20 Best Marketing Agency Software & Tools in 2025

Every marketing agency has its own style, but one thing we can all agree on? The right tools make life a lot easier. Whether you’re managing a dozen clients, launching campaigns across multiple platforms, or trying to keep your team in sync, having reliable software in your corner is a must.

Fortunately, a range of software tools is designed specifically for digital marketing agencies like yours. These solutions help streamline campaign planning, improve client communication, and make tracking progress more efficient.

In this blog post, we’ll explore the top 20 marketing agency management software so you can build a tech stack that supports growth, efficiency, and creativity. 🧰

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⏰ 60-Second Summary

Here’s our list of the 20 best marketing agency tools to streamline operations:

  1. ClickUp (Best for all-in-one agency management)

Scheduling and collaboration tools

  1. Calendly (Best for simplified scheduling)
  2. Asana (Best for structured task management)
  3. Monday.com (Best for customizable project management)
  4. Trello (Best for visualized project management)
  5. Slack (Best for team communication)
  6. Productive (Best for agency financial tracking)

Social media tools

  1. Sprout Social (Best for integrated social media management)
  2. Hootsuite (Best for user-friendly social media scheduling and analytics)
  3. Buffer (Best for social media scheduling)

SEO tools

  1. SEMRush (Best for comprehensive SEO and market analysis)
  2. Surfer SEO (Best for data-driven SEO)
  3. ClearScope (Best for semantic SEO optimization)

Analytics and reporting tools

  1. Google Analytics (Best for tracking website traffic and user behavior)
  2. Google Ads (Best for online advertising campaigns)

Customer relationship management tools

  1. HubSpot Marketing Hub (Best for marketing automation and CRM)
  2. MailChimp (Best for email marketing campaigns)
  3. Drip (Best for e-commerce CRM)

Design and writing tools

  1. Canva (Best for creating visual content)
  2. Jasper (Best for AI-powered content writing)
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What Should You Look for In Marketing Agency Software?

Before committing to a marketing agency software, ask yourself: Will it help your agency run smoother, or will it just add to the chaos?

From project management to analyzing marketing agency KPIs, the right tools enhance efficiency, not complicate things.

Let’s look at key features to look for so you can invest wisely. ⚒️

  • Intuitive interface: If it’s clunky or hard to learn, your team won’t use it. Choose tools that are easy to navigate so everyone can hit the ground running
  • Collaboration tools: Shared workspaces, messaging, and task tracking keep teams (and clients) on the same page
  • Reporting and Analytics: Data-driven decisions matter. Look for digital marketing software with strong reporting and clear insights
  • Vendor support and community: Access to reliable customer support and an active user community can assist in troubleshooting and optimizing software use
  • Security and compliance: Strong data protection measures are necessary. Ensure the software complies with relevant industry regulations to safeguard client information

📮ClickUp Insight: 37% of workers send follow-up notes or meeting minutes to track action items, but 36% still rely on other, fragmented methods. Without a unified system for capturing decisions, key insights you need may get buried in chats, emails, or spreadsheets.

With ClickUp, you can instantly turn conversations into actionable tasks across all your tasks, chats, and docs—ensuring nothing falls through the cracks.

Summarize this article with AI ClickUp Brain not only saves you precious time by instantly summarizing articles, it also leverages AI to connect your tasks, docs, people, and more, streamlining your workflow like never before.
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The Best Marketing Agency Software and Tools

Choosing the best marketing agency tools can feel overwhelming, but it doesn’t have to be.

Do you need an all-in-one platform or specialized tools? Should you prioritize automation, collaboration, or analytics? The answer depends on your marketing agency’s structure and needs.

Here’s a breakdown of 20 tools with their strengths and weaknesses to help you decide. 💁

1. ClickUp (Best for all-in-one agency management)

Work today is broken. Our projects, knowledge, and communication are scattered across disconnected tools that slow us down. ClickUp fixes this with the everything app for work that combines projects, knowledge, and chat in one place—all powered by AI that helps you work faster and smarter. 🤩

ClickUp’s Marketing Solutions : Marketing Tasks
Centralize all your marketing activities in one place with ClickUp

Combined with ClickUp for Marketing Teams and the ClickUp Creative Agency Project Management Software, it might be the perfect solution for your marketing agency. By centralizing project management in ClickUp, agencies can seamlessly manage campaigns, timelines, and deliverables with Custom Views like Gantt charts, Kanban boards, and timelines.

Let’s suppose your agency is handling five product launch campaigns, each with tight deadlines and shifting priorities. Then, a client requests a timeline change, throwing everything into question.

Panic? Nope, not with ClickUp’s AI-powered workflows! 💁🏽

ClickUp Brain
Use ClickUp Brain as your reliable sparring partner, writer, and knowledge manager

ClickUp Brain’s AI Knowledge Manager quickly pulls up all the details—timelines, dependencies, and team workloads—so you can see what needs adjusting. From there, the AI Project Manager can help you automate updates, reschedule tasks, and reallocate resources via ClickUp Project Management Software without skipping a beat.

Need to quickly write up a blog or some social media slogans? Ask the AI writer to step in! All you need to do is open a ClickUp Doc, type “/”, and choose from the options!

ClickUp Brain
Use ClickUp Brain to generate a blog post, social media copy, content strategy ideas, and more directly within ClickUp Docs

When you’re done generating content, collaboration is easy as a breeze on Docs. Add your feedback as detailed comments and assign it to the relevant team member for making changes. No more messy back and forth on emails! Whether it’s drafting campaign strategies, refining brand messaging, or gathering client feedback. ClickUp Docs streamlines these workflows, allowing teams to create, edit, and manage documents in real time.

What if you do need to chat now and then? Enter ClickUp Chat, which is built right into your workspace!

Contextualize conversations to ensure you don’t miss anything with ClickUp Chat
Contextualize conversations to ensure you don’t miss anything with ClickUp Chat

It lets you link messages to specific tasks, transform them into action items with FollowUps, or organize them into dedicated spaces for different teams or clients. Plus, its AI-powered features allow you to generate tasks from discussions, summarize long chat threads for quick updates, and even pull insights from connected documents and project boards.

If you need help crafting an end-to-end marketing workflow from scratch, use the ClickUp Marketing Agency Template

ClickUp’s Marketing Agency Template is designed to help you keep track of your marketing agency’s tasks and projects.

It is an excellent tool for managing multiple clients and campaigns, aligning teams around key objectives, and tracking progress across projects. You can use it to break down simple tasks into manageable steps, improve communication among team members, and maximize output by allocating your resources more effectively.

ClickUp best features

  • Generated images using AI via a built-in image generator in ClickUp Whiteboards
  • Monitor KPIs, campaign progress, and team workloads in real time with ClickUp Dashboards using 50+ customizable cards
  • Save time with ready-to-use marketing roadmap templates for project planning, client onboarding, and campaign management
  • Reduce manual work by automating task assignments, status updates, and deadline reminders without constant oversight with ClickUp Automations
  • Tag team members in ClickUp Assign Comments to assign action items directly, ensuring clear communication and faster revisions during content reviews

ClickUp limitations

  • Its customization options can be overwhelming for beginners

ClickUp pricing

  • Free Forever
  • Unlimited: $7/month per user
  • Business: $12/month per user
  • Enterprise: Contact for pricing
  • ClickUp Brain: Add to any paid plan for $7/month per user

ClickUp ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.7/5 (10,040+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.6/5 (4,000+ reviews)

🍬 Bonus: Want to manage your marketing agency but don’t know where to start? Use the ClickUp Agency Management Template, which helps you track your sales pipeline, project scoping, resource management, client onboarding and feedback, and more.

What are real-life users saying about ClickUp?

ClickUp Brain saves me a ton of back and forth honestly. I know there are AI tools with a pretty efficient free tier, but the constant switching between tabs takes a toll. And honestly, when I’m in my deep work zone, this is the last thing I want to do. I primarily use the AI for writing stuff since I’m in the content industry. It also edits what I’ve written (ah-mazing!). Another thing that really helps me is Docs. I love the formatting options, especially those banners. So cute!

Reddit review

⚙️ Bonus: Want examples of using ClickUp’s extensive features? Read all about how ClickUp’s marketing team uses ClickUp!

2. Calendly (Best for simplified scheduling)

From brainstorming to feedback calls, meetings figure heavily in an agency workflow. Calendly makes the process smooth by eliminating the hassle of back-and-forth emails when scheduling meetings. Set up your availability, share your link, and let clients or team members book a time that works for both of you.

Meetings are automatically added to calendars, integrating seamlessly with Zoom, Outlook, and more. It’s also team-friendly. Shared accounts make scheduling easier, and the Routing feature ensures meeting requests go to the right team member.

Calendly best features

  • Customize event types for one-on-one, group, or round-robin meetings and manage team scheduling with multi-user accounts for centralized booking controls
  • Incorporate buffer time between appointments to prepare or transition meetings and employ date overrides to adjust availability for specific dates
  • Use time zone detection to sync user and invitee time zomes automatically
  • Personalize booking pages with custom branding with logos and color schemes

Calendly limitations

  • It doesn’t sync all Google calendars well
  • Calendly links often break, which causes a disconnect when users send links to clients

Calendly pricing

  • Free
  • Standard: $12/month per user
  • Teams: $20/month per user
  • Enterprise: $15,000/year

Calendly ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.7/5 (2,000+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.7/5 (3,500+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Calendly?

Depending on how you set your availability and the volume of people you’re scheduling with, you may get a lot of back to back bookings. There also may be cases where someone doesn’t understand how to reschedule or accept the invite on their end creating some confusion, but this is more an exception than a rule and wouldn’t deter me from using Calendly. You do lose a bit of scheduling control when you use this tool, but the time saved is worth it to me.

G2 review

🧠 Fun Fact: Apple’s legendary 1984 Super Bowl ad, directed by Ridley Scott, was nearly scrapped by executives who thought it was too risky. When it finally aired, it became one of the most famous commercials ever and helped launch the Macintosh.

3. Asana (Best for structured task management)

Asana: Project management software for teams
via Asana

Asana keeps projects organized and teams on track with an intuitive interface. It offers multiple views, including List, Board, and Calendar, so marketing teams can track progress in the best way for them.

Customizable project dashboards allow efficient workflow management, and automation tools help eliminate repetitive tasks. Everything from team assignments to deadlines can be managed here, improving visibility across projects.

