9 Small Business Marketing Tools to Accelerate Growth

Small businesses have unique marketing needs that must be met to accelerate growth. While there are many marketing tools available, not all of them are appropriate or affordable for small businesses.

In this article, we’ll cover the best marketing tools for small businesses and how they can help you achieve your marketing goals. We’ll also take a look at the features, advantages, and pricing of each tool to help you decide which is the best fit for your business.

What to look for in marketing tools for small businesses

It’s important to find the right marketing tools to help you reach your target audience. There are a lot of different options out there, so it can be tough to know where to start. Here are a few things to look for in marketing tools for small businesses:

Ease of use: You don’t want to spend hours learning how to use a new marketing tool. Look for something that’s easy to set up and understand.

Flexibility: Your marketing needs will change over time, so find a tool that can grow with you. Look for something that offers a variety of features and can be customized to meet your changing needs.

Affordability: Small businesses often have limited budgets, so it’s important to find a marketing tool that fits within your budget. There are free and paid options out there, so find one that fits your needs and budget.

Effectiveness: Ultimately, you want a marketing tool that will help you achieve your goals. Do some research and read reviews to see if a particular tool is effective at helping businesses achieve their goals.

The tools we cover in this article check the box for some or all of these attributes. We’ll offer our top picks for the following marketing channels:

• Email marketing
• Content marketing
• SMS marketing
• Social media marketing
• Search engine (SEO) marketing
• Online advertising
• Marketing Analytics

Related: What is Marketing Myopia?

The 9 best small business digital marketing tools

Top tool for email marketing

1. Mailchimp

Mailchimp is one of the most popular email marketing platforms for small businesses. And for good reason: it’s easy to use, has a wide range of features, and is affordable.

Here are some of the main reasons why Mailchimp is a great option for small businesses:

Ease of Use: Mailchimp is user-friendly, even for those with no prior experience with email marketing. The platform is intuitive and easy to navigate, so you can get up and running quickly.

Wide range of features: Mailchimp offers a wide range of features to help you create effective email marketing campaigns. From templates and automation to reporting and integrations, Mailchimp has everything you need to run successful campaigns.

Affordable: Mailchimp is one of the most affordable email marketing platforms on the market. It offers a free plan for those with very limited budgets, as well as flexible paid plans that scale as your needs grow.

Customizable: Mailchimp’s templates are highly customizable, so you can create emails that reflect your brand and meet your specific objectives.

Integrations: Mailchimp integrates with a wide range of popular applications, making it easy to add your email campaigns into your existing workflow.

With its ease of use, wide range of features, and affordability, Mailchimp is the perfect option for small businesses looking to launch or improve their email marketing efforts.

Mailchimp pricing

Mailchimp offers 4 pricing tiers:

• A free plan for up to 500 contacts
• Essentials starts at $11 per month, for up to 50,000 contacts
• Standard starts at $17 per month and supports up to 100,000 contacts
• Premium starts at $299 per month and supports unlimited contacts

Top tools for content marketing

2. Jasper

Jasper.ai is a cutting-edge artificial intelligence tool that helps content writers produce high-quality, engaging content. Using natural language processing and machine learning, Jasper.ai analyzes a text and suggests improvements that can be made to the content. And Jasper is the perfect tool for small businesses looking to get started with content marketing. Here’s why:

Jasper is extremely user-friendly. It’s designed specifically for small businesses, so you won’t need to hire a team of experts to get started.

Jasper is affordable. There’s no need to break the bank to get started with content marketing – Jasper has you covered.

Jasper gives you the ability to track your results and measure your success. You’ll be able to see how your content is performing and make changes as needed to ensure that you’re getting the most bang for your buck.

Content marketing is a powerful way to reach new customers and grow your business. And with Jasper by your side, it’s easier than ever to get started.

Jasper pricing

Jasper charges for the number of words you use per month. The paid plans start from $24 per month for 20,000 words. Jasper also offers a ‘Boss Mode’ plan which offers more control and flexibility over writing.

Claim a free trial of Jasper here (with 10.000 extra words)

3. WordPress

This digital marketing tool is a versatile content management system that can help you streamline your workflow and stay organized. WordPress comes with a host of features that are perfect for small businesses, including: 

• A customizable dashboard that lets you see everything in one place 
• Plugins and themes that let you extend the functionality of WordPress 
• A built-in blogging platform that lets you share your story with the world 
• E-commerce integration that lets you sell products and services online 

WordPress is an easy way to manage your small business website without hiring a team of developers.

Related: Business blogging tips

WordPress pricing

WordPress is free to use. But if you opt for WordPress hosting, their cheapest plan starts at $4 a month, and goes up to $45 a month for ecommerce websites.

Top tool for SMS marketing

4. TextMagic

SMS marketing is a type of mobile marketing that allows businesses to send text messages, or short messages, to their customers. And TextMagic is the most suitable SMS marketing solution for small businesses. Here’s why:

First, the pay-as-you-go model is perfect for small businesses that want to try out SMS marketing without making a long-term commitment.

Second, TextMagic allows you to send texts from your email account, which is convenient and easy to use.

Third, the service supports text messaging in over 200 countries, so you can reach a global audience.

And fourth, TextMagic offers a number of automation features that make it easy to manage your SMS campaigns.

Overall, TextMagic is an excellent choice for small businesses that want to get started with SMS marketing. You can check out an in-depth TextMagic review here.

TextMagic pricing

The pay-as-you-go pricing model makes it affordable. You can start with a free-trial to see if it’s a good fit for you. You’ll get 10 free SMS credits to start off with. You do have to pay a monthly cost for a virtual mobile number.

