By Bryce Colquitt, Small Business MBA
In 2015, it can be harder than ever to stand out. There are so many marketing channels, and so much noise. There are also a ton of decisions to make – what to write about, how to get your content out there and who to talk to. Fortunately, there are more tools than ever for online marketers to make our jobs easier and make us more effective. Here are 10 tools for online marketers that you should definitely know about:
TOOLS FOR INCREASING TRAFFIC
1. BuzzSumo
Use BuzzSumo to find out what content is resonating with your audience. This tool shows you the most popular content about a topic, or the top performing content of a certain website. It will also list who is sharing this content and on what platform.
With Google Trends, you can see what everyone else is searching for. This tool is good for figuring out what’s current. Wondering if people are still interested in a certain topic? Google Trends will let you know. Deciding on what keyword to use? Google Trends will tell you which one is searched for more.
3. Canva
What makes Canva so great is that it gives anyone the ability to create gorgeous graphic designs. It can be used for all sorts of things (like making PowerPoint presentations more interesting), but for a marketer, it’s perfect for creating marketing graphics, infographics, and images to be shared on social media.
4. Open Site Explorer
Open Site Explorer allows you to see who is linking to you or your competitors. Links are the lifeblood of SEO, and this tool helps you understand who are the most important sites that are linking to you and to research your competitor’s links. In the pro version, you can also analyze social media data.
TOOLS FOR INCREASING CONVERSIONS
5. Optimizely
When you have enough traffic, the first way to increase conversions is a simple A/B test. Optimizely is the easiest way to do this, and does not require technical know-how. It has a visual editor that allows you to tweak your site’s design, and then you can test it. Figure out which version works best and see your conversions increase.
6. KISSmetrics
KISSmetrics is like Google Analytics on steroids. You can get information on what your visitors are doing, where they are going on your site, and where they are bouncing. It allows you to track people throughout your marketing funnel, so you’re not just staring at a bunch of random metrics. Use KISSmetrics to dive into understanding what people are doing on your site, and how you can improve conversions.
7. Olark
I’m a big fan of talking to customers, and Olark is one of the best ways to do that. Olark sets up a chat box on the bottom right hand corner of your site, and if a customer has a question and someone on your team is available, they can chat with you. You can also set up the live chat box to pop up at certain times. Let’s say you use Mixpanel to find the average time spent on your site. You can set Olark to pop up right before that time to ask the customer if they need anything. It’s a great tool to talk directly with customers.
OTHER TOOLS
8. InviteBox
InviteBox gets you closer to mastering that holy grail of word of mouth. It’s an easy way to create a referral program and requires no technical knowledge. In just a few minutes, you can design a widget that you can share and launch your referral program. (If you want to learn why referral programs are so important, here’s an article I wrote about them.)
9. Zapier
Zapier is an automation tool that creates connections between business products. With Zapier, your tools can communicate with each other, and if something happens in one application, you can set Zapier to tell another application to take an action. It will save you time and create a holistic system you can use for the marketing efforts around your site.
10. FullContact
When you’re sharing content online and driving traffic to your website, or testing ads or affiliate programs, you’re working with a lot of people. FullContact helps you keep track of all of them. It unifies contacts from multiple services, gives you daily updates on your contacts, and provides real names and photos.
With these tools, you can figure out the right people to reach out to, what type of content you should market, and understand what’s working best on your site. Using them will make you a smarter, more effective marketer. And most of them are free! If you have any suggestions of other good tools, let us know in the comment section!
Bryce Colquitt is a consultant and founder of Small Business MBA, the place to learn how to grow your business. Small Business MBA provides no-fluff, practical guides and training on strategies to help small business owners. Like them on Facebook to get free, in-depth guides on growing your business.
