In today's digital age, marketing has evolved dramatically, and staying ahead of the curve can be a challenge. Fortunately, there's a wealth of free marketing tools available that can make your job easier, more efficient, and even more creative.
Many small businesses are created on the side, in spare time and with little to know budget behind them. Also, many are new to marketing and it can be very daunting to know where to start! So I wanted to share my top 5 FREE tools I use that have helped me get my marketing set up, scaled and activated. This is designed for existing clients of mine but also anyone looking to learn how to optimise and automate some of their marketing and get ahead!
1. Google Drive, Sheets & Docs. Google provides a fantastic cloud solution to store all your documents meaning you can access them anywhere. So if you’re on holiday and have a fantastic blog idea, or need to track your expenses whilst out nd about, use these tools to manage and organise your business operations
2. Chat GPT - AI has come on a long way and there’s many different solutions out there, but I use Chat GPT for an awful lot of my my marketing ideas. My mindset is it helps be shortcut some of the manual processes and gets me 90% of the way there, and I customise the rest. Here are some examples of how I use Chat GPT:
Identify relevant National Holidays that can be used for marketing purposes for my coaching business.
List up to 20 inspirational quotes buy famous business leaders that can be used for my female coaching business
Generate me 50 inspirational statements that relate to female leadership.
Give me the top 5 steps I need to do to execute a successful marketing strategy
Further expand on each of these statements
Write me a blog on “x” incorporating the following keywords “y”
Top Tip, spend time crafting the right question as that influences the answer you get. Give it as much relevant information (or keep it vague if you want a broad response). In addition, you can always ask this killer question at the end or your request “Before completing this task, please ask me any questions you may have that would make your response better”. If at first you don’t get the right answer, tweak the prompt and evolve the answer with Chat GPT.
3. Canva - Visual content is essential in marketing especially in social media channels, and Canva is a game-changer for anyone who isn't a professional graphic designer. It’s a great free tool to create beautiful and slick visuals for almost any format. Instagram posts, Reels, Business cards or even Powerpoint. Canva is introducing more and more AI such as AI generated images but the free version includes thousands of templates, stock photos, and design elements allowing you to craft professional-looking materials even if you lack design skills.
4. Unsplash - royalty free, beautiful images for almost any scenario.
A picture is worth a thousand words, and Unsplash is the place to find those stunning images for your marketing campaigns. Unsplash offers a vast library of high-quality, royalty-free images that you can use in your content without any legal hassles. Whether you need visuals for your blog posts, social media posts, or website, Unsplash has a wide selection of photos that cater to a variety of niches. It's a valuable resource for marketers looking to enhance the visual appeal of their content.
5. Meta Business Suite - If you are delivering a social media and content marketing strategy Meta Business Suite is a must, you can post on multiple channels and pages at once and also schedule multiple posts up to a month in advance. This means you can deploy a month's worth of marketing posts and then sit back and relax! It's a must-have for marketers who rely on social media to connect with their audience.
There’s so many other tools I use such as Wix & SEM Rush but these are the ones I use on a daily basis and have helped supercharge my marketing strategies. These are my go to free marketing tools for any small business I am working with.
In conclusion, these top 5 free marketing tools are indispensable for marketers and small businesses in 2023 and beyond. From content creation to design, collaboration, social media management, and access to high-quality visuals, these tools have got your marketing needs covered. Incorporate them into your strategy, and watch your marketing efforts become more efficient, creative, and successful without breaking the bank.
Give them a go and let me know how you get on!
P.S. How many of these tools do you think I used to create this post?!