Marketing Software for Small Businesses: 10 of the Best Tools

Marketing software for small businesses can be a game-changer for growth. 

As long as you choose the right tools.

In this article, you’ll learn about the top marketing software options designed specifically to meet the unique needs of small businesses.

10 Great Marketing Software Options for Small Businesses

We’ll look at tools across 10 different categories. And describe the best option in each one. 

Let’s go.

Semrush is a comprehensive suite of marketing tools you can use to optimize your marketing strategy, expand your online presence, and gain a competitive edge.

There are solutions for advertising, local marketing, social media management, and more. Making it a good choice for small businesses that don’t want to manage too many platforms.

Semrush is probably best known for having robust search engine optimization (SEO) offerings that can help you improve your visibility in search engines and get more traffic to your site.

The SEO tools cover four categories:

• Competitive research: Tools like Domain Overview that let you see what is and isn’t working for your rivals. So you can find ways to outperform them.
• Keyword research: Tools like the Keyword Magic Tool that make it easy to find, manage, and track your performance for valuable keywords
• Link building: Tools like Backlink Audit that help you see how many backlinks (links from other sites that point to your site) you have, evaluate your competitors backlinks, and manage outreach campaigns
• On-page and technical SEO: Tools like Site Audit that ensure your website and webpages are primed for search engine visibility

For example, Site Audit is particularly valuable for establishing a strong technical foundation. Because it can scan any website for over 140 technical and on-page issues.

Head over to the tool, enter your website’s domain name, give your project a name, and click “Create project.”

Follow the prompts to configure your settings. And click “Start Site Audit.”

Once the audit is complete, your report will open to the “Overview” tab. This gives you a high-level understanding of your general site health. 

And it includes a Site Health score as well as an overview of your “Errors” (the most severe issues), “Warnings” (issues of medium severity), and “Notices” (non-critical items worth addressing). 

Go to the “Issues” tab to see the problems the tool found while scanning your website. And prioritize fixes for “Errors” first. Then “Warnings.” Then “Notices.”

Click “Why and how to fix it” to learn more about an issue and what steps you can take to address it. 

And click on an individual issue to see all of the pages where that issue was found. So you know where to implement fixes.

• Pricing: Free and paid plans are available. Paid plans start at $129.95 per month. 
• Pros: The extensive set of tools covers nearly every aspect of digital marketing. This means most small businesses and entrepreneurs will only need to invest in this platform along with a few other tools.

2. Best for Email Marketing: Mailchimp

Mailchimp is a popular marketing software tool that helps you manage subscriber lists, create engaging newsletters, and send promotional email campaigns.

The drag-and-drop editor makes it fast to put together professional-looking emails. And you can segment your audience for targeted campaigns and track your performance.

Mailchimp also offers a range of integrations with other common business tools.

• Pricing: There’s a free plan to get started. But you’ll be able to manage more contacts and get additional features with a paid plan. Pricing begins at $13 per month.
• Pros: Mailchimp’s interface is designed with simplicity in mind. So small businesses can create and manage email campaigns without extensive technical knowledge or coding skills.

3. Best for Marketing Automation: Zapier

Zapier is a workflow automation tool that allows you to connect different apps and easily create automated tasks called “Zaps.”

The tool works with over 2,000 popular apps, ensuring compatibility with the tools you already use. Like Semrush, Google Sheets, Slack, and more.

When it comes to marketing automation software for small businesses, Zapier is certainly a good choice. 

• Pricing:There’s a free plan with basic automation capabilities. Paid plans start at $19.99 per month
• Pros: Zapier’s drag-and-drop interface makes it simple for users to create and manage automations without coding knowledge

4. Best for Project Management: Monday.com

Monday.com is a versatile project management and team collaboration platform that allows businesses to plan, track, and manage their work effectively.

It has a simple interface for creating tasks, assigning responsibilities, tracking progress, and collaborating with external teams.

The platform also has automation capabilities. And you can set custom notifications to stay up to **** on what your team is working on.

Monday.com also integrates with popular apps like Slack and Zapier.

• Pricing: The free plan works well for individuals. Small businesses with multiple employees will likely want a paid subscription. Pricing starts at $9 per month per user. 
• Pros: Monday.com’s drag-and-drop interface makes it simple to build workflows and assign tasks quickly and easily. It also integrates with popular third-party apps.

