Best Software Business Books

If you are into technology business (particularly software), you’ll love these books. Each one of them provides it’s own unique value to readers. I’d highly recommend that you check out all these listed below if you have time, as they will help sharpen your mind and make you a better programmer, project manager or company leader.

You don’t have to be in technology industry to read good business books. But, you sure don’t want to waste your time reading bad business books either. Because, who wants that? So, without further ado, here is the list of best software business books.

Secrets of Sand Hill Road: Venture Capital and How to Get It

Secrets Of Sand Hill RoadPortfolio

Frederic Kerrest is cofounder of Okta, a fast-growing cloud company with a market value of $15 billion. Even though he has a busy schedule, he finds time to read. One of his favorite books was written by Scott Kupor, managing partner at Andreessen Horowitz. “Very few know venture capital better than he does,” said Kerrest. “In his book, Scott shares insights from Silicon Valley’s Sand Hill Road into what venture capitalists might be saying about your business behind closed doors and how and where VCs decide to invest in the first place.”

Thinking in Bets: Making Smarter Decisions When You Don’t Have All the Facts

During the past ten years, Brad Brooks has built TigerConnect into a top provider of collaboration software for the healthcare industry. He has raised more than $100 million along the way. “A book I read this past year that I recently recommend to my company is Thinking in Betsby Annie Duke,” said Brooks. “Annie is a world-class poker player and writes about how the principles of probabilistic betting in poker are applicable in business and life in general. Business is comprised of a series of bets that unfortunately are wrong more than we’d like. The mindset of understanding that notion of probability and to apportion your bets appropriately when the odds are in your favor is a really important one.”

The Hard Thing About Hard Things

By Ben Horowitz

As one of the driving forces behind Netscape (a company that helped shape the internet as we recognise it today), Loudcloud (one of the first organisations to adopt the software-as-a-service model) and Andreessen Horowitz (one of the most successful VC firms in existence), Ben Horowitz is uniquely qualified to speak to the challenges of growing a startup.

The Hard Thing About Hard Things applies Ben’s trademark humour and straight-talk to a diverse array of topics – including software development, management, investment and selling a business. Filled with tons of actionable takeaways and overt Hip Hop references, it’s an invaluable and deeply engaging read for any SaaS founder.

The Lean Startup

By Eric Ries

It’s easy to forget that there was a time before the concept of a “lean” startup had even entered into our lexicon – but it was Eric Ries’ ground-breaking book that laid out its core tenets.

Taking inspiration from lean manufacturing processes developed by Toyota, The Lean Startup outlines a framework for rapid, iterative business development, relying on validated learning and constant experimentation to test and improve ideas. Though MVPs, feedback loops and unit economics are a staple of most modern SaaS startups’ practices, it’s well worth revisiting Ries’ clear, example-driven explanation of lean development.

Best Free Software

Wave Accounting

Wave Accounting was created in 2010 by co-founders Kirk Simpson and James Lochrie who were frustrated by the lack of free and easy-to-use financial software for small businesses. Today Wave has more than 250 employees serving small businesses around the world. We chose it as the best accounting software because it lets small businesses track income and expenses, send invoices, scan receipts, track sales taxes, and more, all for free.

Wave helps users connect multiple bank accounts and credit cards and set up profiles for multiple businesses to help keep track of income and expenses. The software organizes accounts, payments, and invoices to make tax time easier and also offers robust reports to help identify cash flow trends.

Users can create and send professional, branded invoices from Wave’s dashboard or mobile app. The invoicing software can set up recurring invoices and automatic credit card payments for repeat customers and automatically syncs invoice and payment information with its accounting software.

Wave’s mobile app lets users scan receipts anywhere and sync them seamlessly with their Wave account to help keep track of business expenses. Users can also email invoices to their Wave account or scan receipts offline to be synced the next time the device is online.

Although Wave is completely free to use, it also offers additional paid services, including accepting credit cards and bank payments and setting up payroll for employees and contractors.

Wave Accounting

Free accounting
Free invoicing
Free receipt scanning

Wave Payments

All Wave Accounting features
2.9% + 30¢ per transaction for Visa, Mastercard, Discover
3.4% + 30¢ per transaction for American Express
1% per ACH transaction ($1 minimum fee)

Wave Payroll

All Wave Accounting features
$35 plus $6 per employee/contractor per month (tax-service states)
$20 plus $6 per employee/contractor per month (self-service states)

Wix

Wix was founded in 2006 by three entrepreneurs frustrated with the difficulty and expense of creating a website. Today, the company has a staff of 5,000 employees worldwide and 200 million users in 190 countries. We chose it for the best website builder since it lets users create professional-looking websites with no coding knowledge for an affordable price.

