We know first-hand that software and resources can be an expensive investment to make, for businesses of all sizes. It can also be difficult to judge if resources are going to fill the need and be worth that investment. With free resources, you’ve got nothing to lose. Especially if they’ve been tried and tested. There are plenty of free marketing resources on the market and here are some of our favourites…
A design agency that supports the use of Canva? Let us explain. In our opinion, there is a time and place for Canva when it comes to design. Canva has become a very popular marketing tool but there are some limitations to be aware of.
Branding and printed documents especially, are a no go in our experience. You simply can’t replicate anything near the quality from a design agency. But for social media, we often find that Canva is the perfect, time efficient and cost effective solution.
You can register for free with the option to upgrade for additional features at an additional charge. On the free version, you’ll have access to a variety of templates that you can customise to suit your content and brand. The program itself is super simple to use, and the interface is very user-friendly.
We’ve worked with clients in the past to develop custom, branded templates using Canva. It is a great solution to retain great design, and take advantage of how easy Canva is to use.
Sometimes all you need to take your website or print marketing from good to great is some awesome imagery. Stock image sites can be expensive but there are plenty of free sites out there which allow you to search and download professional photos. Just make sure to check the licensing agreement on their website.
Our go to free stock site is Unsplash. Here you’ll find a huge selection of beautiful stock imagery (free to use) across a vast range of subjects, including everything from animals to food, textures and backgrounds. The perfect free marketing solution for images, perfect for any project.
Choosing the right font is often more complicated than you might think. Finding a font you like the style of is only the beginning.
Most importantly you need consider the licensing terms and whether the font can be used on a website. Without either of those, you could be at risk of breaching your usage rights or you’ll go to design a website and find that the font isn’t compatible and you are back to square one.
By using Google Fonts, you don’t need to worry about either of those potential issues. The fonts have an open license, can be used commercially, are web safe and best of all they are free. There are nearly 1500 fonts to choose from and they even have a selection if icons, both of which can be easily filter to find exactly what you are looking for. They tick all the boxes and that is why they are our go-to for fonts.
Fonts we love!
- Poppins (our brand font of choice)
- Open Sans
- Roboto
- Josefin Sans
- Delicious Handrawn
- Meow Script (strange name we know, but trust us!)
We’ve found that virtual meetings are here to stay and we’ve tried our fair share of platforms. If you’ve been using Zoom or Teams and finding it difficult to use, full of glitches and a limited experience then you are in the same boat as us.
Our platform of choice is always Google Meet. The events link seamlessly with your Google Calendar, you can have up to 100 participants, there is no time limit and anyone can share their screen. You’ve got the option to create a chat, share files and even share questions for the group to answer.
Social Media
This might sound like an obvious one, but social media could be your best free marketing asset. There are paid for social media scheduling tools out there, but if you are getting started we suggest two simple things.
Firstly, use the in-app scheduling tools for Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. The option to schedule posts is built in and you have the option to save drafts. You could even use something as simple as a Word document or a spreadsheet to plan your content. All you need is to write down what day/time you are going to post, the general theme/copy and a folder for your relevant images. It doesn’t need to be anything fancy or complicated.
Secondly, check out your competition for inspiration. Have a look at what types of content they are posting and more importantly, what content is doing well. Likes, shares and comments show that their followers are interacting with them and the more a post has, the more engaging it has been.
Ok, so we know we said five but consider this a bonus tip! WeTransfer is one of the free resources we get the most use out of, and recommend to all of our customers. It is a file sharing platform that allows you to send up to 2Gb files across the world or across the room.
There is the option to sign up to a paid version to get unlimited file size allowance and even unlimited storage but we find that the ‘I just want to send files’ free option works for most of our customers.
Send PDFs, images, Word docs, Powerpoints, spreadsheets…pretty much any file you can think of can be sent via WeTransfer, all in one go. Simply drag and drop your files, add in your email and the recipients email, a little message if you want and hit send. So much easier than sending a load of emails with one attachment on each!
Here’s another bonus tip…Mailchimp offer free email marketing! Yes, you get more emails and features if you go for one of their paid for packages but if you are a small business or you’re just starting out the free option is worth a look.
With over 300+ integrations, the free version of Mailchimp lets you send 1000 emails a month and you even have access to some of their pre-built templates.
Take a look at our blog post Did You Know? Email Marketing to find out more about email marketing and how it can work for your business.
Hopefully these tips can help you on your way, whether you are a new startup or even if you have been in business a long time. You’ll find plenty of great free marketing tools out there, you just need to know where to look. There is never a bad time to reduce some of your outgoings or test out something new, especially when it is free!