Asana best features

  • Connect work to company-wide goals and track progress with real-time data with auto-calculated goal progress
  • Automate routine work and draft and standardize effective goals across your organization with Asana AI
  • Capture relationships between work, information, and the people involved to connect the what, why, and who of work with the Asana Work Graph
  • Get a single source of truth to track work from every angle, spot problems, and grow your digital marketing agency with Universal Reporting

Asana limitations

  • It’s not possible to assign multiple team members to a single task
  • You can’t view subtasks in the task view, increasing the number of clicks

Asana pricing

  • Personal: Free
  • Starter: $13.49/month per user
  • Advanced: $30.49/month per user
  • Enterprise: Custom pricing
  • Enterprise+: Custom pricing

Asana ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.4/5 (10,000+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.5/5 (12,000+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Asana?

I like Asana but the people I work with struggle sometimes. They want it to be more like a to do list rather than an overview of the entire project cycle and map of what everyone is doing. They struggle with the way it buries subtasks/they want everything at one level of depth, which isn’t how the tool is designed. They struggle with using Asana to communicate and transfer files. Asana works best when it’s the ecosystem for project communication in my experience…

Reddit user

4. Monday.com (Best for customizable project management)

Monday.com is all about customization. Its visual boards let you track progress using status indicators, timelines, and dependencies. You can also use the Leaderboard Widget to monitor team progress, manage leads, and identify bottlenecks.

It integrates seamlessly with Slack, Google Drive, and CRM systems, making collaboration effortless. What’s more, its Workdocs feature centralizes all project details, perfect for strategizing and sharing creative briefs without the usual back-and-forth.

Monday.com best features

  • Build personalized dashboards to track goals and metrics, connecting up to 10 boards with widgets like bar graphs and maps
  • Set up pre-built or custom automations for notifications, status updates, and task scheduling
  • Perform calculations like addition, extraction, and concatenation with AI-assisted formula columns
  • Ensure 256-bit encrypted transmission, Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud hosting, and enterprise-level compliance options

Monday.com limitations

  • There are limitations on the number of automated actions
  • Users have reported bugs and issues with the My Work feature
  • You can’t send bulk emails for more than 500 items at once, and the email templates are quite basic

Monday.com pricing

  • Free
  • Basic: $12/month per user
  • Standard: $14/month per user
  • Pro: $24/month per user
  • Enterprise: Custom pricing

Monday.com ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.7/5 (14,500+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.6/5 (5,000+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Monday.com?

One aspect to improve is the rigidity in the structure of user packages, which are only available in multiples, which can be impractical and costly for small teams. Additionally, during the initial stages of use, notifications can be excessive and even intrusive, hindering the initial experience for some users. It would be ideal to have more balanced default settings for notifications, with clear options to customize them from the start.

G2 review

🧠 Fun Fact: The ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, which raised over $220 million, wasn’t created by an agency—it went viral organically before brands jumped in to capitalize on the trend. Some of the most successful viral campaigns started this way.

5. Trello (Best for visualized project management)

Trello: Business management software with Kanban boards
via Trello

Trello is ideal for visual thinkers. Its Kanban-style boards make organizing projects a breeze—just drag and drop tasks as they move through different stages.

Each task gets its own card, where you can add checklists, deadlines, attachments, and labels to keep things clear. Power-Ups let you customize Trello even further, adding calendar views, automation, and integrations with tools like Google Drive and Slack. With easy team collaboration built in, everything flows smoothly.

Trello best features

  • Personalize boards with backgrounds, labels, and custom fields for better task organization
  • Set up rules, triggers, and recurring actions to eliminate repetitive tasks and streamline workflows with Butler
  • Turn emails into Trello cards with SendBoard or simplify approvals directly within boards with Trello Power-Ups
  • Switch between timeline, table, dashboard, and calendar views to track progress and deadlines

Trello limitations

  • Its simple interface is a problem for complex projects since it lacks time tracking, detailed reporting, and analytics
  • There aren’t built-in Gantt charts and task dependencies

Trello pricing

  • Free
  • Standard: $6/month per user
  • Premium: $12.50/month per user
  • Enterprise: $17.50/month per user (billed annually)

Trello ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.4/5 (13,000+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.5/5 (23,000+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Trello?

Trello is good for managing to-do lists, simple projects with less than 5 stakeholders and tracking progress of things like a basic sales pipeline. It’s rubbish for measuring things and collecting data that can be analyzed. There are plugins you can add to it but by the time you have paid for them you’re better off using something like JIRA (who own Trello) which was designed from the beginning to be a project management tool…I’ve got off point. Trello is a game changer if you need a kanban board.

Reddit user

🔍 Did You Know? Marketing agency Heye & Partner (a DDB agency) came up with the ‘I’m Lovin’ It’ jingle in 2003, but they didn’t write the song—Pharrell Williams did, and Justin Timberlake recorded it before it became a global campaign.

6. Slack (Best for team communication)

Slack : marketing agency software
via Slack

For many, Slack is the go-to for instant communication. Organize conversations by channels—whether for specific projects, teams, or topics—to keep discussions focused.

