Starting a small business can be an overwhelming experience, but having the right tools in place makes it much easier.
There are countless small business tools on the market today, so it can be difficult to determine which ones are the best for beginners.
In this article, we will discuss the 13 best small business tools that every new small business owner should have in their toolbox.
Ready? Let’s dive in!
1. Shopify – Build an Online Store
Shopify is a powerful eCommerce platform that enables small business owners to start their own online stores without coding. With its user-friendly interface and robust features, Shopify has become a go-to choice for entrepreneurs looking to establish their presence in the digital marketplace.
Key features:
- Theme selection: Choose a theme to easily create an optimized eCommerce experience.
- Pre-orders: Sell products that are not yet available by setting them up as pre-orders.
- Sell subscriptions: Offer products on a recurring basis with a scheduled frequency.
- Discount options: Create discount codes, set up automatic discounts, or set sale prices for individual products.
- Live view: Get a real-time view of the activity in your store
- Shopify POS: Sell in person and stay seamlessly connected to your online business.
- Integration with over 100 payment providers: Seamless integration with payment providers worldwide.
Pricing: You can start for free with a 3-day free trial, and then enjoy a special offer of just $1 per month for the first 3 months. After that, the Basic Plan is available for individuals and small businesses starting at just $29 per month.
2. Bluehost – Build Your Blog or Website
Bluehost is a reliable and extensive website hosting provider that powers countless WordPress websites. It offers a seamless experience for those who want to start their own site without the hassle of learning how to code.
Key features:
- One-click WordPress installations: Bluehost makes it easy to install WordPress with just one click, saving you time and effort.
- Optimized performance: Bluehost is optimized for WordPress websites, ensuring that your site runs smoothly and efficiently.
- Reliable web hosting: Bluehost is a trusted and leading web hosting provider, with millions of WordPress users worldwide relying on their services.
- Automatic updates: Bluehost takes care of keeping your WordPress site up to date with automatic updates, ensuring that you have the latest features and security updates.
- Hassle-free online presence: With Bluehost, you can focus on your creative efforts without worrying about the technical aspects of web hosting, as they handle it for you.
Pricing: The basic plan starts at just $1.99 per month. As an added bonus, you’ll get a free domain name for the first year, making it even more cost-effective.
3. Tailor Brands – Easily Make a Business Logo
Tailor Brands is a game-changer for small business owners like you who understand that a logo is the key to unlocking your brand’s identity. If you’re looking to captivate and retain a wide customer base, then you need a logo that speaks volumes about your business. Luckily, this tool has got your back.
Key features:
- Easy logo creation process: Simply enter your business name, take a quick survey, and get a range of perfect logo ideas tailored to your business.
- Quick results: Within seconds, Tailor Brands suggests a range of perfect logo ideas tailored specifically to your business.
- Free customization: Customize your logo until it meets your expectations without any cost.
- Fine-tune every detail: Tweak and adjust every little detail of your logo until you’re completely satisfied.
- Access to high-quality files: Upgrade your plan to gain access to high-quality, vector, SVG, or EPS files that can be used across your website, blog, business cards, or merchandise.
Pricing: Starting from just $3.99 per month, the plan not only includes a social media graphic design tool but also an automated mini-website builder. One of the great things about Tailor Brands is that you can cancel your plan anytime, and your logo will always remain yours.
4. Kit – Email Marketing for Creators
Kit is a very popular email marketing platform specifically tailored for creators looking to monetize their creative efforts. It enables users to effortlessly build and engage their audience by creating both free and paid newsletters, selling digital products, and more.
Key features:
- Customizable Signup Forms: Easily create and embed signup forms to grow your email list.
- Segmentation: Organize subscribers into segments based on their behavior and interests for targeted campaigns.
- Broadcast Emails: Send one-time emails to your entire list or specific segments.
- Visual Automation Builder: Drag-and-drop builder to create complex automation workflows without any coding.
- Landing Pages: Create professional landing pages to capture leads without needing a website.
- Sell Digital Products: Easily sell digital products directly through your email campaigns.
Pricing: You can start for free with their Newsletter plan, which includes up to 10,000 subscribers. After that, the pricing starts at $29 per month for the Creator plan, which includes advanced features and unlimited emails.
5. Todoist – Organize and Prioritize Tasks
Todoist is a powerful task management platform that helps small business owners stay organized and productive. One of the standout features of Todoist is its availability across multiple devices, making it accessible to users regardless of their preferred device or operating system.
Key Features:
- Task organization: Create tasks, subtasks, and projects to break down your workload into manageable pieces.
- Due dates and reminders: Set due dates and reminders to ensure you never miss a deadline.
