Many software tools help with content marketing. This article covers the 24 best for preparation, creation, management, tracking, sharing, and automation.

Content marketing involves creating and distributing valuable content to attract your ideal customers. Instead of directly advertising your services, content marketing offers helpful information to educate your audience about your industry and services.

Content marketing helps you:

• Raise brand awareness

• Generate more leads

• Drive conversions

You also build trust and credibility with potential customers. Because they get value from the helpful content you publish.

Many software tools help you successfully execute your content marketing strategy. I’ve outlined the top 24 content marketing tools to simplify the process.

Your 24 Best Digital Marketing Tools

I’ve sorted the tools into six categories: Preparation, creation, management, tracking, sharing, and automation.

Preparation:

1. Ahrefs

2. Semrush

3. SpyFu

4. Keyword tool

Creation:

1. Convert_

2. Outgrow

3. Involve.me

4. Grammarly

5. Hemmingway Editor

6. OpenAI’s ChatGPT

7. Bannerbear

8. Canva

9. Figma

Management:

1. Uberflip

2. Kapost

3. ClickUp

Tracking:

1. Plausible

2. Pingdom

3. Netbase

Sharing:

1. Oneup

2. Crowdfire

3. Feedly

Automation:

1. Zapier

2. Make

Content Marketing Preparation

You need to prepare your content marketing strategy. Otherwise, things can get messy quickly.

Also, preparation ensures your content marketing is laser-focused on attracting your ideal customer. Targeted content is more effective and will drive results for your business.

Here’s a handy content marketing preparation checklist:

• Keyword research: Identify relevant keywords to improve the visibility of your content in search engines and attract more qualified traffic.

• Competitor analysis: Uncover content opportunities and develop more effective plans with insights into your competitors’ strategies.

• Backlink analysis: Identify websites linking to your competitors’ content to secure high-quality backlinks for your content.

• On-page optimization: Get insights into your on-page optimization (including the use of keywords, meta descriptions, and other elements) that impact your visibility in search engines.

• Content ideation: Discover the types of content performing well within your industry and identify gaps in the market you can fill with your content.

The four tools I’ve chosen will help with your content marketing preparation.

1. Ahrefs

Ahrefs is a personal favorite of mine. This tool has helped me perform a detailed analysis of:

• Websites

• Keyword rankings

• Competitor backlinks

• Organic search traffic

The keyword research tool gives me a comprehensive overview of difficulty, search volume, and traffic potential. I also love the keyword ideas section, where I get:

• Terms match

• Questions

• Also rank for

• Also talk about

This makes finding the keywords I need to target in my content easy. I can create and save keyword lists for different topics, export them as CSV files, and share them with the team.

Ahrefs has a massive database of backlinks, comprehensive keyword research capabilities, and detailed website audit reports. This is everything you need to prepare your content marketing strategy.

2. Semrush

Semrush is a digital marketing tool that provides a range of features and tools for search engine optimization (SEO), paid search (PPC), and content marketing. Some of the key features include:

• Keyword research

• Competitor analysis

• On-page optimization

• Website audit tools

• Backlink analysis

Like Ahrefs, Semrush offers everything you need for content marketing preparation. But I find it less user-friendly than Ahrefs, which may be a personal preference.

3. SpyFu

With SpyFu, you can research and analyze your competitors' online SEO and PPC advertising strategies. This tool offers extensive keyword research capabilities, including information on the keywords that competitors are ranking for and the cost per click for those keywords.

It also provides a detailed analysis of competitors' PPC campaigns. This includes information on the ad copy and landing pages they are using.

You need some prior knowledge and understanding of digital marketing and SEO concepts to get the most out of SpyFu. That background info helps you fully utilize the tool.

4. Keyword Tool

Generate keyword ideas for your SEO and PPC campaigns with Keyword Tool. It lets you create many keyword ideas in multiple languages and countries. This content marketing preparation tool also integrates with various advertising platforms such as Google Ads and Bing Ads.

I like Keyword Tool’s simple user interface. But it lacks the depth of analysis of Ahrefs and Semrush.

Content Marketing Creation

When creating content - a blog, ebook, whitepaper, or infographic - you need at least two things: copy and visuals. A new kid on the block in content creation is interactive content like quizzes, calculators, surveys, and assessments.

With interactive content, your leads offer their details and get valuable information in return. This value exchange is the mechanism that drives increased conversions and generates more leads.

