30 Best Marketing Tools for Small Businesses

I believe every business needs five things to run and grow; tools/ software, knowledge, people, plans/goals, and funds. We will check out every single component of what makes a great business but today we are going to be focusing on the tools aspect.

Every great business needs efficient and effective tools. That's why I'm going to be showing you and your business the very best marketing tools to grow your business.

Category 1: Email Marketing

Email marketing softwares help you create, send, and track emails to your list of subscribers.

Using software makes it easier to create well-designed emails, and also allows pyou to see key metrics such as open rates and click-through rates.

Email marketing remains a powerful marketing tool, with a return on investment of $42 to every $1 spent.

In order to harness the power of email marketing, it’s important to choose the right software that can take your marketing to the next level. As such, I have prepared a list of the best e-mail marketing tools from the cost-effective, expensive and from the simple to the complicated ones. Enjoy.

1. Mailchimp

With about 14 million active users, Mailchimp has become an industry standard as the go to e-mail tool for businesses. MailChimp makes it easy to create, send, and track your emails and campaigns all in one place.

It has an easy to use e-mail editor and once you upgrade to the first paid plan you get access to more advanced tools such as A/B testing and multi-step journeys.

Pros

• Free-forever plan (up to 2,000 contacts)
• Easy to build and customize campaigns
• Clear reporting that helps optimize future sends
• Integrates with hundreds of software platforms

Cons

• Many features aren’t available without a paid subscription
• MailChimp can suspend or cancel your account at any time
• Interface is a bit awkward
• Limited marketing automation features.

Price:

Mailchimp’s free plan includes up to 2,000 contacts and up to 10,000 monthly email sends. Its platform is one of the easiest to get used to with drag-and-drop features that allow you to stylize your emails.

Aside from its free plan, there are also three paid plans, which vary in cost based on how many subscribers you have (nonprofits receive a 15% discount):

• Essentials: $9.99 to $270 per month
• Standard: $14.99 to $540 per month
• Premium: $299 to $1,190 per month

2. Campaign Monitor

Campaign Monitor boasts of 350,000 businesses use its service. Campaign Monitor is a powerful email marketing platform that provides a suite of tools to ensure your email campaigns are professional, timely, and targeted.

It distinguishes itself primarily through ease-of-use and features aimed at getting you emailing quickly. The platform does well at both tracking the customer journey and automating that process.

Pros

• Its interface is excellent and extremely easy to use.
• The templates are beautiful and robust — and faithfully reproduced in all major email clients.
• You can use a decent selection of web fonts in templates — you are not restricted to boring web-friendly fonts.
• The data segmentation options are great — you can send to or exclude multiple segments and lists in mailouts.
• The automation features are comprehensive, powerful and easy to use.

Cons

• It is a VERY expensive platform by comparison to its competitors.
• Split testing is limited to 2 variants.
• There is no (proper) free trial.
• Support is email-only on all but the most expensive plan (which costs a LOT extra).
• There’s no proper landing page creator

Price:

• Basic: $9/month
• Unlimited: $29/month
• Premier: $149/month

3. ConvertKit

ConvertKit is made by content creators for content creators, i.e. professional bloggers, writers, course creators and more. It also helps users build landing pages and sell products and services over email.

This email marketing tool is drawing a lot of buzz this days. It has attracted a lot bloggers and digital marketers lately.

Pros

• It is easy to use
• It is easy to integrate with wordpress
• It comes with autoresponders
• It has no charge for duplicate e-mail
• provide you 24×365 live chat and email support
• Integrated with majority of the digital marketing platforms and tools

Cons

• Limited A/B testing
• Lack of cold subscribers customization
• lack of template customization
• lack of test emails for autoresponders

Price

ConvertKit has no free plan but it offers a 15-day trial for its new users.

• 2,500 subs: $49/mo
• 5,000 subs: $79/mo
• 10,000 subs: $119/mo
• 25,000 subs: $199/mo

4. Active Campaign

ActiveCampaign is a customer experience automation (CXA) software with email capabilities. Because it is designed to manage contacts and the sales process, it offers more than 850 integrations.

