12 Free Google Tools for Your Small Business
With all of the cost cutting these days, I wanted to bring your attention to some of the best free Google tools for your small business. These tools/services can help cut costs for startups and small business within the office, for communications, and for your internet marketing presence. Here’s my list of the top 12 free Google tools (not ranked in any order):
(1) Free blogging service: Blogger
Blogging is a great way to show expertise in your space and become a thought leader through your posts. Blogger is Google’s free service that allows you to easily post and change the layout of the site. If you want to start getting SEO credit for each post (which I recommend), you can also migrate your blogger site to a sub-domain of yours like, blog.yourdomain.com.
(2) Youtube Channel
By creating a Youtube channel, you can keep all of your videos (commercials, tutorials, promotions, skits, events) in one place. Also, Youtube allows you to pull the code and easily embed the videos into your website. There are also Facebook apps that allow you to show your Youtube channel right on your Facebook page through a tab. *If you don’t already have any videos, we have a tip for you! Make your own ”search story” video if you have some exposure on the first page of Google - and it’s fun!
(3) Picture editor and album: Picasa
Picasa allows you to easily put all of your company pictures in one place, and again, easily grab the HTML code to embed an image in your website or on Facebook FBML tabs. You can easily make welcome tabs for your Facebook page this way, which is an important piece to social networking for small businesses.
(4) Local search/maps listing: Google Places
Google Places is a free listing on Google maps, that will come up in searches that will have a local element to them. You can embed appropriate keywords and optimize the listing with content, images, a verified map with directions, and even coupons. This is a very powerful tool - make sure you claim it and make sure the profile is at 100% complete. This is free advertising at it’s best, and very easy for you to maintain and track results.
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(5) Free email: Gmail
You can easily set up a Gmail account for your business, employees and yourself. It is more professional, however, to have your email accounts set up through your own domain (info@yourdomain.com). I recommend setting up a gmail account MyCompanyName@gmail.com, however, for SEO link-building purposes. If you are submitting your site to directories or writing comments on other appropriate blogs, it’s nice to attach a gmail account instead of your professional account.
(6) Phone number services: Google Voice
Google voice is an incredible service that allows you to search for and pick any available number by area code or by letter (214-THE-BEST). Then, you can set up this number to ring your home phone, cell phone, work phone, or no phone at all depending on what time it is or what number is calling. You also get an email transcript and text transcript of the voicemail. You can listen to it online, and read and respond to texts online, all for free. Read more about it.
(7) Online Calendar
Google has a tool to keep your calendar up to date with reminders. You can share it with friends, sync it with other devices and desktop items, send invitations and track RSVPs. It’s a great way to keep your staff on the same page.
(8) Online Document Sharing: Google Docs
Google Docs is another great sharing system. Multiple users can upload and work on a document at the same time or at various points, always keeping the most updated version for everyone to access in the office. We use this for lead generation, recording billable hours, and sharing collaborative reports that have more than one writer.
(9) Latest updates for any topic: Google Alerts
Google Alerts are email updates on the latest results (news, blogs, web) for any topic you choose. You can choose how often you want updates, what type of updates, and the quality of results. I recommend telling employees of yours to subscribe to appropriate updates (the marketing guys should be getting a “marketing in _____ industry” alert). A Google Alert email is a great way to start a day for everyone in the office. It keeps them on top of the industry news and happenings while trying to wake up with some coffee.
Behind the Scene Tools
(10) Webmaster Tools
Google Webmaster Tools covers many of the great tools for a website. It starts with the dashboard where you can see who is linking to you, what keywords your website has, what searches bring your site up, and if you have a sitemap or not. From there, you can find recommendations to improve your website and how to increase site performance. I will not go deeper into it now, but this is the place for seeing the effectiveness of your website on the web.
(11) Google Keyword Tool
The Keyword Tool under Google Adwords allows you to find the local monthly searches (US), global monthly searches, competition, and trends for a specific keyword. The results also recommend and show data for other related searches. This is incredibly powerful for SEO because you can find the right keyword searches to go after for your website. For example, you can find out that you should be going after “Boston Sports Store” instead of “Boston Sports Wear” because it has a higher search count and lower competition. Thistool is part of the first step for optimizing your site.
(12) Google Analytics
Google Analytics is the way to track how everything on your website is going. You can see trafficstatistics, visitor information, where the traffic is coming from, and many other indicators. __________ If you can slowly integrate these 12 free tools from Google into the day-to-day of your small business, you will be able to save money, work more efficiently, and make better decisions as a teamand as an entrepreneur. What are some of your other favorite free business resources on the web? Let’s hear your comments below…