Wix comes with hundreds of professional templates and a drag-and-drop editor, making it easy to create a professional business site in just minutes. Every website is designed to look great on mobile devices and features engaging effects including animation, video backgrounds, and scrolling.

Businesses that want to sell online can take advantage of Wix’s advanced e-commerce features. Users can set up an online store, manage inventory and orders, and get revenue and conversion rate reports using a simple, intuitive dashboard. Wix also lets store owners accept payments via Wix Payments, PayPal, and Stripe and integrates with Instagram and Facebook.

Although creating a basic website is free, upgrading to a paid plan is the only way to unlock Wix’s business and e-commerce features. All of Wix’s paid plans include a 14-day free trial, free hosting, Google Analytics, and the ability to link a custom domain.

Business Basic Plan

$23 per month
Accept online payments
Unlimited bandwidth
20GB storage
Connect your domain
Remove Wix ads
Five video hours
Google Analytics
Free domain for one year
$300 ad vouchers
Site Booster app
Visitor Analytics app

Business Unlimited Plan

$27 per month
35GB storage
All Business Basic Plan features
10 video hours
Professional logo
Social media logo files

Business VIP Plan

$49 per month
Accept online payments
Unlimited bandwidth
500GB storage
All Business Unlimited Plan features
Unlimited video hours
Priority Response
VIP Support

MailChimp

MailChimp was created in 2001 by web design agency owners Ben Chestnut and Dan Kurzius who wanted to create an affordable email marketing service for small businesses. It has grown into a full-fledged marketing platform offering landing pages, websites, postcards, and more. We chose it as the best email marketing software because it offers small businesses high-level email marketing with both free and affordable paid plans.

MailChimp’s free email software makes it easy for business owners new to email marketing to get started. The platform offers premade email templates, opt-in popups and signup forms, audience segmentation, and basic personalization. Users also get a mobile app that lets them view campaign performance and send emails with just a few clicks.

MailChimp’s drag-and-drop templates let users create professional, branded emails with no design skills. A built-in analytics tool also keeps track of open rates and clicks, and segments data to help show what’s working and what’s not. Users can automatically send out targeted emails based on user behaviors, like a welcome message for new signups or a related product recommendation for a recent buyer.

Most small businesses can get pretty far using MailChimp’s free plan. The paid plans add more subscribers and lists as well as more detailed automations:

Free Plan

FREE
2,000 subscriber limit
10,000 emails per month
Basic email templates
Integrations with 250+ apps
Landing pages and popup forms
Google, Facebook, and Instagram retargeting ads
Single-step automations
Segmentation
Basic reports

Essentials Plan

$9.99 per month (based on the number of subscribers)*
500 subscriber limit
5,000 emails per month
All Free Plan features
Access to all email templates
A/B testing
Remove Mailchimp footer
24/7 email and chat support

Standard Plan

$14.99 per month (based on the number of subscribers)*
500 subscriber limit
6,000 million emails per month
All Essentials Plan features
Behavior-based automations
Multi-step automations
Send time optimization
Delivery by time zone

* Use the MailChimp calculator to determine pricing based on the size of the email list.

Trello

In 2011, a company called Fog Creek Software launched a prototype of a project management tool designed to solve high-level planning issues. Later named Trello, the software grew to over 500,000 users in just one year and 4.75 million by 2014. We chose it as the best project management software because it offers a free, flexible, and visual way to manage projects.

Trello uses Kanban-style boards for task and project tracking and makes it easy to manage both individual projects and ongoing workflows. Its simple and intuitive interface lets users create custom boards and lists with cards that can include images, files, links, checklists, due dates, and more.

Users can get started in seconds with a blank board or choose from hundreds of categorized templates created by other users that can be modified as needed. Trello offers integrations with Slack, Google Drive, Dropbox, and dozens of other third-party platforms as well as mobile apps to streamline collaboration and workflows.

Trello offers a lot with its free plan including unlimited personal boards, lists, and cards. The free plan is limited to 10MB per file attachment, 10 team boards, and one third-party integration (Power-Up) per board. The Business Class plan comes with expanded features and a 14-day free trial: