The Tools I Use for My Pre-Revenue Startup [BLACK FRIDAY EDITION]

Startups are hard and the road to success is often winding and unexpected. Some days, you feel like a genius; others, you wonder what in the world you were thinking when you decided to become an entrepreneur. Do not give up hope! Many of us have been there before and we can help guide new founders on their journey through our experiences.

I am currently building a company that offers women a hack to make self-breast examinations a habit along with a mobile application [available here] and with a wearable device [coming soon]. In this journey, we started by building an online community which is not an easy thing to do. To do so we had to improvise and build something people can come back to engage. So here is how I did it with no-code & no-talent tools!

See the full table from here.

TL;DR Black Friday is coming up, and I've decided to put together a list of the tools that I use for my pre-revenue startup. These are all things that have helped me save money or time in some way, so hopefully, they can do the same for you!

Step 0: List Building

I'm sure you've heard the saying, "build your list before you build your product". Do you know what else they also say? “Buy emails with targeted data providers”. Uhm… You can always do that as a reach-out strategy but that is not a list building.

You need to build a list where people check the box that says “I want to receive updates and see more content like this”. Because you need to build a community before your product, not a prospect list. That community will lead you to your product development. One of the useful hooks to start a community is to make people see the value and ask for more. So my advice is to create a bunch of guides, freebies, and e-books with opt-in/lead generation parts at the beginning. Just build these, build a catchy social media post and push so minimum amount of ads with constant organic marketing too!

My pick for this purpose is Decktopus. You can build freebies with lead-gen forms, connect your domain, push ads to that doc, see analytics and collect leads easily. Not just that, but also build many other things at once with great branding and design without doing any editing. It’s hard to explain, you have to try to dive in.

Step 1: SEO

In the old days, SEO was a dark art reserved only for those with years of experience and intimate knowledge. Today, it's as easy as running a Google search to find free SEO tools that will make your site rank higher.

The first step of your SEO journey is to get the right tools. Tools are essential for success, so it's important that you have all of them on hand before starting. Never jump into doing boring and hard tech-required things from the first days. Here are 2 things you should do while your list is building itself.

Do a full web search with your niche keyword

Including Reddit, Instagram, Twitter, Shopify, Etsy, quora, google, medium, and everyplace you can think of this will help you see what people are saying about it, what are they asking about the topic, and what kind of niches people target (Shopify and Etsy really give this insight). With this information, you will be able to build a content strategy for social media, and your blog. Don’t forget to appear on every question on Reddit and Quora.

My pick is TopicMojo. I know it’s not ahrefs or Moz but at this point, you don need to go hard on yourself. Just make sure you answer the right questions in the right way, everywhere.

Check their Black Friday deal&LTD from here: https://topicmojo.com/pricing & https://appsumo.com/products/marketplace-topicmojo/

Build your blog

For this one, go full no-code. The only thing you have to worry about is your strategy and nothing else. And my biggest suggestion is to use something a lot of people use to get help when you need to and also use a website builder a lot of blogger and small businesses use. That means they have great integration and business support tools. Target your keyword and answer questions with authentic content. CONSISTENTLY.

Don’t judge me with pricing but my pick is Wix. They have major integration, their own e-mail marketing tool, their no-code membership builder, forum, blog, and many more… They send a 50% discount after you sign up so, no worries.

Go social

I will not even start with this one. Just craft a content strategy from the first step, go to Canva, pick a template and post it on social media.

Step 2: The Pitch

Going from idea to company is an exciting process. The only thing more exciting than starting a business is pitching your ideas in front of investors. This can be equally as scary but also should be done professionally.

Build your pitch deck

This step can be done with Decktopus mentioned earlier. And generally done better and easier. It has great layouts and embedded booking pages, and websites inside the platform so that potential investors click to visit your website and book a time to discuss further.

Pick: Decktopus

Have a booking link

You will need a booking link because you will need to talk with a lot of people for both fundings and for partnership. Calendly is fine but it’s a little salty. I love using TidyCal, a product of Appsumo which has a lifetime deal and I just love how easy it is both for you and both for the person booking a time.

Find real mail addresses

Rather than purchasing bulk emails from weird and expensive data companies. Try going for personal mail verification and finder tools.

Hunter.io is really easy to use and has a great free quota for starters. If you need more than that you can always upgrade.

Track your reach out emails

I just can’t explain how much I love this tool for both my company and for my wallet. It’s so affordable and I just simply love it. It tells you who opened your email address, who clicked on links, and who didn’t so that you can resend your mail.

My pick is Mailtrack.io.

I hope you found this list of tools useful and that they help save some time or money for your startup! Whether it’s a tool to find the best deals on Black Friday, or a way to create an MVP without any coding knowledge, or just a simple affordable booking service – there are plenty of ways these tools can make life easier.

If you enjoyed this, I appreciate it if you share it on social!

Your favorite community girl!