Have you ever been told that you can’t get something for nothing? Well, you really can these days thanks to an explosion of web based business and consumer tools available. Most people know about Facebook, Twitter, Pintrest and Google+. Below are just a few of some of the services available that can help you save money both personally and for your business.
Communication
Anymeeting – Free, ad supported video conferencing for up to 200 participants
Appointlet – Allows your clients to book appointments with you online which instantly show up on your Google Calendar
Co-op – Kind of like a mini Twitter just for your team
Oovoo – 12-way video chat, call recording, video sharing, send files
Paltalk – video calling, group IM and chat
Trello – Virtual sticky notes, allows you to selectively share with your team
Content & Video
Audacity – free, open source cross platform software for recording and editing sound.
Blip.tv – video blogging, show/channel distribution
BlogTalkRadio – host your own radio show with just a computer and phone.
Drop Shots – share video and photos.
LogoMaker – Design up to 6 logos for free with this app
LogoSnap – This logo service allows you to set your own price for a custom logo designed by up to 20,000 designers, the more you offer the more options you receive, and you own the rights to the logo.
paint.net – photo and image editing software
phinxr – online photo editing
Pinnacle – create video, audio and photos on iPads and iPhones
Seesmic – social media management for up to 3 accounts
slideshare – share slideshows, PDFs, PowerPoint presentations and other professional content.
Financial
BizEquity – Find out what your company and others are worth.
BizStats – Free business statistics, financial ratios and benchmarks such as annual sales for a wide range of industries
Listia – Like eBay but free: give away things you don’t want, get credits for every item given away, use the credits for things you want
Mint – Personal and financial planning, budgeting and money management.
SBA.gov – The U.S. Small Business Administration offers more than 500 free business plan templates on their website and at their Small Business Development Centers across the country
SCORE – Business consulting by over 13,000 mentors sponsored by the U.S. Small Business Administration
Square – Accept credit card and debit payments on any mobile device; the card reader is free and the swipe fee is only 2.75% per transaction. There are other card readers out there, but this is the original and still the best.
Wave – Accounting app designed specifically for entrepreneurs, freelancers, consultants and small businesses with 9 employees or less
Marketing / Networking / Promotion
Blogger – blog publishing site by Google
Craigslist – online classified ad, job postings, and forums
Economy.com – Their FreeLunch.com subsite offers free economic, demographic and financial data
LinkedIn – professional social networking
Moderator – This Google tool allows you to get user feedback and voting
Pligg – Open source, PHP + MySQL, social publishing content management
PolicyMap – Free basic access service to demographic maps and charts
Vistaprint – 250 free business cards, pay only for shipping
YouNoodle – Global entrepreneurship networking and start-up evaluation
Vimeo – High definition video sharing
Organization / Productivity
CutePDF – Free basic CutePDF Writer and PDF converter
Doodle – Free basic scheduling
FlockDraw – Whiteboard based painting and drawing tool
Google – Many free services including Google Docs (open, edit & create), Drive (cloud storage), Sheets (spreadsheets), Forms (surveys), Calendar and GMail.
Mural.ly – Virtual bulletin board meets video conference, great for brainstorming with team members wherever they are
OpenOffice.org – Open source software for word processing, spread sheets, databases and more, most Microsoft compatible
Survey Monkey – Free basic survey creation and publishing
Wufoo – Free basic HTML form and database creator
Wunderlist – Create and share lists with friends and family with real-time sync, also has IM feature
Zoho – Business, productivity and collaboration apps
Project Management
LogMeIn – Free 5GB cloud storage and remote systems administration
ProjectStat.us – Free basic project collaboration and 500 MB cloud storage
Remember the Milk – Task management and to-do lists, compatible with Google Calendar, Evernote and Siri
Team Task – Project manager and community website builder for small teams
Yugma – Free basic one-on-one web conferencing with 30 minutes of time
Security
1Password – Password management system with the ability to customize security levels
Adeona – Open source software for tracking lost or stolen laptops, created and run by Washington University
AVG – Free version of AVG Antivirus
Lastpass – Password management system also has online document backup
Malwarebytes – Malware protection and removal
Storage
Adrive – free basic service offers 50GB of cloud storage
DropBox – As they say, “Your stuff, anywhere”
jZip – free WinZip alternative opens Zip files and creates compatible ones
Mozy – free MozyHome account featuring file sync, access anywhere, and online backup
OneDrive – 15 GB free cloud storage from Microsoft
Web Services
000WebHosting.com – Free web hosting with 1500 MB space and 100 GB monthly data transfer
1and1.com – While not free, the basic web site creation and hosting package is only 99 cents a month and includes a free domain name
DoodleKit – Website and blog creator, web hosting
FreeHosting.com – Free web hosting with 10 GB space and 250 GB monthly data transfer; supports Shockwave and Flash
Google Alerts – Monitor the web for interesting content
1and1.com – While not free, the basic web site creation and hosting package is only 99 cents a month and includes a free domain name
Weebly – Create websites and blogs
Wix – HTML5 website creator and web hosting
Woopra – Free basic web analytics and tracking services
Yola – Free 3 page website, 1 GB bandwidth and storage and Yola subdomain
Check out a great article from WikiHow here on how to create a truly free website, including a free domain name.
