6 free tools to give your email marketing a boost

Business toolkit

Email is one of the simplest and most effective ways of connecting with your customers, so for the first of our business toolkit series we’re focussing on the apps and tools you can get for free to help improve your email marketing.

This list will take you through your email design, right through to tracking who’s opening them.

1. Building an email? Consider MailChimp

Keep your customers up-to-date and reach out to new ones with pre-designed email templates from MailChimp. If you’re new to email marketing, have a look at their support centre which has easy to watch video tutorials. You’ll be an email ninja in no time!

2. Pixabay’s free imagery will brighten your template

Using colour increases readers’ engagement, so why not make an impact by adding an image to your email template. Pixabay has images and illustrations which you can use for free.

3. Use Touchstone to test your subject line

Once you have your email design ready, you’ll need to think about your subject line – it’s your one chance to engage customers so they open your email. Take a look at Touchstone which allows you to test any subject line and get expected results, straight away. Touchstone tests opens, clicks and delivery rates – KPIs crucial for your campaign’s success.

4. Looking for contacts? BuzzStream could help

Use BuzzStream’s Email Research Tool to help you find email addresses of the contacts you’d like to connect with. You can add somebody’s name and company and BuzzStream will automatically generate Google searches to help you find their email address.

5. Hubspot’s email tracking

This app tells you when your email has been opened and clicked on, so you can follow up on any hot leads. Knowing who is and who isn’t opening your emails will help guide you on your email strategy.

6.Mail Tracker

Similar to Hubspot’s email tracking, use Mail Tracker to find out if people are opening your emails which can help you improve your marketing techniques. See where, when, on what device, for how long and how many times your emails were viewed.

There are hundreds of free tools available to give small businesses a boost – you just need to know where to find them! For the next instalment of our Take 10 series, we’re exploring more free tools to help with marketing.

Enjoyed this? Read our 5 trade secrets to email marketing or how you can improve your brand impact by using colour.