It is best email marketing software for automation because it has hundreds of pre-built automations that help you personalize campaigns for each subscriber.

Pros

• Great automation features that simplify customer interactions
• Helpful, friendly, and fast customer support
• All plan levels include data migration and implementation services
• CRM with sales automation included for free (For a limited time)
• Has 850+ integrations with the most popular software

Cons

• Learning curve can be a challenge
• Lite plan is very limited (and includes ActiveCampaign branding)
• Plans quickly jump in price with the number of contacts

Price

There’s not really a free plan but there is a free trial. It’s a 14-day free trial to test the software. After that, you will need to subscribe to one of the four paid plans, which you can pay monthly or annually.

The discount for paying annually ranges from 15% to 40% depending on the plan. The cost of each plan also depends on how many contacts you have (nonprofits get 20% off).

• Lite: $15+ per month
• Plus: $70+ per month
• Professional: $159+ per month
• Enterprise: $279+ per month

5. MailerLite

MailerLite is simple, effective, free email newsletter software. It is probably the easiest to use e-mail tool; it has a drag and drop feature which is in consistency with the mission of the company.

MailerLite is a user-friendly platform, making it the best choice for ease of use. In fact this could probably be the easiest to use e-mail tool there is. Instead of the taking months to get used to the tool like other tools, its takes days to master this tool. Best of all, there is email support to answer any questions and troubleshoot.

Pros

• Drag-and-drop interface makes it easy to design emails
• Free plan for up to 1,000 contacts
• Email support
• Lots of email templates to choose from

Cons

• Doesn’t include CRM functionalities (Though it allows for integration)
• Limited integrations
• Need to provide a lot of company information to get an account set up

Price

It offers a free-forever plan that includes 1,000 subscribers and 12,000 email sends. If you need more bandwidth or want more advanced features (like the ability to remove MailerLite branding), there is a paid plan. Cost depends on how many subscribers you have. You can pay monthly or annually, but with an annual plan, you get a 30% discount. Nonprofits also receive a 30% discount. Here’s a breakdown of the cost:

• Up to 1,000 contacts: $10 per month
• 1,001 to 2,500 contacts: $15 per month
• 2,501 to 5,000 contacts: $30 per month
• 5,001 to 10,000 contacts: $50 per month

6. Moosend

You want to do your e-marketing on a budget, then Moosend is probably the best affordable option not only because its paid plans cost less than most on the market, but It allows you to pay either by the number of subscribers or by the number of emails sent, so you can choose which option is most cost-effective for your business.

It is also user friendly and this makes it easy to get attractive and timely emails out to your audience. It also packed with the benefit of Phone support which can help if you have trouble customizing one of the numerous templates provided.

Price

• Up to 2,000 subscribers: $10 per month
• 2,001 to 2,500 subscribers: $20 per month
• 2,501 to 5,000 subscribers: $30 per month
• 5,001 to 8,000 subscribers: $40 per month

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Category 2: CRM tools

Customer Relationship management software best known as CRM is used by businesses to engage, build connections with leads and clents.

It also helps sales teams and businesses to manage their team's data.

With growth in market and businesses, several CRM tools exists today and as such, businesses are overwhelmed with options and some may end up choosing a bad one

There are multiple factors to take into consideration when choosing a CRM tool for your business; cost, setup and integrations, ease of use, and features.

With the aid of this list your business can soar higher with better CRM software, because we have gathered the best in one place.

1. Saleforce

Saleforce is the industry leader in terms of CRM. It range of popular and essential features is ideal for small businesses and growing businesses.

All Salesforce plans include features for data syncing, sales tracking, customer support, mobile access, custom reporting, integrations and everything else you need to manage customer sales and support.

Pros

• An expansive range of available CRM products means that Salesforce can grow with your company.
• Salesforce acts as a single source of customer data for everyone in your company to improve customer experiences and outcomes.
• Salesforce has a targeted set of CRM products engineered for small businesses.

