5 Lesser-Known Free Online Tools for Collaborating in the Cloud

When it comes to collaborating in the cloud with classmates or co-workers, there are some online tools like Google Docs or Evernote that have already become staples of everyone’s online culture. Such tools have become a necessity in today’s world because of the shifting needs of people living and working in the online world.

With everything becoming more mobile thanks to the Internet and technology in general, working on projects remotely has become the norm. Because of this, there are more and more tools being unveiled that can help people to collaborate on projects even when they are not in the same room.

Here are five newer and not as well-known free online tools that are great for collaboration in the cloud.

Monday.com

This is one of the best free, collaborative mind mappers that exists right now. It’s great to use with your colleagues to get your ideas out visually. The idea maps that you create can be shared with team members through a secure link. You can also invite people to work with you or allow them to follow the progress of your mind mapping session in real time.

Nectar

Nectarhr.com is a tool that has some great features. There are costly versions of the tool, but the free version is packed with features as well, including event calendars for managing your team, discussion boards to talk through issue and plans, file repositories for sharing an saving documents and people directories for having everyone’s contact information on file at all times.

Trello

Trello is a great collaborative tool, especially when it comes to organizing yourself and your team. It allows you to put projects onto boards and then assign roles and follow the progress of these projects and see what everyone is working on. If you are having problems coordinating with your remote team and keeping track of the work, this is the perfect tool to check out.

Bonus.ly

Here is another absolutely free tool that has a lot to offer. It is a collaboration and communication tool that makes it easy for you and your co-workers to share ideas and talk. You can integrate your social networks into the tool or use its own status and messaging capabilities. It also features the ability to share multimedia and another thing that’s great about Bonus.ly is that it can be used on most smartphones as well.

Yammer

If you want to get away from social networks like Facebook and Twitter, but you still want that type of communication between your team, Yammer is a good alternative. It’s a private and completely secure communication platform that your group or team can use to communicate at all times. If you really like it and want to upgrade your version, it’s pretty cheap as well, but the free version is excellent on its own. It allows you to not only talk, but also share files and even create discussion groups separately for each project or team within your company.