Looking for the best marketing tools for your business? Then you’re in the right place!
Determining the best way to market your business is challenging. There are hundreds of online marketing tools available, and new trends are constantly emerging. It can be hard to keep up, let alone decide on the best online marketing tools to develop your brand and grow your business. But fear not, Idomoo is on hand to help.
Most organizations understand that developing a solid online presence is vital in building brand recognition and credibility, leading to increased sales and growth. But getting there can be a hard slog. Digital marketing tools help by automating processes, targeting your efforts, personalizing customer journeys, and keeping your teams connected and on track. Oh, and they also save you a heap of time and effort when it comes to your team’s time.
But which are the best digital marketing tools for your business? In this guide, we’ll cover everything you need to know and run through a comprehensive list of marketing tools and software that can help you stay more organized, create better content, and optimize for success.
What Is a Marketing Tool?
Any technique, strategy, system, or software that helps you communicate company information, stimulate customer interest and motivate action can be considered a marketing tool. Marketing tools help you design and implement your marketing strategy to promote your products and services to the best effect by:
- Gathering consumer data
- Identifying the needs of your target audience
- Increasing customer engagement
- Improving lead quality
- Providing personalized customer journeys
- Saving time on laborious admin tasks
- Enhancing accountability
- Boosting sales and revenue
Most companies use a range of different marketing tools based on their primary objectives and goals. To help you decide what’s right for your business, we’ve put together this complete guide of the top digital marketing tools you should be using right now.
The 20 Best Marketing Tools
This guide will focus primarily on various web marketing tools rather than specific brand name technologies. We know it’s a long list but stick with us. Most businesses won’t need to utilize every type.
However, it’s impossible to make objective decisions and prioritize the best marketing tools for your business unless you fully understand all of the available options. Fortunately, this comprehensive list has all the info you need.
1. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Tools
A CRM is a “must have” on any marketing tools list. CRM technology helps you gather and action information about your customers and potential customers so you can build trusted and long-lasting relationships with them. CRM marketing tools capture and centralize consumer data so your teams can use it to drive and deliver exceptional experiences every time. Data concerning customer preferences, history, and purchase habits can be leveraged at every stage of your marketing efforts. Personalization is key to optimizing return on investment. We have another blog about CRM personalization, so we won’t dive too deep into that topic here.
However, some examples of how you can use your CRM to develop relationships and boost sales include:
- Sending customized offers based on product clicks on your website
- Cross-selling new products based on previous purchases
- Sending discount codes to customers who haven’t purchased lately
- Notifying consumers when one of their wish list items goes on sale
- Providing after sales support with news about upgrades
- Sending email whenever a shopper abandons their cart without completing a purchase
- Offering birthday greetings with a discount code
2. Email and Newsletter Tools
Email automation is one of the most powerful digital marketing tools in your arsenal for connecting with your customers. Emails can nurture leads, generate sales, promote your brand, strengthen customer relationships, and create ambassadors for your business. A well-designed and personalized email can have a significant impact.
Email marketing tools allow you to drag and drop blocks of information into templates to plan headings, text, images, and other graphics targeted to specific audience segments for maximum appeal. Including GIFs and video in your email marketing campaigns makes them more dynamic and increases your click-through rate by 2x-3x.
You can learn more about using and personalizing videos in your email campaigns in our handy guide.
3. Asset Management Tools
Every business should keep its files and documents in a centralized location. It’s easy for records to get lost or mishandled if sent by email or stored on desktops or external drives.
There are several free cloud-based storage systems on the market. However, paying for a premium account adds heaps of extra storage space plus additional functionality for streamlining processes and ensuring customized access that keeps you in check on data security and compliance.
4. Video Tools
Video content is more compelling than web copy and static pictures and is a driving force behind modern-day purchasing habits. Whether you’re announcing a new product launch, advertising an event, or simply providing your subscribers with bonus content, videos play a pivotal role in helping achieve your goals:
- Over 27% of people watch more than 10 hours of online video per week
- Video content accounts for an estimated 82% of all consumer internet traffic.
