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Amol Ghemud Published: August 14, 2018
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There are a huge number of free digital marketing tools available out there in market & finding the right ones for your business can be a daunting task. There’s no shortage of tools with all of them having their own pros & cons. But as a VP or director of marketing, you would be looking for tools to help you in your day-to-day marketing operations & ultimately help your team in simplifying things, saving time & costs & in achieving higher ROI.
There are paid tools too in the market which have many great and additional features. Just a word of caution here: Please don’t go on a spree of buying paid tools first. Do your research, find and use some free tools first and then make your decision of purchasing a paid tool if it is absolutely necessary. Because if you find a free tool which is capable of fulfilling all your requirements and needs, then there’s nothing like it. (Buy yourself a nice gift with the money you have thus saved) So, to make things easy for you (because you might have a severe shortage of time), we have searched all the free tools out there and hand picked 5 of the most important and effective free digital marketing tools. Before we dig into the tools, do remember that these tools are meant to be used to supplement your digital marketing strategy & would show better results if you have a solid marketing strategy in place beforehand. Your marketing strategy would ideally consist of many different aspects such as business objectives, target audience, positioning, etc. We’ve worked through the clutter of tools to list down the top 5 free must-have marketing tools that every business must try out:
It has become quite common for businesses to have multiple social media accounts & if you wish to stay ahead of the game you need to be active on all of them delivering quality content time after time continuously. Initially it may be easy to do so, but after a time as you start scaling up your digital marketing efforts it will start becoming more tougher to keep a track of all your social media accounts & posts and wish that there was a one-stop platform to manage all your social media accounts. Hootsuite is a tool that helps you manage all your social media accounts from a single dashboard. It supports a wide range of social media sites including Google+, Facebook, Twitter & Instagram. The free version allows support to manage up-to 3 social media profiles in a single place, however you can upgrade to the paid version whenever you feel like. You can also use the Auto-schedule feature to schedule multiple posts in advance to your various social media accounts from a single dashboard. In-addition the free version also provides basic analytics to track your followers & see which content is performing better.
Canva is a free-to-use and simple yet powerful graphic designing tool. With it’s array of more than 1million graphics, pics & fonts you can get the perfect image for your post ready within minutes without being a professional graphic designer to do so. It can help you turn any idea into stunning graphic in a simple & quick manner.
Hotjar is a heat-mapping & feedback tool that lets you analyze the clicks, taps & scrolling behavior of the visitors to your site. It also provides data analytics about conversion funnel so that you can identify on which page & at what step are most of the users dropping off which will help you in identifying the areas of improvement in your site. In-addition it also let’s you create feedback polls & survey forms to target users anywhere on the web/mobile site to help understand user behavior. The free plan lets you collect data from 2,000 page-views/day from unlimited users.
Simply Measured provides a huge number of analytics reports to measure your social media marketing efforts. Some of the popular free to use reports are:
Facebook content analysis- Analyze the performance of your content on Facebook
Competitive analysis- Compare your Facebook page with your competitors
Facebook fan page analysis
Facebook insights analysis- In-depth analysis of your Facebook Page visitor’s demographics & activity
Instagram user analysis- Measure your Instagram engagement, trends, content & more
Although the above mentioned reports are free, Simply Measured will ask for Twitter follow or Facebook mention in return for the free reports.
Alright, I agree it’s not exactly a free to use tool though you can try it out for free for 30 days. But, it’s definitely one of the best tools available out there for A/B testing or multi-page testing. It let’s you create multiple variations of your website & then tracks and lets you know which version works the best for your customers. You can use this tool to tweak your website in order to generate more traffic & revenue from your site. Better customer experience will also help you in improving your SEO ratings. A great free-to-use alternative for A/B testing which you can consider is Peek which lets you get a video of a person testing your website or app & provide feedback. That’s it from my end for now. I have kept article short & simple on purpose to give a brief view about the different tools available out there. These tools will definitely help you in simplifying your digital marketing efforts & save both time & costs while leading to a higher ROI. However, as I said before you will still need a solid & effective marketing strategy in place before you can use these tools to the maximum effect. Here’s a workbook which will help you develop an effective strategy for all your social media marketing needs. Fill it up and see yourself get that clarity in setting your social media goals and use it to achieve great results. If you have liked the post & need to find out more about a solid & effective digital marketing strategy for your business kindly write us an email on [email protected]
FAQ
1. Can I start digital marketing with no money?
We’d explain what we did and what we would do differently if we had to start a new company on a tight budget.
