Running a business is in no way an easy task, and in the digital era, there are just so many tasks to do to meet your goals. A report from HubSpot showed that many marketers and business owners have their hands full of routine tasks like data analysis, social media posting, marketing campaigns, and data collection.
There is a way to streamline your task and make your job easier: Automation Tools!
In this guide, we explain why you need automation tools and the best automation tools for business owners.
Why Small Businesses Need Automation Tools
Automation tools are software and services that help business owners automate marketing tasks and efforts. Automation means doing something automatically, so an automation tool enables you to automate the basic and random tasks that dominate your day. With the right automation tools, you can boost conversions, get insights into your campaign performance and automate your marketing campaigns.
Also, business automation solutions can help you perform tasks like sending emails, posting on social media, replying to enquiries, etc. Automation tools can’t do everything, but they can help you save time and relieve you of the efforts of some basic tasks
In general, automation tools save time, improve work efficiency and help you focus on other areas of your business.
Key Features and Functions of Automation Software
Automation tools differ from one another, especially in terms of their features and functions. Also, one of the first things to consider when looking for the best business automation software is the feature. Some of the common features include the following:
1: Social Media:
Social media is for almost every business owner who wants to reach a wider audience. You need a social media presence for your small business, and you will benefit from having an automation tool to schedule your social posting, reply to enquiries and monitor your social performance. This will help you maintain a consistent social media presence without spending all your time on the task.
2. Email Marketing
One of the best forms of marketing for small businesses is email marketing, and that’s why the best business automation tools are email marketing software. A good email marketing software can help you optimise sending emails, follow up, create forms, segment emails, and so on.
3. Advertising and SEO
Some marketing tools can assist you with social media advertising automation and SEO.
4. Reporting and Analytics
How well did your last marketing campaign perform? How many people clicked on your ad? How views and reach did you generate on your social media platform?
A marketing platform can help you get answers to that! There are useful business tools that can help you gain insight into your marketing performance and track key metrics like conversion rates, click rates, ROI, lead funnels, and so on.
How To Choose The Best Automation Software for Business
Deciding which automation tool to go for can be a hard choice, so here are some factors you can consider to narrow down your options.
1. Features
One of the first things to note when investing in marketing automation software is the features. You want an automation tool to carry out the task you need help with. For example, if you want a tool for your email campaigns, it’s essential to use an email automation tool. Read the features and functions of the software you plan to get to ensure you are paying for precisely what you need.
2. Price
Your budget matters a lot when looking for marketing tools. If you are on a tight budget, then it’s best to look out for free business automation tools or inexpensive software.
So when looking for a marketing tool, ensure you research the price to help you make sure it’s suitable for your marketing budget. Also, note that the software you use may increase in price as your contact list grows.
3. Support
Can’t find your way around your marketing automation tool, or experiencing some glitches? Who do you call? Make sure you go for a tool with a standby support team in case you are experiencing some problems or need guidance.
4. Integration
Another thing people consider when looking for the best tools for small business owners is the integration function. Can you integrate your existing software, tools, or data with the new automation tool? You have to consider this, especially if you already use some automation tools, and integration is important to you.
5. Free Trial
It’s a good idea to consider software with a free trial because it helps you evaluate the tool’s features and ease of use before committing to it. You can also consider reaching out to the software sales team for a demo before making a final decision.
15 Best Automation Tools for Business Owners
Automation tools are not created equally, and with hundreds of them available in the market, it may be overwhelming to pick the best for your business. We researched and read reviews, and here are some of the best automation software for business:
1: HubSpot
It’s impossible to talk about major marketing software without including Hubspot. Founded in 2006, this marketing hub has many features, including email automation to enhance your outreach, lead segmentation to segment your leads, and a live chat feature to automate responses.
HubSpot can be a little complex for beginners, but the platform has a resource centre called HubSpot Academy to help you understand how to use the software.
Pricing: HubSpot has different pricing models depending on the feature you want and the number of contacts. However, they offer some free plans but with limited functions and features.
2. MonsterInsights
The next one on the best business automation tools list is MonsterInsights which is a Google Analytics Plugin for WordPress. With this tool, you can get insight into your website traffic and what’s happening on your website.
Basically, MonsterInsights help you teach your audience activity; you get to know where they come from and what they do on your website. Do they read your blogs, proceed to order, or leave as soon as they come? The insights you get can help you work on a strategy to improve your leads and sales.
