You know what they say; “nothing in life is free.” It rings true for most situations, but, in this case, free really means free.
Marketing and other various departments typically have to stick to a certain budget when it comes to improving services or adding a new program to the daily routine. As technology races ahead, however, there are plenty of online resources that can be relied on for free marketing advice, graphic design services, and data management help. Here, I’ve listed several free apps that can help to drastically improve your company.
Canva
This website will take your word-art presentations and throw them in the trash. Canva is a ridiculously easy to use digital marketing platform that allows you to create high quality blog headers, magazine covers, icons, logos, and business cards for free. With dozens of on-trend fonts and design templates, Canva allows you to adjust all aspects of your online imagery. There are a few “pro” aspects of the platform that must be purchased to be utilized, but, if your work is online for the most part you won’t have any limitations with the free platform. The app version is equally as easy to use, giving you access to clever imagery for business presentations even when you’re on the road.
Hemingway
If you’re worried about your writing skills, you don’t need to be worried much longer. The Hemingway app will check your writing for improvements in sentence structure, grammar, and voice. Hemingway will grade your paragraphs on readability, let you know how many words and characters you’ve typed and will give suggestions on how to change sentences to make them more interesting. Proof-reading just got a lot easier!
Hootsuite
Ask anyone in your marketing department and they’ll tell you; scheduling social media posts is one of the most time-consuming and tedious tasks they have to complete. Platforms like Hootsuite can cut down your social media planning time by great numbers with their comprehensive posting feature. You can post up to 3 profiles at one time or schedule to post to 3 websites at the same or different times in the future all from one platform. You can also have your live feeds featured in your dashboard to see what people are tweeting or posting about while you work from inside the app.
Google Alerts
To dominate your industry, you have to know about your industry. This can mean taking the time to scour through dozens of headlines and tweets every day to keep up with industry news. Google Alerts eliminates your need to scour, giving you extra time to devote to other projects. All you need to do is plug in the keywords that you’d like to keep tabs on, such as “Artificial Intelligence,” or search for a company such as, “Nordstrom,” and you’ll receive Google Alerts every day with the top stories surrounding those topics. No need to hire an intern to keep you on trend, you can do it all yourself and in an easy and organized way!