- Labels and filters: Use labels and filters to categorize tasks and find what you need quickly.
- Collaboration tools: Share projects and assign tasks to team members to keep everyone aligned.
- Integration with popular apps: Seamlessly integrate with tools like Google Calendar, Gmail, and more.
- Priority Levels: Assign priority levels to tasks to focus on what’s most important.
Pricing: It’s free to use with basic features for personal use. The Pro plan is available for $4 per month when billed annually, including improved task management reminders and collaboration tools.
6. Notion – All In One Workspace
Notion is an all-in-one workspace that is perfect for small businesses looking to get organized. It’s like having a virtual assistant, project manager, and creative hub all rolled into one. With its customizable templates and tons of features, Notion allows you to centralize all your knowledge and streamline your workflow effortlessly.
Key features:
- Personalized workspace: Customize your workspace to suit your preferences and work the way that suits you best.
- Beautiful note and document creation: Create visually appealing notes and documents with ease.
- Project management made easy: Manage any type of project effortlessly using Notion’s intuitive interface.
- Access to limitless AI power: Harness the unlimited potential of artificial intelligence right within Notion.
- Powerful document collaboration: Collaborate with your team on projects simultaneously using Notion’s robust collaboration feature.
- Customizable workspace views: Choose from a range of views, including Gantt chart, Kanban board, and calendar, to match your project management style.
Pricing: Notion offers a free plan for individuals and for small groups. Notion offers a reasonably priced plan at just $10 per user per month when billed annually.
7. Interact – Create Lead-Generating Quizzes
Interact is a quiz maker that allows small business owners like yourself to effortlessly engage your audience and generate leads. Just imagine creating a fun quiz to help your audience make better decisions or choices. The best part? You can ask for their email addresses by simply adding a form at the end of the quiz to send the results via email.
Key Features:
- Easy quiz creation: Create and customize quizzes with AI, no coding required.
- Lead generation: Capture leads by integrating quizzes with your email marketing platforms, such as kit and Constant Contact.
- Personalized results: Provide personalized results to quiz takers based on their responses, enhancing user engagement.
- Analytics and insights: Gain insights into quiz performance and user behavior with detailed analytics.
- Social sharing: Encourage quiz takers to share their results on social media, increasing your reach.
- Templates library: Access a variety of pre-made quiz templates tailored for different business needs.
- Mobile-friendly design: Ensure your quizzes look great and work smoothly on any device.
Pricing: They offer a free 14-day trial period for you to get started. Once the trial ends, you can choose their Growth plan, which starts at $27 per month when billed annually.
8. Semrush – Improve Your SEO Rankings
Semrush is a powerful SEO toolkit that packs a punch when it comes to helping businesses optimize their online presence. Whether you’re a small startup or a big brand, Semrush has got your back with its comprehensive range of features and tools.
Key features:
- Competitor analysis: Gain a competitive edge by analyzing your competitors’ search engine rankings.
- Keyword research: Find valuable insights and discover new keywords to stay ahead of the game.
- Backlink analysis: Dive deep into your competitors’ backlink profiles to uncover new opportunities for building authoritative backlinks.
- Site audit tool: Conduct a comprehensive scan of your website to identify technical issues and SEO errors, such as broken links and page speed problems.
- Improve website performance: Fix the identified issues and enhance your website’s overall performance.
- Suitable for small business owners: Semrush is a valuable resource for small business owners, not just for big players in the industry.
Pricing: There is a free plan available with some limitations. Small businesses can take advantage of the Semrush Pro plan, which starts at $99.95 per month (billed annually).
9. Canva – Create Beautiful Designs Online
Canva is a must-have tool for every online business owner who wants to engage with their social media followers by publishing great graphics. If you’re tired of spending too much time and money on creating beautiful designs and documents, then Canva is the solution.
Key features:
- Easy-to-use interface: Canva provides an intuitive interface that makes it effortless to create stunning graphics.
- Drag-and-drop feature: With Canva’s drag-and-drop feature, you can easily arrange elements and design your graphics with precision.
- No design background required: Canva is designed for everyone, even those without a background in design, allowing anyone to create professional-looking graphics.
- Pre-designed templates: Canva offers a wide range of professionally pre-designed templates that ensure your graphics will look consistent and visually captivating.
- A vast collection of assets: Canva provides a vast collection of assets, including images, illustrations, icons, and fonts, giving you endless options to enhance your graphics.
- Canva PRO 30-day free trial: With the 30-day free trial, you can gain access to all the premium features and assets, saving you money on hiring a graphic designer.
Pricing: Once the trial ends, you can choose to continue with the Canva Pro plan, starting at just $12.99 per month. But if you prefer, you can always downgrade to the free plan at any time.
