There are many software platforms in the world of digital marketing, aren’t they? Even though there are times when they make life for you easier, there are other times when they make things less straightforward. Not all of them are created equal. There are some which make your job easier, at the same time bringing changes in the way your company is run. Our small business blog will help you with this.
Social media, email channels, blogs, videos, eCommerce, website building tools. We could talk about the various software packages needed for Digital Marketing for hours on end. But…really…when you are starting out you only need 1 online marketing software platform that will help you accomplish all of your marketing goals.
Mailchimp
No matter how large or small your business is, email marketing should definitely be a part of your overall strategy.
When a customer signs up to your mailing list, they’re inviting you straight into their inbox. That’s why email marketing on average offers a higher ROI than any other marketing activity.
To get started with email marketing, you need a service that will enable you to capture emails, manage your lists, send out emails automatically or on a schedule, and analyze engagement.
Mailchimp is an ideal choice if you’re just starting out or if you are running a small business. Mailchimp’s basic service is free until your list hits 2,000 subscribers. It offers the main functionality you need without making managing your email marketing too complex.
Plus, Mailchimp now offers a slew of features and digital marketing tools (some under paid plans):
- Segmentation and personalization
- Landing page builders
- Form builders
- Audience insights
- CRM tools
- Predictive insights
Google Analytics
Google Analytics is completely free software that provides valuable insights into who is visiting your website and how they engage with it.
It’s best paired with Google Search Console – another free digital marketing tool that helps you to identify any problems on your site and optimize it for traffic.
Some of the data points that Google Analytics makes available to you include:
- The number of visitors to your site by day, week, month, or any time period you choose
- Where these visitors are coming from – referrals from other website, organic search, ads, social, or direct
- The keywords people are using in Google to find your site
- The demographics and interests of your users
- How long each user spends on your site and which pages they visit
All this information is interesting, but it’s also vital knowledge that can help you to optimize your website and marketing campaigns (while keeping your SEO efforts low cost).
For example, you might notice through Search Console or Analytics that you’re getting a lot of traffic from a keyword that you lack content covering. Write a blog post optimized for that keyword and watch your traffic and engagement levels rocket.
Getting loads of visitors from Facebook but none from Twitter? Maybe this is a sign you should concentrate your marketing efforts on your main channel.
It’s all about the insights – not just the analytics.
HubSpot Marketing
HubSpot Marketing provides an advanced system that brings all of your marketing efforts together, helping your team grow traffic and increase conversions. It has drag-and-drop functionality to design attractive websites with responsive pages regardless of the device used by your visitors.
Website design is only the first step. The software will further assist you in preparing and optimizing relevant and engaging content and distribute it to the right audiences. It allows you to create compelling calls-to-action and personalize messages to address the specific needs of your visitors.
The vendor has an appealing free trial where you can tinker with the features at no cost.
HubSpot Marketing gives you tools like contact forms and A/B tests to develop successful lead generation strategies and decide which visitors have the genuine potential to become qualified leads. The process doesn’t stop here, as it also allows you to give all valuable leads personalized paths to purchase and turn them into paying customers. From there, it will generate a report on your strategy’s impact and contribution to sales.
HubSpot Marketing starts with a free plan as part of the company’s intent to facilitate the end-to-end critical operations of sales teams, offering a dedicated CRM that is free to use and a Sales Hub with a plan likewise starting at $0 per month.
What is unique about HubSpot Marketing?
- Create landing pages. HubSpot Marketing lets you create landing pages for your campaigns. It also allows you to distribute both static and dynamic HTML messages that can invoke the response you expect.
- Design workflows and prepare enticing content. Even without advanced coding skills, HubSpot Marketing will help you design workflows, prepare, and format content for publishing, and integrate information from other systems.
- Optimize your website. The system provides a variety of SEO and social suggestions for you to share content with the right influencers and audiences, and drive traffic.
- Turn leads into paying customers. HubSpot Marketing has a lead generation feature that lets you convert your website visitors into customers.
SendPulse
SendPulse is constantly evolving, improving the functionality of existing marketing channels and adding new ways to keep in touch with your customers.
At present, with SendPulse users can automate sending marketing emails, SMS, and web push notifications as well as create chatbots for popular messengers like Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, or Telegram.
In addition to that, SendPulse also offers an email verifier, a landing page builder, and a free CRM for marketing and sales.
The popularity of the platform can be explained by the combination of an intuitive user dashboard that doesn’t require any technical skills, a variety of channels to reach customers, and a smart pricing policy where users can opt for solutions to match their budget and business size.
It’s also worth noting that the service is available in six languages which certainly adds a touch of diversity and sets the platform apart from its competitors.
SEMRush
SEMRush is a Search Engine Marketing (SEM) platform that helps you analyze different keywords for SEO. This brand marketing software allows you to measure the competition of a certain keyword, find potential opportunities, and track your progress on SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages). SEMRush is a helpful marketing tool with multi-functions that puts your small business at the top of your industry. It provides a platform to schedule social media posts and also track the engagement of your posts and social media accounts. Check here to install the SEMRush social media poster chrome extension to schedule and publish your social media posts at the same time on all social media platforms.
monday.com
monday.com provides visually stunning templates and marketing tools for your business. It enables you to manage your marketing assets and campaigns in one collaborative space, helping different teams to work together and stay on the same page. It gives you neat and easy-to-use timelines and dashboards for a complete view of your marketing plans and projects. You can use its marketing calendar, project overview, or campaign tracking template to stay on top of everything.
Moreover, it has a client management feature that lets you save your contacts and capture calls, emails, and meetings. It stores all client data in the system so you can easily locate important information in one place. In one centralized dashboard, you can upload files and make them available to your team members.
You can use all the features for free for a period of time to see if the software matches your needs.
Conclusion:
The marketing software has changed a lot in recent years. It started out with traditional advertising, which is obviously still important. Then moved to more online methods such as search engine optimization, social media marketing and content marketing. In addition to this there are many different types of marketing software. There is lead management, email marketing, customer relationship management, blogging software and so much more. It can all get a little confusing when you look at it from a small business perspective and not a large corporation level.