Cons

• Larger businesses may have to pay additional fees to use Salesforce integrations effectively.
• Most Salesforce plans require an annual commitment.
• It could be difficult to get immediate technical assistance during nonbusiness hours.

Price

• Essentials: $25
• Sales Professional: $75
• Service Professional: $75
• Marketing Cloud Account Engagement: $1,250

2. Hubspot

HubSpot is a cloud-based CRM platform that helps companies of all types and sizes track and nurture leads and analyze business metrics. 

It is suitable for B2B and B2C businesses across multiple industries like retail, real estate, marketing, sales, construction, accounting and more. 

It also help in monitoring of outbound and inbound leads, sales pipeline management with automation, leads and contact management, email campaigning and tracking.

Pros

• Core CRM software is free
• Real-time lead behaviors notification
• Personalized email sequences for leads as well as existing customers

Cons

• Per-user plans can get expensive for small businesses
• Only one email per contact

Price

Each Free plan includes one deal pipeline, one team or department with unlimited users and up to one million contacts, companies, deals or task details. The downside is that it has only online support; there is no phone option.

From $45 per month, billed annually

3. Zoho

Zoho CRM is an excellent entry-level CRM platform that scales with your small business’s growth. It’s an ideal pick for startups and small businesses that need client and contact management, along with sales forecasting and marketing automation features. 

You may not have a need for advanced features, such as AI-powered tools, but Zoho CRM scales easily with five different plans. So, if your business grows and your teams require more sophisticated features, those features are present.

Pros

• Free plan available
• Affordable pricing plans
• Automation on all plans
• Multiple integrations
• Easy to use
• Mobile app

Cons

• AI features only on top tiers
• Limited custom fields
• No third-party integrations for free plan

Price

The free plan allows up to three users to track contacts, leads, accounts and deals. You can also log events, calls and notes on your contacts and leads. 

You’ll be able to set workflow rules to automate specific tasks, such as notifying sales to email leads based on a date. 

Automation is limited on the free plan, and you’ll miss out on lots of customizable tools. There are no analytics at this level either.

• Standard plan: $14 per user/month
• Professional plan: $23 per user/month
• Enterprise plan: $40 per user/month
• Ultimate plan: $52 per user/month

Section 3: Project Management Tools

Project management tools are specially designed to assist an individual or team in organizing and managing their projects and tasks effectively.

Project management tools can be customized to fit the needs of teams of different sizes and with different goals.

Project management tools can include the following features:

• Planning/scheduling: PM tools allow you to plan and delegate work in one place with tasks, subtasks, folders, templates, workflows, and calendars.
• Collaboration: Email should not be your only form of communication — with project management tools, you can build a better way of working with your team: assign tasks, add comments, organize dashboards, and proof or approve changes.
• Documentation: Avoid missing or outdated files with file management features that allow for editing, versioning, and storing files.
• Evaluation: Track and assess productivity and growth through resource management and reporting.

1. Slack

Slack is a must-have business messaging app for your business. It offers private channels, easy file sharing, critical integrations with Google Drive, Zoom, Asana, Dropbox, Zendesk, Outlook Calendar and Monday.com. 

It has a user-friendly design. It also works on mobile devices, tablets, and even desktops.

Slack is essentially a chat room for your whole company, designed to replace email as your primary method of communication and sharing.

Pros

• Free version available
• Over 2,000 apps and integrations
• Can host video calls
• Two-factor authentication
• Easy File Sharing
• Highly Customizable

Cons

• Minimal file storage (unless you pay for it)
• Easy to get distracted
• Moves quickly so can be hard to keep up

Price

The free plan lets users have a feeling for the tool, although the features are somewhat limited. 

You’ll be able to use personalized notifications, unlimited private and public channels, and 1:1 voice and video calls directly inside the messaging app. 

The free plan also gives you access to 10,000 searchable messages and notable file-sharing capabilities.

• Slack Pro: &6.67/mo
• Slack Business: $12.50/mo
• Slack Enterprise Grid: Contact sales

2. Trello

Trello is an online project management software with built-in collaboration tools to work with your teams. It’s lightweight, simple, and straightforward to use. 

