Tools for SEO, ads, social scheduling, and campaign reporting that a solo marketer can actually run.
8 guides
Marketing software is priced for teams and sold to individuals. We work out what each tool costs a one-person marketing function specifically: the entry tier, what it withholds, and how steeply the price climbs as a list or a team grows.
The highest scoring tools we have tested in this category.
Brevo is the strongest replacement because it bills by emails sent rather than contacts stored, which is the exact cost that makes Constant Contact expensive. AWeber is free to 500 subscribers. ActiveCampaign wins on automation.
Surfer SEO is the strongest pick once you already publish content regularly. Semrush covers more ground for a broader marketing effort. Mailchimp remains the easiest email entry point, if you budget past its 12-month promo pricing.
Buffer is the best value at $5 a channel a month billed annually, with a real free plan. Later suits visual-first brands. Hootsuite at $99 a user is hard to justify for a small business.
Social scheduling tools price on completely different units: per channel, per social set, per user. Four options compared on what a small business actually ends up paying.
AWeber gives you 500 subscribers free. ActiveCampaign gives you nothing free and holds its real automation behind the $49 tier. Which trade makes sense for a small list.
Constant Contact gets expensive as the list grows and has no free plan. Four alternatives that price differently, including one that bills by emails sent rather than contacts stored.
Hootsuite Standard starts at $99 per user a month, annual commitment only, with no free plan. Whether the established name justifies the price against far cheaper alternatives.
Constant Contact starts at $12 a month for 500 contacts. Pricing scales aggressively as the list grows, and there is no permanent free plan. What each tier actually adds.
ActiveCampaign starts at $15 for 1,000 contacts, but the Starter plan caps automations at five actions. The add-on costs and a 2025 billing change matter more than the headline price.
Three AI marketing tools worth the money for a small business, ranked on price versus what you actually get, from content optimization to email automation.
Surfer SEO pricing across four content-optimization tiers, what the Discovery plan actually limits, and when a small business should wait before buying it.