Posted by Cameron Francis
on
24 May , 2019
in
Digital Marketing
In this age, most business operations have shifted, and things are being done online. This way, businesses are being forced to invest in having a strong online presence and managing their website, which is the place where customers go to when they are interested in what is being offered. If you are not conversant with managing a website, it is easy to go on one and check out the fantastic features and imagine that creating and maintaining them is simple. Well, the truth is that running a website for any business is not straightforward. The online world is known to be volatile and one aspect that was important a few weeks ago can turn out to be completely irrelevant today. This way, one needs to keep up to date with these changes while still monitoring and maintaining their website.
Luckily, the internet has a plethora of tools, both paid and free, that one can use to monitor their site. These tools are designed for different functions, and one should select them based on what they want from them. This article will look at some of the top tools for business owners and what they do so that you know what to get when you need something to be done on your website.
1. Search Console
This is a tool meant to help your performance on Google search. It is developed by Google and the tools available there help to report and measure your site’s search traffic and performance. They also help to fix any issues with your visibility on the engines and make your site better placed to be found by people searching for your business. This is an essential tool for business owners, but it is often overlooked. This is terrible since it can deliver fantastic results if used correctly. It helps you to ensure that Google can access your content and gives you a platform to submit new content for crawling. You can check out the content that delivers engaging results and maintain your site without affecting the search performance. It helps to keep your site clean by resolving any malware and spam issues.
Search Console is a free tool but still rivals many paid ones out there. While it may not be a replacement for most of the tools available out there, it is a perfect supplement for the rest.
2. Google Analytics
You might be familiar with this one since it undoubtedly the most popular and commonly used one among site owners. It is a free tool offered by Google, based on the internet, that allows you to get an insight into the traffic coming to your site. You can check out the demographics of your visitors, their location, time spent on a specific page and many others. In plain terms, you can stalk your visitors and get more information about them even when they come back to your site. This tool can offer extensive and detailed data that can help you to understand your audience better. This is important for all your marketing efforts since you need to appeal to these visitors and you are better placed to do it with their profile known.
Google Analytics has several features and metrics that stand out and make it a top tool for any business owner. Read on:
- It helps to track conversions since you can set goals and get notified when a visitor attains a particular one.
- Tracks new customers and identifies them when they come back.
- Shows how visitors interact with your site by indicating the length of sessions, bounce rates, page views, and actions.
- You can tag your Google AdWords profile to know if a visitor originates from there.
- Has an e-commerce option to know where your profitable customers come from.
- You can tweak the reports and customise it to receive what you want at the end of a specific period.
3. MouseFlow
This is a user experience tool that allows you to see how visitors interact with your website. The importance of UX cannot be underestimated since it can make a visitor buy what you are offering or leave the site. MouseFlow tracks this behaviour through screen recording, mouse tracking, and heatmaps. They allow you to point out trends, collect user behaviour insights and work on these areas to improve your site. It does this using a couple of features pointed out below;
- Click maps identify the various elements that users click on when they visit a specific page.
- Scroll maps show the parts of a page that are visible while indicating the number of visitors who scrolled down a page.
- Movement maps show where users move their mouse.
- Attention map is a time-based one that shows how visitors are engaged with specific parts of your site.
- Geography map indicates where your users are from physically based on their IP address.
- User recordings allow you to watch real user’s activity as they go through your website.
This is undoubtedly an essential tool for analysing the user experience, and business owners can use it to identify site malfunctions and change the layout or any other issue with it for the better.
4. WorkChat
This is a tool that allows you and your staff members to send text and images in real time without having to exchange contact information. It can be used to send broadcast and personalised messages to employees. It was designed for businesses that have less than a hundred people working there. It is a perfect replacement for other means of communication commonly used such as email, Facebook and WhatsApp. It is also used to eliminate the issue of having people use their personal contacts to communicate business issues. It can be installed on a computer, android and apple device and has a portal for managers and employees.
5. MailChimp
Email marketing is an important aspect of online marketing and businesses cannot afford to ignore it. However, building an email list and managing it is not an easy thing to do and it could be overwhelming for any person. MailChimp is a tool that can help you to manage your email marketing campaign through some of the fantastic features it has in store. Read on;
- Allows you to collect email addresses from your visitors and send them automatic follow up emails.
- Has an extensive collection of layouts, themes and templates you can use to customise your emails.
- The availability of an HTML editor allows tech savy people to develop their unique templates.
- Helps to categorise your email subscribers based on specific characteristics, for instance, those that have achieved a certain goal or new ones etc.