Direct messages make quick chats easy, and file sharing means you’re never hunting for that one important document. Need to find something fast? Slack’s powerful search function makes it simple. It integrates with tools like ClickUp, Google Drive, and Trello and even lets you automate routine tasks, keeping your marketing team connected without overwhelming notifications.

Slack best features

  • Work with partners, clients, or vendors in shared channels with Slack Connect
  • Start quick audio or video calls with screen sharing and automatic conversation with Huddles
  • Set up Slackbot replies, highlight keywords, and fine-tune notifications for better focus
  • Create dedicated channels for teams, projects, or topics while keeping sensitive info secure

Slack limitations

  • Users report the app asks them to log in every few days, even if they use a VPN
  • It doesn’t sync messages between the desktop and mobile versions quickly, causing a disconnect

Slack pricing

  • Free
  • Pro: $8.75/month per user
  • Business+: $15/month per user
  • Enterprise Grid: Custom pricing 

Slack ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.5/5 (33,000+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.7/5 (23,000+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Slack?

Slack is great for communicating in real time, but the sheer number of messages sometimes be too much to handle. It would be advantageous to have more detailed notification controls, either with improved filtering or longer channel snooze choices. Additionally, usefulness for our hectic logistical operations would be much improved by enhancing the search tool to retrieve previous talks quickly, particularly inside crowded channels.

G2 review

🧠 Fun Fact: One of the most famous marketing slogans was inspired by the final words of convicted murderer Gary Gilmore before his execution: ‘Let’s do it.’ Nike’s agency, Wieden+Kennedy, modified it to ‘Just Do It’ in 1988, creating an iconic brand message.

7. Productive (Best for agency financial tracking)

Productive is built for agencies that need financial clarity. It combines agency project management with budgeting, time tracking, and invoicing, giving you a complete financial picture.

Track time down to the minute, set project budgets, and monitor profitability in real time. Customizable reports provide insights into KPIs like team utilization and client revenue so you can see precisely where your agency stands at a glance.

Productive best features

  • Manage projects, budgets, and resource allocation together for better coordination
  • Get live insights on costs, revenue, and margins for faster decision-making
  • Plan team schedules to avoid bottlenecks and adjust project allocations as priorities change
  • Forecast revenue, utilization, profit margins, and cash flow for a clear view of your company’s financial future

Productive limitations

  • Automations don’t work at the account level, only at the project level
  • The different modules it offers aren’t integrated with each other; for instance, the sales CRM module doesn’t integrate with the project management module

Productive pricing

  • Essential: $11/month per user
  • Professional: $28/month per user
  • Ultimate: $39/month per user

Productive ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.7/5 (50+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.6/5 (90+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Productive?

The pipeline and project management options are useful for the administration of my agency….The reporting features are rather weak and not quite satisfying. I can’t manage simple things such as hours and costs for a project, It didn’t allow me to view some further details about team activity.

G2 review

🔍 Did You Know? Founded by David Ogilvy in 1948, Ogilvy has won more Cannes Lions awards (one of the most prestigious advertising honors) than any other agency, making it one of the most influential names in marketing history.

8. Sprout Social (Best for integrated social media management)

Sprout Social takes the guesswork out of social media management. It centralizes scheduling, publishing, monitoring, and analytics so agencies can handle multiple accounts from one dashboard.

Advanced analytics offer deep insights into audience behavior, engagement rates, and even competitor activity, helping fine-tune your social strategy.

Sprout Social best features

  • Plan, create, and schedule posts across multiple social platforms for maximum reach with Sprout’s Compose Publisher
  • Manage conversations and interactions across multiple platforms and collect customer messages and inquiries in one place with Shared Inbox
  • Automate the content approval process by adding and removing external stakeholders
  • Track brand mentions, keywords, and hashtags even when your brand isn’t tagged with Social listening features

Sprout Social limitations

  • Two users can’t simultaneously work from the same account
  • You can’t edit the post copy for multiple channels at once when scheduling a post

Sprout Social pricing

  • Standard: $249/month per user
  • Professional: $399/month per user
  • Advanced: $499/month per user
  • Enterprise: Custom pricing

Sprout Social ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.4/5 (3,800+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.4/5 (500+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Sprout Social?

Sprout suggests our Instagram has a 0.0% ER which is virtually impossible. I dug into it and realized the problem was that when they calculated ER (per impression) they counted paid and organic impressions but only organic engagement so we have an obscene amount of impressions (mainly from ads) but a comparatively very small amount of engagement, which is why it registers as 0.0%. I brought it up to our account manager at Sprout and was basically told that they can’t separate the impressions. This seems like a massive oversight.

Reddit user

🔍 Did You Know? Chanel’s marketing agency spent $1.6 billion promoting Chanel No. 5 over the years, featuring stars like Marilyn Monroe, Nicole Kidman, and Brad Pitt. It remains one of the most extravagant ad campaigns ever.

9. Hootsuite (Best for user-friendly social media scheduling and analytics)

Hootsuite simplifies social media scheduling and analytics. Plan posts in advance across multiple platforms, ensuring consistent content without the daily scramble.

The built-in analytics tools track engagement, follower growth, and audience demographics, giving you a clear picture of what’s working. Team collaboration features allow agencies to assign tasks, manage approvals, and streamline workflows—so no post goes live without a final check.

