Welcome to the Mazepress resoures area where you will find my curated list of tools, websites and services that I highly recommend for building and improving your online business.
Everything you will find on this page has been battle tested by myself and is either important in the growth of projects I work on or has been in the past.
Affiliate Disclaimer: Some of the links on this page are affiliate links. To find out more see my affiliate disclaimer page.
Here are some of the tools I use to manage my websites including where I buy my domain names, where I host my websites and the software I use to run my websites, blogs, and eCommerce stores.
Tools
- WordPress.org - Open source Website Software with unrivaled possibilities.
- Genesis Framework by Studiopress, the best theme framework for WordPress, SEO friendly, flexible & fast loading.
- GoDaddy & Namecheap - Affordable domain names from companies you can trust.
- Bluehost - Affordable Shared Web Hosting. My ideal company for hosting new websites.
- WPEngine - Premium hosting for more serious marketers and more mature resource intensive websites.
- Shopify - Simple, hassle-free eCommerce solution for small business owners with powerful tools.
- UpDown.io - Ping your websites periodically to ensure they aren't down and react quickly when they are.
- WebsiteSetup.org - Step-by-Step Guide on how to create a website.
Our Guides
- Create an Online Course Website With WordPress and LearnDash - If you want to productize your services so you can scale your business this guide will show you the framework I recommend.
- What is Affiliate Marketing and How Does it Work? - Everything you need to know about using affiliate marketing to make money from your website or blog.
- Squarespace vs WordPress - Looking to compare two of the most popular website builders online? Read our review and comparison.
- The Best WordPress Plugins - My list of essential and recommended WordPress plugins for your website or blog.
- Recommended WordPress Themes & Frameworks - The themes for WordPress that I recommend to bloggers and site builders.
- A Guide to Creating Visual Content Creating attractive and engaging visual content is one of the best ways to grab your audience's attention and keep them coming back.
- Easy Ways to Speed Up WordPress for a Faster Loading Website - A simple guide for beginners to help you improve your website loading times.
- Why WPForms is the Best Contact Form Plugin for WordPress - This article looks at why I switched from Contact Form 7 to WPForms.
- The Best Ways to Backup and Restore WordPress - Learn the different ways you can backup a WordPress website to make sure you can bounce back if your site ever breaks.
- WordPress Security Guide: How to Secure Your WordPress Website - A guide on all of the security measures to take to prevent your site from getting hacked.
- How to Remove Malware from WordPress: Fix Hacked Website - Learn how to fix a hacked WordPress website manually.
- Why You Should Switch Web Hosts - A look at the criteria to consider when deciding if you should switch WordPress hosting providers.
- How to Change Web Hosting Provider - This guide covers how to do a manual website migration with WordPress to a new host and the alternative methods available.
- Website Project Plan - Get help planning your next website by working through this guide on what to evaluate before you begin.
- Signs That You Should Change Your Web Design - A guide to help you decide whether your website is due for a redesign or not.
- Black Friday Deals 2023 - Find deals and discounts this Black Friday through Cyber Monday on tools and software for web design, blogging, SEO and running an online business.
The tools that are essential for any digital marketers toolkit. There are lots of services you need to manage and market a business online and growth hack.
Autoresponder services like Mailchimp & Drip, social media automation software and tools to help you manage and grow lots of accounts with ease and search engine reporting and analysis tools to do the required keyword research, check on-page SEO health and then report on your progress.
Email Marketing
- MailChimp - Email marketing service that is free until you have 2000 subscribers and responsible for sending over 10 billion emails each month.
- Aweber - Another fantastic autoresponder with some capabilities not available in MailChimp. Aweber is possibly the most popular of all these tools.
Social Media Tools
- Jarvee - The most comprehensive social media marketing software online. This is what I use most.
- CoSchedule - The best social media and content scheduling editorial calendar that works standalone or inside your WordPress dashboard.
- Hashtagify - Perform hashtag research to find out what's trending in your niche in social media.
- HootSuite - One of the best social media management tools for Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn & Google+.
- Creating The Perfect Pinterest Pin Image - This guide shows you how to create a Pin image or video on Pinterest that generates repins and traffic to your blog.
