On a Budget? 31 Free Tools for Entrepreneurs and Freelancers

Whether you’re working for yourself full time or just taking on a couple side projects outside of your day job, you’ve probably noticed by now that building your own business from the ground up is hard work.

Everyone told you it would be, and you knew the risks and sacrifices you were going to have to take, but I’m willing to bet you still underestimated the stress it would bring. Don’t worry, it happens to everyone.

From general business admin tasks to content marketing, I know you’ve got a lot on your plate. When you’re just starting out, a few recurring bills for various business administration tools can be tough on your budget. One of the best ways to alleviate some of that stress is to take advantage of the numerous free tools available to you which can do just as good of a job as some expensive software suites.

Here’s a collection of some of the best free tools to help make your life easier:

Design

• Logaster: Professional logo maker.
• Hipster Logo Generator: Create simple logos.
• Layers: A WordPress site builder.
• Templated: 860+ free CSS & HTML5 site templates.

Writing/Blogging

• Grammarly: An extension to help correct grammar mistakes.
• Hemingway: Hemingway helps make sure your writing is easy to understand.
• Headline Analyzer: Analyze headlines to determine emotional appeal.
• ZenPen: A clean writing slate to help you block any distractions.
• Liberio: Simple eBook creation with Google Drive.
• Free Summarizer: Quickly summarize any text.
• MakeAWebsiteHub.com: Learn how to start a blog quickly and easily.
• SiteBeginner: to help you launch your first website.
• BloggingBasics101.com: great blogging tutorials.

Communication

• Mailchimp: A bulk email tool with free and paid options.
• Slack: Real-time messaging.
• Sumome List Builder: Collect email addresses.
• Hello Bar: Build your subscriber list.
• Sendinblue: Send 9,000 emails per month free.
• Mandrill: Free 12K emails/month.

Social Media

• Ruzzit: Find the most shared content on the web.
• WriteRack: Post multiple tweets in a row quickly.
• Spruce: Create attractive images for Twitter format.
• Latergram: Schedule Instagram posts.
• SharedCount: Track URL shares, likes, tweets, and more.
• Klout: Social media influence score on browser extension.

Customer Service

• Free Survey Creator: Create a survey and get customer feedback.
• Responster: Customer feedback made easy.
• Groove: Custom help desk software.
• InvoiceHome: A simple, yet robust invoice generator.

Legal

• LegalTemplates.net: Legal forms including non-disclosure agreements, invoice templates and more.

Organization

• Trello: Keep track of all of your tasks.
• Evernote: Keep track of your ideas.