How can you reach your audience, achieve your goals, and scale your business faster? It should come as no surprise that the answer is digital marketing. You need to be where your customers are and your customers (along with everyone else) are online.
To make the most of your digital marketing dollars and execute an effective strategy, it’s vital to have the right tools to support your efforts. But with new tools popping up every day, it can be hard to know where to start.
Which digital marketing tools are right for you?
Every new tool you try is an investment of time and money, so making the wrong choice can be a big waste of resources. That’s why we’ve put together this list of services you can count on to take your business to the next level.
These are the tools that — through trial, error, stumbles, and success — we’ve found to be the must-haves of your digital marketing toolbox. Whether they are new-on-the-scene or tried-and-true, they will help you create a foundation for digital marketing success.
One of the best tools to have at your disposal is a great digital marketing partner. GO2 Partners is standing by to help you develop and manage digital content that works.
Top Tool for SEO: SEMrush
With millions of users each day looking for solutions to their problems, search engine optimization (SEO) is an absolute necessity for improving both the quantity and quality of the traffic to your website, blog, or online store. A good SEO tool will help increase leads and conversions through brand exposure and organic (non-paid) visibility.
What is SEMrush?
SEMrush is a versatile, all-in-one search engine optimization platform. From social media calendars to website traffic analysis, there’s a lot to keep track of when it comes to optimizing SEO. With over 30 tools for keyword and market research, SEMrush has just about everything a small- to mid-size to business needs to manage an effective SEO strategy.
Why SEMrush?
- It’s comprehensive – The extensive feature set won’t leave gaps in your SEO strategy.
- It’s proactive – Keyword suggestions and active monitoring will help you continually refine your content.
- It’s competitive – Robust competitor research capabilities are one of SEMrush’s strongest advantages.
Top Tool for Inbound Marketing: HubSpot
A good content and inbound strategy is the heart of effective digital marketing. Not only does it work to generate leads, build trust, and cultivate loyalty — it’s what your customers have come to expect. Today’s consumers are attracted to authenticity, engagement, and education. So to ensure you’re building relationships that generate sales, you need both quality content and the right tools to manage it.
What is HubSpot?
HubSpot provides comprehensive tools to help you manage and automate your inbound marketing. A long-time leader in the space, its flexible solutions include web page hosting, blogs, and email marketing. You can also manage interactions with leads and customers, analyze the success of campaigns, and track user behavior. With its ever-growing suite of capabilities, HubSpot helps companies of all sizes to create and nurture their online presence.
Why Hubspot?
- It’s all-inclusive – Hub Spot puts all your inbound marketing tools in one place and even includes free email marketing.
- It’s integrated – Not only does it have integrated customer relationship management (CRM), it also merges easily with the business apps and services you use every day — from WordPress to Slack to Salesforce.
- It’s smart – HubSpot gathers all the data and metrics you need to guide your content marketing efforts.
Top Tool for Project Management: Trello
Even the best SEO and content management tools can’t create the material for you. You need to rely on your team for a steady flow of quality content that keeps your audience interested. But coordinating the resources for all your blogs, social media posts, white papers, ads, and videos is easier said than done. That’s why project management software is often a wise investment. It will help your team manage timelines, collaborate on projects, and track ROI to ensure you’re getting the most out of your digital marketing investment.
What is Trello?
With over 25 million users organizing everything from meal prep to marketing, Trello is one of the most versatile and well-established project management tools around. In their own words, “Trello is a collaboration tool that organizes your projects into boards. In one glance, Trello tells you what's being worked on, who's working on what, and where something is in a process.”
Why Trello?
- It’s visual – Like a board of digital post-it notes, Trello gives you the full picture of your projects and the related tasks.
- It’s accessible – With a simple layout and intuitive drag-and-drop interface, Trello is accessible to users with all levels of technical savvy.
- It’s customizable – With over 85 “Power-Ups,” you can enhance your Trello experience by connecting to other excellent productivity apps.
Top Tool for Surveys: Survey Anyplace
How do you know if your content is resonating with your customers? There’s tracking and measurement software, of course, like SEMrush’s Content Analyzer. While this information is essential for optimizing your digital marketing plan, don’t forget that one of the best sources for data collection continues to be the customers themselves. That’s where customer surveys come in.
What is Survey Anyplace?
While other tools and apps we’ve covered, like Hubspot, do offer survey functionality, Survey Anyplace is a standalone tool. It helps you create engaging interactive surveys and quizzes, with modern-looking templates that are highly customizable. It provides the ability to add images, video, animations, and incentives. With Survey Anyplace, you can ask for feedback in a way that’s fun, effortless, and compatible with the latest mobile devices — meaning you’ll get more responses and better insights. Along with robust creation tools, they also offer services for distribution and analysis.
Why Survey Anyplace?
- It’s user-focused – Survey Anyplace helps you create appealing, user-friendly surveys to get the best response rate.
- It’s helpful – You don’t have to start from scratch; Survey Anyplace offers free templates and questions types that are proven to solicit the information you are after.
- It’s feature-rich – You can incentivize your survey with a digital scratch card or make it fun with animations. As the Survey Anyplace team notes, you can make your survey “belly and whistley.”
Top for Pay-Per-Click (PPC) ads: Google AdWords
There’s no getting around it, more clicks equals more leads. Much of your focus can be on optimizing content and appearing in organic listings, but if you want to take full advantage of the incredible number of searches that take place daily — paid advertising needs to be part of your plan. Not only is paid advertising easier to control, but you can bet your competitors are already in this valuable space.
What is Google Adwords?
Google Adwords is a pay-per-click advertising service that helps you reach Google’s vast audience with search ads, display ads, video ads, and app ads. The Google Search Network shows ads to users who search for the keywords that you’ve selected. The Google Display Network shows your ads on apps and websites you want to target. By using the right keywords, you can reach people who are already interested in what you have to offer.
Why Google Adwords?
- It’s huge – As the largest search engine in the world, Google has a massive reach and is simply one the best ways to find your audience.
- It’s fast – As soon as your campaign goes live, your ads will appear and you’ll get instant results.
- It’s engaging – When a user searches for your keywords, your ad is helping them find what they need.
Even More Digital Marketing Tools
The digital marketing landscape is vast and complex, but if you master the above five tools you’re already ahead of the game. If you’re looking for even more ways to automate and optimize digital marketing, try these specialized tools and services:
- Slack – A collaboration and networking hub
- MailChimp – A tool to automate email campaigns
- Hootsuite – A social media management solution
- Canva – A simple graphic design tool
- Google Analytics – A service that tracks and reports website traffic
