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Recommended Tools for Web Design, SEO, and Marketing

Browse our recommended small business tools for web design, SEO, marketing, business management, operations, and more.

At Igniting Business, not only do we work with small businesses across America, but we're a small business ourselves!  This means we know the ins and outs of small businesses.  We know the struggles and the joys.

Over the years, we have come to recognize that utilizing the right combination of tools can be vital to the success of any small business.  However, we also know that the time of each small business team member and owner is precious, and there's never enough of it.  This means finding the right tools gets put on the back burner in exchange for whatever tools, or perhabs outdated methods, you're using today. 

Therein lies the catch-22!  You're too busy to spend time finding tools that can maximize and save your precious time

At Igniting Business, whether you're a current client of ours or a small business owner we've not yet met, we want to come alongside you in this challenge.  We've worked with hundreds of small business owners and seen many tools that helped accelerate their efforts.  Below are tools we specifically recommend to you and to any of our clients.  You'll find a lot of these of tools are geared towards online marketing efforts, but we've even included some that will simply help the operations of your small business.  We have personally tested each of these tools and can attest to their quality and benefit for most small businesses.  In many cases, we even use these tools on a day-to-day basis in the operations of Igniting Business.  While we may receive a small commission if you sign up for any of these tools, above all else, we provide these recommended tools as a part of our core mission: to help your small business succeed.

At no additional cost to you, we may receive a commission if you click on some of the links on this website and make a purchase.  Feel free to try out these tools, experiment, compare, etc. to your heart’s delight.  We simply hope one or two of these recommended tools save you a bit of time and stress on your road to success.

Browse Our Recommended Tools for Small Businesses

BrightLocal Logo

BrightLocal

BrightLocal provides robust SEO tools for small businesses including rank tracking, citation tracking, search audits, Google My Business tracking, and more!  We love that BrightLocal offers their diverse toolset at an extremely affordable price for single location and multi-location businesses.

Redeem Free Trial

WhatConverts Logo

WhatConverts

Track form submissions, phone calls, e-commerce transactions, chats, and more with this all-in-one tracking solution. Even better, understand your customer's journey and identify which online and offline marketing campaigns are leading to the most conversions for your business.

Try It for Free

SEMRush SEO and PPC Tools

Semrush

Semrush offers a robust toolset that helps small business monitor SEO and online marketing performance.  We love Semrush for their robust SEO tracking tools like keyword research and rank tracking. 

Try Semrush Free

Hotjar Logo

Hotjar

Analyze visitor heatmaps, watch screen recordings, integrate customer surveys, and monitor experiements. Use Hotjar as your comprehensive conversion rate optimization (CRO) tool to make your website more effective.

Redeem Extended Trial

KnownHost Logo

KnownHost

KnownHost is a quality web hosting company for small businesses.  We love KnownHost because they offer premier support 24/7/365 with 99.99% uptime.  If you're a small business maintaining your own Wordpress website, they even offer fully managed Wordpress hosting with automatic Wordpress updates.

Compare Hosting Packages

Zoho business and marketing tools

Zoho

Zoho is a business management software provider with a multitude of platforms to benefit small businesses.  We love the wide variety of programs Zoho offers like Zoho CRM, Zoho Projects, Zoho Sign, Zoho Meetings, Zoho SalesIQ (website chat), and more!

Explore Zoho

vistaprint print marketing materials

Vistaprint

Vistaprint offers small business marketing material printing at economical pricing.  We love Vistaprint for their wide variety of materials printed including promotional products. They also provide a large variety of templates to start with if you don't have a design pre-made.

Order Print Materials

99designs logo for graphic and marketing materials design

99designs

99designs provides custom graphic design services for small businesses. Whether you’re looking for a logo or a custom marketing material designed, 99designs can connect you with a graphic designer to affordably meet your needs. We love 99designs because they offer both direct graphic designer hiring or creation of a contest for access to numerous design concepts from multiple graphic designers.

Get Graphic Design Help

Shopify E-commerce logo

Shopify

Shopify is a leading e-commerce platform for small businesses, second only to Amazon in sales volume as of 2019.  We love Shopify because it offers a robust e-commerce platform for small businesses, while remaining easy-to-use and exceptionally affordable.

Redeem a Free Trial

Explore Benefits

Amazon Logo

Amazon

Amazon offers a wide variety of products for purchase through various vendors.  At Igniting Business, we use Amazon for numerous purchases ranging from office technology to all types of office supplies!  We love Amazon because the robust selection and quick delivery offered is unparalleled.  Make your time and money go further by purchasing your supplies through Amazon!

Start Shopping

Adobe Logo

Adobe Creative Cloud

Adobe Creative Cloud offers a comprehensive suite of design programs.  We love Adobe Creative Cloud because the flexibility of their programs allow small businesses to work on photography, design, video, and more.

