As we celebrate a new year (and decade!), we’re looking back on our favorite marketing tools featured in the Social Ape newsletter in 2019! A few or all of these tools would make a great addition to your marketing strategy in 2020.
Influence.co
Looking for a quick and easy way to find influencers for your next campaign? Meet Influence.co, a platform that connects brands and agencies to influencers from practically every niche imaginable.
Influence.co’s straightforward interface allows marketers to simply search for their preferred industry and instantly see a pool of influencers looking for new projects. The platform’s “Advanced Search” tab even allows you to sort influencers by criteria such as Instagram follower count, age, location, Google Analytics traffic, etc.
Influence.co offers a free “Basic” account, as well as several more intensive paid memberships that cater to agencies, businesses, and influencers.
Headspace
There’s no better time for social media marketers, public relations professionals and business owners alike to set aside some “me” time than during the holidays. If you haven’t been checking out on a regular basis, take time this holiday season to do just that. Headspace makes it possible.
According to its description in the Apple App Store, “Headspace is your guide to health and happiness.” While our phones are mostly filled with social media, email and photo editing apps, we love Headspace for ensuring mindfulness and providing guided meditation so we can recharge!
Adobe After Effects
Adobe After Effects CC is an all-encompassing application with a professional toolset designed for anything from tilting to character animation, compositing, and more. Using this animation and creative composition app will certainly set your brand apart from the crowd. Pricing starts at $9.99 per month.
The latest version, After Effects CC 2018, brings new VR and 3D options, data-driven animation, and enhanced GPU settings. It also comes with a range of new features that create a more streamlined working environment, and a more intuitive user experience.
Lumen 5
Lumen5 can turn your blog posts, articles, and any other long-form content into videos. Simply upload the text into the platform, choose photos and music, and then you can share it directly to Facebook or upload it to share wherever you’d like.
The free version enables you to create unlimited videos and upload your own logo and photos for the videos you create. It also gives you access to 10,000,000+ free media files.
With a pro account (at $49/month), you’ll get all the same features on top of the ability to upload your own watermark and outro with square videos. You will also be able to remove the default credit scene and all Lumen5 branding.
Rival IQ
Rival IQ analyzes posts, likes, and comments from all the major social media channels, including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest. The platform is integrated with Google Analytics, enabling it to display a comprehensive picture of how your customers get to you and what they do when they arrive.
Spark
Spending too much time in your email inbox? Spark is the tool for you. This app-based email prioritization service allows users to declutter their inbox and cut down on time spent sending emails. Spark acts as a noise reduction and intelligent email disposal tool to help you reach inbox zero. The user-friendly interface bumps emails from real people to the top of your inbox and deprioritizes the pesky automated emails. Our favorite aspect of Spark is its emoji quick-response feature. For emails that don’t require a lengthy response, reply with a thumbs up, heart and more.
Spark users also have the option to snooze an email, set reminders and even schedule an email for later. Ever feel like now isn’t a good time to respond to your boss? Just type up your reply, and set a date and time that works with their schedule.
The Spark app is available to download on the Apple Store and Google Play. Spark has a free plan as well as two paid membership levels. To learn more about Spark’s pricing plans, click here.
Coffitivity
If you’re struggling to find that productive workday flow or get your creative juices flowing, Coffitivity is the app for you.
Coffitivity is a white noise app that “recreates the ambient sounds of a cafe to boost your creativity and help you work better”. The effectiveness of the app is even supported by a study from the University of Chicago that concluded the type of ambient noise it provides is “conducive to creative thinking”!
Coffitivity is available for free online through the company’s website, as well as the App Store for iOS devices and HERE for MacOS users offline. Users can also upgrade to the “Premium” version to unlock three additional audio tracks for nine dollars per year.
