Free or Cheap Tools for Startups that Make It Possible
February 3, 2010Tags: startup tools free cheap
One of the main keys to startup success is to stay lean - you don’t want to get caught up in any unnecessary expenses. The entrepreneur’s financial motto should always be “If you don’t make money, don’t spend money.” A lot of what made CorkShare possible, and many other startups possible, are the free tools available to help us take care of business. Here are some great examples of those tools you can use for your business - or for personal use!
Productivity Tools and Collaboration
Google Docs (free) - A staple for any startup. Make spreadsheets, text documents, and presentations, and then share them with each other. Super powerful and super free.
Google Calendar (free) - Setup a Google Calendar for your company so you are all on the same page on who’s doing what and when. Google keeps adding new features to make it more comparable with Microsoft Outlook - it’ll never have all the bells an whistles, but it’s more than good enough.
Basecamp ($24 a month for basic plan) - Product Management and Collaboration tool used by many startup companies, especially useful for software development. Basic plan only supports 15 “projects” but that’s probably all you’ll need for a long time.
Yammer (free) - It’s like Twitter for within businesses. It’s private, let’s you share links and content, and let’s you tell it what your organizational chart is. Keep each other updated on what you’re up to, and rather than e-mailing all those random links out and spamming each other, put it on Yammer with some # hashtags to keep it organized.
Open Office (free) - Microsoft Office is expensive. If you really need some offline tools, consider Open Office which has pretty much all the power with none of the price.
Zoho (free) - Zoho is a suite of online software similar to Google Docs, Gmail, and Google Calendar, but it also has CRM, Wikis, Invoicing, Product Management, Reporting and Business Intelligence, HR/Recruitment software, and much more. They limit how many users can use things, with the intent that you’ll pay later when you outgrow the free level. We haven’t used it much yet because we haven’t needed some of that more intense software stuff yet. But its pretty awesome, and when we need it I’m sure we’ll come back to it.
Brand Identity
Logoworks (decently priced) - As much as you can, you want to do things yourself or bug your creative friend in exchange for some pizza and beer. But if you’re willing to pay up a little, Logoworks will design your logo, website, business cards, etc. for decent prices. It’s not super cheap, but it’s worth checking out if you need something professional for a reasonable price and you need it pretty fast - in many cases they can get you concepts in just 3 business days.
Marketing or Business Materials
Zazzle (decently priced) - Zazzle is really cool - customize your t-shirts, business cards, mugs, you name it. It’s not the cheapest on the block, but the level of customization is huge. I’ve noticed the business cards are really cheap, and as you customize things the cost stays the same - some sites like to really pump up prices to more you modify.
Website Statistics
Google Analytics (free) - Google Analytics is used by just about everyone it seems - it’s relatively easy to setup, and its extremely powerful. Figure out how many people are coming to various pages on your site, how many people are clicking on certain links, etc. etc.
MixPanel (free, may have to buy some credits soon if you use it heavily) - A different option for analytics. It have some heavy duty customization to get very specific as to what you are measuring, it’s in real-time, can support detailed “funnel” analytics, and more.
Newsletters
MailChimp (free credits, but you’ll need to buy some soon) - Use one of their templates or upload your HTML and blast out your e-mail messages to your e-mail lists. It makes the whole process a million times easier, and it gives you great statistics on who’s been clicking on what in your e-mail, how many people are opening your e-mail in the first place, and how things compare with past e-mail blasts.
Customer Feedback
Get Satisfaction (free, with lots of good upgrade options) - CorkShare just setup an account here, you can only have a couple admins at first but it’s a really great way to engage customers and have them engage eachother for (1) Questions, (2) Ideas, (3) Bugs/Problems, and (4) Praise.
Blogging
Tumblr (free) - Tumblr has a really easy setup for a blog, and has a strong community to reach out to. Our blog is setup through them with some customization.
Wordpress (free) - Wordpress has some really good customization options, and can be placed on your own servers and such. Requires a little more setup than Tumblr, but may be worth it for you.
Online File Space
Dropbox (free) - Gives you 2 GB of space online for free with a great syncing system. Whenever someone in your startup puts a file in the Dropbox folder on their computer, it automatically uploads it to the internet, and also downloads it to everyone else’s folder on their computer. It’s quite magical.
Drop.io (free) - Little drop zones for files to be uploaded to, pretty useful for adhoc or temporary sharing of files with people, and has many different views to interact with content.
Social Media Marketing
Twitter (free) - Great for having conversations with customers and colleagues, blasting out links to your blog articles or interesting related content, and gaining a following. Those who say Twitter is overrated may have some valid points, but we’ve found it to be a tool that has delivered consistent business value.
Facebook Page (free) - Very much like the Twitter of the Facebook world. It’s a good way to reach out to Facebook, which has a huge user base. Also very useful - being able to make events on Facebook. A lot of people have profiles there, and often making an event on Facebook is the most effective way to build an RSVP list.
YouTube (free) - Good old YouTube. Post your videos up easily and then distribute. In the social media world, content is king - and video is the most powerful and engaging form of that content.
Vimeo (free, premium member is worth checking out though) - Vimeo is growing in popularity and doesn’t have all the noise and copyright infringement of YouTube and tends to be a friendly audience. Great place to put up high quality or HD video as their viewer is beautiful and administrative system is intuitive. Also breaks down the statistics of who’s watching your video pretty nicely.
Interesting Programs of Note
Microsoft BizSpark (free at first, but has some catches) - Microsoft will let you use their software for free as long as you are a small, privately-owned startup. Most of the software can only be used for test or demonstration purposes which is the big catch, but it’s a huge help to be able to use legit, full-powered Microsoft software to get stuff done. Includes Office 2007, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Sharepoint, SQL Server, Microsoft Dynamics, Visual Studio, Expression Studio, and more.
Have some other recommendations for free or cheap tools for startups? Let us know at @CorkShare or on Facebook!
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