Small businesses are a vital part of the American economy. They represent 99.7% of all employer firms in the United States, they employ over half of private sector workers, and they contribute more than half of U.S. job creation.
That’s why it’s so important to get your small business marketing right!
In this article, we’ll be looking at some of the best apps for small business marketing. These apps will help you create an online presence that will allow you to promote your products and services, build brand awareness, and connect with customers.
Best Apps For Small Business Marketing
Many small business owners have conflicted feelings about marketing. They know they need to be doing it, but all the different types of marketing and approaches to marketing can make it overwhelming. And then there’s the price. Small business owners are a frugal lot. They have to be. And marketing can be expensive. Marketing mistakes are even more expensive.
The combination of being short on time and on money is tough. But there’s yet another layer to the problem. It’s the classic friction small business owners face between the work of running their business versus the work they went into business to do. Pizza guys want to make pizza – not run Google Ads campaigns. Florists want to arrange flowers – not master email marketing.
Apps will save you time and money
Fortunately, we live in a world with apps. And many small business owners have figured out that they can save themselves a nice chunk of time by using them. That’s what the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council discovered when they ran the survey for their report, “Saving Time and Money With Mobile Apps”.
According to that report, “78 percent of these small business owners believe that their company’s use of mobile apps saves time for the owner. On a weekly basis, these small business owners estimate that they save an average of 5.6 hours (a median of 4.0 hours) due to their firm’s use of mobile apps.”
4-5 hours! That’s half a day each week. That’s a huge win for a time-pressed small business owner. To help you free up half a day in your week, we assembled a short list of essential digital marketing tools for small business owners. These cover all the basic marketing tasks, with one or two added in for marketing outsourcing and marketing project management.
- Proofhub
Proofhub
ProofHub is a project management and team communication solution that will help you manage your marketing projects and teams more effectively. It provides all of the tools you’ll need to plan, communicate, manage, and complete projects on time together in one place.
ProofHub’s Kanban boards allow you to break your work into stages based on your marketing requirements and track their progress, while their Gantt charts provide a visual depiction of the overall project timetable. Online proofing makes it simple to evaluate, proof, and approve designs and documents for marketing campaigns. With ProofHub’s built-in timers, keeping track of time for each task your marketing team is working on becomes super easy.
Check it out on Android here, or on iOS here.
- Trello
Trello app for mobile phones.
Marketing involves a lot of project management. Trello is another app that makes that easier. The feature that really helps with marketing tasks is the checklist you can add to cards.
If you create a checklist for your most common marketing tasks, you can save time and reduce errors. They’re also helpful for managing employees.
Some checklist-friendly tasks might be:
Writing blog posts
Scheduling the week’s social media updates
Sending newsletters for various occasions
For Android you can click here, and for iOS here.
- Yelp
Yelp app.
Just last week I met a small business owner who thinks it is more important for her to have a presence on Yelp than it is to have a website. While I don’t agree with that, her assertion shows how critical Yelp is to local businesses. Ignore it at your peril.
Fortunately, having it in app form makes it easy to edit and update your Yelp account. You an also check and respond to reviews, too.
For Android you can click here, and for iOS here.
- Mention
Mention – small business marketing app.
To stay relevant and to cater to the ever-changing needs of the customers, it’s important to keep track of what people say about you and your niche online. But, it can be hard to look for your mentions on Twitter, Facebook, etc., when you’re already superbusy running a business. Well, Mention is an app that lets you set keywords and monitor millions of different sources that mention it in real-time, all the while getting the crucial stats.
For Android click here, and for iOS click here.
- Twitter
Twitter mobile app
Twitter is less important for small local businesses, but it should definitely be part of the mix. And, like all these other apps, you’re far more likely to use it if it’s in your back pocket.
For Android click here, and for iOS click here.
- LinkedIn
LinkedInapp
If you’re in B2B, this is the place to be. Whether you want to follow up with a prospect or contribute to a group discussion, this is a nice app to have on hand. Many small B2B businesses get a sizable chunk of client work from LinkedIn. And the more active you are, the more likely you are to see some of that action.
For Android click here, and for iOS click here.
- GetResponse Social Ads Creator
With our Social Ads Creator you can create and share engaging promotional posts for any occasion – quickly and easily. Cut through the clutter and reach more people with easy-to-edit videos, animated slideshows, and photo collages. You can easily showcase the products you sell on Etsy, creating promo videos and banners in the easiest way possible. And if you don’t have a photographer on board in your small business, don’t worry – you can browse the Unsplash gallery in-app.
Boost your brand presence on social media with posts that get more followers, shares, and sales. Customize a template, publish it on your social profiles, and track your engagement. No design or marketing experience needed!
