Serious professionals in any industry use the best tools. Those pros know that such tools are instruments of their success. The online business ecosystem is no different. When used well, tools can be real game-changers.
Which are the best tools for online entrepreneurs serious about growing their business? We have worked hard over the years to answer that question by testing dozens upon dozens of platforms. Most are okay. Some stink. And a few are excellent.
Here are our chosen few—those platforms that we have come to love and trust. The SPI business could not function without these tools. We are grateful for the teams who build these tools and the care they show their customers like us.
Important Disclosure: Please Read Before Proceeding
Most Recommended Tools
Bluehost
Bluehost is our go-to hosting platform for all of our websites, including this one.
Bluehost is a proven powerhouse in the website hosting industry. They offer exceptional customer service. They allow you to host multiple domains under one account, which is super convenient. They're as reliable as they come. And they offer an exclusive discount just for you as an SPI Fan: hosting for only $2.75/month!
Buzzsprout
The absolute best platform to use to launch and grow your show.
If you host your podcast with Buzzspout from the get go, then you’re in a golden spot. We love Buzzsprout for its ease of use, product-centric ethos, devotion to podcasters, and concentration on the fundamental features that actually matter versus crazy bells and whistles that most podcasters don’t really need.
Circle
The modern community platform for creators—and the easiest way to set up a premium community experience. That's why we use it for SPI Pro.
Circle is powerful enough to support some of the largest and most successful online communities—while being easy to use for community builders who are just starting out.
Circle is fully white-labeled so it can match and integrate with your brand. Your members stay looped into your community—increasing engagement, retention, and connection.
ConvertKit
ConvertKit is the only email marketing platform we use, and will ever use.
ConvertKit is our #1 recommended email marketing platform because it has been built with care to the exact needs of creators building online businesses. Their user experience is very user-friendly. And segmenting our subscribers into focused groups so that we can deliver content specific to their needs has never been easier. We’re all-in on ConvertKit.
RightMessage
RightMessage gives us the ability to communicate with our fans on their terms.
It’s hard to get your messaging right, which harms your ability to motivate others to take a call-to-action. Thankfully, RightMessage is here to save the day. Their platform empowers you to dynamically display content and user experiences on your site tailored to individual audience types, which can dramatically boost your conversion rates.
Teachable
Offering online courses to our audience revolutionized our business a few years ago.
That was possible thanks to Teachable, a market leader in the booming online courses industry. All of our online courses are housed on Teachable because they make it so darn simple to configure content, manage settings, and sell to students. There’s absolutely no coding required to set up and start selling your online course.
Browse our other tools by category:
Business Platforms
Guideline
We are so grateful that Guideline exists because without it we may never have rolled out a 401(k) plan to our team. It integrates beautifully with Gusto, which we use for payroll. And it keeps us compliant, which provides blissful peace of mind.
Gusto
Gusto makes running our SPI business a breeze. It starts with payroll, which is critical to get right for a growing business. We also use Gusto for PTO tracking, culture surveys, important document capture, and more. Oh, and their concierge team is dynamite.
Help Scout
There's no way we could operate our customer care inboxes without Help Scout. We also rely on Help Scout as the home of knowledge base tutorial content for some of our offerings. It's pure magic in the form of a software system made to delight.
Collaboration Technology
Dropbox
Dropbox is our cloud-based document storage system of choice that easily syncs with all of our team's computers and provides simple access controls to third-party contributors. We also dabble with Dropbox Paper for elegant document creation.
Slack
Slack is our beloved digital HQ for all things SPI. We organize all of our communications in Slack using various channels tailored to unique projects, departments, and hierarchies. It's made email almost a thing of the past, which is glorious for our productivity.
Zoom
Many, many companies have tried to get video conferencing right. Zoom finally did. All of our internal meetings and external calls are hosted through a Zoom conference line. The quality is unmatched. Screensharing is simple. And recording is easy.
Legal & Compliance Tools
Cookiebot
Cookiebot ensures that your website is compliant with the latest privacy laws. It consists of three important features: cookie consent, cookie monitoring, and cookie control. For example, worried about GDPR? Worry no more with Cookiebot.
HelloSign
The document signing process can be a real hassle—emailing various PDFs back and forth, scanning hard copies, etc. Thankfully, there's a much faster, easier, and more secure way—use HelloSign. We use it for all of our sensitive documents, and always will.