Hootsuite best features

  • Compare organic and paid campaigns, track hundreds of social metrics, and integrate with GA4 and Adobe Analytics
  • Schedule and publish content across LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, and more, with the ability to bulk schedule up to 350 posts
  • Generate captions, content ideas, and hashtags in seconds to overcome creative blocks with OwlyWriter AI
  • Track brand sentiment and trending topics, and even detect brand mentions in images, videos, and GIFs with Blue Silk AI

Hootsuite limitations

  • You can’t delete multiple posts at once 
  • Posting on X (formerly Twitter) is difficult with Hootsuite since it pushes back for size restrictions that aren’t an issue when posting directly on the site

Hootsuite pricing

  • Professional: $149/month
  • Team: $399/month
  • Enterprise: Custom pricing

Hootsuite ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.2/5 (5,000+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.4/5 (3,500+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Hootsuite?

While Hootsuite offers many great features, there are a few aspects that could use improvement. The biggest issue I’ve encountered is with the reporting tool… I’m no longer able to have my “default” screen include an overview of all my accounts. […] Additionally, the reports seemed stuck on data from 2022 for a while, which was frustrating. I also noticed that the reports can sometimes be inconsistent—if I pull two similar reports, the top posts may differ based on the metric (likes, comments, impressions)…

G2 review

10. Buffer (Best for social media scheduling)

Buffer : marketing agency software
via Buffer

Buffer keeps social media scheduling effortless. It’s known for its clean and intuitive interface, making content planning and publishing straightforward.

Schedule posts across multiple channels, customize content for each platform, and maintain a consistent presence without spending all day on social media. Basic analytics provide insights into engagement and reach, helping agencies refine their social media strategy.

Buffer best features

  • Share updates across multiple channels and customize future posts using the Buffer browser extension and Power Scheduler
  • Assign tasks, leave comments, and review posts before publishing for seamless teamwork and curate and share articles easily with built-in RSS feed integration
  • Edit images directly within Buffer with cropping, resizing, and text overlay tools
  • Create landing pages to centralize content and make it easy for audiences to find key links

Buffer limitations

  • It doesn’t offer analytics for all social media platforms
  • Pinterest accounts don’t connect sometimes
  • Reconnecting unlinked accounts requires contacting an organization admin, adding an extra step to account management
  • Users have reported glitches and instances where scheduled posts fail to publish

Buffer pricing

  • Free
  • Essentials: $6/month per channel
  • Team: $12/month per channel
  • Custom pricing for more than 10 channels

Buffer ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.7/5 (9,000+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.5/5 (1,400+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Buffer?

As I said earlier, I have used Buffer for a long time with no main issues but the use of emojis was quite tedious for many years of using the tool. Recently, Buffer has solved it by showing your most used emojis first to select instead of having to scroll down all the emojis if it happened you needed to select a country flag…one of the last emojis in the list, which was really annoying. I have not liked that on the free plan, Buffer has removed the possibility to have threaded tweets.

G2 review

🧠 Fun Fact: Content marketing agencies working for retailers all popularized Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and even Singles’ Day (China’s biggest shopping event). Some brands even create their own ‘national days’ to generate buzz.

11. SEMRush (Best for comprehensive SEO and market analysis)

Looking to level up your SEO efforts? SEMRush is a digital marketing software that helps marketers and agencies optimize their search strategies easily. One of its standout features is the Keyword Magic Tool, which helps you uncover both short- and long-tail keywords relevant to your niche.

SEMRush offers a Trend Tab highlighting emerging keywords so you’re always ahead of the curve. Ever wonder what your competitors are up to? The Competitor Analysis feature lets you peek into their SEO strategies, helping you identify gaps and opportunities to refine your own approach. You can also track your keyword rankings daily with the Position Tracking tool, making it easy to monitor fluctuations and fine-tune your strategy over time.

SEMRush best features

  • Use Keyword Overview to analyze search volume, competition, and trends and the Keyword Difficulty tool to assess ranking challenges
  • Monitor your competitors’ SEO tactics with the Domain Overview tool, track their organic search rankings, and estimate traffic based on keyword performance
  • Run a Site Audit to identify technical issues affecting performance to obtain a Site Health Score for a snapshot of your website’s SEO standing
  • Enter any domain into Backlink Analytics to get a full breakdown of its backlink profile; identify strong links, assess broken ones, and strategize

SEMRush limitations

  • There’s no ‘light’ version for do-it-yourself SEO without a huge budget
  • Users on the basic plan can only manage a restricted number of projects simultaneously, hindering those managing multiple websites or client portfolios

SEMRush pricing

  • Pro: $139.95/month per user
  • Guru: $249.95/month per user
  • Business: $499.95/month per user

SEMRush ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.5/5 (2,000+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.7/5 (4,000+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about SEMRush?

There’s definitely a learning curve and integrations that require some technical know-how, so it may be a bit too advanced for some. Though the pricing is affordable even for small businesses, the costs can quickly ramp up when adding more of the additional a la carte options.

G2 review

🔍 Did You Know? In the early 2000s, some marketing agencies created Hollywood-style ‘movie trailers’ for products instead of traditional ads. The best example? Halo 3’s ‘Believe’ campaign, which looked like a war documentary rather than a video game ad.