You must follow the procedures listed below.
Step 1 – Hire Yourself as the Marketing Expert to Save Thousands of Dollars
Step 2 – Building your brand and creating a professional logo.
Step 3: Use an inexpensive organic marketing strategy.
Step 4: Only use paid advertising to support your organic marketing.
2. How can I use free marketing?
Organize classes and activities.
Hold informational seminars.
Participate in professional networking activities.
Run a sweepstake or giveaway on social media.
Hold a business card drawing in-store.
Create a program for client referrals.
Participate in regional competitions or activities.
Purchase some fantastic business cards.
3. Which is the best tool for digital marketing?
This list can be the cornerstone of an entire marketing stack, whether for managing customer relationships, luring leads, or finding new marketing possibilities.
To get begin, look at the categories below:
Tools for social media promotion
Tools for email promotion
Tools for SEO (search engine optimization)
Tools for conversion optimization
Tools for lead addition
Lead capture and landing page utilities
Graphic design software
4. What is the cheapest digital marketing?
There will be more channels and ways in 2023 to increase your company’s online exposure as the digital marketing landscape changes. Our internet marketing services which are cost-effective, have developed over the years we’ve been in the business.
Web design and development,
social media marketing,
search engine optimization, and
pay-per-click (PPC) advertising
Content Marketing
eCommerce Solutions
For Curious Minds
A clear digital marketing strategy provides the necessary direction to ensure that tools are deployed to achieve specific business objectives, not just to perform tasks. Without this foundational plan, even powerful free tools can lead to fragmented efforts and a poor return on investment. Your strategy dictates why you are using a tool, which is far more important than just knowing how to use it. For example, your strategy should define your target audience and positioning, which then informs the content you schedule with Hootsuite. It should also outline your conversion goals, making Hotjar’s analysis of up to 2,000 page-views per day more focused and actionable. A well-defined strategy transforms these tools from simple utilities into key components of a growth engine. To learn how to better align your tool selection with your core business objectives, explore our complete guide.
Canva democratizes design, enabling marketing teams to produce high-quality, on-brand visuals with speed and at no cost, which directly enhances the return on investment for your content efforts. It removes the common bottlenecks associated with relying on a professional designer for day-to-day visual assets. This approach provides several key advantages:
Speed and Agility: You can turn ideas into stunning graphics for social media posts or blog headers in minutes.
Significant Cost Savings: By avoiding freelancer or agency fees, you can reallocate that budget toward ad spend or other growth initiatives.
Brand Consistency: Pre-set templates ensure that every team member can create visuals that adhere to established brand guidelines.
With access to over 1 million graphics and fonts, your team can maintain a polished and professional appearance across all digital channels. Find out how to maximize your visual content production in our full tool breakdown.
While native platform management offers access to the latest features, a tool like Hootsuite provides superior efficiency through centralization. The evaluation hinges on balancing the value of streamlined scheduling and unified analytics against the nuances of direct platform interaction. You should consider these critical factors in your decision:
Efficiency: The free version of Hootsuite lets you manage up to 3 social media profiles, use the Auto-schedule feature to plan multiple posts in advance, and view basic performance data from a single dashboard.
Consistency: A centralized hub helps maintain a coherent brand voice and posting rhythm across channels like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Analytics: Its free plan provides basic analytics to track followers and see what content performs best, offering a consolidated overview that native apps lack.
