Top 8 Free Must-Have Tools For Website Owners
Running your website can be challenging, especially choosing the right tools to help make your site a success. This is why we have put together this list of 10 must-have tools for website owners and best of all, they are all free, so they will not cost you a penny to use.
These tools are designed to help make your life as a website owner easier by providing you with valuable information and helping you keep your site safe and secure. So, on to the list.
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How Secure Is My Password is a very simple, but effective tool yet is one of those tools for website owners that is essential for helping keep your website safe.
All you need to do is visit the site, type in your password and it will provide you with details of how secure your password is and how long it would take a computer to crack your password.
As you can see from the screenshot above, the test password we entered shows it would take a computer 2 thousand years to crack, and the longer and harder a password is, the longer time it will take.
To show it is working, if you type in a simple password such as “demo123” it says it will take 1 second to crack, or if you just use “password” it would be cracked instantly.
One of the most important tools for website owners is measuring your site’s visitors and behaviour and Google Analytics is currently the most widely used tool for this purpose.
Google Analytics is a free web-based application that allows a website owner to track a whole range of data from visitor numbers and location to more in-depth analysis such as conversion rates and page visits. You can also see how many new and returning visitors are using your website.
Google is always improving their Analytics to provide you with even more data that can help you make your website a success so this is yet another reason why it is the most widely used analytics application available.
Stripe is a third-party payment processor that helps you accept payments via credit and debit cards from your customers. Stripe is currently one of the most popular and widely used payment processors in the world for a few reasons:
- Low fees – processing fees are lower than most of its rivals and they do not charge any setup or monthly fees.
- On-page checkout – Unlike some payment processors like PayPal, your customers do not need to leave your website to complete their payment which means there is less chance of an abandoned cart as the form is easily embedded directly on your website.
- Easy setup – there are no complicated processors to go through and no drawn-out application process. You can be up and running and accepting payments in minutes.
Stripe was created to make online payments easy for companies of all shapes and sizes and can help reduce declined payments using their fraud detection service and in turn, can help you grow your revenues.
Even if you don’t think you need help with your content writing it is very easy to make a mistake such as spelling errors or grammar. Grammarly is a free Google Chrome extension that helps you proofread all of your work, from website content to emails to ensure they are correct.
Spelling and grammar mistakes can hurt your website if potential customers see these errors which is why Grammarly is one of the most important tools for website owners, especially those who have a lot of content on their sites.
Email marketing can be one of the most important tools for website owners as it allows you to connect with your users quickly to advertise anything you like such as new products and services or special offers.
Although creating a mailing list can take time, using MailChimp can help you in various ways to such as:
- Collect email addresses directly from your website
- Create, design, and edit email templates from within your MailChimp account
- Manage your mailing list subscribers
- Track the performance of your email campaigns such as how many emails were sent, opened, and clicked.
MailChimp can be integrated into almost any website environment and for WordPress users, they have a handy plugin that makes this integration even easier.
One of the best ways to engage with potential customers is through Live Chat. This can allow you to instantly answer any questions a user may have about your products or services which in turn can lead to an increase in conversions.
It is this potential conversion increase that makes Live Chat one of the most important tools for website owners and with tawk.to you get much more than just a live chat plugin for your website.
With tawk.to you can use the Live Chat function alongside a knowledgebase, messaging system and have complete control over the look and feel of your chat icon.
Add to this a large number of other options to help customise your customer’s live chat experience make tawk.to the best all-round option.
One of the most common issues for websites is speeds and the most common reason for slower loading speeds is down to images. One of the most important tools for website owners to help solve these image issues is TinyPNG.
This free tool allows you to optimise the images you are looking to use on your website and cut the file size by up to 90%.
The biggest make some website owners make is to add a large number of images to their site without any optimisation. This can lead to loading issues, no matter how good a web hosting service they may have.
Using the TinyPNG tool reduces file size and therefore can help to increase website performance and page speeds. This is especially important for eCommerce websites which usually have many images per page.
After you have built your website, one of the most crucial tools for website owners is GTMetrix. GTMetrix allows you to measure and analyse your website’s performance and speed and provides you with a huge range of insights into potential issues you need to fix to help improve the performance of your site.
You can use GTMetrix without even creating a free account, although if you choose to create an account you can view your report from different testing locations and using different browsers to give a better indication of your website speed and performance.
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Conclusion
Finding the right tools to help you manage your website can be difficult as there are a huge number of options available. In this list, we have shown you 8 free tools that will make your life easier. This is by no means an exhaustive list, and what other tools you may need can depend on what your website offers but these 8 tools are a great start.