Learn how to grow any startup or business via full stack marketing with these top software/products.

In the previous post, titled “What is a full stack marketer”, I’ve outlined some of the key things that a marketer needs to know about full stack marketing. If you haven’t read that post yet, I recommend that you do before you get started with this one. In that same post, I’ve also listed some of the major skills that you should acquire in order to become a full stack marketer.

This time around, I recommend to you the best software/products that you can use for each skill. The list below is made up of paid and free tools that any full stack marketer can use to get started in growing a startup or online business.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

• Moz (formerly SEOmoz) - This SEO company, which is co-founded by Rand Fishkin, provides paid and free web-based softwares that makes search engine optimization accessible to any type of marketers. Their free tools include the Open Site Explorer and MozBar, while members who are subscribe to PRO (premium) have Moz Analytics, Fresh Web Explorer and On-Page Grader.

• BuzzStream - Another online software that is designed for marketers that need help in promoting their products/services and content via link building and digital PR tools. Products include the BuzzStream for Link Building and BuzzStream for PR.

Copywriting

• Scribe - This copywriting software is part of CopyBlogger Media’s suite of marketing tools using WordPress. Combining content, social, and search, Scribe makes your content marketing efforts effective and efficient. You don’t need to have WordPress to use Scribe as you can use also use it as a web-based app or via Microsoft Word.

Search Engine Marketing

• WordStream - This software is designed to help you organized your search engine marketing campaigns via paid advertising or pay-per-click (PPC). Their PPC Advisor is designed to make PPC management easy to any marketer. They also have free keyword tools like the Keyword Niche Finder, Keyword Grouper, and Negative Keyword Tool.

Email Marketing

• MailChimp - Send emails, create lists, manage contacts, and track results with this email marketing service provider. With MailChimp, you can also build and design signup forms that have the look and feel of your brand. It’s free for 2,000 subscribers with up to 12,000 emails per month.

• Customer.io - Use this tool if you want to send event-triggered emails to your website subscribers or app users. By embedding a code snippet, you’ll be able to send emails automatically to users according to their behavior. For instance, you can send an email to a user who hasn’t logged in for at least 30 days by setting a certain rule on your Customer.io account.

Social Media

• Facebook - With over half a billion active users each day (as of July 2013), it’s really hard not to take advantage of Facebook’s market reach. WordStream has posted on their blog at least 7 ways to use Facebook for marketing.

• Twitter - This social media platform boosts over 200 million active users each month. With only 140 characters allowed at a time, Twitter forces you to get more creative in promoting your business. Social Media Examiner has written a detailed guide on how to use Twitter for business and marketing.

• LinkedIn - With its over 200 million users, 40 percent of those check their LinkedIn accounts daily. This platform is more than a professional social network, this is also a tool where you can promote your business. You can both target businesses (B2B) and users (B2C). Kristi Hines has written a detailed guide on how to use LinkedIn for marketing.

• Google Plus - Google’s social networking platform is one of the newest players in the social media wars. Even if it’s still new, Google+ has a growing number of users, and over 300 million of those are active. HootSuite has created a series on how to use Google+ for business.

• Pinterest - This social media platform took the online world by storm. Compared to other networks, Pinterest mainly uses visuals (known as “Pins”) to spur engagement among its over 70 million users. According to Social Media Examiner, there are 3 ways to use Pinterest for your business: increase the authority of your brand, expand your reach, and drive traffic back to your site.

• Buffer - This is the New kid on the block in the social network space,  its a social management tool to help you organize all your social media campaigns in one place. Using Buffer, you can do things like schedule messages and tweets, and analyze traffic from Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc.

Press Release (PR)

• MyPRGenie - This tool, which is both a newswire and business social network, provides press release distribution services that enables you to connect with journalists. It’s free to create an online newsroom in MyPRGenie and upload and post your release to more than 28 social media sites. To distribute your release to journalists, you may need to upgrade to a premium account.

Inbound Marketing

• HubSpot - A SaaS company that offers an all-in-one inbound marketing software. By using HubSpot, you can create a blog, send email, track social media, build web and landing pages, and other marketing stuff in one place.

Blogging

• WordPress - This is considered as the most popular blogging platform today. WordPress offers a blogging software that you can download and install for free. You can also use WordPress as a CMS platform if you don’t have a website yet. Most hosting companies nowadays offer a one-click install of WordPress. But if you prefer to install the software yourself, you can follow the official installation instructions.

