Everyone has their favourite tools—here are some of mine…
I have used all of the following software, services, tools and equipment to build websites, make products, create online courses, drive traffic, generate online sales and automatically accept payments.
Some of the links below are affiliate links, which means I may earn a small commission from the ones that people click and end up buying. (Helps fund all the free info on this site!)
However, I have never and will never recommend anything I don’t use, like or agree with. #JUSTSAYING 🙂
So without further ado, here’s my list of ‘go to’ tools…
Website Building
I use WordPress for all of my websites. It’s free, easy to install, and can be highly customised.
On top of WordPress I install various ‘plugins’, to enhance it’s functionality, with the main ones being either GeneratePress or the more geeky combo of Genesis Framework + Cobalt Dynamik + Beaver Builder.
I use the Gravity Forms plugin to create data capture forms.
And without a doubt the absolutely most life-saving (well, blog saving) tool I ever subscribed to has been BlogVault.
BlogVault is an automated WordPress daily backup service that has saved my bacon on far more occasions than I’d care to admit. ALL of my websites (and I run a lot) are backed up every single say with Blogvault, and it lets me instantly restore if anything goes awry. Highly recommended!
E-Mail Marketing & CRM
Many years ago I signed up for Aweber, and a few years later, InfusionSoft too.
Unfortunately as much as I love what Aweber did for me, I feel like it’s totally out of date now. They have belatedly added various features to it, but it seems like they’re always playing catch up with newer email marketing and CRM services, and the way it organises subscribers into separate lists is really far from ideal, at least for how I perform email marketing these days.
Infusionsoft is amazing, but it’s a ‘beast’. Perhaps they’ve made it easier to use since I last logged in, but my experience of moving to InfusionSoft from Aweber was not a good one. It’s probably my fault but I think for quite a few years I got lost in all it’s crazy complexity, and my business suffered as a result.
In 2011 I more or less stopped my Internet Marketing activities for a few years, to focus on other opportunities.
Now I’m back online, I knew I didn’t want to go back to either Aweber or InfusionSoft, so I started looking at all the various new services out there.
And blimey… so many to choose from!
In the end though, the choice of which service to use was easy.
ConvertKit is amazing… click here to read my full review.
Outsourcing
Don’t try and do it all yourself… it takes too darn long!
Outsource the stuff you don‘t enjoy doing. Outsource the stuff you enjoy doing but which takes too long and isn’t profitable. Outsource the stuff you love doing and which is also profitable… so you can scale your business without having to employ full time staff!
As you can see, there are lots of reasons to outsource, so here are some of the best places to find people to pass your work onto;
Upwork – I have used them for all manner of outsource tasks including simple graphic design and web work right up to complex programming tasks. A great place to find outsource workers.
Fiverr – quick and cheap. Work can be variable but it’s a great place to look especially for simple tasks. (I’ve used this website for a lot of voiceover talent and they’ve never let me down.)
People Per Hour – I’ve not used this much but not had any problems and other people seem to recommend it.
Freelancer – Another great source of skilled freelancers for hire.
Toptal – generally more expensive but they have stringent process that ensures the people offering outsource services are the best of the best.
Content Marketing & Copywriting
Content Idea Generator – the clue’s in the title of what this does! It can generate hundreds of suggestions in less than one second.
Web Hosting
Being UK based, I host most of my websites with Krystal, and I use Fasthosts to register and manage my domain names.
Video Marketing
This list could go on and on and on and on, so I’ll just give you the basics (my courses go into all the options in a lot more detail).
For easy video hosting I use and recommend Wistia. If you’re technical or like a challenge then you can try and setup Amazon S3 to host your video files. (It’s cheap, but not for the faint hearted—very technical!)
For pro video recording I use a Fuji X-T2 camera with a Rode NTG4+ Shotgun microphone.
On a shoestring budget? Your smartphone’s probably good enough. Just make sure you’re recording good audio.
My Manfrotto mini tripod is really handy, and I use a Blue Yeti USB microphone along with Camtasia software to create high quality screen recordings.
For royalty free audio music and sound effects I use the fabulous Epidemic Sounds.