You can find plenty of content marketing tools online. But not all are free – or even if they are free, they can get kind of expensive over time.
There are many reasons why you might need these tools to help your content marketing efforts. At the most fundamental level, a content marketing strategy should help you build your presence on the web.
You want people to be able to find out about you and your business, and for them to do that, they need to be able to find information about you on sites like yours and many more across the Internet.
If you need some tools that help boost content visibility, you’re in luck – because today I’m going to tell you about 11 awesome, free (or almost free) content marketing tools that will make it easier for your brand to be found online.
What are content marketing tools?
With social media drawing more people to the web, it’s important to build an online presence that draws visitors in as well. This can be accomplished through content marketing. Content marketing is essentially any type of marketing strategy that produces content for the purpose of attracting and engaging with leads.
A content marketing tool is any resource you can use to help you create, manage, and distribute your content. This includes everything from social media platforms to scheduling tools to design templates and more. Here are some of the tools;
Learn more: Content marketing statistics and trends you need to know.
Buffer is a very nicely designed tool to manage all your social media profiles. It allows you to share the content from your website or blog to any of your social media profiles as well as schedule it for future publication.
Buffer is one of the more modern platforms for content marketing. It has a ton of features, and it will help you schedule all of your social media posts, blog posts, and so much more.
Pros
- You can schedule posts
- Collaborate with multiple clients
- A single view of past activities.
- Notify the team by setting reminders
Cons
- Buffer may have trouble handling some video files.
- There are not many analytics capabilities available.
- There is no calendar view
2. Google Analytics – measure and analyze content marketing results
Google Analytics is a free and easy-to-use web analytic tool which helps you learn how your website visitors are engaging with your site. It gives you detailed reports about the digital traffic on your website and provides you with insights into how to improve your site performance.
There are a lot of analytics tools out there, but Google’s is arguably one of the best. Google Analytics offers you a comprehensive understanding of your customers, no matter what channel they use to find you.
Pros
- It’s FREE!
- Support is available
- It’s simple enough for anyone to use.
- There is enough functionality for users to make data-driven decisions.
Cons
- The user interface is sometimes clunky
- The event tracking process is carried out with other tools.
- Limitation in the ability for multiple datasets to be viewed at once
3. Hubspot’s blog topic generator – catchy blog titles tool
There are a lot of content marketing tools out there, but they don’t all work for every industry. If you want to find the best content marketing tools for your specific needs, try Hubspot’s topic generator machine.
A really interesting tool – the topic generator is a great way to discover new blog post ideas that you can write about. All you need to do is enter a topic into the search box and click “generate topics”. It does most of the work for you!
Pros
- Simple and easy to use user interface
- There is a draft mode
- Search engine optimization benefits
Cons
- There are limitations to staging content
4. Pixabay – free stock image tool
Pixabay has a great collection of quality photographs that you can use for free. One of the most innovative features is the search feature, as well as how each image can be labeled by topic/category.
They’ve got millions of high resolution images there for you to download and use however you see fit. And boy, do they have a lot of photos there. They’ve got over 1 million images uploaded at the time of writing this post!
Pros
- There are lots of resources to choose from, and it’s easy to use.
- Great images for business.
- It’s free
- Different resolution and friendly image size
Cons
- It‘s possible you get more animated images
5. Google Docs – create documents on the go
Google docs are a great alternative to Microsoft Word. One of the best online office tools you’ll ever find. It is a collection of powerful apps to create, view, edit and collaborate on documents with other people. It is available on all platforms whether you are at home or traveling.
One of my favorite features is that you can save a version of your document for offline viewing or editing. There are also categories and labels for organizing your documents and google takes care of the user privacy aspect by encrypting data.
Pros
- Search Google from within your document
- Access the app wherever you are on any device
- Using it is easy and it’s free.
- There’s a dictionary to find synonyms for unfamiliar words or find new words you don’t know
Cons
- Word counter at times stop showing after about 5,000 words
- Customer support is not all that effective
6. Survey Monkey – digital content research tool
The online content research tool makes it easy for anyone to create professional, mobile-friendly surveys and see results on the go.
Survey Monkey is a powerful and fun way to gather feedback from the people you care about. With SurveyMonkey, anybody can experience the joy of creating a survey and getting insightful answers.
Pros
- Good customer service feedback
- Good employee feedback
- Nice product feature assessment
Cons
- Occasionally, there are minor glitches
- Inconsistency in customization
- Question formats are limited.