• SquareSpace - While WordPress is an easy to use blogging platform, you still have to deal with hosting-related stuff. If you don’t want that kind of setup, you can use a service like SquareSpace, which provides an all-in-one website solution. Your site and blog are all hosted under SquareSpace, so you don’t have to worry about hosting problems like downtimes. Foursquare uses SquareSpace for their business page.

User Experience (UX)

• Balsamiq - This is a tool for creating wireframes or mock ups that you can show to your team or client. Instead of drawing it on a white board, Balsamiq allows you to make one in your computer or online where everyone can collaborate and iterate rapidly.

Lifecycle/Marketing Automation

• Marketo - This software is designed to automate demand generation campaigns and get leads with minimum effort. Marketo also boosts the “world’s first integrated solution for social marketing automation.”

• Pardot - Another SaaS marketing automation application that allows you to build, deploy, and manage online marketing campaigns. Pardot integrates with CRM apps like Salesforce.com, SugarCRM, Microsoft Dynamics, and NetSuite.

App Store Marketing

• Google Apps Marketplace - This is the place to submit your cloud-based product or online service and integrate them with Google Apps. By submitting to the marketplace, you’ll be able to advertise your business to over 4 million organizations using Google Apps for their domains or business.

• iOS App Store - You can target iOS device users by submitting an app to the Apple App Store. Apptamin has written a great post on how to market your iOS app.

• Chrome Web Store - Another Google marketplace for apps, but this time it’s for the Chrome browser users. The official Google Apps Developer blog has posted a guide on how to market your app on the Chrome Web Store.

• AppExchange - If your business is geared towards CRM users, or you want to target Saleforce.com’s millions of subscribers, then AppExchange is the marketplace to submit your product or service.

Analytics

• Google Analytics - This web-based analytics and reporting software is another free tool from Google. With Analytics, you can track the performance of your content, social, and mobile marketing campaigns. Once you have the tracking code installed, you can view reports within 24 hours.

• MixPanel - While this tool is mainly being marketed as a mobile analytics software, you can still use it as an alternative to the likes of Google Analytics. Some of its known users are Khan Academy, Hipmunk, Match.com, TaskRabbit, Airbnb, and Jawbone.

• KISSmetrics - A people-based analytics tool specifically built for the SaaS and Ecommerce industry. KISSmetrics allows you to understand what people do before and after they hit the signup button. Basically, it’s designed to improve your customer acquisition and retention rates.

A/B Testing

• Optimizely - Optimized conversion rates for your site, landing pages, email campaigns and other marketing materials with A/B testing using Optimizely. This tool features point and click editors that allows you to perform A/B tests without the help of an I.T. guy. Some of its customers include Starbucks, Walt Disney, TechCrunch, TRUSTe, and 99designs.

• Google Content Experiments - You can use this tool via Google Analytics. Google Experiments is designed to give you more than A/B or multivariate testing. Google calls it A/B/N. With Content Experiments, you can test five full versions of a single page, which are viewed by your visitors with different URLs.

Landing Pages

• Unbounce - Use this tool to create and launch landing pages without any coding knowledge. Unbounce features point and click interface that lets you build and test pages easily. You can also do A/B tests and integrate third-party marketing tools with your Unbounce landing pages. You can get started by reading our Unbounce landing page tutorial.

HTML/CSS/JavaScript

• Treehouse - Learn how to code by using an online education tool like Treehouse. Topics include HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Ruby on Rails, WordPress, and app development. Treehouse mainly utilizes video in teaching their courses. After watching, users can practice what they’ve learned in real time using the Code Challenge Engine.

• Codecademy - This tool uses gamification in teaching you how to code. You can get points and earn badges in every step of your progress. Codecademy is completely free and offers coding languages like HTML/CSS, JavaScript, jQuery, PHP, Python, and Ruby. You can also learn how to use APIs from YouTube and Twitter.

• Udacity - Another online education site that offers free courses. With Udacity, you won’t be limited to learning only coding languages as you can also take courses in business, mathematics, and science. Like Treehouse, Udacity uses a series of short videos to teach their online students.

Customer Service

• Zendesk - This is a cloud-based help desk software that allows you to provide customer service and support tickets to your users. With Zendesk, you’ll be able to create a customer portal, knowledge base, and community for your product or service in one place. Companies who are using Zendesk include Box, Tumblr, Yammer, and Mavenlink.

• Salesforce Desk.com - Another all-in-one help desk support platform that lets you create awesome customer support for your customers. Your support team will only have to access your Desk.com account to view all tickets filed via your website, Twitter, Facebook, email, chat, and phone. Spotify, Yelp, Square, and SquareSpace are some of the customers of Desk.com.