12. Surfer SEO (Best for data-driven SEO)

Surfer SEO is built for data-driven content optimization, ensuring your pages have the best shot at reaching the top of search results. Its in-built content editor analyzes top-ranking pages and gives real-time recommendations on structure, keyword usage, and readability. This means you can craft content that resonates with your audience and ticks all the SEO boxes.

If your existing content is not performing well, the Audit Tool helps you optimize it based on competitor benchmarks so you’re always aligned with the latest SEO best practices.

Surfer SEO best features

  • Use the SERP Analyzer to study the best-performing pages for your target keyword and analyze content length, keyword density, page speed, and header tag usage
  • Leverage the Content Editor for real-time feedback on readability and structure
  • Identify AI-generated content with the built-in detector and rewrite it with the AI Content Humanizer
  • Let Auto-Optimize scan your content and insert missing keywords and sections to improve topical relevance

Surfer SEO limitations

  • You can’t edit inside the auto-optimize window, and the content editor refreshes itself, which disturbs the flow
  • You can’t hide or unpin the Surfer panel, which sometimes collides with other elements of WordPress or Google Docs

Surfer SEO pricing

  • Essential: $99/month
  • Scale: $219/month
  • Enterprise: Custom pricing

Surfer SEO ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.8/5 (500+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.9/5 (400+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Surfer SEO?

It is expensive, particularly for small businesses like mine, but there are ways of gaining extra content editor credits, which I think is a nice touch as 10 on the basic plan feels very limited. It is a premium product, however, so I would expect to pay a premium price.

Capterra review

🔍 Did You Know? Some of the most famous commercial directors, like Ridley Scott (Alien, Gladiator) and David Fincher (Fight Club, The Social Network), started their careers directing ads. In fact, ad agencies have produced Super Bowl commercials with higher production value than some Hollywood movies.

13. ClearScope (Best for semantic SEO optimization)

If you’ve ever struggled with making your content SEO-friendly without keyword stuffing, ClearScope might be a good solution. This tool focuses on semantic SEO, meaning it helps your content be more relevant and comprehensive.

The Content Brief feature tells you what keywords and topics to include based on top-ranking articles. Whether you’re a solo blogger or part of a marketing team, ClearScope keeps your content relevant, engaging, and search-friendly.

ClearScope best features

  • Use Keyword & Topic Analysis to identify essential keywords, related terms, and their optimal usage frequency for better search rankings
  • Gauge content effectiveness with the Content Grading System that assigns a grade (A+ to D-) based on keyword alignment
  • Build SEO-optimized outlines with suggestions to improve readability, organization, and relevance
  • Utilize pre-defined Content Views like ‘Best Opportunities’ and ‘Striking Distance Queries’ to focus on high-impact improvements

ClearScope limitations

  • Some keyword suggestions are not optimal for ranking at the top of Google SERPs
  • It’s hard to edit the keywords you want to use, for example, it recommends mentioning competitors in your content

ClearScope pricing

  • Essentials: $189/month
  • Business: $399/month
  • Enterprise: Custom pricing

ClearScope ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.9/5 (90+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.9/5 (60+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about ClearScope?

The price. It’s very costly. Pasting directly from the web version onto WP is a bust because a lot of formatting follows. It would be nice to have an English Standard switch button to change between UK, US, AUS, CA standard of English.

Capterra review

🧠 Fun Fact: The fictional agency Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce in Mad Men was inspired by real 1960s agencies like BBDO, McCann Erickson, and J. Walter Thompson, all of which played a key role in shaping modern advertising.

14. Google Analytics (Best for tracking website traffic and user behavior)

Ever wonder how visitors interact with your website? Google Analytics gives you all the insights you need. Real-time reporting lets you track user activity as it happens—perfect for monitoring spikes after a campaign launch or social media post.

Beyond real-time data, you get detailed demographic insights, including your visitors’ age, gender, location, and interests. This makes it easier to tailor your marketing efforts. Plus, with Goal Tracking, you can measure conversions (like form submissions or product purchases) and refine your strategy based on what’s driving results.

And if you’re running Google Ads, the integration makes analyzing both organic and paid performance seamless.

Google Analytics best features

  • Gain actionable insights, predict future actions, and visualize customer journeys with built-in automation, revealing key metrics and reports
  • Track how users complete tasks with Funnel Exploration, identifying drop-off points and supporting A/B testing for content improvements
  • Compare up to three user segments with Segment Overlap to identify and target new customer groups effectively
  • Use custom reporting to run ad hoc queries, filter, segment, drill down, and reorganize data for detailed analysis

Google Analytics limitations

  • Users report wanting more AI integrations and smarter insights
  • It lacks features like sales reporting in GA4, and advanced customization requires technical skills

Google Analytics pricing

  • Google Analytics 4: Free
  • Google Analytics 360: Custom pricing

Google Analytics ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.5/5 (6,000+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.7/5 (8,000+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Google Analytics?

If you’re running a large online business and spend thousands through Google Ads/Shopping, then having the GA integration present can be helpful. However, if you’re only making use of GA to see how many visitors you get, then yeah it’s pretty pointless and server-level stats are more than adequate.

Reddit review

🧠 Fun Fact: The Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity started in 1954 to recognize the best advertising campaigns. It was inspired by the Cannes Film Festival but is now considered the most prestigious award in marketing.

