Top 10 Software Programs for Startup Business Marketing

Entrepreneurs! Here are the top 10 software programs that will help you launch and automate your startup business marketing.

Photo by Anthony Shkraba from Pexels

If you’re getting ready to launch a business in the near future, you’ve probably already considered a lot of your options. Everything from what products and services you’ll offer, to where you’ll secure your funding, and probably even your website design.

But there’s something missing — your marketing plan.

For small businesses that are already established, the Small Business Administration recommends budgeting 7-8 percent of the revenue for marketing, but that number goes up for startups. According to some experts, startups should expect to earmark 12-20 percent of their projected gross for marketing early on.

Marketing can take a hefty chunk out of your startup budget. But if you’re looking to handle a lot of your marketing yourself, there are plenty of tools to assist with that goal.

You can find list after list of specialized or categorized suggestions, but here is our top ten list of software programs that are essential for marketing your startup. It covers everything —  programs to help you structure your campaigns, design your visuals, compile your leads, craft excellent content, and ensure that you’re getting the most out of your marketing.

• Hootsuite
• Trello
• GotPrint
• MailChimp
• Answer The Public
• TubeBuddy
• Google Analytics
• Yoast SEO
• Grammarly
• Good Email Copy

1. Hootsuite

Hootsuite often makes the list of great programs to help startups and small businesses, and that’s because it’s very effective. Social media marketing is one of the foremost opportunities to reach your audience, but keeping on top of all the different platforms and structuring your content in a sensible and effective way can be time consuming.

Hootsuite is designed to streamline social media marketing. It integrates with most platforms so you don’t have to keep switching around to different programs, allowing you to write, edit, schedule, and publish posts according to your timeline. Content management systems are vital for marketing, and this is one of the most popular out there.

It has a free version that allows for most of what a startup will need, and you can upgrade as it becomes necessary for your company.

2. Trello

Another frequently name-dropped software, Trello is designed to help you orchestrate tasks and projects for your team, including your marketing campaigns. 

Trello is easy to use, which is great for newbies to the startup and project management game. Make checklists, get message notifications, communicate with your team, and make sure that each aspect of your marketing — and the rest of your business — is handled according to deadlines.

Organization isn’t just a matter of wishful thinking — it’s absolutely imperative if you want to run a startup effectively.

Like Hootsuite, Trello also has both free and paid versions, so you can try it out before you put any of your budget into the software.

3. GotPrint

Let’s say that you’re launching a startup music label. You’ve put the time and effort into creating a great logo design using a music logo generator, and you know the color palette that you want to use for your branded materials. But now that you’ve got your design, what do you do with it?

Print it! On pens, coffee mugs, business cards, products — everywhere you print your logo automatically becomes a piece of marketing material. 

There are plenty of print fulfillment services out there to choose from, but GotPrint is one that includes some design software assistance within their product catalogue. You can upload your logo and select from designs and colors that match your branding, and then produce high quality marketing materials, already branded.

4. MailChimp

When it comes time to send out marketing via email — like subscriber letters, special offers, and follow-ups — MailChimp is one of the most popular, effective, and competitively priced software options to keep track of your leads.

Once again, there are both free and paid versions of this software.

5. Answer The Public

Creating content that fills a need is a big part of smart marketing. Ask any proponent of SEO, or anyone who ever Googled a question and was frustrated because they couldn’t find the answer. Answer The Public is a free resource for content creators who are looking to leverage their blogs in order to bring in more people — and of course, when you create a blog post that directly answers a popular question, you’re more likely to see your link pop up at the top of the search page.

Answer The Public allows you to search for any topic and provides real, popular search questions and subjects that are related to that matter. If you ever run out of ideas for blog articles and you’re desperate to keep your blog SEO-worthy, Answer The Public is an excellent tool for you.

6. TubeBuddy

Video marketing is the wave of the future — in fact, it’s a wave that’s been growing for a long while, and doesn’t show any sign of stopping.

Audiences like videos. We’re attuned to visuals to begin with, and if there are moving pictures and audio to go with it, we’re that much more likely to pay attention. YouTube and other video streaming sites are seeing their heyday now, and that might just be the key to your marketing for your startup. It seems like everybody and their brother has a YouTube channel now — it’s simple to start, and can not only generate leads for your main site, but can end up generating income as a separate revenue stream, if you design your content right.

TubeBuddy is designed to be integrated into your browser or used as a mobile app to help you manage content on your channel, handle marketing, optimize your content, and promote your business.

7. Google Analytics

The granddaddy of SEO data and making sure your website is as user-friendly as possible, Google Analytics offers a host of information that you can leverage in order to build your marketing strategy. 

It also gives you insight into the return on investment that you’re seeing from your marketing efforts, helping you to decide which avenues to pursue as your startup grows.

8. Yoast SEO

Content is king, and optimized content is emperor when it comes to marketable sites, posts, and blogs. Yoast is a plugin for WordPress that helps you to optimize your written content in order to reach more viewers — which in turn boosts your business.

Yoast points out structure and formatting, word use, internal links, and other aspects that can be used to build beneficial content. It is constantly being updated in order to reflect any changes to Google’s ranking algorithm, keeping your content on the cutting edge.

9. Grammarly

Whether you’re crafting content for your blog, creating a post for social media, or getting ready to print branded materials for a little old-fashioned marketing, it always helps to get a second opinion on your grammar, spelling, and sentence structure. That’s where Grammarly comes in.

You can download the free browser extension to give it a try, but the paid version is definitely recommended for small businesses who handle their own marketing and content creation.

10. Good Email Copy

A final resource (which also happens to be free) Good Email Copy piggy-backs on content that is already tried and true. This site provides a huge range of well-designed content, including the way it was written, chosen images, and branding, for inspiration and a starting point for your own marketing efforts.

You can search by subject to find content relevant to your startup. Sometimes all we need is a little inspiration to craft marketing content that will appeal  to our audience — and whether you’re writing content for email marketing, social media posts, or anything else, this is a fantastic resource to help get your startup marketing strategy away from a blank page and onto better things.