• UserVoice - Being marketed as “More than a helpdesk”, UserVoice integrates a user-friendly feedback forum on top of the usual help desk, support ticket, and knowledge base tools. The UserVoice Facebook app allows you to get user feedback right from the Facebook page of your product or service.

• SnapEngage - A chat software that you can embed in your website. By using SnapEngage, you’ll be able to provide your site’s visitors with real-time communication channel. The feature that I like best about SnapEngage is its integration with other customer support tools like Zendesk, Desk.com, and BatchBook.

• Olark - Another easy to install chat app for your site. If you don’t like SnapEngage, Olark is a nice alternative that you can try out. Some of Olark’s satisfied customers are Hipmunk, App.net, 99designs, and Shopify.

Pitching

• Prezi.com - This is a web-based presentation software that you can easily use in presenting your ideas. Create your pitch in Prezi and access it anywhere, anytime. You can also share it to social media sites or embed it on other sites. If you want your presentations to be private, you may have to get a premium subscription.

• SlideShare - If you need to share your PowerPoint presentations, documents, Keynote, PDF and infographics online, you can use SlideShare to do so. With over 60 million visitors each month, SlideShare is also one of the best ways to spread your content virally as users can easily embed/share your presentation on blogs and social networks.

Conversion Rate Optimization

• Qualaroo - Find out what your website visitors are trying to accomplish. Qualaroo allows you to install an unobtrusive survey widget on your site that contains “in the moment” question, which is designed to help you understand users better. Basically, you’ll be able to find out what worked, what didn’t, and what your visitors wanted.

• CrazyEgg - Convert more visitors on your site by visualizing their actions using a heat map. CrazyEgg’s heat map reports allows you to track what your users click and what they do. By looking at the report, you can immediately implement changes that will improve your conversions.

Video

• YouTube - Google’s video sharing site is a great place to start learning about video marketing. With over 6 billion hours of video being watched every month, it’s really a great place to market your service or product using video. You can get started by visiting YouTube’s Creator Hub.

• Wistia - This is another video hosting site where you can upload your video. However, Wistia is built specifically for business. Aside from uploading videos, you can also use Wistia’s analytics tool to measure and improve your videos for higher conversion. Some of their customers include MailChimp and Moz.

• Animoto - If you want to create videos that your users can download, embed, share on social networks, then Animoto is a good place to start. You only need to take three steps to make a video on Animoto. It’s free to create videos that are under 30 seconds.

Integrations

• Zapier - Make your marketing efforts easier by automating your tasks between web services -- all without coding. Zapier is made up of triggers and actions, which makes one app work with over 200 other apps. Basically, it looks like this: when something happens in A, do this other thing in B. Imagine having a new lead automatically created in Salesforce every time you get a new entry from a Wufoo form.

• IFTTT - (Pronounced “ift” as in “gift”) Just like Zapier, IFTTT allows you to automate an action whenever a trigger is achieved. That combination is called a “Recipe” in IFTTT. You can build connections between 70 channels, which include Facebook, Evernote, Box, Dropbox, Gmail, and LinkedIn.

Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

• Salesforce.com - A cloud computing company best known for its CRM software. Saleforce.com’s Sales Cloud allows you to manage contacts and your company’s sales activities. The app also allows you to sell anywhere, using any mobile device.

• RelateIQ - Not just Another CRM app.  Relationship Management is the new term.  These guys just raised 40 Million and previously 29 Million.  Keep an eye on them. RelateIQ automates, simplifies, and deepens the way you engage with professional relationships. Whether you are managing a sales pipeline or tracking deals to closure, RelateIQ provides tools and insights to increase your effectiveness. It automatically tracks and analyzes the day-to-day interactions that drive relationships in business development, sales, and more, using data and algorithms to make you better at your job.

Affiliate Marketing

• GetAmbassador - A referral marketing software that allows you to give rewards to customers who refer their friends via word of mouth. By creating a perfect incentive program, you’ll be able to convert your customers as your brand ambassadors. The rewards that you can give may include a fixed amount or a percentage of the sales, one-time or recurring commissions, or any other non-monetary item.

Conclusion

As a full stack marketing agency, we’ve been using a few of the products/services above, like Unbounce, SquareSpace, Qualaroo, and Google Apps Marketplace. Basically, softwares online are now made easier and beginner-friendly. But if you have some questions or need help in getting started with a tool, I’ll be glad to assist you with your needs.

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Have you used some of the software/products mentioned above? What app or set of apps that have greatly contributed in increasing your conversions and ROI? Let us know about your thoughts in the comment box below.