15. Google Ads (Best for online advertising campaigns)

Trying to maximize your ad spend? Google Ads has features to ensure your campaigns reach the right audience. The Keyword Planner helps you discover high-performing keywords, while Audience Insights lets you segment users based on demographics, behaviors, and interests.

If you aim to retarget visitors who didn’t convert the first time, it lets you create remarketing lists to bring them back with tailored ads.

And with multiple ad formats—search, display, video, and shopping—you have plenty of options to craft a strategy that works for your business. Google Ads also offers in-depth performance tracking so you can continuously optimize your campaigns for the best return on investment (ROI).

Google Ads best features

  • Maximize reach with targeted advertising, including keyword, demographic, location, device, audience, time, and content-based targeting
  • Use Performance Max Campaigns to run a single AI-optimized campaign across Google Search, YouTube, Display, Gmail, and Maps
  • Boost conversions with its Smart Bidding Strategies that leverage machine learning to optimize ad performance for specific goals like acquisition or ad spend
  • Get real-time insights on ad performance and budget allocation for better ROI

Google Ads limitations

  • Users complain of misleading promotions and ad recommendations
  • No offline capabilities and inadequate customer service

Google Ads pricing

  • Pay-per-click platform (no subscription fee)
  • Payment based on ad spend and bidding

Google Ads ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.3/5 (1,500+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.4/5 (900+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Google Ads?

The range of products available within Google Ads is second-to-none and as a result it’s simply not plausible to not use it. The recent layout updates resolved the majority of my issues but of all the platforms I deal with on a daily basis, Google Ads has the worst support I have ever experienced.

G2 review

🔍 Did You Know? Volney B. Palmer opened the first official advertising agency in Philadelphia. At the time, ad agencies mainly bought newspaper space for clients rather than creating campaigns.

16. HubSpot Marketing Hub (Best for marketing automation and CRM)

HubSpot Marketing Hub combines CRM functionality with powerful AI marketing automation tools. One of its biggest strengths is Email Marketing Automation, allowing you to send personalized emails based on user behavior. This means better engagement and less manual effort.

Hubspot’s lead generation tools include landing pages and forms designed to capture visitor information seamlessly. You can also A//B test different strategies to refine your approach. Because everything integrates with HubSpot’s CRM, you get full visibility into how leads move through the funnel, making it easier to nurture and convert them into customers.

HubSpot Marketing Hub best features

  • Unite marketing and sales teams with collaborative tools with its Account-based Marketing Software
  • Qualify leads, book meetings, provide customer support, and scale conversations with its free Chatbot builder
  • Create and publish podcasts effortlessly with Hubspot AI, generate scripts, and track impact with analytics
  • Create, distribute, and track content across platforms with its AI-powered marketing software; it also helps with content remixing, content embedding, and brand voice generation 

HubSpot Marketing Hub limitations

  • Limited reporting capabilities, especially tracking customer journeys and marketing event timelines
  • The social media module lacks depth and functionality, and it offers limited email templates with restrictive customization options 

HubSpot Marketing Hub pricing

  • Free Tools
  • Starter: $20/month per user
  • Professional: $890/month
  • Enterprise: $3,600/month

HubSpot Marketing Hub ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.4/5 (12,000+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.5/5 (6,000+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about HubSpot Marketing Hub?

The reason why I use Hubspot is because it’s all-in-one platform: CRM, email newsletter, sign up forms, social media management, email automations, etc. If you use only one feature like CRM, probably, not worth it.

Reddit review

🧠 Fun Fact: In the 1930s, marketing agencies helped radio networks create daytime dramas to promote household cleaning products, leading to the birth of soap operas—so named because brands like Procter & Gamble sponsored them.

17. MailChimp (Best for email marketing campaigns)

If email marketing is your go-to strategy, MailChimp makes it incredibly easy. The Drag-and-Drop Email Builder lets you create professional emails without needing design skills. Whether you’re customizing templates or building from scratch, the platform keeps the marketing planning process simple.

It also provides robust Analytics Tools to track open rates, click-through rates, and engagement. You’ll know exactly what’s working and where to improve. Plus, for e-commerce businesses, MailChimp’s integrations allow you to automate follow-up emails based on customer behavior, such as abandoned cart reminders—boosting conversions effortlessly.

MailChimp best features

  • Use the AI-powered Content Optimizer to analyze campaigns and get data-driven suggestions to improve engagement and effectiveness
  • Create tailored automation sequences, track customer behavior, and automate personalized customer interactions during email drip campaigns
  • Categorize customers based on behavior, demographics, or purchase history for highly personalized campaigns
  • Compare subject lines, content layouts, and calls-to-action to determine what works best for your audience

MailChimp limitations

  • Users complain of emails sent through MailChimp landing in spam folders
  • The mobile application doesn’t allow users to create or edit campaigns effectively

MailChimp pricing

  • Free
  • Essentials: $13/month
  • Standard: $20/month
  • Premium: $350/month

MailChimp ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.3/5 (12,000+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.5/5 (17,000+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about MailChimp?

Because Mailchimp has so many features it can be a bit hard to find what you are looking for sometimes. However, there are a lot of articles in the knowledge database. I don’t find their site builder to be as simple to use as what is offered by other email providers.