Semrush Social is a collection of tools that let you publish and schedule posts, respond to messages, analyze your performance, and more.

It connects to your Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Business Profile, and Pinterest accounts. Making it easy to manage your social media efforts in one place.

Social Tracker lets you monitor your competitors. So you compare your growth and engagement levels to theirs. And learn about their social media strategies.

To get quick insights into your overall performance at a glance, use Social Content Insights. It gives you a high-level look at key metrics across your accounts. And the Content Tagging feature lets you categorize and filter content to gain in-depth insights.

• Pricing: There’s a seven-day free trial to test out Semrush Social. After that, it costs $29.99/month. 
• Pros: Semrush Social has built-in competitive analysis options that give you a deeper understanding of your performance

6. Best for Sales Automation: HubSpot

HubSpot is a marketing platform that helps small businesses drive growth. And includes tools for customer relationship management (CRM), email automation, content management, SEO optimization, etc.

HubSpot has features for automated lead nurturing, lead scoring, customer engagement, landing page creation, and lead generation forms.

Because of its general flexibility and focus on email, HubSpot is one of the best CRMs for small businesses.

• Pricing: There’s a free plan with limited features for up to five users. Pricing for small teams starts at $15 per month per user.
• Pros: HubSpot offers features to help streamline your marketing efforts. And comes with a library of helpful resources and tutorials.

7. Best for Design: Canva

Canva is a popular graphic design software that allows you to easily create professional-looking visuals for social media posts, presentations, marketing materials, etc.

The drag-and-drop interface is easy to use. So, you don’t have to be a graphic designer to make great graphics.

There’s also a library of templates, images, fonts, and design elements to choose from. And tools for text editing, image cropping, color scheme adjustments, and photo filtering.

• Pricing: Individuals can get started with a free plan. Paid plans begin at $14.99 per month (for one user).
• Pros: Canva’s collaboration tools make it easy for small business teams to work together on design projects. You can share drafts, provide feedback, and collaborate in real time.

8. Best for Conversion Rate Optimization: Microsoft Clarity

Microsoft Clarity is a free marketing software that lets businesses see how users interact with their sites to improve their conversion rates. 

It can record user sessions and provide easy-to-read heatmaps for tracking visitor activity. It also tracks click, scroll, and engagement metrics.

Image Source: Clarity Blog 

These insights can help you understand what’s driving conversions and what’s decreasing them. So you can make adjustments.

• Pricing: Microsoft Clarity is free to use, making it a great marketing tool for small businesses
• Pros: It has a user-friendly interface and is easy to set up either by adding a snippet of code directly to your website or through Google Tag Manager

9. Best for Website Analytics: Google Analytics

Google Analytics is a free web analytics tool that allows you to get a holistic perspective on your website’s performance.

It captures data points such as views, sessions, average engagement time, and more. And you can apply filters to better understand user behavior by subgroup.

Google Analytics also allows you to customize existing reports or create your own from scratch. And has report-sharing capabilities to keep your team up to **** on performance. 

• Pricing: Google Analytics is free to use
• Pros: This tool is easy to set up and use and provides comprehensive data points captured. It also integrates with Google Ads. 

10. Best for Content Promotion: Outbrain

Outbrain is a content promotion tool that allows you to showcase your content on popular publications.

Image Source: Outbrain

It does this by placing your content as ads on media sites that link back to the full article on your website.

Outbrain offers a range of options for small businesses. Like sponsored stories and personalized recommendations.

It also allows you to create targeted campaigns based on user interests, demographics, and location. And offers detailed analytics reports to track your performance.

• Pricing: Outbrain costs vary depending on how many campaigns you run and your budget. And it operates on a cost per click (CPC) model.
• Pros: You can create highly targeted campaigns tailored to users. And there are comprehensive analytics reports.

Take Your Marketing Efforts to the Next Level

Small businesses need the right marketing tools to help them succeed. And the right mix will depend on your exact needs.

But consider opting for a platform that offers a suite of tools designed to help you succeed across all your marketing efforts. Like Semrush.

Start today with a free account.