Top tool for social media marketing

5. Hootsuite

Hootsuite is one of the most popular social media management platforms, and for good reason. It’s an easy way to schedule social media posts, track who’s talking about your brand online, and measure your social media ROI.

But why is Hootsuite such a good fit for small businesses? 

First, let’s talk about scheduling social media posts. Every small business owner knows that social media marketing requires a consistent posting schedule. But it’s not always easy to find the time to sit down and craft new social media posts. That’s where Hootsuite comes in. With Hootsuite, you can create and schedule social media posts in advance. This means you can spend less time on social media and more time running your business. 

Second, Hootsuite provides valuable insights into your social media performance. It’s important to know how your social media campaigns are performing so you can make adjustments accordingly. With HootSuite, you can see which posts are getting the most engagement and adjust your strategy accordingly. 

Finally, Hootsuite is free for small businesses with three or fewer social media accounts. For small businesses on a tight budget, this is a great perk. 

Overall, Hootsuite is an excellent tool for small businesses looking to improve their social media marketing efforts. It’s easy to use, cost-effective and provides valuable insights into your social media performance.

Hootsuite pricing

Hootsuite has 3 pricing plans.

• Professional at $49/month
• Team at $179/month
• Business at $739/month

You can get started with a free 30-day trials to get familiar with the features.

Top tools for search engine marketing

6. Ahrefs

Ahrefs is a comprehensive one of the best SEO tools that offers everything you need to improve your website’s ranking, including keyword research, competitor analysis, backlink tracking, and more. Best of all, it’s designed for businesses of all sizes, so it’s easy to use and scale.

Here are just a few of the ways Ahrefs can help your small business:

Keyword research: Use Ahrefs’ Keywords Explorer tool to find the right keywords to target for your website. Just enter a seed keyword and let Ahrefs do the rest.

Competitor analysis: See how your competitors are ranking for the same keywords as you on search engines with Ahrefs’ Site Explorer tool. This information can help you adjust your own SEO strategy.

Backlink tracking: Keep track of who is linking to your website with Ahrefs’ Backlink Checker. This is important for both link building and reputation management.

If you’re not already using Ahrefs, now is the time to start. You won’t be disappointed.

Ahrefs pricing

Ahrefs comes with 4 pricing options:

• Lite starts at $99/month
• Standard starts at $199/month
• Advanced starts at $399/month
• Enterprise plan starts at $999/month

If you sign up for an annual plan, you can get your first two months for free.

7. Surfer SEO

Surfer SEO is a content optimization tool that helps small businesses improve their search engine ranking. The tool analyzes the top-performing pages for a given keyword and provides recommendations on how to optimize your own content to match those results.

In addition, Surfer SEO offers real-time data on keyword difficulty, search volume, and search intent, helping you to make smarter decisions about your SEO and content marketing strategy.

The tool is easy to use, affordable and offers a wealth of data and insights that can help you to rank higher in Google and other search engines. If you’re serious about improving your website’s organic traffic, then Surfer SEO is definitely worth considering.

Surfer SEO pricing

Surfer offers a free plan which includes all basic content optimization tools. They have 3 paid plans which are:

• Basic at $59/month
• Pro at $119/month
• Business at $239/month

Visit SurferSEO

Top tool for online advertising

8. Google Ad Manager

Google Ad Manager is the top tool for online advertising for small businesses. It’s a complete ad management platform that helps you control your ad inventory, customize ad placements, and track your revenue and performance.

Ad Manager is easy to set up and use, and it offers granular ad targeting and open bidding, making it a great fit for small businesses.

With Ad Manager, you can control how much you spend on advertising, who sees your ads, and where your ads are placed.

You can also track your revenue and performance to see what’s working and what isn’t.

Perhaps most importantly, it offers competitive prices, making it a cost-effective way to reach your target market.

If you’re looking for an all-in-one solution for online advertising, Google Ad Manager is the best option for your marketing team.

Google Ad Manager pricing

Google Ad Manager is free to use.

Top tool for marketing analytics

9. Google Analytics

Commonly considered the gold standard for marketing analytics, Google Analytics is a powerful and free tool that provides website owners with valuable insights into their traffic and marketing campaigns. And while it may be most commonly used by larger businesses, it’s also an excellent tool for small businesses—if you know how to use it.

One of the primary benefits of using Google Analytics is that it allows you to track all of your marketing campaigns in one place. This includes everything from email marketing to social media ads to paid search ads. Not only does this make it easier to track your results, but it also allows you to see which campaigns are performing well and which ones need improvement.

Perhaps even more importantly, Google Analytics can help you better understand your website visitors. Through the use of data like bounce rate and time on site, you can get a clear picture of what interests your visitors and what doesn’t. This information is essential for making informed decisions about your website content and design.

Overall, Google Analytics is an incredibly useful tool for small businesses. It’s easy to use, and it provides valuable insights that can help you improve your marketing efforts.

If you’re not already using Google Analytics, now is the time to start.

Google Analytics pricing

Google Analytics is free to use.

Top digital marketing tools for small businesses: Wrap up

It’s important for small businesses to use the right marketing tools in order to reach their target market and accelerate growth. We’ve outlined our top picks for effective small business marketing.

But it’s important to do your own research and find the tools that will work best with your digital marketing strategy. The best tools for your business will depend on your unique needs and budget.

Each tool has its own strengths and weaknesses; the key is to find the ones that work best for your specific business and use them to their full potential.

Related article: Best Branding Materials for Small Businesses