It uses boards, lists, and cards to create tasks and stay organized. Users can collaborate within the cards, share files, and leave comments.

Pros

• Free
• Create unlimited tasks
• Intuitive features
• Customizable workflows

Cons

• Uses Internet- no offline feature
• Tasks are limited to one board
• Limited storage

Price

• Trello Free – a great plan to get started with, and better than some other free plans
• Trello Standard ($5 per user, per month) – ideal for smaller businesses on tight budgets that need more than the free plan
• Trello Premium ($10 per user, per month) – perfect for growing businesses, houses most of the core features needed for project management
• Trello Enterprise ($17.50 per user, per month) – ideal for larger companies, not necessary for teams smaller than 100

3. Asana

Asana is a flexible saas project management tool with a focus on collaboration. There are workflows that automate recurring tasks. It is intuitive with different task displays and supports custom fields and forms. 

You can even invite unlimited guest users. There are also options to build custom rules and approval workflows.

Asana offers a lot for productivity and collaboration while a lot of the core project management functionalities are handled through integrations which may not be ideal for all users.

Pros

• More than 200+ integrations
• Free basic plan for up to 15 people
• Forms feature
• Choose from multiple project views

Cons

• No time tracking functionality
• Requires some experience
• Almost too many features

Price

There’s a free plan for up to 15 users. You can manage tasks by viewing them as lists, on a calendar, and on a Kanban board.

• Asana Premium: $10.99/user/month - for unlimited users and storage
• Asana Business: $24.99/user/month - for unlimited users and storage
• Asana Enterprise: on application - for unlimited users and storage

Section 4: Social Media Tools

A social media management tool does more than publish or schedule content. Social Media Management Tools aim to be the "One Tool to Rule them All". They help to manage all aspects of your social media empire including:

• Posting and scheduling content to your social media channels
• Analytics and reporting on your social media efforts.
• Engagement. So you can respond to your social media mentions, comments and messages efficiently.
• Listening. So you can find and engage with people talking about your brand, your competitors or keywords.

1. Coshedule

Coshedule is a very well thought out Editorial & Marketing Calendar that also integrates with common softwares and tools such as WordPress, Social Media, Google Calendar, Analytics, and So much more!

It automates all your Social Media Posts & even ReQueues your evergreen content for posting at a later time automatically.

Pros

• Centralized dashboard and calendar
• Easy collaboration for teams and clients
• Project management tools
• Multiple features

Cons

• Noncompetitive pricing
• Not enough customization options
• Slow loading

Price

• Marketing Calendar: $39/month/per user
• Marketing Suite: Call for price - plans are custom built.

2. Hootsuite

Hootsuite is a social media management tool with features to help with planning, scheduling, and syndicating social posts. 

Key features include automatic scheduling, social media monitoring, performance reporting, basic task management and more.

It makes social media-ing easy by helping to bringing Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Pinterest into one place so you can post on them at once, instead of opening them individually to post there.

Hootsuite also has a helpful Analytics feature for in-depth social media performance reporting.

Pros

• There’s a Free Plan. One of the only social media management tools to have a free plan.
• Schedule updates (including on a calendar and even upload from a spreadsheet (csv file)
• Team Features. Collaborate as a team (delegate replies, tweets, mark as done, track messages etc)
• Mobile apps (iOS & Android)
• Customised analytics (including scheduled reports)
• RSS integration (post updates from an RSS feed)

Cons

• Expensive Analytics Reports & the Point System
• Forced to Use Owly Short Links
• Expensive Custom URL Shorteners
• Facebook Image Problem
• No Data in Facebook Insights
• Lower Facebook Reach & Engagement
• Expensive for Teams

Price

• The limited free plan (which is free)
• Professional (from $588 per year)
• Team (from $1,548 per year)
• Business (from $7,188 per year)
• Enterprise (possibly from $16,000 per year).

3. Buffer

Buffer is an amazing social media tool as it one of the earliest tool to come with scheduling of tweets and addition of social media posts in a queue (buffer) to be published at a later time.

