated. At UBA, we recognise that collaboration is the cornerstone of sustainable business success.

“The ‘Stronger Together’ Business Series is designed to inspire entrepreneurs and corporate leaders to forge meaningful alliances that drive progress, unlock opportunities, and contribute to Africa’s economic transformation,” Shamsideen said.

Also speaking, the Group Head, Corporate and Marketing Communications, Alero Ladipo, emphasised the UBA’s commitment to empowering the business community through knowledge sharing.

 “The quarterly series represents our dedication to nurturing entrepreneurship and fostering an ecosystem where businesses can thrive through strategic collaborations. Our speakers represent diverse industries and have successfully leveraged partnerships to scale their businesses, create jobs, and drive innovation.”

The UBA Business Series is a knowledge-sharing platform created by United Bank for Africa to empower entrepreneurs and small business owners with the tools, strategies, and insights needed to grow and sustain their businesses.

United Bank for Africa is one of the largest employers in the financial sector on the African continent, with 25,000 employees group wide and serving over 45 million customers globally.

Operating in twenty African countries and the United Kingdom, the United States of America, France and the United Arab Emirates, UBA provides retail, commercial and institutional banking services, leading financial inclusion and implementing cutting-edge technology.

Today, Zoca has closed a $6 million round to flip that script. The company is building an AI-first growth platform to help hyperlocal service businesses get discovered, booked, and rebooked, promising one outcome: more paying clients, guaranteed. 

The funding round was led by Accel with participation from GTMfund, Elevation Capital and Better Capital.

While most software hands small business owners a tool and wishes them luck, Zoca takes a different approach. Its AI agents manage the entire growth funnel, automatically identifying what services are in demand in a specific neighborhood, optimizing for discovery, converting leads into bookings, and re-engaging clients at just the right time. 

The result is a done-for-you system that fills calendars and drives real revenue, not just clicks or leads. Zoca has already helped over 1,000 local beauty & wellness businesses generate $10M+ in revenue, book more than 120,000 appointments, and save hundreds of hours on manual marketing tasks.

Founded in 2024 by longtime friends and IIT Kharagpur classmates Ashish Verma and Robin Chauhan, Zoca was born out of a fundamental realization: while local service professionals are masters of their craft, the systems meant to support their growth simply weren’t designed with them in mind. 

As more professionals left salon chains to open independent businesses, the gap became clear. These entrepreneurs weren’t failing because of talent – they were being failed by a system that never prioritized helping them get found, booked, and consistently in demand.

“We saw a fundamental disconnect,” says Ashish Verma, Zoca’s co-founder and CEO. “These entrepreneurs are selling time, not products. Every empty chair is revenue they’ll never recover.

“The real challenge isn’t just visibility anymore—it’s everything that comes after it. Being found is one part, but converting leads, filling schedules, and retaining clients is where businesses either grow or stall.

“What makes this space unique is the business model itself. These service professionals aren’t focused on selling more units—they’re maximizing their available time. So the ROI on every lead, every appointment, and every repeat visit directly impacts their bottom line. That’s why we built a system that addresses the entire customer journey, not just one piece of it.”

Zoca fixes this with what it calls hyperlocal intelligence – a proprietary engine that detects neighborhood-level demand patterns for services like “lymphatic drainage massage” or “glycolic facial” that vary dramatically from block to block. 

The company’s data shows that demand for “lymphatic drainage massage” can be 3x higher in one part of a city versus another area just miles away, while terms like “glycolic facial” follow entirely different patterns depending on local demographics. 

Instead of relying on generic keywords or city-wide trends, Zoca builds individualized strategies based on what people are actually searching for within a 5-mile radius and then executes it all automatically using its AI agents workforce.

That includes optimizing across 50+ local ranking factors, building mobile-first websites, responding to leads 24/7 through conversational AI, and sending personalized retention SMS and email campaigns timed to each customer’s history. 

Zoca has recently launched AI agents for paid ads and social media management taking charge over the entire marketing value chain for a small local business. With Zoca, businesses get what used to require five tools, an agency retainer, and hours of work every week.

Gail Aungst, co-owner of Ohana Sun Tanning, commented: “Google search is really important and so keywords are critical for us. One of them is ‘tanning near me’. Zoca has helped us stay on top and win. They are totally helping us with our rankings”. 

Latasha Seawood, owner of Slay by Vashae, said: “The first 30 days of using Zoca, my business went from maybe 3-4 people a day, into a queue. I was forced to turn people away. No lie. It was like a 30 day turnaround. If you search “sew-in” in your area, I pop up. And that’s because of Zoca.”

AI is the reason this is possible now. Zoca’s model turns high-cost services into software margins, unlocking growth for a market that’s historically been considered too fragmented and low-margin to serve.

“Zoca is driving business outcomes for the underserved $750B local services market,” says Manasi Shah, partner at Accel. “Ashish and the team have the highest customer obsession with a deep understanding of AI in automating a significant number of use cases applicable to the local services market. Growth AI agents are just the beginning, Zoca will create an agent-led OS for every hyperlocal business to achieve full potential.”

 Paul Irving, partner at GTMfund, added: “These businesses are the cornerstones of their communities, but most are being left behind in a digital and AI-first world. Zoca allows them to focus on what matters most: delivering an exceptional service to their customers.

“The growth, the customer retention and engagement – all on auto-pilot with Zoca’s AI platform. It’s a total game changer for these local businesses, and we couldn’t be more excited to support the Zoca team on their mission.”

Poorvi Vijay, principal, Elevation Capital, said: “Zoca arms every neighbourhood business with a 24/7 AI growth engine. Ashish and Robin’s passion and unique insights to serve this underserved market and help them transform with AI is truly outstanding. We are thrilled to back them as they build the operating system for hyperlocal services worldwide.”

Looking ahead, Zoca plans to expand its agent architecture, deepen its platform integrations, and bring its system to more verticals where professionals face the same time-based growth challenge. 

The company believes the future of local business will be powered by invisible AI infrastructure – not dashboards, but agents quietly working in the background to drive outcomes.

“In the next decade, the top local businesses around us won’t be big chains. Instead, they’ll be local professionals — quietly supercharged by AI that helps them attract more clients, keep them coming back, and grow faster than ever.

“At Zoca, we are making it possible for independent businesses to thrive without all the tech headaches and focus on delivering exceptional experiences to their customers.” said Ashish Verma.