Search Engine Optimization Tools
- SEOMoz - One of the most renowned all in one SEO SaaS solutions. Features ranking tool,
keyword checker, backlink checker and more. - SEMRush - An all in one marketing toolkit that allows you to evaluate competitors' websites as well as improve your position in the SERPs.
- ahrefs - One of the most comprehensive toolsets for SEO professionals and marketers. A must-have for anyone serious about improving their SEO and willing to invest the time and a bit of money.
- LinkWhisper - LinkWhisper makes building and optimizing internal links in WordPress easy, this is one of my new essential SEO plugins for any WordPress niche site or blog.
Our Guides
- One of the best ways to learn and keep up to date with digital marketing is with podcasts. We wrote an article on The Best Marketing & Growth Hacking Podcasts that I highly recommend you check out.
- If you are using WordPress for your website, here's a MUST READ guide on WordPress SEO Tips.
- Best Autoresponders - See our full review guide on the best autoresponder and email marketing tools.
- Best Social Media Tools Guide - See our complete guide to the best tools for managing and automating your social media marketing.
- Grow Your Instagram Followers - Our guide on how to get more Instagram followers to grow your business.
- The Best SEO Tools - See our complete guide to the best SEO Tools you can start using today to build more traffic and find opportunities by doing competitive research.
- Best SEO Blogs - Want to improve your SEO skills and master search engine optimization? I have compiled all of the best blogs I use to learn and stay on top of search marketing.
- Competitive Analysis and How to Evaluate a Website - A guide that will allow you to find the best tools for reverse engineering your competitors' websites.
- How to Outsource Content Marketing - A guide on the steps you should take when outsourcing content marketing for your website or blog.
- The Quick Guide to Cold Email Outreach - A practical introduction guide on how to succeed with cold email outreach and what strategy to use.
- 7 Ways to Increase Your Online Earnings & Profits - A guest post looking at different ways you can make your online business, website or blog more profitable through CRO/conversion rate optimization and other improvements.
- Visual Link Building with Interactive Maps - A look at how you can create interactive maps as a great way to earn more valuable backlinks.
- How to Get Unbiased Local SEO Rankings & Data - If you are trying to rank your business for local searches you need to be able to collect reliable data, this guide will help you do just that.
- How to Increase Domain Authority - If you want to rank your website and blog posts on Google Search you will need to be aware of DA and PA scores. This guide will help you learn the basics.
One of the best ways to make more money is to save money and when time IS money, improving your productivity by adopting automation into your workflow and optimizing the day to day processes involved in your business is a great growth hack to improve your bottom line. Today you can use tools to make your life a lot easier so it pays to learn how to put them into play.
Tools
- Asana - My number 1 tool for micromanaging clients, projects and my day to day responsibilities in an organized and measurable fashion.
- G Suites (Formerly Google Apps for Business) - The best email solution that also comes with a plethora of business apps for Word processing, spreadsheets, cloud storage, and more premium Google services.
- IFTTT - Automate and connect all of the services in your life for free. If This Then That is a powerful service.
Our Guides
- Productivity Tips: Ultimate List to Getting More Done - An extensive guide detailing all of the productivity tips and hacks I use to maximize efficiency.
- Productivity Tools for Bloggers & Marketers - The ultimate guide to productivity tools. A list of software, apps, and hardware I use to stay as efficient as possible.
- Eliminate, Simplify, Automate, Delegate – In That Order - This is an essential process in maximizing your productivity and freeing up time for the big picture decisions.
- 7 Ways to Increase Your Productivity with Asana - Asana is the tool I use to squeeze more hours out of my day and remain hyper-organized. Find out how I am using it and how you can too.
- Email Productivity - Does dealing with emails always feel like a burden that takes your time away from the work you want to be doing? You need to read this guide.
- Best VPN Services Guide - Browse the internet privately at home and while traveling with a VPN provider you can trust, read our comparison guide. TLDR? I use NordVPN who offers a massive discount on the 2-year plan.
- Best Free Punctuation Checker Tools - Improve your writing productivity by using a punctuation and grammar tool in addition to a spellchecker.
