Luckily enough, we live in a time with numerous options that increase efficiency. Did you know that usage of suite of tools can save you a lot of resources in terms of money and time?
Choosing the right tools for your type of business can help you improve effeciency across all departments. Be it Customer relationships, team communication, graphic design, UX, and SEO optimization of your webpage.
It is not always possible to pick the best tools for your start-up right at the beginning. But the good thing is, that there are a lot of tools on the market that offer a free day trial so you can actually try them out and see whether they suit you or not.
Why do you need tools for startups?
It is difficult to figure out where to begin when setting up a company. However, with the appropriate tools, you can always get your startup up and running quickly.
People believe that establishing a company is beyond their reach or that it requires a large sum of money. In fact, 20% of small businesses fail in the first year, often due to operational inefficiencies, highlighting the need for startups to leverage effective tools early on. That’s why we’ve compiled a list of affordable and readily available online tools for startups that you can use for your new company without exceeding your budget.
Best software for your startup
We are bringing you the list of the 25 Best tools for startups in 2024:
1. UXtweak
If you’re running a startup, you know that building a product people actually want to use is your golden ticket. That’s where UXtweak comes into play with its wide range of tools. UXtweak is a user research platform that will help you nail product-market fit, improve user experience, and validate your concepts right from the start – saving your limited budget and time.
Features:
- Validate concepts and ideas
Don’t rely on gut feeling. Use concrete data from our User Survey Tool to inform your product decisions.
- Test Before You Build
Leverage our Website Usability Testing tool and Prototype Testing features to validate your ideas before you even write a single line of code. Test wireframes, mockups, and MVPs to find out what works and what doesn’t.
- Optimize Onboarding and UX
First impressions matter. Use the First Click Testing tool and Session Recording software to understand where users might get stuck and what keeps them from converting.
- Understand UPreferences and collect feedback
Our Preference Testing tool and Five-Second Test feature offer quick insights into what design elements resonate with your audience. User Survey tool allows you to collect customer feedback helping you to build more engaging products.
- Refine your information architecture
Our online Card Sorting tool and Tree Testing tools help you organize your website content and navigation in a way that makes sense to your users.
- User test your mobile apps natively
Our Mobile App Usability Testing tool lets you test finished App Store and Google Play apps as well as TestFlight, APK, mobile prototypes and more. Make sure your mobile apps offer world-class UX to stand out from the competition.
- Save Time on User Recruitment
Finding the right test users is difficult. Our Recruiting Widget and User Panel lets you easily recruit your target audience for any type of research you need.
Pricing:
UXtweak offers a free plan for early-stage projects. The Business package starts at $151. It comes with a free trial upon request and is designed to scale with your startup’s growing needs.
For those in between, our Plus package starts at $59 and offers a balanced set of features. And if you’re looking for something more advanced, our Enterprise package can be customized just for you.
Build products people want and know how to use with UXtweak. Start for free today! 🐝
2. Asana
Asana is one of the best project management tools for startups. But it is not only popular between new businesses, companies such as Uber, Google, PayPal, and Facebook were also using this tool to increase effectiveness within project management.
This tool helps with managing and organizing tasks, tracking progress, and following deadlines, and it also enables teams to communicate within the platform. It drives businesses’ innovation and growth by providing an overall outlook of the projects and individual responsibilities.
Features:
- Workflow Builder
- Timeline
- Workload
- Automation
- Reporting
Pricing:
Asana offers a free plan for teams of up to 15 people. It consists of simple tasks and project management.
The Premium plan starts at 10,99€ and the Business plan starts at 24,99€. Both prices are per user and per month billed annually.
3. CloudTalk
CloudTalk is a cloud-based call center software designed to improve your telephone operations without the need for traditional hardware. It provides access to more than 70 calling features, enabling companies to streamline their communication procedures and enhance the efficiency of their sales and customer support teams. Additionally, it allows businesses to easily establish a global presence by offering access to 160 international phone numbers.
The software integrates with various CRMs, eliminating the need for manual data transfers and ensuring a smooth workflow. This integration empowers companies to deliver personalized and seamless customer experiences, leading to higher customer satisfaction and loyalty.