For an effective content strategy, you want to combine passive and interactive content to cover all your bases. I’ll highlight some content creation tools that can help you create interactive content, clean copy, and visuals - better and faster.

1. Convert_

Convert_ is a no-code content creation tool. It helps business owners and marketers create interactive content such as:

• Product configurators

• Calculators

• Quizzes

• Surveys

• Forms

• Tests

Our DIY drag-and-drop builder lets you create interactive content without needing expensive developers. It lowers the cost barrier to interactive content creation - something I’m proud of as co-founder.

The amazing thing about interactive content is it performs better than static content. For instance, interactive content gets 52.6% more engagement and 2x more conversions than static content.

Some of what Convert_ offers:

• Complex question branching

• Embed into any website

• No coding skills needed

• Seamless integration

• Multi-functional tool

• High customization

• Unlimited users

• Free plan

Unlike similar content creation tools, our software is extremely powerful, versatile, and customizable. This allows you to create interactive content with very few limitations or set approaches.

Our proprietary logic and calculation engine called FormulaScript is our (not so) secret sauce that breathes life into your content. The power and versatility do mean Convert_ can have a steeper learning curve than alternatives.

2. Outgrow

This content creation tool lets you build calculators, quizzes, surveys, chatbots, and assessments. Its range of integrations include Mailchimp, HubSpot, and Salesforce.

With Outgrow, you can embed interactive content on your:

• Website

• Popup windows

• Customer chat modules

I like the idea of the last feature for connecting with customers immediately.

Good analytics and data integration help you check how your content performs. This makes it easy to change what isn’t working and create more of what does.

This content creation tool has 1,000+ pre-optimized templates. But the highest plans are pricey, and the Essentials plan is limited to three users and Business is limited to ten. I’m not a fan of these user limits - exactly why Convert_ has unlimited users across every plan.

3. Involve.Me

Making quizzes, surveys, and calculators is easy with this content creation tool. Their templates make creating content to meet your needs very convenient.

They have 40+ templates for creating quizzes, surveys, and calculators. The software integrates with CRM tools and common email marketing services and supports payment integration.

Using Involve.me has some limitations: 

• Comes at a higher price point

• Lacks many customization options

• Limited users (only 3 on the highest plan)

Outgrow and Involve.me have similar offerings to Convert_ and allow you to create beautiful interactive content. But both content creation tools are more restrictive in what you can create, although that also makes them easier to learn.

4. Grammarly

Grammarly helps you improve your writing. It checks for real-time mistakes in:

• Grammar

• Spelling

• Style

• Tone

You get explanations and suggestions for improving you writing. Grammarly's biggest strength is offering comprehensive and accurate feedback on writing errors. This lets you refine the overall quality and clarity of your writing before you publish content.

5. Hemmingway Editor

Hemingway Editor helps you improve the clarity and simplicity of your writing. It offers real-time suggestions for shorter, simpler sentences, and it provides a readability score.

Hemingway Editor focuses on simplicity and clarity, helping you to write clearly and concisely. This is crucial for content marketing because you don’t want to confuse your audience.

Simple and clear copy over trying to sound clever is always your best bet.

6. OpenAI’s ChatGPT

Since the introduction of powerful AI writing models, new applications were launched that can support your copywriting. One of the most influential AI companies around, OpenAI, launched the super popular ChatGPT. You’ve probably heard about it, unless you’ve been living deep in the Amazon for the past few years.

ChatGPT gives you a viable alternative to paid tools on the market. It offers a conversational interface that handles a wide range of questions.

It can be effective for supporting your content creation efforts. But Keystone Copywriting founder, Shane Curry, advises against using the output straight from the tool.

“ChatGPT can create passible copy and content - if you know how to prompt it well. Even then, I’d always suggest editing its output before you publish. I see some businesses copy and pasting output straight from ChatGPT. It’s clear they don’t know how to prompt and do zero editing, which only hurts their content marketing efforts in the long run.”

I think ChatGPT is good for getting ideas as well. You can use it for content ideation even if you don’t want to use it for creating content.

7. Bannerbear

Bannerbear helps you auto-generate social media visuals, e-commerce banners, and more with their API and integrations. The app supports #nocode automated workflows that take care of repetitive marketing tasks in the background.

This tool integrates with Zapier, Airtable, and Integromat. One cool content marketing use for Bannerbear stood out to me. You can set it up to automatically create featured images for your blog posts, which could save a lot of time.