7. Ubersuggest – digital content keyword tool
UberSuggest is a content marketing tool that can generate long-tail keywords as well as related keyword suggestions. It has the ability to find long-tail keywords that other keyword tools can’t find. It is indeed a tool with a lot of cool features for your keyword research.
Pros
- Gives you a whole bunch of new keyword suggestions.
- SEO can easily use location-based data that is easy to use for searches.
- The metrics are simplified and there are quick results.
- Charts and stats are included on each keyword.
Cons
- No mobile app yet.
- The target market has some limitations
8. WordPress – digital content publishing tool
WordPress is one of the most popular CMS and blogging platforms out there today. With over 60 million sites running on the platform, leading bloggers and online business owners swear by it.
It’s an easy-to-use, full-featured platform with an intuitive content managing system and excellent search engine optimization capabilities. Best of all, like the other tools in this list, it’s absolutely free.
Pros
- Excellent for eCommerce sites
- The WordPress platform is mobile-friendly.
- Excellent social media integration
- Increased security
- Supports SEO
Cons
- Additional web design knowledge may be required for some updates.
- WordPress itself is free, however, it requires theme and plugin customization to make it work efficiently.
- Due to some themes’ generic codes, the site may have slower loading times.
Learn more: Why WordPress is the best website builder.
9. Hemingway App – clear, concise sentences creation tool
Hemingway App is a tool that can be used to determine how readable a piece of writing is. Indeed, it helps you write better. The app highlights confusing and hard-to-read sentences in yellow.
It also checks your writing for common grammar mistakes. At the conclusion of your editing session, it will summarize your writing with a reading time and show you a readability score that the app calculates.
Pros
- The interface is simple to use
- Color coding and suggestions help a lot
- Easily handle long documents
- There is no need to install or log in to the online version.
Cons
- The online version does not have a save functionality.
- Can be difficult to use advanced vocabulary and adverbs.
- A writer’s personal style may not be appropriate for this.
- Checks spellings and grammar in a limited manner.
- There are no browser plugins for checking text
10. Mailchimp – email marketing tool
One of the best email marketing services out there. Mailchimp is a complete solution for those looking to launch a newsletter or improve an already existing one.
Best of all, Mailchimp makes it easy to create professional-quality newsletters and grow your subscriber lists without needing any design or HTML skills. They offer a variety of templates and drag-and-drop options to make newsletter creation super simple.
Pros
- Importing the email list
- Several integration options are available
- Mailchimp provides complete comparative metrics
- An excellent editor for landing pages
Cons
- Email automation has a couple of limitations
- The interface is clumsy and inconvenient.
- There are no advanced analytics features.
Learn more: Email marketing service to increase your conversion rate.
11. SEMrush – SEO tool
SEMrush is an all-in-one marketing platform that provides a wealth of invaluable SEO and PPC analysis tools, including a keyword research tool, rank tracking, a link-building research tool, and an organic traffic research tool.
It’s got pretty much everything you could ever need, and for anyone that’s doing SEO or just digging into what keywords people might be searching for (so they can do some awesome content marketing), it’s a must-have tool.
Pros
- Find out about digital competitors.
- Report any instances on your website that are not conforming to best practices.
- Conduct competitor research.
- Maintain and review the overall SEO perspective of the website.
Learn more: How to perform competitor research.
Cons
- It’s not always the easiest to use.
- When researching competitors with crawlers, the results are not always accurate.
- Getting used to the program is not an easy task for new users.
Why you might need content marketing tools
Team collaboration
As a content marketer, you are probably coordinating with different teams, from SEO to sales, design, and copywriting. It’s best to have one place where all the information is centralized. Team collaboration means a wider sharing of ideas and knowledge within the marketing team.
Content creation is just one aspect of content marketing which other aspects like social media marketing, email marketing development, etc involve a larger team.
Being able to access information quickly on your smartphone while working, can also help ensure you don’t lose sight of important deadlines. Content marketing tools can help facilitate this process for your team.
Efficiency
When it comes to increasing efficiency, one great way to do this is by using a tool. Content marketing doesn’t require a writing team or a well-staffed sales department. But it does require an organized approach to maximize the tools available to marketers.
So when tasked with creating an article that not only informs and engages but also integrates well on your site, how do you make sure it aligns with what you need? You use content marketing tools.
Content marketing tools are extremely helpful and can increase your content quality immensely as well!