Features:
- Interactive voice response (IVR)
- Power Dialer
- Call Flow Designer
- Call Monitoring
- Smart Dialer
Pricing:
CloudTalk offers a 14-day free trial period to users, following which they can choose from paid plans such as Basic, Expert, and Custom, priced at $25, $30, and $50, respectively.
4. HubSpot
Building and maintaining a relationship with your customers is extremely important. HubSpot is one of the most preferred tools for startups that provide a free Customer Relationship Management tool. HubSpot’s CRM platform has all tools your start-up needs for marketing, sales, content management, and customer service. It also integrates with all of your business’ key systems like your landline service, email platforms and any analytics tools you use.
Features:
- Content management
- Contact website activity
- Companies
- Deals
- Tasks & activities
Pricing:
HubSpot offers a free CRM tool with many features.
When it comes to paid offering, you can choose between products & plans, or bundles. Hubspot pricing differs, but the starting point is usually 41€ per month for a Starter package.
If you are looking around for the right CRM, take a look at this comparison of the best CRM for small businesses to find the right one for your startup.
💡Tip: If HubSpot is not the right choice for you take a look at this list of the best free CRM tools.
5. Slack
Slack is the communication tool that will help you manage and improve your internal communication. Slack is also one of the fastest-growing business applications in previous years and currently, over 75,000 companies are using this tool.
Slack enables you to create multiple channels where you can discuss different projects and topics. One of the best features of Slack is the possibility of connecting other tools that your start-up uses, for instance, Gmail, Google Drive, etc.
Features:
- Organized conversations
- Possible external collaborations
- Voice & Video calls
- File sharing
Pricing:
A free plan is limited to only 90-day access messages and integration only allows no more than 10 other tools.
Paid plans start at 6,75$ and 11,75$ per person monthly when billed yearly.
6. Uniqode
Uniqode is our next choice among essential tools for startups. It is a versatile tool that’s a game-changer for startups, particularly when it comes to form building and data collection. Whether you’re gathering leads, conducting surveys, or seeking customer feedback, Uniqode’s advanced form capabilities streamline the process. This platform not only allows you to create customizable forms and surveys but also integrates seamlessly with over 5000+ apps like HubSpot, Mailchimp, and Zapier, helping you track performance and automate workflows with ease.
It also offers powerful analytics to monitor user behavior, so you can continuously optimize your forms to maximize conversions. As a bonus, Uniqode’s dynamic QR codes can link directly to your forms, making it easy to collect responses both online and offline.
Features:
- Customizable, dynamic forms & surveys
- Conditional logic to tailor forms to user inputs
- Seamless integration with CRMs and other tools
- Built-in analytics to track form performance
- QR code generation for quick form access and tracking
Pricing:
Uniqode offers a free plan that allows you to create basic forms and track submissions. Paid plans start at $5/month for individuals, with plans for businesses starting at $15/month. Each plan includes advanced features like custom branding and analytics, with a 14-day free trial to test all the capabilities.
Uniqode is perfect for startups looking to optimize customer interaction and data collection—whether you’re gathering feedback, generating leads, or simply streamlining communication with your audience.
7. Upmetrics
Upmetrics is a modern, AI-powered business planning software designed to simplify the creation of detailed business plans. It helps startups, new entrepreneurs, and small business owners draft professional business plans in minutes.
Its advanced AI capabilities and user-friendly functionalities make the business planning process a breeze for its users. The AI writing assistant auto-writes sections of your business plan, whereas the forecasting assistant assists in realistic financial projections and accurate budgets.
The best part? It’s affordable, reliable, and most suitable for beginners to plan and grow their businesses with ease.