Try Adobe Creative Cloud

Adobe Logo

Adobe Stock

Adobe Stock provides high-quality stock photography, videos, audio, and more for small businesses.  We love Adobe Stock because it allows small businesses to obtain digital media with the appropriate commerical-use rights at reasonable costs.

Purchase Stock Media

Asus Logo

ASUS

ASUS manufacturers a variety of computers and electronic equipment. We love ASUS for their high-quality, long-lasting, and reliable monitors and networking equipment (such as wireless routers).

Shop ASUS Products

Camtasia video capture and editing software

Camtasia

Camtasia® is a cost effective and easy-to-use tool that can be used for both capturing and editing video content. We particularly like using Camtasia for creating training videos, performing basic video editing, and capturing screen recordings with audio and/or video overlays. If you're new to video production and need an affordable tool to get started, give Camtasia a try.

Explore Camtasia

Canva Graphic Design Tool

Canva

Canva assists small business in creating customized graphics.  We love Canva because small businesses can easily create digitial graphics sized for numerous social media platforms and elsewhere.

Try Canva for Free

Constant Contact Email Marketing

Constant Contact

Constant Contact is an email marketing platform that allows small businesses to create email campaigns, social ads, and more.  We love Constant Contact because they offer robust customer support for their small business customers and a great free trial.

Try Constant Contact

CyberPower Logo

CyberPower

CyberPower is a leading manufacturer of high-quality, long-lasting Uninterrupted Power Supplies (UPS) - also known as battery backups.  We love CyberPower because a UPS can protect your equipment during a surges or outages and even provide short-term power to your devices.  

Buy CyberPower Products

Learn About UPS

FATJOE outsourced seo content marketing services

FATJOE

FATJOE provides specialized, outsourced SEO services related to content marketing and distribution. We specifically like FATJOE’s services for converting blogs to videos, infographic creation, and niche edits. For best results when using any 3rd party content marketing service, ensure their strategy responsibly fits within your own SEO goals and note that overarching guidance must be provided.

Explore SEO Services

freshbooks accounting and bookkeeping software

FreshBooks

FreshBooks is a small business estimating, invoicing, and timekeeping software.  We love FreshBooks because it makes providing quotes, generating invoices, and getting paid a breeze for any small business owner. 

Try FreshBooks Free

Grammarly Logo

Grammarly

Grammarly is an incredible AI powered writing assistant. You can use Grammarly to get suggestions on improving your writing quality, as well as find critical grammar and spelling errors. Additionally, Grammarly integrates with numerous systems including Google Docs, Microsoft Word, Evernote, Slack, and even select email and social media platforms. Grammarly has both free and paid plans with varying features. Whether you're drafting internal communications, website content, or email marketing and ad campaigns, Grammarly can save you time and help rid your content of embarrassing errors.

Explore Grammarly's Features

Hootsuite social media tools logo

Hootsuite

Hootsuite is a social media scheduling, posting, and monitoring service.  Hootsuite takes the hassle out of social media management.  We love Hootsuite because it allows small business owners to easily plan and schedule social media posts at a convenient time for them, rather than requiring manual posting at ideal times for their social media audience. 

Redeem a Free Trial

Compare Hootsuite

Kraken Logo for image optimization software

Kraken.io

Kraken.io is a image optimization software.  We love Kraken.io because it allows a business to both resize and compress an image in just a few clicks. Using Kraken.io you can ensure your images are properly sized for quick loading on your website.

Try Kraken.io

Learn More

Liquid Web Hosting

Liquid Web

Liquid Web offers premier web hosting for advanced small business needs.  We love Liquid Web because they provide migration services and offer premier server packages that can meet even the most advanced needs.  Additionally, their customer support is top notch with live chat and phone support accessible within minutes!

Compare Hosting Packages

MailChimp Email Marketing

MailChimp

Mailchimp is an email marketing platform that allows small businesses to create email campaigns, social ads, and more.  Mailchimp is our preferred email marketing platform because it powers robust email marketing campaigns for a small business' current and potential customers in a manner that abides by spam best practices at an affordable cost. 

Explore Mailchimp

Microsoft Office 365 Logo

Microsoft 365

Microsoft 365 (formerly known as Office 365) offers robust office productivity tools for small businesses.  We love Microsoft 365 for their Office products (like Word and Excel) and reliable email hosting services at low costs for small businesses.

Try Microsoft (Office) 365

MSI Computers Logo

MSI

MSI manufacturers laptops and computer components.  We love MSI for their premier performance laptops.  Although well-known for gaming, MSI laptops can provide your small business a robust, powerful laptop that meets your business operations and even design needs.

Browse MSI Laptops

Namecheap Domains and Web Services

NameCheap

NameCheap offers domain registration, website hosting, CDNs, and more! We love Namecheap for their easy domain registration with privacy settings and robust DNS management. 