8. Canva

Canva makes it easy to create and share professional designs. They offer thousands of professional templates, images, and quality content to get started.

Whether you’re making an infographic, banner, poster, or video, Canva has the tools to help you create stunning graphics. It comes in handy for blog and social media images without needing to spend too much time.

9. Figma

Figma is primarily an interface design tool. But its versatility and broad feature set allow you to create stunning marketing images with ease.

Figma has an intuitive interface, making it user-friendly. And it’s excellent for online collaborations. I find it more powerful than Canva, but the free plan is more limited.

Content Marketing Management

Managing content creation can be a daunting task. You need to generate ideas before scheduling, creating, editing, and publishing content.

Each step requires time, effort, and organization.

Fortunately, content marketing tools make the management process faster and easier. These tools have features like collaborative workspaces, content calendars, and workflow management to help you stay organized and meet deadlines.

Automating administrative tasks helps with consistent content marketing. You can focus on crafting engaging content that resonates with your audience.

Here are my picks for the best management software.

1. Uberflip

Uberflip is a content experience platform. This content marketing tool empowers you to create, manage, and optimize personalized content experiences at every stage of the buyer journey.

It allows you to centralize all your content into one organized hub. You can then segment and personalize content to match your target audience's interests and behaviors.

With Uberflip, you can:

• Streamline your content distribution

• Enhance user engagement

• Generate quality leads

• Accelerate sales

It's a great tool for those seeking to maximize the impact and ROI of their content marketing campaigns.

2. Kapost

Kapost is a cloud-based content marketing suite for managing content and campaigns. Organize all your digital marketing content in one place for:

• Planning

• Producing

• Distributing

• Analyzing

Kapost focuses on creating buyer-centric content. It accommodates various marketing content types like demand generation assets and product marketing materials.

Kapost optimizes content across all sales funnel levels and functional groups. This makes it an excellent tool for planning, executing, distributing, and enhancing content marketing strategies within a team environment.

3. ClickUp

ClickUp is a comprehensive project management tool used for marketing projects and tasks. It combines tasks, whiteboards, dashboards, chat, goals, and docs in one collaborative environment.

Notably, it helps you organize your editorial calendar and develop landing pages. This ensures process consistency through task templates, custom statuses, and checklists.

Marketing is just one weapon in Clickup’s arsenal. They also offer solutions for Human Resources, operations, design, and more.

Content Marketing Tracking

Content marketing tools also help you track your campaigns. They provide valuable data-driven insights helping you make informed decisions, refine your marketing strategies, and ultimately achieve your business goals.

They help with:

• Data Collection and Analysis: Gather extensive data about your audience's behavior and interactions with your content. Get insights like page views, click-through rates, and time spent on your site. They help you analyze these metrics for insights into what works in your content marketing strategy and what doesn’t.

• Content Optimization: Identify your best performing content and keywords and the topics resonating most with your audience. You can use this information to optimize future content and improve search engine rankings.

• Social Media Monitoring: Many content marketing tools help you track social media engagement. This often includes likes, shares, comments, and mentions to paint a clear picture of how your content is performing across various platforms.

• Email Marketing Analysis: Track email open rates, click-through rates, and conversions to fine-tune your email marketing strategy.

• Campaign Tracking: Monitor the performance of specific marketing campaigns, and identify which ones drive the most traffic, leads, or sales.

• Competitor Analysis: Observe your competitors' content strategies for valuable insights to inform your own strategy. Use what works for them and make it better.

1. Plausible

Plausible is a lightweight, open-source web analytics tool. It provides valuable insights without invading user privacy.

Plausible is useful for content marketing because it allows you to:

• Track content performance

• Understand audience behavior

• Make informed optimization decisions

It has features like real-time data, custom events tracking, and referral source identification. These help you identify successful content, improve user engagement, and enhance lead generation. You can use this data to refine your content to better meet your audience's needs and achieve your marketing goals.

2. Pingdom

Pingdom is a powerful web performance monitoring tool. It lets you analyze user behavior, identify website performance issues, and optimize overall user experience. Using real user monitoring (RUM), Pingdom offers insights on user interaction based on different browsers, devices, and platforms.

It helps you:

• Identify geographic usage trends

• Track website functionality and speed

• Recognize areas for strategic improvements

With its custom reporting feature, you can analyze data to make informed decisions in your content strategy.