LegalZoom
Forming a business is almost effortless with LegalZoom. Pat used LegalZoom to form some of his first companies. And although we have a legal team that does this sort of work for us today, we still believe that LegalZoom is a strong option for many entrepreneurs.
Marketing Platforms
ConvertKit
ConvertKit is the only email marketing platform we use, and will ever use. ConvertKit is our #1 recommended email marketing platform because it has been built with care to the exact needs of creators building online businesses. Their user experience is very user-friendly. And segmenting our subscribers into focused groups so that we can deliver…
Demio
After loads of trial and error with other webinar platforms, we discovered Demio. It was love at first sight. Finally, we found a platform that provides great video quality, is very stable, makes adding guest presenters a snap, and has excellent user experiences included like public and private chat channels. There's no beating Demio.
RightMessage
RightMessage gives us the ability to communicate with our fans on their terms. It’s hard to get your messaging right, which harms your ability to motivate others to take a call-to-action. Thankfully, RightMessage is here to save the day. Their platform empowers you to dynamically display content and user experiences on your site tailored to…
Podcasting Tools
Buzzsprout
The absolute best platform to use to launch and grow your show. If you host your podcast with Buzzspout from the get go, then you’re in a golden spot. We love Buzzsprout for its ease of use, product-centric ethos, devotion to podcasters, and concentration on the fundamental features that actually matter versus crazy bells and…
Rev.com
We have relied on Rev.com for years for all of our podcast episode transcription needs. The quality is always there. And price is always fair. And despite the hype of some newer options in the industry, Rev.com continues to deliver without fail.
Fusebox Player
Most web-based podcast players are a total bust, which is why we built our own: the Fusebox Podcast Player. It's the solution we needed to a key problem: galvanizing the consumption and growth of our podcast via our own website. We love it, and fans do too.
Project Management Apps
Airtable
If you're a big fan of spreadsheets, then you'll love Airtable as a means of organizing and planning your work. It's become a powerhouse option within the world of project management systems. With loads of customizable options, it's worth considering.
CoSchedule
If you're looking for a content-specific project management solution, then look no further than CoSchedule. It integrates seamlessly with your WordPress blog. It allows for standard editorial workflows to be created. And it centralizes all content creation tasks.
Monday.com
Monday.com is our new go-to work management platform. It's drag-and-drop simple. There are oodles of pre-made templates for a variety of use cases. And it's highly collaborative and visual by design. We use it for darn near everything we do.
Sales Platforms
Eventbrite
If you run your own events, then do yourself a favor and sell your tickets through Eventbrite. We've tried to adapt other platforms for ticket sales and it never really works. We always come back to Eventbrite, which powers such events as FlynnCon.
Stripe
Stripe is the gold standard for payment processors. Pat uses it to process payments for his private mastermind and workshops. Most SaaS companies today use it for their recurring payments, as we do with Smart Podcast Player and as does Teachable.
Teachable
Offering online courses to our audience revolutionized our business a few years ago. That was possible thanks to Teachable, a market leader in the booming online courses industry. All of our online courses are housed on Teachable because they make it so darn simple to configure content, manage settings, and sell to students. There’s absolutely…
Video Production Tools
Frame.io
Frame.io is a key component of Pat's workflow for producing, reviewing, and collaborating on videos. The user experience is off the hook. And upload times are blazing fast. And it's all highly secured. If you're a video pro like Pat, definitely check out Frame.io.
Loom
Loom is a welcomed breath of fresh air in the world of video recording tools. There's a free plan option that's not lacking in features. And videos are saved automatically to the cloud. We use Loom anytime we need to create an important explanatory video.
Wistia
Wistia hosts all of our core educational and marketing videos, including our online course videos and promotional videos. We've been using it for years and have no intention of switching to a different option. We believe in Wistia and are all in on them.
Website & Form Builders
Bluehost
Bluehost is our go-to hosting platform for all of our websites, including this one. Bluehost is a proven powerhouse in the website hosting industry. They offer exceptional customer service. They allow you to host multiple domains under one account, which is super convenient. They're as reliable as they come. And they offer an exclusive discount…
Circle
The modern community platform for creators—and the easiest way to set up a premium community experience. That's why we use it for SPI Pro. Circle is powerful enough to support some of the largest and most successful online communities—while being easy to use for community builders who are just starting out. Circle is fully white-labeled…
Leadpages
We have long used Leadpages to create dedicated landing pages to launch a new educational product or experience. Like most brands, we prefer to build pages on our own site. However, whenever we cannot, we use Leadpages to get the job done.