The primary trade-off is a potential delay in accessing new, platform-specific features. A hybrid approach often works best, using a dashboard for efficiency and native apps for deep engagement. The full article explores this strategic balance in greater detail.
Hotjar delivers visual proof of how users interact with your website, allowing you to move beyond abstract metrics to see precisely where they click, scroll, and exit. This evidence is fundamental for making informed, data-driven enhancements to your conversion funnels. With its free plan covering 2,000 page-views per day, you can diagnose specific usability problems. For instance, an e-commerce company could analyze heatmaps and discover users are repeatedly clicking a non-interactive image, indicating a design flaw. The tool's conversion funnel analytics can pinpoint the exact step in the checkout process where most users abandon their carts. By pairing this visual data with targeted feedback polls on that page, you can ask visitors *why* they are leaving. This powerful combination of observation and direct feedback creates a clear path for optimization. Explore more examples of data-driven site improvement in the complete guide.
By integrating Canva for creation and Hootsuite for distribution, you create a streamlined content engine that turns a reactive process into a proactive strategy. This systematic approach allows you to scale your output efficiently while maintaining high quality. Follow this clear, four-step plan for seamless integration:
Establish Brand Templates: First, use Canva to create a suite of branded templates for various post types (e.g., announcements, testimonials, promotions) to ensure visual consistency.
Develop a Content Calendar: Plan your weekly or monthly content themes, post ideas, and copy in a shared document or spreadsheet.
Batch Create Your Visuals: Dedicate a specific block of time to create all the visual assets for the upcoming week in Canva using your pre-made templates.
Schedule Content in Bulk: Upload the finished graphics to Hootsuite and use its Auto-schedule feature to distribute the posts across your connected profiles.
This structured workflow saves time and frees your team to focus on more strategic initiatives. Our full guide offers more detailed workflow optimizations.
The wide availability of powerful free tools is shifting the focus for marketing leaders from budget acquisition to strategic integration and data interpretation. Future directors must excel at synthesizing insights from disparate sources to construct a cohesive, evidence-based marketing engine. The emphasis will move decisively toward analytical and strategic skills rather than platform procurement. A director's value will be measured by their ability to connect the dots. For example, they might use Simply Measured to find a high-performing content theme on Facebook, then use Hotjar’s heatmaps to analyze the corresponding landing page and understand why it converts effectively. This requires a deep understanding of the entire customer journey, not just expertise in a single tool. The full article discusses how to build a tech stack that prepares you for this evolving landscape.
The most frequent mistake is adopting tools to solve isolated problems without considering how they fit into the overall marketing strategy and customer journey. A strategic approach involves selecting tools that complement each other and support specific business goals. To avoid this, start with your marketing funnel as a blueprint and map tools to each stage:
Awareness: Use Canva to create engaging social media graphics and Hootsuite to distribute them effectively.
Consideration: Deploy Hotjar to analyze how users interact with your product pages or blog content to identify areas for improvement.
Conversion: Use Hotjar's conversion funnel analytics to find and fix leaks in your checkout or sign-up process.
Analytics: Use a tool like Simply Measured to report on social media performance, which informs your next awareness-stage campaign.
This method ensures each tool has a clear purpose and contributes to a unified objective, helping you avoid the common pitfall of collecting disconnected solutions. Our complete overview shows how to audit your toolset.
A report from Simply Measured replaces guesswork with objective evidence, enabling you to concentrate your content strategy on what demonstrably resonates with your audience. Its Facebook content analysis can reveal your most effective post formats, topics, and timing with clear data. For example, imagine the report shows that posts featuring customer photos receive 40% more comments and that video content published on weekend mornings gets the highest organic reach. A manager can use this specific evidence to make immediate strategic shifts:
Launch a Campaign: Create a new user-generated content campaign encouraging customers to share photos with a branded hashtag.
Adjust Content Mix: Prioritize the production of short-form video content over static image posts for key announcements.