- People remember details from visuals, and a single minute of video is estimated to be worth around 1.8 million words.
- According to a recent video marketing report, 96% of people have watched an explainer video to learn more about a product or service.
- Video is a particularly popular medium if you’re marketing to Gen Z, even more so when videos are personalized, and 81% of zoomers are happy to exchange their data for personalization.
Here’s a video for a campaign Cadbury did years ago that shows just how effective video can be for emotionally charged creative marketing.
Check out our video inspiration gallery to gather some ideas for your next campaign.
5. Video Landing Page Tools
Marketers report conversion increases of between 80% and 300% when switching from a standard landing page to a video landing page
Video content creates leads and conversions by grabbing attention and connecting with site visitors on an emotional level. Video allows you to convey information clearly and quickly while also consolidating your brand image and personality. Leads stay on your page for longer and after watching a video.
Plus, with Interactive Video, you can provide site visitors with customized videos that automatically update based on user interactions, so they’ll always get the most relevant information.
6. Video Personalization Tools
Studies show that 80% of people prefer to buy from companies that offer personalized experiences.
With Personalized Video, you can provide a completely bespoke viewing experience, making viewers much more interested in interacting with your brand. In fact, that’s what we do here at Idomoo, combining the power of personalization with the engaging must-watch nature of video content.
We can help you harness the power of Next Gen Video technology that will truly wow your customers. Take a look at some of the best personalized video examples in our previous blog post, but here’s a sneak peek of one of the videos from that blog we love. It’s a great example of how adding something simple like a first name to a video can really put your customer in the spotlight.
7. Social Media Scheduling Tools
If you’re active on several different social media platforms (which you should be), a social media scheduling service is one of the best online marketing tools to invest in. Dedicated social media management software helps you plan, draft, schedule, and post your content across all of your chosen channels.
Scheduling tools also gather valuable analytical data on reach and engagement so you can adapt and adjust your marketing strategy accordingly for optimum outcomes.
8. Design and Image Tools
Quality branded images are a must to get your posts noticed and get consumers engaged. Plus, you can use design tools to create flyers, menus, postcards, eBook covers, business cards, website banners, and more. Most providers offer a range of made-to-measure dimension templates for Facebook covers, Facebook posts, Insta stories, YouTube thumbnails, etc. So there’s no need to resize manually. You’ll need to weigh up the benefits of a free service like Canva (or upgrading to a premium account) versus paying for Adobe Creative Suite.
In general, Adobe options are better for more experienced designers, whereas the simple ‘drag and drop’ features of web-based apps are better for novices. However, there are not as many features, and the range of functionality is reduced, so the end decision will depend on your goals and the skills set of your team.
9. Graphics Tools
Some businesses need more than pretty images and photographs to run a successful marketing campaign. What if you need infographics, charts, tables, or even memes?
While design and image creation tools can help to some degree, it may be worth investing in a dedicated graphic creation platform if you find yourself regularly in need of these types of visual content.
10. Analytics and Reporting Tools
Sure, it’s possible to compile your own reports. But these days, no business needs to have actual people poring over various data streams and compiling old-school excel reports and charts when there’s tech out there that can do it for you.
Modern analytics platforms can collect, merge, and process big data into easy-to-view and easy-to-use visuals for instant and effortless oversight.
11. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Tools
If you want your website to rank, then SEO web marketing tools are a must — especially if your business is based in a particularly competitive industry or you’re one of several similar businesses in the same geographical area.
SEO tools allow you to write new content and optimize existing copy by providing the best organic keywords and headers. They also analyze your site against your competitors to identify top-performing content, backlinks and traffic data.
12. Team Communication Tools
There must be a dedicated channel where everyone can remain connected and up to date. Particularly if your set-up involves several teams, multiple locations or complex projects, it’s a good idea to write a set of standard operating procedures. This way, everyone knows what is expected, and nothing gets missed or falls between the cracks.
