Chuck’s Favorite Content Marketing Business Software for 2023

So… you want to learn the tools that top digital marketers use and try them all out (for free)?

Well, I’m happy to help! I’m Chuck Copenspire, I own and manage Identity Pending and have been a small business digital marketer for over 10 years. Here’s everything I used to scale myself from a freelance graphic designer to a full digital marketing agency. Good luck, and please reach out to me at chuck@identitypending.com if you have any questions!

(note: I do get referral bonuses if you sign up via some of these links. Thanks for supporting me!)

And remember, you CAN do all this yourself, but if you don’t WANT to, you can hire me and my team at www.IdentityPending.com. We offer 1:1 coaching for DIY marketers and full creative services for anyone who wants to hire an experienced team to do the work of marketing your small business online. Good luck out there!

Tools I recommend for anyone who is new to social media or content marketing

Toggle the switches to see my recommendations for each category of online business tool

Coaching Business

Circle.so — Circle.so is where I host my membership community (Magical Weirdo HQ). It also allows me to link to all my other services and courses, host live events, and keep a chat room for my group coaching clients. I really prefer it over mightynetworks and facebook groups, because the UI is amazing and I think it’s the cleanest experience. Click here to try Circle.so and build a membership community for your coaching business

DropFunnels — I have tried EVERY sales funnel platform on this planet and I ended up going deep with DropFunnels. I am on their agency plan, build all my client’s sites on their platform, host my courses there, and even got certified as an expert in their tool. I’m obsessed. The team behind it cares more than any other saas product out there, they offer tons of hands on training and resources, and I believe this tool with win the funnel wars in the long run. Click here to build your sales funnel or coaching course with DropFunnels

Automation + Productivity

Notion — That’s what you’re reading this on right now! It helps me keep my meeting notes organized and I prefer it over google drive when it comes to creating and sharing documents with customers and employees. It’s super powerful in terms of organizing notes, timelines, and tasks. I’m a big fan of the free plan but will likely upgrade to a paid plan eventually. Click here to try Notion and get organized.

ManyChat — ManyChat is a great tool for automatically responding to your customers on instagram, messenger, or whatsapp. You can even do SMS Texts and Email with their pro plan. I love this for getting leads through instagram stories or reels, messaging new followers, and answering common questions when I’m running a promotion. It has a visual editor that makes it super simple to set up your automations, even if you don’t know how to code. Click here to automate your responses with ManyChat

ClickUp — Clickup is a new one for me, that was recommended by a fellow efficiency nerd. It allows me to manage my agency team of 4 for a pretty reasonable price. I can track projects, tasks, and subtasks for each client, track time, and visually see deadlines. I was really impressed by the different dashboards and views, as someone who’s pretty new to project management. Click here to manage your creative projects with ClickUp

Motion — I really appreciate this tool for anyone who has a ton of things to do every day, but doesn’t click with traditional to-do lists. I will automatically move your to-dos around based on priority, and it also allows you to schedule appointments externally, while considering your current workload and committments. Click here to manage your time and to-do list with Motion

SEO + Writing

Ubersuggest — SEO Research is the backbone of any good content strategy and Neil Patel has really made a name for himself in the space. This tool is great for keyword research, AI brainstorming, analyzing competitors, finding opportunities and issues with your site — you name it. It’s a darn good tool.

ChatGPT — I love using AI for brainstorming content ideas and helping me flesh out the weaker areas of my writing. AI copywriting should never be used verbatim (google can tell and DOES NOT LIKE IT) — but it’s a great way to get an outline or overview of a topic and can save you hours of time in research. And somehow, it’s also free. Probably not for long!

Hemingway — This is a great editor that highlights any sentences that are too hard to read. Studies have shown that if you write at a 3rd to 5th grade level, you are going to connect with more people. You don’t need fancy writing. You need writing that is easy to understand, even if English is someone’s second language. Don’t sleep on this one. It’s free too!

Social Media Scheduling + Analytics

Metricool — I tried every single social media scheduling tool out there, but Metricool is the only tool that reliably let’s me post to almost EVERY single platform (I’m talking tiktok, instagram, facebook, twitter, pinterest, AND youtube) for myself, and also manage the brands for all of my clients at a super reasonable price. And then on top of that, they have incredible metrics and analytics, and even track your website traffic too. Nothing even remotely compares if you are a social media manager for multiple brands who needs to schedule content across platforms. I am OBSESSED. Click here to try the most powerful social media scheduler and cross-posting tool of 2022.