Register Your Domain

PageFly Shopify Page Builder

PageFly

PageFly allows small businesses to build robust, graphically-pleasing pages on Shopify.  We love how PageFly builds on Shopify's existing system and takes pages to the next level for optimal user experience.

Build With PageFly

QuickBooks Accounting Software logo

QuickBooks Online

QuickBooks Online offers small business owners and managers a robust online accounting platform.  Knowing the income and expenses of your small business is vital to the sucess of your business.  We love QuickBooks because  it streamlines analyzing the financial health of your business at a reasonable monthly fee. 

Try QuickBooks

RingCentral Cloud PBX Phone Systems

RingCentral

RingCentral provides robust communication tools for small businesses including phone, video, messaging, and more!  We love RingCentral because they streamline communications for small businesses whether you are a team of one or 100+.

Sign Up for RingCentral

Learn About Cloud VoIP

Ring Security Systems

Ring

Ring offers affordable commercial office alarm and surveillance systems for small businesses. Ensure your office is continually monitored for intrusions with Ring. We love Ring for their high-quality security products backed by a premiere app and exceptionally affordable monthly fee.

Secure Your Business

screen capture software

Snagit

Snagit® is a simple and powerful tool for screen capture and screen recording. Whether you're looking to capture static images, examples for customers, or screen recordings, Snagit is an excellent and very affordable option. Note that if you need a more robust video editing software, consider Camtasia which is created by the same company, TechSmith®.  

Start Capturing

StackPath CDN and Firewall Services

StackPath

StackPath offers a wide variety of virtual machines, storage, and other Edge services.  We love StackPath for their low-cost Content Delivery Network (CDN) to improve your small business website speed and SEO.

Setup a CDN

Learn About CDNs

Sucuri website security service

Sucuri

Sucuri provides complete website security, protection, and monitoring for small businesses.  We love Sucuri because not only do they provide stellar support when needing to cleanup a hack or breach of your small business website, but they also offer premier detection and protection services to minimize a future breach.

Try Sucuri Today

See Cybersecurity Stats

Synology Logo

Synology

Synology offers Network Attached Storage (NAS), a powerful alternative to servers and paid cloud providers for data storage.  We love Synology for their reliable NAS devices that offer a wide use of applications for any small business at an affordable price.

Browse Synology NAS

See NAS Benefits

Our Process for Recommending Tools for Small Businesses

As you can tell, we have quite a few tools and products recommended on this page ranging from online marketing to business operations.  While we understand not every tool or product will be the exact right fit for your small business, we wanted to let you know how each tool or product made it to the list.  Each of the following tools or products were evaluated on the following criteria in order to make it on the list:

  • Does the recommended tool solve a tangible need/challenge that a small business owner faces?

  • Have we personally used or currently use the tool in question?

  • Is the tool reasonably priced for the benefits/features it provides?

  • Does the toolset have a dedicated customer support team in place?

  • Is the toolset innovative at embracing new technology and the ever-changing needs of small businesses?

Common Questions About Our Recommended Tools

Have you actually tried these tools?

Yes!  We would never want to recommend a tool we have not personally tried.  In addition, many of these tools have been used by our clients with success.

Why do you include tools for operations?

Even though our services are focused predominantly on online marketing, as a small business ourselves and with exposure to hundreds of small business clients, we've faced many of the same operational challenges your small business might be encountering right now.  We felt it only right to mention some operational tools we've found successful in our own small business operations.

Do you get paid for all these links?

No! First and foremost, we have compiled this list of recommended tools as a part of our mission to help small businesses succeed - even when that does not directly benefit us.  While we do include some links in which we are a Partner or Affiliate with the platform, not all links fall into that category.  As such, we do not receive any compensation for many of the above links even if you sign up.

Do you guarantee any of these tools?

While we have personally tried all of the above tools, we cannot guarantee any of the tools will be a positive fit for your small business.  We certainly hope you find trying any of these tools is worth your time and energy, but we also recognize that some of these tools may not be the best fit for the unique setup and/or circumstances of your small business.

Is this list all-inclusive?

Absolutely not!  As we continue to evolve and work with more small business clients, we'll continue to add to our recommended tools.  We advise you to check back on this list periodically.  If you ever have a tool you'd recommend we check out ourself, please drop us a note so we can check it out!  We LOVE learning about new tools!

Overwhelmed and Need to Talk to a Professional?

If you would prefer to receive professional help with any web design, SEO, or marketing services instead of a DIY approach, feel free to reach out to our team. We are here to help!

Know a Great Tool That Should Be Added to Our List?

Have you used a phenomenal tool that should definitely be added to our list of resources for small businesses?  Feel free to reach out and tell us more about your experience!