How to Launch Your Business Blog Using Free Tools

 

One of the toughest things when you start a business is being able to predict cash flow. Spending money on marketing seems like a chore, especially when you have many other tasks to accomplish in your day. Thankfully, blogging exists as a way to help market yourself with little or no money.

When you start a new business venture, you must become accustomed to blogging. This is foreign to most people, especially when all you want to do is be the face of your business. When you are thinking about how to create a blog that drives traffic and sales, you may be lost.

Luckily even doing what used to be extremely difficult in the past, such as content marketing, has become much easier with the help of free tools. You no longer need to become an expert blogger or pay a company to do your bidding for you.

Here is a list of five free tools that you can use to become proficient in promoting your blog and analyzing the results.

1. Google Analytics

Google Analytics can be one of the greatest tools for any marketer who is trying to learn more about Website visitors. You can do cohort analysis, set goals for your site, and much more.

If you are a beginning blogger, you can perform simple tasks such as track which blog posts get the most traffic and which channels are sending you the most readers. Once you compile this information, you can spend your energy in growing those areas.

2. Google Search Console

Google Search Console is one of the best tools for finding which words and phrases people are searching for and using them to bring customers to your website. One you know the terms people use to find your site, you can develop a link-building campaign with those keywords.

3. Hootsuite

Hootsuite is probably the best automation tool for those who are serious about getting social-media traffic. The best part about Hootsuite, unlike other tools, is you don’t need to worry about paying a fee for the product unless you are linking multiple accounts.

Hootsuite allows you to automate LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter posts to push your blog content to readers. Simply set the queue to schedule posts days (or even years) in advance. This allows you to focus on creating more content while your current content is working hard for you.

4. Google Trends

Google Trends is a free tool to help you find what people are currently interested in. As opposed to Google Search Console (which shows you how people got to your site), Google Trends shows you what people are searching for and where they are going to find the information. This is important as you can find what is popular and build content appropriately.

5. MailChimp

One of the biggest mistakes many internet marketers make is not building an email list. Your list is your go-to data to market to current and potential customers. No list? No Income!

MailChimp is a product that lets you collect email addresses and send out email campaigns—all for free up to 2000 members. A great feature of MailChimp is the ability to track analytics on your emails, which can be a huge help for doing comparative testing of your copy.

Blogging Demystified

Blogging can be one of the most profitable channels of customer acquisition if you do it correctly. Unfortunately, so many business owners just don’t know how to properly promote blog content and analyze the results.

Using the free tools mentioned above, you will become more proficient with both, driving traffic and growing sales for your business.

Brian Horvath is a freelance writer from Michigan and founder of MyBusinessTalk. He is a journalism graduate and a regular contributor to numerous online magazines and journals.