Build brand authority
Building brand authority is critical online and one of the best ways to do this is by using content marketing. The more people who know about your brand, the better. Content marketing tools help with that.
As you continue to build your brand and help solve problems for people, the more authority you will build. If your content marketing works well, you’ll be seen as a trusted source of information on your topic or industry.
Enhance visibility in search engines
Blogs and websites are now part of the content marketing strategy. The top priority of the majority of websites or blogs is to get traffic from search engines. Fresh and up-to-date content is the best way to ensure that search engines will show your site.
You’re going to be writing and publishing consistently throughout the year (are you?). The next step is visibility for those blogs and websites, and that means using tools to make your blog posts more visible in search engines.
Get more content on your site
If you’re looking to add more content to your website, there’s no better way than to use a content marketing tool.
There are a ton of tools out there for you to use to generate blog posts, landing pages, and other types of content that are backed by valuable tools for SEO, social media, and reporting.
FAQs
Why are companies so particular about content marketing?
Content marketing allows companies or brands to create and distribute valuable information to attract prospects, deliver on promises, and build loyalty. The idea is that if your content is so good that your customers enjoy reading it, then they’re going to love your products!
It is important for brands to keep their audience engaged and happy by providing them with interesting and useful tips, tricks, and articles. And it makes sense: people are always searching for answers to their questions; they want more than just a product description or generic sales pitch.
If you’re providing relevant, helpful information that you don’t expect them to pay for, they’ll be armed with the knowledge they need to choose your company over the competition. This not only leads to more sales but happier customers who have a closer bond with the brand.
Who uses content marketing tools?
Expert bloggers, businesses, and online publishers. Content marketing is an excellent strategy for building your audience and driving sales. Using tools like content ideas generators and management platforms is a great way to get started!
In addition, if you have a product or a service to sell, then you should invest in content marketing tools to help you create rich and engaging content, which entices consumers to buy your products and services.
What are some free marketing strategies?
Free marketing strategies are available to anyone who is prepared to find them. You don’t need to be a marketing expert, and you don’t need access to thousands of dollars for a marketing campaign. All you need are the right tools, the creative juices flowing and the drive to succeed.
Before you can start a free marketing campaign, you need to have clear objectives in mind regarding your primary goals, such as growing your business or creating more visibility for your brand.
Here’s a list of free marketing strategies you can use to promote your business:
- Brand yourself
- Be social,
- Be helpful
- Build quality backlinks,
- Solve problems
- Guest blogging
- Host an event or workshop
Learn more: Why your content marketing strategy isn’t working and how to fix it.
How do you create better content?
Good content is a combination of two factors: luck and dedication. You can never predict what kind of content will go viral or what will resonate with your target audience and if you’re lucky, you’ll have something that helps you succeed.
However, it’s definitely possible to elevate the quality of your content by working on it consistently, analyzing social media statistics, and listening to feedback from customers.
The most important concept in developing great content is to focus on solving the needs of your target audience. This is where a lot of companies fall short because they get so caught up in simply talking about what their company does that it can be difficult to separate themselves from the competition.
What can I do with free content marketing tools?
In a perfect world, you’ll be strategic and intentional about your content marketing and choose the right tool for the job. By adding free content marketing tools to your arsenal, you can improve your content creation process and the quality of the finished product.
With a little bit of creativity and these tools, you will easily be able to tell your unique story, develop brand loyalty, and build authority in your industry. There are tons of free tools available out there that can improve your content marketing program. This article contains some of the best tools.
How long does it take to master these tools?
The majority of these tools are easy to master. However, creating a solid content marketing strategy takes time. These tools help you create, distribute, and manage content more efficiently.
Final thoughts
In conclusion, the concept of content marketing is simple. You create useful and interesting content in order to build a valuable ongoing relationship with the people who will be most interested in it: your target customer.
The idea is that you would want to make what you create as useful as possible so that those people will want to keep coming back for more. To increase your online visibility and generate traffic, you’re going to want to drive more visitors to your website.
But, if you’re like most small businesses, you don’t have a huge advertising budget. That means it’s up to you to find cheap or even free ways to market your business. One of the best places to start is by getting involved with this new marketing phenomenon called “content marketing.”
The 11 content marketing tools in this post will make the work easier and can help you to achieve better results for less money and time.
If you haven’t started using Google docs, I suggest you start today. Write anytime and anywhere. Check other interesting posts on the blog.