Optimize Schedule: Reschedule the content calendar to publish the most important video content during peak weekend hours.
This data-driven approach directly improves performance by aligning effort with proven audience preferences. Explore more ways to use free analytics in our detailed tool guide.
Teams often rush to paid tools because of aggressive sales tactics or a misconception that free software is inherently incapable. You can avoid this costly error by implementing a disciplined evaluation process that prioritizes your specific requirements over a tool's feature list. The key is to define your needs first, before you even begin looking at solutions. Follow these steps:
Identify the Core Problem: Clearly state the issue you need to solve, such as saving time on social media posting or understanding website drop-offs.
List Must-Have Features: For social media, this might be scheduling for 3 profiles and basic analytics. For user analysis, it might be heatmaps for 2,000 daily page-views.
Research Free Options: Actively look for free tools like Hootsuite or Hotjar that meet your documented needs.
Pilot the Free Tool: Use the free version for a set period to confirm it fulfills all your requirements in a real-world setting.
Only after a free tool proves insufficient should you consider a paid plan. This ensures you only pay for functionality you actually need. The full article provides a checklist for this process.
A heat-mapping tool like Hotjar functions as a diagnostic instrument, translating anonymous user activity into visual, actionable insights about your website’s user experience. Analyzing this data is critical because it uncovers the “why” behind your quantitative metrics, such as bounce rates and conversion numbers. Hotjar provides a crucial qualitative layer on top of your standard analytics. The free plan's limit of 2,000 page-views per day is often sufficient to identify significant usability issues.
Identify Friction Points: Heatmaps show where users are not clicking, helping you improve the placement and design of calls-to-action.
Optimize Content Hierarchy: Scroll maps reveal how far down a page users go, telling you if your most important message is being seen.
Validate Site Design: Click maps confirm whether users are interacting with key navigational and functional elements as you intended.
By understanding these behavioral nuances, you can directly improve site engagement and boost conversion rates. Our guide explains how to integrate these insights into your optimization cycle.
Hootsuite can serve as a central command center, allowing a director to oversee the entire content pipeline with greater efficiency. Even its free version, which supports up to 3 profiles, enables a structured workflow for scheduling posts and maintaining a consistent brand voice. You can implement a simple and effective system:
Content Creation: Team members create posts and associated visuals, perhaps using Canva, according to a shared content calendar.
Centralized Drafting: The social media manager logs into the single Hootsuite dashboard to draft and prepare all posts for the upcoming week.
Streamlined Review: The manager shares a view of the scheduled posts (e.g., via a calendar link or screenshot) for the director's quick review and approval.
Automated Publishing: Once approved, the posts are published automatically via the Auto-schedule feature across Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
This process reduces manual effort, minimizes errors, and provides leadership with clear visibility into the content plan. Discover advanced team workflow tips in our complete analysis.
Building a cohesive free tech stack requires you to evaluate tools not just on their standalone features but also on their ability to work in concert to create a holistic view of the customer journey. Your key criteria should be strategic alignment, workflow complementarity, and the actionability of the combined data. You should weigh these factors for any tool combination:
Strategic Alignment: Does each tool serve a specific, defined stage of your marketing funnel? For instance, does Hootsuite drive traffic that Hotjar can then analyze on your landing pages?
Workflow Complementarity: Do the tools streamline your team's processes? For example, your workflow might involve using Canva to create visuals that are then scheduled in Hootsuite.
Data Actionability: Does the data from one tool inform actions you can take with another? Insights from Hotjar about a confusing page layout could inspire a clarifying poll you run on social media via Hootsuite.
While free tools might lack direct API integrations, focusing on how their outputs inform each other is essential. The full article details how to build a powerful, interconnected free toolset.
Amol has helped catalyse business growth with his strategic & data-driven methodologies. With a decade of experience in the field of marketing, he has donned multiple hats, from channel optimization, data analytics and creative brand positioning to growth engineering and sales.
Growth Strategy and Planning
