That’s why you need to use every tool in the toolbelt to get ahead of the game.

If there’s one thing I’ve learned from running a small business, it’s that sales take a lot of hustle and legwork. You have to acquire leads, send out information, have meetings, follow-up, and close the deal. Even if your customer is interested, they aren’t usually the drivers of the conversation. If you forget to follow-up with your prospects, you’ll likely lose the sale.

But if you’re running a small business, there’s not always a lot of extra bandwidth (either in time or budget) to build out a big sales workflow. Instead, you need to be smart about the tools you invest in.

Today we’re sharing 14 best (and mostly free) sales tools that prove you don’t really have to spend money to make money.

Live Chat

I initially added a live chat widget to my webpage as an experiment. I didn’t think many of my potential customers would message me through it. I definitely didn’t think it would turn into my biggest source of leads.

But my experiment paid off. Adding live chat to my website was the easiest way to start converting website traffic to leads – even if I couldn’t always respond in real time. There are tons of free tools available.

Here are three I like:

Drift: While Drift is known for its powerful workflows and integrations for enterprise sales teams, their free individual plan is also pretty useful. It includes one seat for live chatting, space for 100 contacts and a customizable welcome message.

Chatra: Built as a modern messaging platform, Chatra includes a lot of really nice to have features that make talking with your customers feel almost like talking with your friends. Their free plan also includes just one user, but is stacked with a ton of valuable features.

Tawk.to: It’s one of the most popular chat tools on the internet, and for good reason. Tawk.to is free forever, with unlimited agents. It’s a great basic chat platform that will meet most of your sales needs.

Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

When you start your business, you might have kept all your client information in your head, or stored in your inbox. Once you have a few dozen customers, that’s no longer practical. I started by documenting clients in a spreadsheet but still found things were falling through the cracks. A CRM can help you keep track of all your leads, prospects, and customers much more easily. These free tools will help you remember who needs a follow-up, identify opportunities and measure your overall sales volume.

Hubspot

Automated interaction tracking, pipeline management, and excellent reporting. Hubspot’s free CRM helps you know exactly what you should be doing next to bring in more sales. Plus, as you grow, Hubspot’s ecosystem of marketing automation, service desk, and sales hub will meet your ever-changing needs.

Really Simple Systems

Track your sales from start to finish, set tasks and automate follow-ups and campaigns with Really Simple Systems – a CRM for small B2B sales teams. Their free plan includes two users and 100 contacts.

Freshsales

Part of the Freshworks platform, Freshsales offers unlimited contacts and unlimited users in their free CRM. Plus, it fits seamlessly in with the rest of their helpful suite of tools including a Help Desk, Status Page and collaboration tools.

Email Tracking

I send a ton of emails every day, but the big sales emails are the most important to me. I want to know when potential customers have opened my cold email, I want to see when prospects have read my quote and I need to know if my existing clients have viewed the invoice. This is where email tracking comes in handy. Using these tools will help you remember to follow up and give you a nudge when your clients are engaging with your information.

SalesHandy

Schedule emails, see when prospects open up your email and create templates for your sales emails. The free version of SalesHandy is super useful and integrates with Gmail, so you can easily send and track emails.

Mailcastr

Mailcastr’s free plan limits tracking to just three emails per day, but it’s a simple, lightweight option for teams just looking to get notified on the occasional email. Install it as a Chrome extension and get real-time notifications when your email is opened.

Bananatag

Bananatag was one of the first email-tracking products available on the market. Their free plan allows you to track five emails per day. When a prospect opens your email, you’ll get a notification right in your inbox.

Booking

“I can do between 2 and 4 on Thursday, and anytime after 5 on Friday”
“My time or your time?”
“Oh, sorry, actually….”

Sound familiar? Booking software can eliminate the need for back-and-forth emails to choose a meeting time that suits everyone. They also prevent timezone issues and help every attendee add the meeting to their calendar of choice. The invite includes a meeting link to the video conference call software you use too. Best of all, there are a ton of free booking software options available.

Calendly

Offering prospects the chance to book a convenient meeting time through Calendly removes all the friction of booking meetings. It only takes three clicks to book, which means you’ll have more sales calls on your schedule in no time. The Basic Calendly plan includes one calendar and one event type (ie. only a 30 minute meeting or 15 minute meeting).

Bookafy

Unlimited event types, unlimited bookings, and a beautiful design. Bookafy’s free offering is a heavy hitter. Even with their basic version, you can do a lot of customization to get your booking workflow exactly in the shape you want it.

Productivity

When you have a million things to do, finding a tool that saves you time is a cause for celebration. These tools will all make your sales process more effective and keep your business running smoothly.

Document signing: HelloSign

Remove the need for prospects to print, sign, scan, or fax paper contracts back to you. Digital signing is much more efficient for everyone. HelloSign’s free plan includes three documents per month.

Video Conferencing: Zoom

The free version of Zoom might even be better than the expensive enterprise video platforms available. It’s lightweight, extremely easy to set up, great quality and syncs to your calendars. The free version only allows meetings up to 40 minutes for up to 100 participants. Incorporating small business phone systems can significantly boost your communication capabilities. These systems support robust direct customer engagement and internal team coordination, essential for busy sales environments.

Email Locator: Hunter

If you want to get in touch with a company, but you aren’t quite sure who the best person to email is, Hunter can locate all the relevant email and job titles for you. Simply enter the company’s domain name and Huner will return every contact they’ve found for them. Get up to 100 searches per month on their free plan.

Bonus tool

Email Signature Generator: Newoldstamp

A standardized email signature used across your whole organization can create thousands of sales opportunities every day with every email sent.

Newoldstamp helps sales teams stay memorable and keep prospects engaged with the help of customized email signatures. It also comes with built-in email signature analytics that helps monitor your CTA effectiveness, which is a valuable addition for any salesperson.

Boost your sales workflow into overdrive

When you’re trying to grow your business, every sale counts. That’s why you need to use every tool in the toolbelt to get ahead of the game. Plus, it doesn’t help if those Sales tools come free! Did we miss any tools that your sales team can’t live without? Let us know!

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