Capterra review

🔍 Did You Know? Guerilla marketing agencies create highly unconventional campaigns, like placing giant coffee cups in the streets that look like steaming potholes or using public benches that double as ad spaces. The goal? Get people talking without spending millions.

18. Drip (Best for e-commerce CRM)

Drip : marketing agency software
via Drip

For e-commerce brands looking to scale, Drip offers advanced automation tailored to online retailers. Its Visual Workflow Builder allows you to create detailed customer journeys based on browsing habits and purchase history—no coding required.

Segmentation is another key strength. Drip lets you categorize customers based on purchase frequency, average order value, and more, making sending personalized recommendations and offers easier. If you want to boost customer loyalty and drive repeat sales, this tool is a good addition.

Drip best features

  • Enable multi-step sequences triggered by customer interactions for hyper-personalized engagement with advanced automation workflows
  • Track individual email performance and overall campaign metrics, including open rates, click-through rates, and revenue
  • Use the tagging system for both manual and automated tags within workflows for targeted email campaigns
  • Prioritize high-value leads with lead scoring and grading based on behavior and demographics

Drip limitations

  • The sign-up window is buggy and there’s no email confirmation
  • Once you add a decision point in automation workflows, moving elements around requires rewriting the entire flow rather than simply repositioning them

Drip pricing

  • Custom pricing

Drip ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.4/5 (450+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.4/5 (150+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Drip?

The workflows can be difficult in the beginning to get your head around with the different possibilities and also options that you need to ensure are set correctly. Once you have these fully understood, it becomes a really robust tool to utilize.

G2 review

19. Canva (Best for creating visual content)

Canva: Design software : marketing agency software
via Canva

Canva makes it easy for anyone— a solo entrepreneur or part of a big marketing team—to craft stunning visuals with its simple drag-and-drop interface.

Plus, it helps teams collaborate seamlessly. With real-time editing and feedback tools, you can work together with your team to refine designs, assign tasks, and keep everything on-brand. Its integrations with other marketing agency software streamline your workflow, making it faster than ever to create and share content.

Canva best features

  • Access a vast library of customizable content calendar templates, along with those for different design needs like social media graphics, marketing materials, and more
  • Use features like Magic Design (automated design suggestions), Magic Write (AI-generated text), and Magic Eraser (removes unwanted elements) to streamline the creative process
  • Create and edit videos with ease with its background removal, beat sync, and seamless video and audio integration features
  • Publish social media posts directly from Canva with its Content Scheduling tool

Canva limitations

  • Video editing templates are too short and aren’t useful for longer videos
  • It lacks advanced text formatting options, and once you export a design, its quality drops

Canva pricing

  • Free
  • Pro: $15/month per user
  • Teams: $10/month per user
  • Enterprise: Custom pricing

Canva ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.7/5 (4,000+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.7/5 (12,000+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Canva?

It’s integrations and AI is not yet optimized. I understand it’s still in the Beta phase but some applications have been launched almost a year now and it’s still performing the same. Right now integration with Grammarly is a little concern. Because the icon if there are corrections or edit suggestions will not quickly go away! It’s very disturbing when you are in the zone, and it blocks some buttons to click, or you are just focusing on the design and not on the text or content.

G2 review

🔍 Did You Know? Long before social media, marketing agencies hired actors and models to pretend to be everyday people using products in public spaces. This was an early form of influencer marketing called ‘undercover marketing.’

20. Jasper (Best for AI-powered content writing)

Jasper
via Jasper

Jasper is an AI-powered writing assistant that helps marketers, bloggers, and businesses create high-quality content quickly and efficiently. It can generate everything from blog posts to ad copy and social media captions, all tailored to match your brand’s tone and style.

For those looking to enhance their workflow, Jasper’s conversational Chat feature allows users to brainstorm and refine ideas in real time, making the content creation process smoother and more engaging.

It’s a good alternative to outsourcing content writing services, giving you more control and speed.

Jasper best features

  • Generate high-quality content with its multi-model content generation that leverages GPT-4, Cohere, and Anthropic
  • Try the Company Knowledge feature to save brand guidelines, voice, and audience details
  • Upload written content to help Jasper mimic distinct tones for different team members, campaigns, or sub-brands with its customizable brand voices
  • Access 60+ copywriting and content writing templates for different needs like Amazon product features, AIDA framework, and content improver

Jasper limitations

  • The output is often generic, inaccurate, and lacks creativity in comparison to other AI writing tools
  • Users complain about the unsubscription experience. You only have two choices: close your account or suspend it for a month

Jasper pricing

  • Creator: $49/month per user
  • Pro: $69/month per user
  • Business: Custom pricing

Jasper ratings and reviews

  • G2: 4.7/5 (1,200+ reviews)
  • Capterra: 4.8/5 (1,800+ reviews)

What are real-life users saying about Jasper?

Jasper is great but also very expensive and besides a monthly plan they have a volume-based price model attached. So if you produce larger content it becomes quickly very expensive. There is a translation built in but using it in German needs to be monitored quite well, as grammar mistakes appear quite often.

G2 review 

🧠 Fun Fact: The Michelin tire company started the Michelin Guide in 1900 as a marketing strategy to get people to drive more and wear out their tires faster. Today, Michelin Stars are the highest honor in fine dining.

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