- The Best Tips for Working From Home - Adapting to working from home? Feel like you could be more productive? This guide is for you.
These are some of the tools I use to improve my writing and make the whole process easier. Everything from how to better plan and research my ideas and subject matter, the contextual spelling and grammar check tools to spot my typos before my readers and tools to improve my writing abilities.
Tools
- Grammarly - Contextual spelling and grammar checks will change your word and improve your writing tenfold.
- Hemmingway - Remove the clutter from your writing and write like Hemmingway with this web-based writing editor.
- AnswerThePublic - Need content ideas? Answer your customers' most common questions by finding out what people want to know.
- Ditto - Ditto is a clipboard manager. This means instead of hitting copy/paste and only having access to the last one item you copied you can pull up a list with the last 1000. This is possibly my favorite productivity hack for anyone who works at a computer all day. Ditto is Windows only but 1Clipboard appears to be a good alternative that works on Mac as well as PC.
- Camtasia - The single best tool for people looking to create educational content on YouTube. you can record your own screen, Powerpoint presentations, your webcam and produce high-quality video content without the hassle.
Our Guides
- Start Your Blog - If you are new to blogging and the idea of running your own website we have created a simple step by step guide on how to do this using WordPress & Bluehost in under 10 minutes. Start your First Website or Blog.
- Naming Your Blog or Website - A detailed guide on how to pick a good name for your blog or website including how to brainstorm ideas, common mistakes and securing the best possible domain name.
- How to Monetize Your Blog - A comprehensive guide on how you can make money blogging and listing all of the possible monetization methods.
- Choosing a Blog Niche & Topics - Stuck on what you should be writing about? This guide will help you work out the best subject for your blog.
- Blog Post Ideas Guide - A list of blog post ideas to give you inspiration. With this list, you should be able to come up with 100's of ideas you can start working on, but only bite off as much as you can chew.
- How to Perform Blogger Outreach - If you want to get your blog in front of more readers, the best way is to get your website mentioned on other websites or blogs, this is an essential guide to getting started with outreach.
- Blogging vs Vlogging vs Podcasting - Which content type should you pursue as a content creator? This guide weighs up the options.
- Improve Your Content Strategy with a Content Calendar Template - A content calendar is one of the best ways to keep yourself accountable and publishing at a healthy velocity.
If you are bootstrapping your online business then you are probably doing most of the design work yourself too. Sometimes this can compromise quality unless you have the best and in most cases easiest tools to use.
Here is an inside look at the design tools and software I use to bootstrap all of my own websites with high-quality visuals.
Graphics tools for social media content, graphics editors, logo and branding tools, image compression and a few tools for when you do want to outsource your design work for the most professional results.
Tools
- Canva - The fastest tool to create professional graphics for your blog posts and social content.
- Flickgraph/Clipgraph - Create your own Cinemagraphs to use on your website, social media or Facebook ads to command attention.
- Gimp - The best free Photoshop alternative for those not looking to invest in expensive design software who want to make simple or advanced edits.
- 99Designs - The best place to get affordable logo design and be blown away with 10 or more high-quality professional logos to choose from.
- Book Cover Design Software - A tool for creating eBook & Book cover designs and then allows you to also convert them into 3D eCovers for use in your marketing kit.
- LogoJoy - One of the best and most affordable logo and branding design tools I have ever used. Highly recommended if you need a new logo.
Our Guides
- Best Free Stock Photography Websites - Read our complete guide on where to source royalty free images.
- Best Graphic Design Tools Guide - We created an article to cover all of the design tools we use on this website and other projects.
- Best Smartphone Apps for Content Creators - Create content on the move like short graphics and videos you can share on social media.
- Visual Content Creation Ideas - A guide covering different ideas to spice up your visual content with more variety and eye-catching designs.
Video marketing has become a major part of the digital marketer's wheelhouse over the past couple of years as internet speeds improve and video content is becoming the best way to keep a visitors attention video marketing isn't just for video producers anymore.
Digital marketers, web designers and social media influencers are all self-publishing video content online to engage their audience and it's well worth learning some of the tools so you can add video content to your arsenal of sales tools.
