Your online business success depends on the tools you use. Although starting one is relatively easy, the competition is fierce, with a staggering 90% failure rate in the first four months.
However, you can mitigate that by choosing reliable tools, like data analytics software and residential proxy services. Here’s a list of tools to reduce online business failure chances as much as possible.
Web Scrapers
Web scrapers are software applications developed for online data-gathering. They connect to targeted websites and extract valuable data like commodity prices and discounts, product reviews and descriptions, ad keywords, and more. This tool is essential for in-depth market research and competitor monitoring.
Although such information is publicly available, most businesses try to block scrapers to maintain a competitive advantage (often scraping competitors simultaneously.) To avoid detection and to bypass location-imposed access restrictions, scrapers are combined with a residential proxy to obtain a new IP address each time a request is made for specific information.
Professional residential proxy service providers offer millions of high-speed proxy servers to avoid detectability and target hundreds of websites simultaneously. You will automate data-gathering tasks that would otherwise consume time and resources you can now spend elsewhere. A residential proxy and web scraper combo is a robust tool to gain an early competitive advantage.
Graphic Design Tool
You can’t run a successful online business without visual representation. A unique logo helps with continuous brand visibility, and a neat Instagram post will draw user attention to buff up growth.
Your graphic design tool should offer several data visualization templates, like infographics and charts you can use on your websites or during business meetings. A vast repository of stock photos is a significant advantage that will make your website lively.
Website Building Platforms
You don’t have to be a JavaScript guru anymore to have a functional website. No-code development platforms allow casual Internet users to build websites using a simple graphical interface. They take HTML, CSS, and JavaScript elements and turn them into drag-and-drop website parts.
A significant advantage is that you don’t have to reinvent the wheel here. You can use website templates proven popular among users instead of trying to create your own flavor. Of course, worldwide renowned brands must create unique online representations, but emerging online businesses should rely on time-tested looks.
SEO
SEO is an acronym for Search Engine Optimization, and we can’t imagine a successful online business without it. SEO ensures that your website ranks as high as possible in the Google search engine and is visible to potential consumers. It’s an excellent channel to drive steady organic flow and ensure a higher conversion rate.
Professional SEO tools allow you to select keywords for your ads, headings, and blog posts relevant to user queries. It will display regional keyword volumes so that you can set the content strategy accordingly to the geographical location. After all, ads heavily depend on the cultural environment, and what’s acceptable in one region might not be in another.
No less important is the competition research. You can analyze competitors’ websites to see their used keywords, backlink strategies, and competition difficulty. It will give you a good idea of how high you can rank and the expected traffic results.
Data Analysis
Online businesses heavily rely on data. Whether it’s user data to create a personalized buyer profile or BigData to set adequate prices, you will need a data analysis tool to avoid days of manual labor. These tools, combined with discussed web scrapers, accept structured data and aggregate it to make it accessible and searchable.
Furthermore, they will reveal correlations unseen by the naked eye. Predictive analysis lets you foresee potential revenue and manage expenses, and machine-learning-based tools can identify user sentiment and offer marketing strategy tips.
CRM Tool
You won’t do without Customer Relation Management software when your consumer base reaches four digits. These tools allow organizing customer data to streamline sales and communication tasks and monitor the purchase funnel.
It’s an invaluable tool if your ads run well, the website ranks high, but conversions are low. CRM lets you identify issues in the purchase funnel that prevent the customer from going all the way.
Honorary Mentions
We outlined the most important tools for emerging online businesses, but depending on your services, there are additional choices. Check out social media management software if you’re big on social networks, and email marketing automation tools optimize email campaigns. We recommend mastering a few early on because you will encounter fierce competition the moment you enter the virtual marketing arena.