- Gives you a clear insight of how your campaign is faring one, and you can see the number of emails sent, those that were opened and the links that were clicked.
6. BaseCamp
Communication is important for the smooth running of a business. Basecamp is a real time communication tool that allows a team in any organisation to keep tabs on impending matters. With many tasks assigned to different people, scheduling issues and file sharing, this tool offers a portal for people to keep track of what is happening in their area.
The tool was established back in 2004 and since then, it has focused on coming up with a straightforward interface where users can execute several tasks without any difficulties. It is web based and the signed-up members can log in and out anytime using a web browser or through apps that are compatible with most mobile gadgets being used today. It is not restrictive to any business niche and can be used for any company. The pricing tiers and subscription packages vary with respect to the amount of storage offered and number of users signed up. Some of the features offered include;
- Projects overview.
- File sharing functionality.
- To do list for projects.
- Apps for mobile devices.
- Calendar view for tasks and projects.
- Status of a task, whether assigned or not.
7. Hunter.io
This is an online tool that looks through websites for contact information. It is the first tools in the email scraping area, and it has evolved to become a must have tool for business owners. It works by searching and indexing email addresses it comes across on websites across the internet. Its working is very simple and you can either key in a site to find out the email addresses on that domain or key in the individual’s name to find the email address. One impressive feature of this tool is its bulk email verification feature. There are lots of email addresses on the web, and you cannot know whether one was deleted, changed or left as a spam trap. The verifier feature allows you to check if the emails are working even if they are from another source.
8. HootSuite
This is a social media management tool that will make you forget what it is like to switch between multiple accounts. You can keep track of your social media growth using this tiny tool. Here are the features it has;
- It is compatible with several platforms.
- Allows you to pre-plan for when specific posts will be posted looking at how peak times vary on various platforms.
- It keeps tabs on mentions allowing you to respond in a timely fashion.
- It offers detailed social media analytics to help you keep tabs on engagement rates on various profiles.
- If you are lost for ideas when creating posts, it can give you suggestions based on what is relevant.
9. Wistia
You might be familiar with YouTube and Vimeo but Wistia is an equally impressive tool that makes it simpler for businesses to create, host, manage and share videos. It is a business-oriented service that helps businesses to grow their brand awareness and track marketing performance through its inbuilt analytics and marketing tools. Here are some of the features offered;
- Simple video embedding and sharing.
- Cross device compatibility.
- Call to action tools.
- Email marketing capabilities.
- Drag and drop organisation.
- Video SEO.
- Engagement graphs.
This tool basically helps your video marketing through the mentioned and other features available. You can do several things on your videos and the ability to integrate it with other online marketing tools makes it a top tool for business owners.
10. WordPress
This is one of the most popular website building platforms available on the internet today. There are several options out there looking at how many people use this one, it must have amazing features. WordPress is free of charge and you can make different types of website using it. It is simple to use in that it divides content, design and add-ons, making it better for developers. It has a collection of add-ons, plugins and templates that you can use to tune your site. Most third-party tools listed here are integrable with WordPress, making it easier to manage all your online tasks on one platform.
11. Google Keep
This is a cloud-based tool that allows you to take notes and compile lists which can later be accessed on any of your devices. It can be accessed via a mobile app on Android and iOS devices or an extension on Chrome browser. It is helpful in keeping friends and family on the same page on crucial matters since it allows real time collaboration. One can also record a voice note and set reminders on tasks or commitments that need to be honoured. The notes can be exported to Google Docs meaning that they can be converted to normal documents.
12. PageSpeed Insights
This tool is important for optimising a website’s speed as the name goes. It looks at the content available on a page and then gives suggestions on how the speed can be increased. It is well known that faster page speeds directly translate to lower bounce rates and can increase the number of conversions. It is beneficial and offers advantages such as providing the mobile page speed scores and offering detailed reports on what it finds on your site. It is free but has a slight disadvantage of having limited actionable data.
13. Avanser
This is one of the best call tracking tools available today. For better business operations, you need to keep track of your calls and the features offered by this tool provide more than that. They include;
- Call tracking.
- Call conversion to generate more bookings and appointments.
- Call routing to effectively direct call traffic.
- Call analytics offers detailed call intelligence in one place.
- Call centre allows you to add a live centre on your business with no hardware needed.
The list of tools that can help any business owner today is long but there is no doubt that the listed ones are among the top. They have been seen to be useful in different aspects that would otherwise stress out any businessperson.
If you are looking to generate more sales and not sure where to start, book in a free strategy session with one of our business growth specialists today.