10. VEED.IO – Easy Online Video Maker
VEED.IO is a fantastic tool that simplifies the process of creating videos right from your web browser. If you’ve ever wanted to make videos without the hassle of downloading software or leaving your browser, then VEED.IO is definitely worth checking out.
Key features:
- Clean storyboard: VEED offers a clean and intuitive storyboard that streamlines the video editing process. Trim videos, insert text, add music, and record voiceovers with just a few clicks.
- User-friendly interface: With the simple interface, you won’t get bored during the editing process thanks to the user-friendly design.
- Automatic subtitles: VEED goes above and beyond by providing automatic subtitles for videos. This feature makes it incredibly easy to create short videos for platforms like YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram.
- Premium plans: With VEED’s premium plans, users can enjoy additional benefits such as removing the watermark from videos and exporting videos in 1080p video quality.
- Free online video converter: In addition to its video editing capabilities, VEED also offers a free online video converter for all internet users.
Pricing: VEED offers a free plan and paid plans starting at just $12 per month when paid annually. It’s a good investment for the convenience and power that VEED brings to your video editing workflow.
11. Jotform – Free Online Form Builder
Jotform is a fantastic online form builder that allows you to easily create forms and collect valuable information from your customers or users. Whether you need to gather product orders, bookings, registrations, or any other type of data, Jotform has got you covered.
Key features:
- Customizable forms: Easily customize your forms to match your brand’s style and design.
- Intuitive drag-and-drop builder: Add form fields, rearrange them, and make your form look exactly how you want it.
- Integration with popular tools: Connect your forms to over 100 popular tools like Google Sheets and various payment solution providers.
- Form templates: Access a variety of form templates to kick-start your form creation process.
- PDF Editor: Edit and customize PDFs generated from your form submissions.
- Report Builder: Use the Report Builder feature to analyze data quickly and efficiently.
Pricing: JotForm offers a free plan that gives you access to all the essential features. However, if you need more advanced functionalities and increased limits, JotForm’s paid plans start at just $39 per month.
12. Constant Contact – An Email Marketing Tool
Constant Contact is an email marketing tool that’s perfect for anyone looking to start their email marketing journey. You need a way to build a relationship with your audience, to engage with them on a regular basis, and ultimately, to convert them into loyal followers of your brand. Constant Contact can help you just do that.
Key features:
- Beautiful sign-up forms: Build your customer base by using sign-up forms that capture the attention of potential subscribers and encourage them to join your email list.
- Drag and drop email creation: Easily create beautiful and engaging email campaigns by simply dragging and dropping elements into your email.
- Pre-designed templates: Choose from a variety of professionally designed templates to kickstart your email marketing efforts.
- Automated paths: Set up automated paths to manage your email sends, ensuring that your important messages reach your customers at the right time.
- Analytics and reporting: Track the success of your email campaigns with detailed analytics and reporting features, allowing you to make data-driven decisions and optimize your email marketing strategy.
Pricing: You can start with a free trial to test out their features and see if it’s the right fit for your needs. Once you’re ready to upgrade, their premium plan starts at just $12 per month for up to 500 contacts.
13. NordVPN – A Secure Way to Browse the Internet
NordVPN is a popular VPN service that can make your internet browsing experience safe and secure. When you connect to the internet without a VPN, you’re not always in a safe and private place. Hackers and snoopers are constantly trying to exploit your data if you’re not taking the necessary steps. But with NordVPN, you can say goodbye to these worries.
Key features:
- Connect up to 6 devices: With just one subscription, you can connect up to 6 devices, including smartphones, tablets, and laptops.
- Comprehensive device protection: NordVPN ensures that none of your devices are left vulnerable to cyber threats, giving you peace of mind while using the internet.
- Access content abroad: NordVPN allows you to access content that may be restricted in certain regions or countries.
- Stop malware, web trackers, and ads: NordVPN helps stop malware, web trackers, ads, and other common internet threats.
- Lightweight browser extensions: Offers lightweight browser extensions for popular browsers like Chrome, Edge, and Firefox.
Pricing: You can get 2 years of NordVPN service for just $3.99 per month. Considering the level of security and privacy you’ll be getting, this is a small price to pay for the peace of mind it brings.
Final Thoughts on Small Business Tools
All of the best small business tools are ideal choices for anyone who wants to run their tasks smoothly with their business.
Most of the tools are free to use, and some of these come with advanced features in premium plans.
However, small business owners typically want to do everything themselves, but sometimes that’s not possible.
In the meantime, you can also look into freelance marketplaces like Fiverr.com to hire a skilled freelancer to get things done.
