Are you a solopreneur, micro or small business and can’t afford to be spending hundreds or thousands on tools to help market your business? We were the same when we first started and lived off free subscriptions and tools to help grow our business. Want to know what the best ones are? There are so many more but here are the best ones. Here we go…
1. Google Analytics
If you don’t have Google Analytics, get it installed now. If your web guy wants to charge for doing it, leave. He should have done this in the first place, and it’s a 5 minute job. This tool gives you great insight to how well or badly your site is doing in different aspects. There are a million blogs out there, showing you how to use this tool and the data it provides. It’s a major must to know how your site is making sales and if it’s not, then you’ll have a better understanding why by utilising this free tool.
2. HootSuite FREE
HootSuite has a free account for users with up to 5 profiles, that means you can add your Facebook Profile and business page, Twitter, LinkedIn and even Google+. Trying to manage more than five profiles when you are a small business is time-consuming. Especially when you have to manage the other daily business operations.
Managing all your profiles in one dashboard, from one app will save you time, and you can monitor conversations that your company should contribute in. You can use this tool to generate leads and build traffic going to your website. The best time saver is scheduling all your posts at the one time and not having to do it everyday or every few hours.
Want to know about HootSuite, please drop us an email as we are HootSuite Certified.
3. MailChimp
MailChimp has a FREE account for users up to 2000 subscribers and send less than 10,000 emails a month, which is hard to do if you’re a small business. They have these handy templates that you can create nice emails and gain more attention with your email marketing. The best feature has to be, who’s opened my emails. Here’s an example. I send an email about how to gain more leads through social media. MailChimp’s analytics shows me who has opened my emails and anyone who has opened my email, say over five times, I can tell they’re interested. So, I either send them another email with some more tips and value or I may even call them and try and sell them a service package.
4. WordPress (Blogging)
This site is built using WordPress and is the best blogging platform out in my opinion. It’s so easy to use, but it drives great results. Blogging helps keep your website from being a static site with no new content. Google loves websites with regular new content. If folk like you and me don’t provide new content, Google starts to sweat. The more pages indexed on the web, the more opportunities Google can make money. On a plus note, it helps your customers to learn more about you as they see you’re an expert in your field, and it drives more targeted traffic to your website. It’s the single best thing I’ve ever done for my businesses.
5. Google Apps
If I had to choose one premium tool, it would have to be Google Apps. Our Zap emails are powered using Gmail, and we have never had a problem. We manage our leads, customers and tasks using Gmail colour tabs. At Zap we use Google Drive to store files we need to share so we can work from home or the office. My Google+ account is based on the same email along with YouTube and my calendar. The features within Google Apps saves me time, money and makes my business life so much better. And guess what? It’s only £2.75 a month. That’s nothing compared to what you get. I will go as far as saying it’s my best business tool I use.
Do you use any other FREE tools that are amazing? What’s your best premium tool? Do you have any other struggles with your small business?