3. Netbase

NetBase is powered by advanced AI, giving you a comprehensive content marketing tool. It provides real-time social audience insights to enrich buyer personas and personalize marketing experiences. You can measure online brand mentions and analyze conversations, helping you develop targeted content strategies.

NetBase's unique features - such as the "real-time mood meter" - can boost website activity and attract your desired audience. Building strong customer relationships and optimizing campaigns becomes easier with capabilities like tracking audience engagement and identifying influencers.

Industry giants like Coca-Cola, Taco Bell, and Kraft Foods use NetBase for a reason.

Content Marketing Sharing

Sharing is caring. Use these content marketing tools to automate posting, maintain your online presence, and curate your content. This ensures you keep it relevant and engaging for your audience.

1. Oneup

OneUp is a scheduling tool that facilitates strategic content marketing. Use it for automating social media posts, optimizing the timing, and repeating successful posts. It helps you maintain a consistent online presence, track performance, and engage your audience effectively.

OneUp can be a game-changer for your content marketing efforts. Because it allows you to:

• Plan and schedule your posts in advance

• Analyze your social media strategies

• Amplify your audience reach

This content marketing tool is an efficient way to manage multiple social media accounts. It saves you time and ensures effective content distrubution.

2. Crowdfire

Crowdfire is a robust content marketing tool. It aids in discovering and curating content, scheduling posts, and managing all social media platforms from one place. This tool uses smart algorithms to recommend content that will resonate with your audience, helping to boost engagement.

You can pre-plan and automate your posts for a consistent online presence. Additionally, it offers analytics to measure the success of marketing campaigns.

Crowdfire streamlines:

• Content discovery

• Audience engagement

• Performance measurement

3. Feedly

Feedly is a content curation tool that collects content from various online sources. It allows you to organize, read, and share content from a single platform. It helps with content marketing by identifying trending topics, tracking competitors, and staying updated with industry news.

Generating a constant stream of relevant content helps you plan and schedule posts, ensuring a consistent and engaging online presence. Ultimately, it enhances content marketing strategies by providing a wealth of valuable information and insights at your fingertips.

Content Marketing Automation

You need to create a lot of content for an effective content marketing strategy. Automating your content publishing is a must to stay ahead of your competitors.

You will save a load of time, reduce costs, and improve marketing performance. Automation helps you scale your business with content marketing for sustainable growth.

1. Zapier

Zapier connects various apps, automating repetitive tasks and streamlining operations. For example, you can use Zapier's automated workflows (known as Zaps) to automatically publish blog posts or distribute WordPress content across social media platforms.

This content marketing tool can also integrate with AI content generators such as Jasper, enhancing productivity. Zapier ensures a smooth and efficient content marketing flow - from automating social media tasks to orchestrating email management and lead tracking.

2. Make

Make Software is a comprehensive content strategy tool. It assists with planning and executing your content strategy.

This content marketing tool helps you:

• Identify optimal content formats

• Pinpoint trending topics and keywords

• Schedule content across multiple channels

This tool automates processes and offers metrics for strategy success tracking. Make helps with streamlining content creation, publication, management, and promotion. This tool can increase your online presence and enhance lead generation.

What is Content Marketing?

Content marketing is a strategy where you create and share valuable content to attract and engage your target audience. This content might be educational or solely entertaining, but it gives your audience value in some way.

Your content marketing strategy may include:

• Social media posts

• Interactive content

• Blog articles

• Podcasts

• Videos

Instead of directly advertising your products, you publish content that:

• Educates

• Entertains

• Solves problems

You create and distribute content through content marketing to:

• Build brand awareness

• Generate leads

• Drive sales.

Ingredients of effective content marketing are a well-defined target audience, a clear content strategy, and a distribution and promotion plan.

Want higher conversion rates?

According to the Content Marketing Institute, content marketing produces three times more leads per dollar spent than paid search.

Conclusion

Content marketing might sound simple enough. But when you dive into the specifics, you soon discover that you need to follow a lot of steps to make an impact. And each step requires different software applications.

Choosing your best content marketing tools from this list will help you on your way. You won’t need them all because many functionalities overlap.

Choosing tools that carry out multiple content marketing functions in one app can help you save money. It comes down to knowing what’s vital for your business and creating a plan that will help you reach your content marketing goals more efficiently.