New to franchising and to running your own business? There are some simple online tools you can use to improve your business.

As a franchisee, you will probably wear many hats in your business, including that of a marketer. And being a marketer of your business, you’ll need to include online marketing or the Internet in your mix.

Today, there are a plethora of online marketing tools available that make life easy. What’s more, a lot of these tools are free to use online.

We’ve compiled a list of tools you can use to boost your marketing efforts. Let’s look at some of these below:

1. Social media – Hootsuite:

Undoubtedly, social media has become one of the best-known ways to market your business today. New business Facebook pages are mushrooming as you read this, and Twitter peeps are busy tweeting away juicy posts. Then of course, there’s LinkedIn and Google +.

With so many platforms available to use, entrepreneurs get overwhelmed with the enormity of social media and the nagging question “How can I find the time to be on all these platforms that are relevant to my business”?

The answer is Hootsuite. It’s a free tool that brings together all your social media account in one place, and makes it easy to compose and schedule new posts. With the free account, you can add social networks of Facebook, Twitter, Google +, LinkedIn, FourSquare, WordPress, MySpace, and mixi. The layout is easy to understand and simple to use.

You can also add “streams” such as Mentions, Direct messages (Inbox + Outbox), Sent Tweets, Favourite Tweets etc. “Mentions,” for example, will allow you to enlist your brand mentions in each of the social media.

With paid options, Hootsuite also allows you to integrate Google Analytics and Facebook Insights and track your social media performance.

2. Email marketing – Mailchimp:

If social media is the latest fad, email marketing is the ol’ tried and tested method. Email marketing is argued to be more personal because your email lands right in your prospect’s inbox.

MailChimp is an email-marketing software with more than 400 templates to choose from. There’s a recent addition of the drag and drop editor, which makes life so much easier for the busy entrepreneur. The software uses an open API and other apps like Paypal, SurveyMonkey, Shopify etc can be integrated with it. For a full list, check here.

Signing up is free, and so is sending 12,000 emails per month to a database of less than 2,000. But if you’re above that mark or want to use the Auto-responder feature, you’ll have to opt for a paid plan.

3. SEO – Google keyword tool:

Market research is an ongoing effort. Google’s free Keyword Tool allows you to understand customer behaviour to quite an extent.

The tool also helps you to find new market and niches that may be profitable to explore. Mainly, the Keyword tool is used for two purposes:

• For on-page SEO of company websites
• Research tool for Pay Per Click (PPC) or Adwords ad campaigns.

You can search for high-traffic keywords, gauge competition and cost of acquiring new customers, look for most commonly used keywords for your industry (and optimise your website for those), and analyse data geographically.

4. Online reputation – Google Alerts:

You’ve probably heard of Google Alerts, but have you set it up for your business yet? Google Alerts is another free service from Google that emails you every time there’s a piece about your brand published online.

Google Alerts is simple to set up and takes a few minutes, and in return you don’t have to scour the web searching for what people may be saying about your business. The first alerts should be obviously in your or your company’s name as keywords. If there is a blog post or a news item published with the keywords, Google will notify you via email.

Neat way to keep a track of and maintain your online reputation! You can respond to negative/misleading information out there, as well as thank others for any positive feedback.

Google Alerts can also be used to keep up with the industry. As an expert, you want to remain up to date with the latest news and happenings. The tool makes it easy for you by delivering it right in your inbox or via RSS feed.

5. Save on the Cloud – Dropbox:

In the age of technology, you have a gazillion gadgets that can save data for you. Liked a cool idea for your master bedroom interior? Click a pic with your smartphone and save. Got all your music on the iPod and a bunch of important documents safely saved on your work laptop? Great!

But what if you want to bring it all together? Dropbox allows you to do just that.

Like a multitasker’s true friend, it lets you save all your data – personal or professional – “on the cloud”, which simply means on Dropbox servers. It simplifies sharing your data with teams and friends. All the files you upload on Dropbox can be accessed from anywhere on Dropbox website or any device which has the Dropbox client.

What’s more, even if you have a massive computer meltdown or your data is set on fire, your files are still safe with Dropbox and can still be accessed come rain or hail.

What other online marketing tools would you add to the list?

Revive Projects helps franchises attract, engage and retain their clients through marketing, communications support, training advice and social media policy development. Reach Maria at mariaabadilla@reviveprojects.com.au or phone 1300 836 863.