Features:
- 400+ sample business plan templates
- Robust AI Assistant to draft actionable plans
- Business plan builder (with drag-and-drop capabilities)
- Financial forecasting up to 7 years
- AI pitch deck creator for compelling pitches
- Free guides and educational resources
- Real-time cloud storage
- Easy collaboration and sharing options
Pricing:
Upmetrics offers three subscription plans to fit different needs. It includes:
- Starter plan: $7/month
- Premium plan: $14/month
- Professional plan: $37/month
8. Trackdesk
If you’re planning to launch your own affiliate marketing program, Trackdesk is a reliable affiliate marketing platform that lets easily onboard and manage affiliates, track and analyze their performance and create personalized experiences for your affiliate partners.
With Trackdesk, you get reliable tracking and analytics to measure campaign performance and KPIs to make data-driven decisions.
It is great for startups thanks to its nonexistent setup cost and the fact that it is free for up to $1,000 monthly revenue, allowing you to start small and scale up.
Features:
- Bulk auto-affiliate payouts
- Real-time analytics and reporting
- Customizable payouts and offers
- User-friendly interface and dashboard
- Customization and personalization capabilities
- Seamless integrations with platforms like Stripe, Zapier, and Shopify
- Supports 17 languages
Pricing:
Trackdesk offers a free plan and when you reach a monthly affiliate revenue of $1,000, you can sign up for the Starter Plan which starts at $67 a month.
9. Stripe
Stripe is a financial services provider that allows sellers to accept credit and debit cards or other payments. Since most of Stripe Payments’ distinctive features, like an open application programming interface and the capacity to support over 135 currencies, are mainly applicable to internet sales, business owners who organize the majority of their work online are especially suitable to use it.
Features:
- Online payments
- Risk management
- Financial connections
- Invoicing
- Revenue recognition
Pricing:
Stripe gives different possibilities in pricing. You can customize the package of features you need or choose a ready-made one.
10. Nightwatch
Nightwatch’s Rank Tracker offers reliable rank tracking solutions with an attractive interface. It allows for customizable reporting and local tracking, accessing various Google Data Centers worldwide. Its focus lies in offering customizable automated reporting and detailed local tracking solutions. It provides the option to access and monitor various Google Data Centers that cover global locations down to the postcode level.
Features:
- Rank Tracking
- Global Data Center Access
- Segment Analysis
- Automated reporting
- Site auditing
- Intuitive interface
- API Access
Pricing:
The pricing structure is flexible to accommodate different business needs, starting at $32 per month for the basic plan.
11. Canva
Canva is one of the most popular tools for start-ups. Thanks to Canva, you will be able to create amazing designs for your social media, blogs, products, advertisements, and much more.
You do not have to worry if you are not a graphic designer, Canva has a library with numerous templates, fonts, images, videos, etc. Thanks to Canva it is easy to create an appealing visual content.
Features:
- Photo editing
- Content Library
- Graphs & charts
- templates for Social media content, product mockups and many more
Pricing:
You can freely use Canva for free. However, the pro version enables you to create a brand kit, and use premium content such as images, videos, and icons.
The pro version is available as a 30-day free trial. After that, you need to pay 11,99$ a month.
12. Figma
Figma is a cooperative web-based application for interface design, with desktop applications for macOS and Windows enabling extra offline features. Figma links everybody involved in the design process, allowing teams to deliver better products more quickly.
It can be used for anything from wireframing websites to modeling mobile app functionalities, prototyping layouts, designing social media posts, and much more.
Features:
- Application programming interface
- Integrations with Third Parties
- Import/Export of data
- Tools for Cooperation
- Animation
- CAD implements
Pricing:
A free plan is limited to only 3 Figma and 3 FigJam files but allows unlimited collaborators.
Paid plans start at 12$ and 45$ per editor monthly when billed yearly1. Grammarly
13. Grammarly
Grammarly is a tool that will help you to be present on social media and the web without grammatical and spelling mistakes. It is a writing assistant that offers you specific suggestions to help you improve your writing. Grammarly is also analyzing and evaluating your tone of voice, and it will tell you how your text might sound to readers.
Features:
- Correctness
- Clarity
- Engagement
- Delivery
- Plagiarism detection
Pricing:
You can download Grammarly for free. The free version will correct your grammar, spelling, and punctuation.