3. ConvertKit
ConvertKit is a robust email marketing tool with a wide array of features, including email automation and email segmentation. It’s perfect for business owners, bloggers, and creators trying to maintain a relationship with their audience.
The tool makes it easy to create emails perfect for all devices and also segment your contacts so you can personalise your emails to them. You can also create clickable CTA buttons, assess free email templates and track your open-through and click-through rates.
Pricing: The free plan costs $0 a month and is limited to 1000 subscribers and features customisable domains, email broadcasts, unlimited traffic, unlimited forms, and landing pages, among others.
The Creator Plan costs $29 per month for 1000 subscribers and $119 for up to 10,000 subscribers, while the Creator Pro starts from $59 a month for 1000 subscribers and $807 a month for up to 900,000 subscribers.
4. Sender
One of the best free business automation tools for small businesses is Sender. This email automation tool makes it easy to create, send and optimise your email campaigns. Sender also helps analyse your campaigns and has an email template builder and HTML editors.
One of the best features of Sender is the Segmentation and Personalization tools that help you categorise your email subscribers according to their persona and behaviour. With this, you can send target emails that fit the profile and characteristics of your buyer persona, and this can increase your engagement rate. Also, users can integrate Sender with apps like Salesforce and Slack.
5. MailChimp
Mailchimp is the best automation platform out there and is best known for its email services. This email marketing tool allows users to send targeted emails when triggered by a specific action, event, or activity. For example, you can automatically send targeted emails to anyone who abandons their cart on your ecommerce platform.
Mailchimp also offers design templates, segmentation tools, and scheduling tools to help you improve your email marketing efforts.
Pricing: This platform offers a free plan for 2000 contacts, while the paid plans start from $10 per month.
6. Mention
At this time, it is essential to keep track of what people are saying about your brand across multiple channels and websites. This is where Mention comes in, a business automation solution that lets business owners monitor mentions on social media, blogs, review sites, and other websites. It makes it easy to listen to what people are saying about your brand as well as your competitors. With this, you can get insights into how to improve your business and stay ahead of your competitors.
Pricing: Mention offers a free plan which provides the option to create a single alert, while the paid plan costs about $25 per month.
7. ChatBot
ChatBot is an automation tool perfect for business owners who want to engage with their users just like a live chat agent. Instead of standing by your requests and enquiries 24/7, you can invest in ChatBot to take your bookings, respond to certain customer enquiries, and even fix a problem. You don’t have to be there to communicate with your audience, schedule calls, and even sell products when you integrate ChatBot with your website or LiveChat.
Pricing: you get a 14-day free trial, after which you are expected to pay $50 per month for 1000 chats.
8. HootSuite
One of the best social media management platforms is HootSuite. With this business automation tool, you can bring all your social media content in one single app. Another thing you can do with HootSuite is schedule your social media posts ahead of time.
HootSuite also lets you get detailed reports about your content performance across the different social media platforms you use. Also, you can manage your social media activities, including responding to private messages/comments from the HootSuite Inbox. Hootsuite also lets you monitor conversions about your brand, competitors, and industry.
Pricing: Hootsuite has a free plan that lets you add 3 social media profiles, while the paid plan starts from $29 per month.
9. Buffer
Like HootSuite, Buffer is a social scheduling tool that lets you create content ahead of time and schedule them for posting across different social networks, including Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Pinterest.
Buffer is also perfect for tracking your social media performance, organising hashtags, and planning your social media campaigns.
Pricing: Free plan is available with 3 social media accounts and 10 scheduled posts at once, while the next plan costs $12 per month.
10. Octopus CRM
Octopus CRM is one of the leading automation for LinkedIn and a must-have if you run a business on the platform. LinkedIn is a popular platform for professionals and B2B businesses, and Octopus CRM can help.
11. Zapier
Zapier is a great workflow automation for small businesses which allows you to connect your apps and automation tools. Cool right? It makes it easy to access all the apps you use for your business in one place and move your content from one platform to another.
Pricing: Zapier offers a free plan, and paid plans costs between $19.99- $299 per month
Conclusion
Now that you are familiar with the best automation tools for business owners, it’s time to select which of them you will use for your brand. Note that you can use as many as you can as long as they work for your business. Lastly, if you are not ready to commit to the marketing tool, you can consider going for the Free Trial to get a hang of how the platform works.