Buffer is good for all business; small social media teams or small businesses. It is accessible, effective platform to create and post more successful social media content.

Buffer continues to improve and has even added more features to its artillery and more tools like Pablo- to make easier to create unique content within the content

Pros

• Very easy to use
• Great for publishing and scheduling posts
• Free account available

Cons

• Limited social listening capabilities
• No support via phone or live chat
• The price can add up if you need multiple subscriptions

Price

There is a free account option, which allows connection to three social media account. It is also possible to schedule up to ten posts within the free account and that may be just enough for smaller businesses

Buffer Publish offers three subscription options, all of which can be paid monthly or annually. As with similar tools, there is a discount for paying upfront for an annual subscription.

• The Pro account: $12/month for one user, connects to eight social media accounts, which should be plenty for solo users and small businesses.
• The Premium package: $56/month for two users, introduces some collaboration tools and allows up to 2,000 scheduled posts.
• The Business subscription: $85/month for six users, can connect with up to 25 social media accounts and is priced competitively.

There is also the option to add users at a rate of $25/month per user, or you can contact Buffer to negotiate a subscription for larger social media teams.

4. Sprout Social

Sprout Social is a social media management tool, but it’s more like a social media management suite. It’s a web and mobile application broken up into a few different tools for managing your social media schedule, inbox, mentions and analytics.

For core social media, the app supports Instagram business accounts, Twitter, Facebook pages, Pinterest, YouTube and LinkedIn. When you connect a profile, you’ll also notice the ability to connect accounts from Google My Business, Google Analytics, Tripadvisor and Glassdoor.

The Publishing tool makes it easy to schedule multiple posts at once and schedule them for when audiences are most active. You can also pre-configure specific times of the week you’d like to publish to each social media platform for easy scheduling.

Pros

• The entire platform is extremely well thought-out and offers fantastic UX.
• No half-measures – every part of Sprout Social’s platform is brilliant.
• Post tagging makes it easier to manage your social media content.
• Scheduling posts (via content calendar) is very user-friendly.
• Reporting and analytics offer a large number of reports and offer excellent insights.
• The social listening feature is as good as a dedicated social listening tool which will save you money.
• Team workflow makes it easy to collaborate with your team.
• Support is excellent.
• Support is available via multiple channels.

Cons

• It comes with a hefty price tag which makes this a tough sell for businesses that are just starting out.
• It can get expensive really fast if you have a lot of team members that all need access to the tool.
• There is a bit of a learning curve. You’ll need to use the learning resources available to fully capitalize all of Sprout Social’s features and user interface.

Price

Sprout Social has three plans that determine the number of profiles you can manage and which features you have access to.

• Standard plan: $99/month or $1,068/year ($89/month) per user. This plan supports five profiles, though you can purchase additional profiles for a nominal fee without having to upgrade to the Professional plan.
• Professional: $169/month or $1,788/year - supports 10 profiles.
• Advanced: Supports 10 profiles$279/month per user or $2,988/year per user.
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Section 3: Analytics Tools

Also called BI are tools that endeavor to provide insight into your business with advanced modeling. They help with the cost-effective use of resources, KPI measurement, business health planning, and making strategic decisions.

1. BuzzSumo

BuzzSumo is a content marketing platform built to provide all the tools content marketers and SEO professionals need in one place

Pros

• Powerful content discovery toolkit
• Powerful content analysis functionality
• Great for content marketers and PR professionals.
• Deep competitive analysis

Cons

• Doesn’t offer data for every social network
• Limited backlink metrics

Price

The Free plan gives you limited access to BuzzSumo. It won’t cost you anything but there are usage caps and you won’t be able to use all the tools. You’ll be restricted to 10 searches per month, 0 alerts, and 1 content project.

• The Pro plan costs $99/month, 5 user accounts, and 5 alerts.
• The Plus plan costs $179/month.
• The Large plan costs $299/month.
• The Enterprise plans with 5 years of historical data and even higher usage limits are also available, but you’ll need to contact BuzzSumo for a quote.

In addition to the Free plan, BuzzSumo also offers a 30-day free trial.