You can also purchase a premium plan (starting at 12$ a month), or a business plan (starting at 15$ per member, monthly).
14. SendPulse
Marketing automation platform that incorporates a variety of channels and offers to build an elaborate sales pipeline by means of combining marketing emails, SMS, web push notifications and messenger chatbots.
The visual chatbot builder is very intuitive and allows marketers to automate customer interactions on social media platforms and popular messengers like Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Telegram, and Viber.
Features:
- intuitive drag-and-drop editor helps build message flows
- GPT-3 integration allows for a more human-like interaction
- Payment system integration provides seamless and secure payment options
- Smartphone App to manage your chatbots on the go
Pricing:
Free plan allows users to build 3 chatbots with up to 1000 contacts.
Paid plans start at $8 per month.
15. Bizplanr
Bizplanr is an innovative AI business plan generator that helps young entrepreneurs and business owners write their business plans with ease. It offers robust AI capabilities, easy-to-use templates, sample plans, and user-friendly features to streamline the complicated business planning process.
But how to get started with Bizplanr? The process is easy: All you’ll need to do is answer a few simple questions about your business idea. Then, its AI will use your response to structure a comprehensive business plan that covers all the essential elements, from market analysis to financial projections.
Features:
- Advanced AI Assistance to create solid plans
- Industry-specific guidance
- Library of sample plans
- Easy sharing options
- Most affordable and reliable
Pricing:
Bizplanr is 100% free to use. It allows you to generate a plan for free with simple question-answers and a downloading option (PDF).
16. NAKIVO Backup & Replication
NAKIVO Backup & Replication is our next startup tool. This platform is a comprehensive data protection solution tailored for small and medium businesses (SMBs), offering seamless backup, replication and disaster recovery functionalities.
Organizations of all sizes and in various industries can protect their critical workloads, minimize downtime, and ensure data availability in case of a disruption or disaster. The NAKIVO startup solution combines easy management capabilities with advanced features, making it one of the key tools for startups seeking reliable and efficient data protection.
Features:
- Fast and incremental backups
- Anti-ransomware features
- Cross-platform recovery
- Strong security protocols
- Automation and scheduling
- DR orchestration
Pricing:
The free edition offers fast backups, basic protection against ransomware, and limited cross-platform recovery options. The free trial includes all features but is available for 15 days.
The paid plans can be purchased with a subscription license that starts at $2.50 per workload/month or with a perpetual license that starts at $229 per socket.
17. Gusto
Gusto is an HR tool that will help you with onboarding, paying, insurance, and much more. If you want your new business to be successful, you need to build your own employer brand. Don’t keep it all in Google Drive. A well-managed employer brand will help you expand your talent pool and attract more candidates for your open job positions, apart from that, a good employer brand can be a strong competitive advantage.
Features:
- Running payroll
- Hiring
- Employee benefits
- Business finances
- People management
Pricing:
Unfortunately, there is no free trial available.
The core plan starts at 6$ per person plus 39$ monthly base price.
18. Buffer
Daily life in startups can be extremely busy. But you can save up some time when it comes to social media management. Buffer is a platform that enables you to manage all of your social media platforms from one place. With their automatization tool, you will be able to publish your content to your social media channels from one place. Buffer is a great choice among affordable tools for startups that focus on social media management.
Features:
- Publishing
- Analytics
- Engagement
- Start Page
Pricing:
In Buffer’s free plan, you will be able to schedule 10 posts for 3 social channels.
Paid plans start from 5$ billed monthly to 100$ billed monthly.
19. Generated.photos
Generated.photos offers a platform for accessing and creating photos entirely crafted by AI. Users can explore a diverse gallery or produce unique models based on specific parameters in real-time. The service is designed for various applications including design, research, and machine learning.
Additionally, the platform provides tools for uploading and modifying photos, ensuring users can tailor images to meet their specific needs. The AI-driven approach ensures high-quality and diverse image outputs, streamlining the process of finding or creating the perfect image for various projects.
