Free marketing tools for small businesses
Starting a small business is hugely satisfying and rewarding.
If you are starting on your own or in a small team chances are you will be responsible for a number of the marketing tasks.
You can save time and streamline your workload by using some of the free marketing tools that are available to small businesses.
Marketing software can be extremely expensive. When you are getting your small business started controlling costs is essential.
This post will look at the free marketing tools that are available to support you and your business with a number of marketing tasks.
Quick disclaimer: I am not paid to advertise any of the following tools – I have tested and used all of them and of course there are alternatives available.
Research
Google Trends will provide you with insights into what the global internet users are searching for online.
You can check out different regions, compare items against each other and examine the change in trends over time.
This is great for gaining insights into what your audience is thinking in real time and to support other areas of your marketing.
For your keyword research try Ubersuggest. Here you will get assistance in generating lists of suggested keywords that can support your content marketing efforts.
A great tool for conducting surveys is Survey Monkey. You are able ask up to 10 free questions to up to 100 respondents so is perfect for gathering insights about potential products or for gaining feedback from your clients.
Websites
A lot of your digital marketing efforts will involve generating traffic to your website. Once a user is on your site you can make use of free Plugins to assist your marketing.
OptinMonster and WordPress Popups include features that allow you to create nice looking popups. Use these to encourage users to download a piece of content or subscribe to your mailing list.
Sassy Social Share is a social media plugin that you can use to add social buttons to your blog as well as floating social bars. This will encourage users to share your content on social media, increasing your overall reach.
Display your Twitter feed with Custom Twitter Feeds and/ or your Instagram feed with Social Feed Gallery. Your site users can see what you’ve been up to on social media and easily switch between your website and social networks.
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
For your on-page SEO efforts try the Yoast SEO plugin. The plugin will help you to optimise your website content and support you work towards a higher ranking on search engines.
Ubersuggest backlinks can also be used to monitor your Off-page SEO progress. You will gain quick insights into your domain score, number of backlinks, referring domains and organic traffic.
A report is also produced that will show you who is linking to your site and from what page on their website.
Keep on top of your technical SEO with Google Search Console. It will help you to discover any issues with your website, submit sitemaps and to analyse data relating to your website.
I’ve only ever used one email marketing provider and have always found it to be very easy to use. Mailchimp offer a free version that has a limit of 2,000 subscribers, a monthly send limit of 10,000 and a daily send limit of 2,000.
Integrate with your website and popup forms so that your subscribers can automatically be added to your Mailchimp email list.
Content Marketing
HubSpot provides a free blog idea generator if you are struggling for blogging inspiration.
Trello provide a free project planning solution so that you can work more collaboratively with your team.
You can bring your blog posts to life with creative infographics which you can create for free with Canva or Infogram. You can also use both to create professional presentations, e-books and animated graphics.
Boost your content with amazing visuals by downloading stock photos for free from Unsplash or Pixabay. Don’t overdo the use of stock photos as they can have a negative impact on your brand.
Everyone’s favourite lockdown software is Zoom. You can use the free version to host 40-minute webinars for up to 100 participants.
For larger audiences you can use Microsoft Teams Live to host up to 10,000 participants, with a free 6-month trial.
Facebook Live is another free option that you can use to host webinars or live events.
Video marketing
Video marketing is an increasingly important digital marketing channel. The most cost-effective way to create great video is to film with your smart phone, edit with free video software like iMovie or OpenShot and upload to YouTube.
Social Media
Planning your posts is a great way to keep on top of your social media marketing. Download my free content calendar to plan your posts.
Canva is great if you have limited design experience. It offers loads of free templates for social media content creation.
Hootsuite offer a free version of their software that allows you to schedule your social posts. You can also monitor and manage your engagement on 3 of your social channels.
Measuring your marketing
Google Analytics provides you with a colossal amount of information for free. This includes, amongst other things, data regarding your website traffic, behaviour of users and which content is performing best.
Conclusion
There are a lot of free marketing tools out there for your business to use.
Here, we have looked at a collection of free marketing tools available to support you digital marketing efforts. The majority of the above also offer paid versions that provide additional marketing benefits. You can invest in these as your business grows.
Do you use any of these or other free tools that are available? Let me know in the comments!
I am currently working on a free digital marketing strategy template that will assist small businesses with their digital marketing.
Send me an email to hello@dannylayzell.com with the subject ‘digital marketing strategy template’ and I shall send you one as soon as it is ready!
Thanks for reading!
Supporting Your Digital Marketing
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