3. Kissmetrics

Kissmetrics is a powerful business intelligence platform that allows users to determine, monitor and improve metrics and other significant elements for the success of their businesses.

With this information transformed into actionable insights, this program has everything you need to help you create marketing strategies and improve existing marketing practices.

Pros

• Implement Smart Campaigns
• Improves customer engagement
• Automate precise email campaigns
• Understand what drives sales
• Monitor key segments easily
• Detailed data and reports on your key segments.
• Reach your goals on time: understand which users need attention and start new initiatives to always reach your goals
• Understanding customer behavior
• Key insights of Surface: take advantage of ready-to-use reports with the analyzes and insights necessary to make better marketing decisions.

Price

• Kissmetrics has 3 pricing editions. A free trial of Kissmetrics is also available
• Silver: $299.00 Per Month
• Gold: $499.00 Per Month
• Platinum: Contact Kissmetrics

4. CrazyEgg

Crazy Egg is an amazing website optimization tool that lets you get an insight of customer behavior on your website. It’s a sales booster giving you more control over your business strategies through effective tools.

Pros

• Easy to use
• Good UX and UI:
• Segmentation possibilities: Supports customer segmentation based on their referrer, location, etc
• Crazy Egg integrates well with external softwares.

Cons

• Billing term disadvantage - its users get billed annually and don’t have a month-to-month payment option
• Crazy Egg doesn’t capture some users in the analytics:
• Crazy egg functionality issues
• Crazy egg slows down page load
• Customer support is relatively weak

Price

• Basic plan – $24 per month
• Standard plan – $49 per month
• Plus plan – $99 per month
• Pro plan – $249 per month
• Enterprise plan – customer pricing

5. Google Analytics

Google Analytics is lumped in with many business analytics tools, but it is a standalone data analysis tool that allows you to track business performance online. 

It enables business owners to measure their RIO for advertising, and track data across video, Flash, and social networking sites/apps. It’s a simple way to gain a better understanding of your customers.

While Google Analytics does allow you to collect fundamental data from your website, most businesses find the need for more in-depth business analytics tools

Pros

• They help you gain insights that can:
• Resolve urgent issues.
• Affect growth.
• Provide a real-time organizational view.
• Anticipate future outcomes with predictive analytics.

Cons

• Customer support has way too much automation.
• Focus on marketing and advertising can be frustrating to users.
• Relies mostly on third parties for training.

Price

Free

6. Excel

Microsoft Excel is among the most popular business analytics tools in the world. Almost all data scientists rely on Excel to one extent or another. And non-analytics professionals usually don't have access to more commercial types of business reporting software.

Excel handles the grunt work for business analytics, making itself vital for data collection and organization on all scales.

Section 7: Content marketing tools

1. WordPress

WordPress is the world’s most popular site builder. It powers more than 43% of all websites on the internet, that’s millions of websites all over the world.

It’s important that you don’t confuse the WordPress.org content management system (CMS) with the WordPress.com blog hosting service.

Pros

• Due to its popularity, almost all popular third-party tools already have integrations available for WordPress.
• It gives you access to a huge collection of extensions, add-ons, and plugins to extend your website.
• You are in charge of your website, so you can keep it simple and only add new features as your website grows
• Super easy to customize with thousands of website designs and templates to choose from.

Cons

• You do not need to learn coding to use WordPress. However, some basic knowledge of HTML and CSS will make things a lot easier.
• WordPress does not come with a built-in drag and drop website builder. It takes some time for most beginners to get familiar with it and learn the basics.
• You are in charge of your website. This means you are also responsible for security, making backups, and installing updates.
• Due to its popularity, almost all popular third-party tools already have integrations available for WordPress.

2. Google Docs

Google Docs, a part of Google Drive, and is the most popular and arguably the best free online word processor available.

Creating, uploading, saving, sharing, and collaborating on documents with Google Docs is easy, and you can create and edit with a rather impressive selection of formatting options.

Pros

• Accepts most popular file formats.
• Files can be downloaded in a variety of formats.
• Documents are auto-saved to your Google account.
• Has an uncluttered and simple interface.
• Easy to share your documents or keep them private.