Features:
- AI-generated diverse images
- Real-time model creation
- Face and Human Generator
- Anonymizer
- Datasets for machine learning and academic research
Pricing:
The Yearly Plan is priced at $16.58/month with a free trial and a 22% discount. The Monthly Plan is available at $19.99/month. Additionally, API access for programmatically integrating Generated Photos and Anonymizer is available.
20. Just In Mind
Just In Mind is one of the best tools for startups when it comes to creating wireframes and turning them into highly interactive prototypes. Available web interactions and mobile gestures will make your design process easy and efficient, and you will be able to create delightful user experiences.
Features:
- Visual design
- Mobile gestures
- Web interactions
- Animations and effects
- Functional forms and fields
Pricing:
Just In Mind offers a free wireframe tool with unlimited projects and users and free UI kits.
Standard plan starts at 9$ per one user per month.
21. Foundersuite
Foundersuite is a leading platform, used by thousands of startups, for raising capital. The offering of Foundersuit will help you set a structure and efficiency in terms of investor management.
You can also find tools that will help with creating monthly progress reports, and with customizing your own board and stages of your funnel according to your workflow.
Features:
- Investor CRM
- Investor Database
- Investor Updates
- Custom emails
- Startup Docs
Pricing:
Foundersuite offers a basic package with 25 investors in CRM.
Paid offering starts at 44$ , or 62$ billed annually.
22. Balsamiq Wireframes
Balsamiq Wireframes is a quick, low-precision UI wireframing platform that simulates doodling on a whiteboard or notebook while using a computer. It effectively forces you to put your attention on content and structure rather than wasting time on conversations about colors and details.
With wireframes, you can easily create more ideas, discard the subpar ones, and identify the best options.
Features:
- Tools for Cooperation
- Library of Components
- Import/Export of data
- Brainstorming
- Adaptable Templates
Pricing:
There is a 30-day trial that is completely functional for local files. You’ll then need to purchase a license in order to update your work.
A license for one user costs – $89.
23. Product Hunt
The online network platform Product Hunt was established in 2013. A variety of the newest software, hardware, and app products can be found on Product Hunt. The website is used by many founders and business owners to successfully implement their latest products.
The social element of Product Hunt is its best feature. New products are ranked according to popularity on the homepage. The number of Upvotes from other participants determines this popularity. A product appears higher on the main page the more Upvotes it receives.
Features:
- Founder Club
- Business promotion
Pricing:
The use of Product Hunt is free for everyone. But if you want to use the Founder Club offer you need to pay $60/ per month.
24. Xmind
Xmind is a mind-mapping and brainstorming tool. The software has the potential to handle complex data, promote teamwork, and visualize thoughts and concepts. XMind provides a smooth workflow, a flexible graphics engine, a distraction-free mode, and all the basic options you’ll need to design and format mind maps.
Features:
- Presenter View
- Tree Table
- Stickers & Illustration
- Mind Map
- Logic Chart
- Essential Mind Toolbox
Pricing:
Xmind has a trial version with limited features. To open all functions you need to buy a subscription for 59.99/ annually.
25. Freepik
Freepik is our last platform on the list of our best tools for startups. It is a free online platform for downloading vectors, stock photos, and illustrations. It’s an excellent resource for startups who need to access an extensive library of visuals for their content. Freepik also offers a “Popular Photos” section where users can find the most downloaded images. This section provides an easy way to find the best visuals from the platform.
Features:
- Stock photos
- Vectors
- Illustrations
Pricing:
Freepik has a free plan and also a premium plan, which will be a good option for designers starting at 15€/ per month.
Grab the opportunity
As we mentioned before, managing a new business can be challenging. But there is a huge number of tools that can help you, whether you work for a new start-up or one of the top digital transformation companies to make your processes more effective.
Every company needs specific tools on its journey to success, so do not be afraid to try them out. We also suggest you research available tools to get an idea about their offering.
In addition, there are a lot of available blog posts and articles that can help you with your research. If you are interested, you can visit our web page and see blogs that can provide you with more tips and tricks for your growing business.
But to make it easier for you, we have created this overview of the best tools for startups in 2024. After your research and trial, you will be able to decide which of them suits you well.