GetResponse social ads creator – best small business marketing apps.
Check out the GetResponse Social Ads Creator for your Android or iOS devices.
- Fiverr
Fiverr app.
Why add Fiverr to this list? Because it’s a great way to get small, simple marketing tasks done for very affordable prices – like $20-30 for a logo nice enough to actually use. Once you’ve found three or four Fiverr pros who can help you with routine, repeating tasks like
designing an ebook cover
converting an epic blog post into a SlideShare
writing a few product descriptions
editing a video
then you can outsource that work without worry. Given how short on time most small business owners are, that’s quite a deal.
For Android click here, and for iOS click here.
- Perka
Perka app.
One of the most frequently used marketing tactics for a local business is a loyalty program. Usually these are fulfilled with business card-sized punch cards. The way they work is every time you go to the sandwich shop, or the nail salon, or the coffee shop, you get your card punched. When your card is all punched up, you get a free sandwich, or free coffee, or you get your nails done for free.
Perka takes that tried and true model and makes it digital. They do seem to still be ironing out some quirks with the app, but this is definitely something to try if your business has a punch card program.
Best part? It’s free.
For Android click here, and for iOS click here.
- Google Ads
If you’re doing any pay per click advertising, you’re probably doing it with Google Ads (f.k.a. Google AdWords). Local businesses often decide to add a little oomph to their website traffic with this channel. Trouble is, it’s pricey. And there are no refunds. I’ve seen small businesses blow an entire year’s worth of marketing budget in one month due to a runaway Google Ads account.
Don’t let that be you. Keep close track of your account by having this app on hand at all times. You can check your daily spend, get campaign suggestions, edit your budget and much more.
For Android click here, for iOS (AdWords Express only) click here.
Google Ads mobile app.
- Google My Business app
Google My Business mobile app.
I don’t have to tell you how important Google is. If you’re a local business you know. Local businesses that are well-optimized for local searches can clean up, especially if their reviews look good and their Google My Business site is correctly filled out.
The Google My Business app will let you do nearly everything you could do from a desktop. It’s an excellent way to check your profile, stats and any new reviews while you’ve got a minute or two of downtime – like while you’re waiting in line at the post office.
For Android click here, and for iOS click here.
- The GetResponse app
GetResponse mobile app.
Of course, you’ve got to have your email marketing planned out, too. If you’re on the go and want to check how the morning’s email promotion did, it’s a few clicks away if you’ve got the GetResponse app installed. You can also see dashboard stats, check how your list is growing. You can also see individual emails in an autoresponder series and thumbnails of past emails.
So go fire up your GetResponse app and have at it. Maybe the stats from your last email have gone up since you last checked them…
For Android and iOS click here.
Editor’s note: Want to run webinars from your phone or tablet? Do it with GetResponse Webinars mobile apps. Available for Android and iOS.
Back to you
That covers the essential apps, but it’s not everyone. Did I maybe miss your favorite marketing app? If any of your favorite apps aren’t mentioned here, please, give us a shout out in the comments. Make your contribution to this list.
digital marketing apps
Managing your digital marketing campaigns requires constant attention— and sometimes, it requires managing your digital presence on the go. Luckily, there are numerous digital marketing apps you can use to help you build your online presence wherever you are. On this page, we’ll provide you with the nine best digital marketing apps you can use to help your business build better marketing strategies on-the-go!
To get more valuable insight on how to amp up your marketing efforts, join 190,000 marketers and subscribe to Revenue Weekly!
P.S. All these apps are free to download, but some require that you have a subscription or plan for the service to use the app. We’ll list the cost of those plans as they apply.
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- Canva
Cost: Free plan available, other plans $9.95-$30/per user/per month
First on our list of best apps for digital marketing is Canva. Canva is a design app that enables you to create graphics on the go. It’s a great app if you need to make a quick graphic for social media or email.
This app offers pre-built templates that make it easy for you to drag and drop elements into place. It also makes it easy for you to customize templates with your brand’s unique style.Once you’ve created your graphics, you can easily share them via social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and more.
It’s a quick and easy way to create visually appealing graphics for your audience.
- Buffer
Cost: $15-$99/month
Next on our list of the top digital marketing apps is Buffer. Buffer is a social media scheduling app that helps you plan your social media posts ahead of time. With this app, you can schedule social updates for platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn.
Within the Buffer app, you can also keep track of your social media posts and see how they’re performing. It enables you to monitor your social posts and keep tabs on engagement. So, for example, if you run a poll, you can track the post’s engagement to see who answers the poll and if people leave comments about why they made the choice they made.