Tools
- DJI Drones & Cameras - Drones & Video cameras are essential for any modern marketer and DJI creates great products without costing a fortune.
- Camtasia - Camtasia is one of the best tools available for creating educational video content using screen sharing, your webcam, and Powerpoint presentations.
- Explaindio One of the best tools for creating whiteboard animation videos and explainers for your website.
Our Guides
- We have created a guide covering video tools in more depth you can see at The Ultimate Video Content Marketing Toolkit.
- Learn how to start streaming online and why this growing medium is worth exploring. Start Streaming to Grow Your Business Guide.
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eCommerce is one of the most reliable and profitable sources of income online and an area I have been actively involved in for nearly a decade. Here are some of the hottest tools you need to be aware of if you are interested in using eCommerce as an income stream for your online business.
Tools
- Amazon FBA - Send your inventory to Amazon and let the professionals take care of delivering your products to your customers on time always whether you are at home or sitting on a beach.
- WooCommerce - One of the best eCommerce platforms in the world, extremely flexible and runs within WordPress.
- Shopify - The easiest eCommerce platform to setup and maintain by far with lots of powerful tools.
- Oberlo - Automatically import products from AliExpress to Shopify and run a dropshipping operation in a matter of hours.
- Alibaba & AliExpress - Two great websites for product sourcing. Alibaba owns both, one website for bulk orders and the other for smaller unit orders.
Our Guides
- How to Create and Sell Merchandise - Create and sell your own merch and swag online with no upfront costs. Fulfilled and shipped globally. Sell anything from t-shirts and hoodies to hats, caps, swimsuits, and backpacks.
Learning online is one of the biggest growth areas on the internet today and if you follow Gary Vaynerchuk you will know what he thinks about going to university and college these days! It's a waste of money if you want to learn something that you can self-study online for either free or a fraction of the cost of getting a degree.
College is good for those that need to study law or medicine but if you want to be an entrepreneur, writer or digital marketer then you are far better off online, the only other ingredient that is absolutely necessary is motivation.
Our Guides
- Best Websites for Online Learning - Read our break down of the best free and paid sources where you can learn new skills.
- Best Marketing Podcasts - Podcasts are one of the best ways to learn online. See our article covering the best marketing and growth hacking podcasts to subscribe to.
- Virtual Reality for Marketers - A guide looking at the possibilities Virtual Reality / VR is bringing to the digital marketing space, eCommerce, retail and paving a new way to experience the internet.
Over the years I have tried and tested most of the general methods online for making money and the different ways to monetize a website. Below are some ways you can earn additional income from your website and online presence across social media promoting products, reselling or creating your own exclusive items to sell.
Some offer a higher profit margin than others, some are more scaleable but all of them are opportunities that may or may not tie in with your business, website, and skillset and are worth exploring.
Tools
- Freelance Online - Upwork is our pick of the bunch for finding freelance opportunities online as a web designer, programmer, graphic designer or any other remote worker. Another option for both freelancing, offering unique services and for outsourcing is Fiverr.
- Dropship Anything - Another popular online business model is dropshipping which has been made a lot easier thanks to websites like AliExpress, the little brother of Alibaba.
- Amazon FBA - Read our Beginners Guide to Amazon FBA to find out how you can use Amazon Fulfillment to make selling products online a breeze.
- Legit Ways to Make Money Online - If you want to read a comprehensive list then head over to our make money online guide.
- Become an Affiliate - Want to discover the best ways to monetize your website or blog with referrals? Visit our Best Affiliate Programs Online guide.
- ClickFunnels Sales Funnels - Sales Funnels and Landing Pages are an essential component for any internet marketer. We recommend one tool only, read our ClickFunnels Review.
Our Guides
- Buy Bitcoin X - I recently launched a new educational website about Bitcoin, Cryptocurrencies, Alt Coins & the blockchain as I expect this to be the biggest disrupting force we have seen since the Internet & Smartphones.
All of my essential resources that I have written up a review of and gone into more detail explaining the benefits and why these tools are so useful. Some of these products and service pages contain affiliate links.
What do you think? Are you a digital marketer, web designer, SEO or social media strategist using tools that you think I might have missed from my list?
Please get in touch and let me know.