Email isn’t ideal for big teams, so a dedicated communication platform on which you can set up several workspaces and channels is usually a better option.
13. Team Collaboration Tools
Having one centralized cloud-based location where you can organize all of your teams and projects minimizes administration and keeps your staff on track to meet deadlines.
Most collaboration tools utilize easy-to-use “drag and drop” features, allowing users to make a series of boards with custom access and editing rights for various staff members. Most integrate a team calendar and chat room in addition to project organization. The beauty of collaborative marketing tools is that they can be accessed from any computer or mobile device, from anywhere, at any time.
14. Conversion Optimization Tools
Conversion optimization tools analyze consumer actions and behaviors on your website. By creating user heat maps, they can identify the point at which a customer abandons their cart or bounces away to another site. From there, you can test minor revisions to combat and prevent this. Examples include changing the color of your call to action (CTA) button or making it more prominent on the page.
Small adjustments can make a big difference. Optimization case studies show that updated designs can increase conversions by 33%, and making CTAs more prominent can increase conversions by a staggering 591%.
15. Lead Generation Tools
It’s possible to grow your email marketing lists organically by using lead magnets on your website and social media. You could even source prospects from industry journals, LinkedIn, job boards, and online directories.
But all of this takes considerable time and effort. Automated lead generation tools tap into databases with hundreds of thousands of connections and can be customized to ensure each prospect guarantees the best chance of a conversion. Plus, if your email lists have become outdated, lead gen software can fill in the blanks within just a few clicks.
16. Lead Capture Tools
Getting people to visit your website is all well and good, but that’s only the first stage. How do you convince them to sign up, create an account or otherwise volunteer their contact information to your CRM?
Innovative online marketing tools focus on segmenting messages so that the user journey through your website is customized. For example, the software can identify whether a browser is a first-time visitor, a long-time lurker, or an established buyer, then display different pop-ups based on that user profile to maximize the chance of capturing lead information.
17. Lead Enrichment Tools
Lead enrichment software is one of the top digital marketing tools used by business-to-business (B2B) companies. The technology is designed to help you gain a deeper understanding of your leads by gathering as much structured data about each prospect as possible.
In doing so, companies can be assured their prospect database is as accurate and up to date and that each marketing communication is primed for the maximum number of conversions.
18. Online Advertising Tools
Once you start running ad campaigns across different social media platforms and search engines, it’s much quicker and easier to have all the information in one place.
Otherwise, you have to log into each network individually to view your stats, then compare, collate, and compile reports on the results manually. The best marketing tools for ad managers keep things simple by presenting all of your pay-per-click (PPC) campaign data on one centralized dashboard. This makes planning, initiating, and analyzing ads easy, even for complete beginners.
19. Event Marketing Tools
If your business runs regular customer or prospect events or hosts conferences, trade shows, or other in-person outreach activities, then an event marketing platform may well be worth the investment.
Most event management software allows you to make custom landing pages for each event and can also automate promotion, ticketing, and other logistical factors. In-person events are a great way to connect with your target audience and make a great first impression. An organized and efficient event management system can go a long way to help you achieve that, long before the first handshake occurs.
20. Online Learning Tools
The market for business-based online learning is growing exponentially, and platforms that enable businesses to create and deliver their own online courses are becoming some of the most popular digital marketing tools. The online learning industry is expected to be worth $457.8 billion by 2026.
Dedicated online learning platforms offer businesses the flexibility to plan and deliver bespoke content, whether to external customers or as part of their internal professional development programs. Building unique, company-specific courses provides organizations with complete control over the content while also maintaining solid brand values and identity.
Time To Upgrade Your Marketing Toolkit?
As consumer behavior changes and evolves, every business needs to think seriously about the best marketing tools for their operation, when to implement them and when to upgrade.
That might mean that if you’re doing regular video campaigns, it’s time to level up with Next Generation Video — video that can be personalized, interactive and even AI-driven. Video that’s actionable, relevant and drives ROI.
Wondering how it all works? Click the button below to schedule a call, and we’ll show you.