In addition, if you need to make last-minute changes to a post, you can do so in the Buffer app. The Buffer app is a great app to have to manage your social media presence, whether you’re in the office or on the go.
- Facebook Ads Manager
Cost: Free
If you run ads on Facebook or Instagram, you’ll want to have the Facebook Ad Manager app on hand. This app enables you to check your advertising campaigns on your phone, as well as make changes. Facebook Ads Manager enables you to edit your ad campaign schedules, as well as adjust your budget.
It makes it easy for you to stay on top of how much you spend on your ads and determine if you need to modify, cut back, or increase your budget.You can also create new ads and track current ad campaigns to see how they’re performing. If you’re running ad campaigns on these platforms, the Facebook Ads Manager app is one of the best digital marketing apps to have to help you track and manage your ad campaigns.
- Mention
Cost: Free plan available, advanced plans range from $25-$450+/month
If you’re looking for one of the top digital marketing apps for monitoring brand mentions, Mention is the answer. This app is designed to help you keep track of brand mentions across platforms. It enables you to keep tabs on every conversation about your brand.
First, you can see any mentions of your brand on social media platforms, blogs, or news sites. You can stay on top of conversations about your brand, whether good or bad, and act as necessary. It’s a great tool to help you build a better brand image for your business.
- Evernote
Next on our list of the best online marketing apps is Evernote. This app is great to have is you need to take notes on the go.
Cost: Free plan available, Premium plan for $7.99/month, Business plan from $14.99/user/month
Evernote enables anyone on your team to take notes and share them with other members of your team. So, if you’re out and about and think of a great content topic idea for your blog, you can quickly jot down your idea for everyone else to see. You can keep all your notes, ideas, and reminders in one place, so you never lose track of anything.
It helps your marketing team stay organized and ensures your team has all the accurate information about a project or campaign. Using Evernote will help you create more cohesion between your team and make it easier to manage projects, whether you’re out at a meeting or in the office.
- Feedly
Cost: $6-$8.25/month for Pro and Pro+, $18+/per user/per month for Business and Enterprise
Feedly is one of the best online marketing apps for companies that want to keep tabs on topics that are trending in their industry. With this app, you can follow topics of interests and trends and curate content on those topics into your feed. It helps you keep your information focused on what matters most to your business.
Feedly enables you to easily monitor when new trends arise, so you can deliver the most relevant information to your audience before your competition. It allows you to create current content and share it on social media to your audience. You’ll stay on top of your industry and keep your audience informed.
- Ripl
Cost: $14.99/month or $119.88/year
If you’re looking to create branded videos and images, Ripl is one of the best digital marketing apps to help you do just that. This app enables you to pick from thousands of templates to build beautiful visuals for your business. You can use your images and videos, but you also have access to a database of over 500,000 images and videos.
This editor makes it easy for you to create short, professional videos and beautifully designed images. When you finish your creation, you can easily connect your social media profiles to the app and post this content on those profiles. You can also export your photos and videos to share through other platforms, like email or your website.
Ripl is a great app to have when you need to generate a video or designed brand image quickly and professionally. If you’re already shooting photos and videos on your phone, why not take the next logical step by having an app that can help you edit your photos and videos into top-notch visuals?
- Tawk.to
Cost: Free
Tawk.io is a free messaging app that enables you to chat with people who visit your site and monitor visitors on your website. Whether you message visitors or people on your team do, you can track who’s chatting with visitors and review chat history. This app also enables you to provide better customer support for people who visit your site.
You can engage with these users wherever you are. It allows you to build better connections and help your customers get the answers they need. Tawk.to offers tons of great features for your business, too, like real-time visitor monitoring and setting predefined shortcut messages to answer questions fast.
It makes it easy for you to communicate with your audience.
- Google Analytics
Cost: Free
One of the best online marketing apps you need to download is Google Analytics. Google offers an analytics app to enable you to keep tabs on your search engine optimization (SEO) campaigns wherever you go. With their app, you can see how your sites are ranking and the traffic you’re driving to your pages.
From clicks to conversions, you have all the data you need at your fingertips. The Google Analytics app is fundamental to access your SEO metrics when you need them.
Our digital marketing campaigns impact the metrics that improve your bottom line.
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Take the next step with your digital marketing strategy
We’ve shown you some of the best digital marketing apps you can download to stay on top of your marketing plan, but downloading the apps isn’t all you should do. You need to stay on top of your digital marketing strategy and ensure it’s tailored to your business’s needs. At WebFX, we have a team of over 450 marketing experts eager to help with your digital marketing plan.
If you feel like it’s not driving the results you desire, or you want to dive into new strategies, our full-service digital marketing company is ready to help. Give us a call today at 888-601-5359, or contact us online to speak with a strategist!
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