Hashtag + Keyword Research

I went in depth on this on my latest newsletter, but the basics are:

• https://answerthepublic.com/ — see what questions people are asking
• Google trends (explore 2+ keywords to see which one is more searched)
• Banned hashtag checker — make sure you’re not breaking any rules and see related hashtags

Graphic Design

The barriers to graphic design are a lot lower today than when I started my first graphic design business. I still am happy to help folks produce unique templates and graphics, so please reach out if you’d like a professional touch. That said, many new businesses use…

Creative Market — If you’re really on it, you can get tons of (free) design assets, fonts, and templates of exceptional quality for using Creative Market. I opt for the shockingly affordable monthly plan where I get a fat stack of resources that I can use to majorly upgrade graphics I make for my clients. Click here to download tons of free fonts and design resources

**Canva** — Canva is a great low-cost option for creating still images, carousels, simple animated reels/tiktoks, and even one-pager websites! Be careful of using base templates, because you’ll the same as your competitors, but with a low barrier to entry, I had to call this one out. Click here to build simple graphics Canva

Adobe — I’ve been using Adobe Creative Suite for 15 years, and they are the industry standard if you want to create more customized and unique graphics and videos. It’s a lot more expensive if you go for the entire suite but you can literally create ANYTHING. Click here to get graphic design superpowers with the Adobe Creative Suite

**Relight** — This one is kind of wild for a free tool, but you can relight any photo of yours to add some personality or branded colors to any basic photo! You have to see it to believe it, honestly.

Pexels — Pexels is an AMAZING resource for (free!!) stock photos and they have a more creative and editorial style than most stock photos you’ll find

Short-Form Video — Instagram Reels, Tiktok + YouTube Shorts

You can always outsource your batch video editing to a social media video editing service, like ours, but if you want to try things on your own, I recommend…

Capcut — Amazing free editor that you can use on mobile OR desktop (I’ve been asking for that for years!). Some of the effects are a little cheesy, but if you need a quick edit for mobile video, it really comes through.

Adobe Premiere Rush — This is included in the Adobe Creative Suite, but it’s great for making quick videos that you can use Metricool to blast out on every platform. Click here to try it out.

Captions App — For weeks, I was trying to figure out how all the big boy business coaches like Alex Hormozi and Gary Vaynerchuck were getting super clean captions that popped and had emojis. It was this app, Captions, which I absolutely love!

Websites

Now, of course, I’ll tell you that building a website is a lot of work and you can always hire a professional (like me!) if you get in over your head, but that I said, I recommend…

Squarespace — Incredible website builder for any online service providers or brick-and-mortar businesses. I’ve tried just about every no-code web builder out there, and Squarespace has been my bestie for 10 years (I was a very early adopter!) Wix is fine, but slower. I really don’t like Wordpress. There are more powerful builders out there if you want more control, but really Squarespace has helped me get so many small businesses off the ground quickly. I’m about to test out their email campaigns as well.

Shopify — If you’re starting an Ecommerce shop, Shopify is pretty dang powerful. They have a really great inventory management system, great design tools, and excellent integrations. I’ve launched a few clothing and product brands on here and have no complaints.

Legal + Security

Dashlane — I recently started using this tool because I can easily save all my passwords, generate secure new passwords, store my ID + credit/debit cards, AND they offer DarkWeb monitoring and a VPN. Plus my clients can share their passwords securely with me when I’m managing their websites and social profiles. Pretty sweet little bundle for a good price. Click here to secure your passwords and identity with Dashlane

Termly — I use Termly to write all my cookie policies, privacy policies, and any legal disclaimers that I need on my site. This is really important if you are running ads or need to be in compliance with any regulatory agencies. They have a free plan that was so good, I ended up going with a paid plan and love working with them. Click here to get your cookie banner and privacy policy with Termly

Finances

Honeybook — Honeybook has been a saving grace for me as I’ve sold higher ticket packages. It allows me to build proposals, invoices, payment plans, and contracts. I accept payments through them, and it sends reminders to my clients when recurring payments are due. All of which I was doing MANUALLY before this 😱 Click here to try Honeybook for $1/mo for the first 6 months (worth it, I promise!)

Bench — I decided to invest in a full service accounting solution. They help me with loans, grants, expenses, write-offs, and answer all my questions. I highly recommend them for the peace of mind and they were way cheaper than any bookkeepers I found in my area. Try Bench Accounting and get free month of bookkeeping (and a free trial!) when you sign up with my link

QuickBooks Self Employed — I really like quickbooks for tracking expenses. I use Honeybook for invoicing, but when it comes to tracking my money and making sure I’m paying my taxes on time, QuickBooks is the 🐐. Plus, if you use TurboTax to do your taxes, they pair seamlessly.

Wise — Wise is an amazing tool for accepting and sending international payments. They offer incredibly competitive exchange rates and fees, and their user interface makes it incredibly easy to send money to anyone, anywhere. I’ve been using Wise for several years, and I’ve never had an issue. I highly recommend it to anyone who deals with international transactions. Click here to try Wise and get the best exchange rates available.