Cons

• Only works as fast as your internet connection.
• You must be logged on to use it.
• Missing some advanced formatting and style options only found in a traditional word processor.
• Uploading other document files sometimes results in missing or changed formatting.

3. Grammmarly

Grammarly is an advanced writing assistant. It offers grammar and plagiarism checks and enables writers to improve their works’ readability.

Essentially, Grammarly scans a piece of writing, and using artificial intelligence, identifies writing mistakes, errors and other issues.

Pros

• Has a built-in plagiarism checker.
• Catches most punctuation errors.
• Catches misspelled words.
• Only takes a few minutes to use.
• Gives you suggestions to help you learn.
• Provides real-time checking.
• Works in most browsers, social media, and email.

Cons

• Highly accurate, but does not catch every mistake.
• No control to tell it to ignore every instance of a mistake that is actually correct.
• Suggestions are not always 100% correct.
• Does not work with Google Docs.
• Aggressive advertising with the free version.
• Does not allow offline editing.
• Cannot completely replace manual proofreading.

Price:

The free version of Grammarly won’t cost you a penny. It’s completely free.
But if you need more features, here are the prices for Grammarly Premium (as of this writing):

• A monthly subscription is $29.95 per month
• A quarterly subscription is $19.98 per month (billed as one payment of $59.95)
• An annual subscription is $11.66 per month (billed as one payment of $139.95)

4. Airtable

Airtable is a company and project management software for viewing project data and enabling collaboration between stakeholders through a central cloud-based platform.

For teams looking to import an existing project, Airtable hits the mark with an invaluable capability for avoiding duplicative work and manual inputting of project data

Users can access the platform via web browser, desktop application, or mobile application through the Apple and Google Play stores for iOS and Android devices.

Pros

• View, collect, and modify data across multiple views with remote teams.
• Import process took a few clicks, loaded fast, and accurately reflected existing data.
• A handy help menu and chat box when starting different tasks for the first time.
• All plans come with the Interface Designer to build and customize apps for internal or external use.

Cons

• Changing the primary column and adding subtasks in Grid view could be more intuitive.
• Import reconciliation required later to manage column types
• Lagging when moving between views with extensive data or position movements.
• Limited extensions for two of the three business plans (3 per Plus, 10 per Pro).
• Not a niche pick for software development teams.

Price

Airtable offers 4 pricing plans.

• Free: $0 per user/month for 1,200 records/base, 2GB attachment space/base & 2 weeks of revision & snapshot history
• Plus: $12 per user/month for 5,000 records/base, 5GB attachment space/base & 6 months of revision & snapshot history
• Pro: $24 per user/month for 50,000 records/base, 20GB attachment space/base & 1 year of revisions & snapshot history
• Enterprise: To receive an accurate quote, contact Airtable directly.

Airtable also provides special plans for nonprofit and education organizations.

Section 6: Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Tools

1. SEMRush

Semrush is a comprehensive all-in-one digital marketing platform comprising over 50 different SEO tools.

You can use them to create, measure, and manage your SEO, content marketing, keyword research, PPC, and social media marketing campaigns.

For example, you can use Semrush to:

• Find keywords that your target audience is searching for
• Optimize your website content
• Conduct comprehensive SEO audits of your site
• Find new link-building opportunities
• Analyze your competitors and spy on their website traffic
• Gather insights to inform your paid ad campaigns
• Schedule social media posts and track your SMM performance

Price

• Free: The Free plan gives you limited access to Semrush and won’t cost you a penny. You’ll still be able to use most of the core tools, but you won’t have access to all the usual data you’d get in the reports. You can only pull up 10 Analytics reports per day (whereas paid users get thousands of searches). Plus, you can only create a single project and track up to 10 keyword positions.
• Pro: $99.95/month if billed annually and is designed for independent marketers, beginners, and small teams
• Guru: It starts from $191.62/month if billed annually and comes with sufficient usage limits for pretty much any type of user (including SMEs, agencies, and marketing consultants).
• Business: $374.95/month if billed annually. It’s designed for large enterprises and businesses and costs

2. MOZ Pro

Moz Pro delivers a comprehensive suite of SEO tools for small businesses that want to manage their organic search within one interface. Some Moz Pro tools allow limited free use, so freelancers will find a lot to like here too.

Moz Pro covers the core areas of SEO, but offers less depth on technical SEO than it does on link analysis and keyword research.

Price

• Standard plan: $99/month for one user. This will allow you to crawl 100,000 pages per week in a technical SEO review, which should be plenty for smaller businesses.
• The Medium plan at $149/month for one user increases the limits significantly on keyword searches and lists.
• The Large subscription is $249/month and offers access to three users. You can add an additional user to any subscription level for an extra $49/month
• The Premium plan comes in at a hefty $599/month for five users and offers data access to match the price tag.

3. UberSuggest

Ubersuggest is an online keyword research tool designed to help you increase your blog or web traffic.

Specifically, it offers multiple SEO tools at affordable prices, making it an ideal choice for any blog type.

Pros

• Detailed keyword suggestions based on thorough research
• User-friendly, streamlined interface
• Descriptive data with each keyword
• Free basic plan and 7-day trial
• Word clouds for easy visualization

Cons

• Mobile interface isn't as user-friendly as the web
• Niche bloggers might not get many results
• No mobile app as of 2022
• Basic plan is somewhat limited in results
• Process lags a bit when running multiple reports

Price

Paid prices are as follows.

• Individual: $29 per month or $290 lifetime
• Business: $49 per month or $490 lifetime
• Enterprise: $99 per month or $990 lifetime

4. KWFinder

KWFinder is a keyword research tool for search marketing. It meets the need for keyword expansion: generating more keywords to position a site on.

It provides a proprietary index value for SEO difficulty and insight into the competitive landscape in pay-per-click (PPC) advertising.

KWFinder is a keyword research tool for search marketing. It meets the need for keyword expansion: generating more keywords to position a site on. 

It provides a proprietary index value for SEO difficulty and insight into the competitive landscape in pay-per-click (PPC) advertising.

Some of the top features KWFinder offers include:

• Hidden long tail keyword insights: Find long tail keywords that give you more opportunities to acquire traffic.
• Competitor keyword insights: See how your competitor's keyword strategy compares to your own, plus find more keyword opportunities.
• SERP analysis tool: Analyze competition in the SERP to understand what elements readers are looking for on your pages.
• Local keyword research tool: See what searchers are looking for locally and appeal to local markets for more niche traffic.

Price

• Mangools Basic: $29.90/month
• Mangools Premium: $44.90/month
• Mangools Agency: $89.90/month

5. Ahrefs

Ahrefs is an SEO software suite that contains tools for link building, keyword research, competitor analysis, rank tracking and site audits. 

Most of the features inside Ahrefs are designed for marketing professionals. In short: Ahrefs is an SEO tool designed to help people get higher Google rankings.

Some of Ahrefs' main features are:

• Site Explorer: Shows you the performance of specific webpages on your website.
• Content Explorer: This allows you to search high-performing webpages under specific keywords and topics.
• Keywords Explorer: Generates the monthly search volume and click-through rates of specific keywords.
• Site Audit: Crawls specified verticals within your domain and reveals a number of technical issues at the page level.

Price

Seven-day trial for $7, $99/ mo for Lite,

• Standard:$179/ mo
• Advanced: $399/ mo
• Agency: $999/ mo for

Whew, that was a long read. Now having a tool isn't enough, you need to have parameters to measure the effectiveness and success of your tools. I you just saw someof the best marketing automation for small business. Now its time for you to give them a trial. Before you go, below are some of the metrics you can use to know if your tools are doing what they are supposed to do or not.

Ways to Measure the Success of your business tools

A few ways to measure the success of your tools

1. By Monitoring email and social media analytics/insights
2. Monitoring engagements with your marketing materials
3. Monitoring how well projects are managed
4. Monitoring how often users make use of your team and communication tools

Tags: blog marketing

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