Powerful tools of the trade for online entrepreneurs
We only recommend online platforms that we use to manage and grow our own business. There’s no hype or fluff here — just the stuff we’ve found essential to our success.
Over the years, we’ve worked hard testing dozens of online platforms to find the ones that can be real game-changers for your online business. Here are the critical few we believe in so much that we use them ourselves.
This page is broken up into a series of guides. Choose the guide that matches where you are right now to get our best recommendations for you.
The right resources for where you’re at right now
For beginning entrepreneurs
I’m brand new to this — keep it simple.
Resources, apps, and services for the brand-new entrepreneur. If we were getting started today, these are the tools we would use.
For advanced entrepreneurs
I have employees and contractors to manage.
These are the tools that we use to run the SPI business, manage payroll and taxes, and keep track of complicated processes.
For podcasters and YouTubers
I need gear and software recommendations.
Our favorite equipment and software for video and podcasting production, from budget picks to fancy gear worth the cost.
Special deals for you from our sponsors
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Sponsored Recommendation
HighLevel
All-in-one sales and marketing automation platform
HighLevel is the leading all-in-one sales and marketing automation platform built for agencies, entrepreneurs, and small business owners. From funnels and CRM to automation, payments, and reputation management, HighLevel brings every essential growth tool under one roof — so you can simplify your tech stack and focus on scaling your business.
Start your free 30-day trial today.
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Sponsored Recommendation
Poppy
Create viral content & ads with Poppy AI.
Poppy AI is the only AI tool that lets you work visually with multiple inputs at once. Drag in YouTube videos, competitor content, PDFs, voice notes, and images – then watch as Poppy helps you create viral scripts, ad copy, and social media posts that actually convert.
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Sponsored Recommendation
Relay
Your cash flow could be clearer with Relay
Relay is small business banking that puts you in complete control of your cash flow. It’s an all-in-one money management platform with multiple checking accounts, team spend controls, no account fees, and more—so you can see what you’re earning, spending and saving.
Don’t waste another day—or dollar—with traditional institutions that nickel and dime small businesses like yours, sign up for Relay today!
Get $50 when you sign up and fund a Relay account
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Sponsored Recommendation
Riverside
Record, edit, and repurpose all in one place.
Riverside is a recording and editing platform built for creators, podcasters, and entrepreneurs. You can capture remote interviews in up to 4K video and crystal-clear audio, then edit and repurpose everything in your browser. It’s trusted by thousands of creators who want to publish faster and skip the tool-juggling.
As an SPI listener, you’ll get 30 days of our Pro Plan for free. That means full access to everything you need to create faster and free up hours in your week.
Use code SMART at checkout to access all Pro features.
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Sponsored Recommendation
ScoreApp
Create a high-converting quiz that grows your list…and your income!
ScoreApp helps you create quizzes or assessments that your audience actually get excited to take! It gives them instant, personalized feedback, and gives you the data you need to qualify leads and follow up automatically. Set it up once, and let it work for you 24/7, turning visitors into loyal customers while you focus on what you do best.
SPI listeners get 50% off for three months.
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Sponsored Recommendation
Tailor Brands
Form your LLC from $0 + state fees with Tailor Brands
Tailor Brands brings everything into one place — form your LLC, build your brand, manage your finances, and stay compliant. We guide you every step of the way, so you focus on what matters most and launch your business, worry-free.
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Sponsored Recommendation
Taplio
Build your LinkedIn brand like a pro in no time.
Taplio is your LinkedIn coach tool, built for people who take the platform seriously. It helps you stay consistent with all the tools to grow your personal brand on LinkedIn. Taplio shows you what wins so you can post with confidence and grow faster. Start your free trial and see your personal brand grow!
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Sponsored Recommendation
Vubli
The fastest way to post short form videos everywhere.
Vubli is the fastest way for creators to schedule & post short form videos across YouTube Shorts, Instagram Reels, TikTok, Facebook Reels, LinkedIn, and X.
Upload your video and thumbnail once, then Vubli auto-generates platform-ready titles, descriptions and tags so you can post everywhere in a few clicks. On average, creators save around 27 minutes per post.
Get 50% off your first 3 months with code PAT.
Easy-to-use resources for beginners
When you’re first getting started, it’s important to keep things as simple as possible. This will minimize the amount of time you spend working on technical issues, freeing up your time to actually serve your customers. It will also help you keep your costs low. Here is our list of what you need to get started.
Choose a tool for talking to your audience
One of our core beliefs at SPI is that you need to “own your audience,” which means that you need the ability to contact them outside of social media platforms. In other words, you need to be able to email them. SPI began in 2008, and we have seen time and time again that social media platforms love to make changes to their algorithm — and often it upends the current monetization strategy for that platform.
We have two different tools that we recommend. Both of these platforms make it easy to email your audience and to create an online storefront for selling products. Kit leans more heavily into the longer-form content space (podcasting, video creation, blogging), whereas Stan is more focused on helping social media influencers create a storefront that they control.
Kit
Kit is the only email marketing platform we use, and will ever use. Kit 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 Kit.
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Stan Store
Stan Store is the fastest, easiest way for entrepreneurs to launch their online businesses. It’s an all-in-one storefront where you can sell digital products, manage income, track analytics, and more — all in just a few clicks. Set up your Stan Store in 5 minutes and start monetizing your knowledge and passions today!
Get started today with a 30 day free trial of Stan Store.
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Decide if you want to build a website
After you set up either Kit or Stan Store, do you need to create a separate website? Strictly speaking, the answer is no — both Kit and Stan Store allow you to create landing pages. In the spirit of keeping it simple, this can be enough. But if you need something more, especially if you need to build an informational resource, then you will want a website.
For a Website, you need to purchase hosting, a domain, and then you need to choose a theme, which is the design of the website. There are many website platforms these days, such as Squarespace, Wix, and Webflow. We are big fans of the WordPress platform, because it will grow with your business over time.
Flywheel
Offering thoughtfully built tools to manage your clients and websites while growing your business. Flywheel handles all of the technical bits and bobs of running a website built on WordPress — including nightly backups, blazing-fast speed, 24/7 support, and a free SSL certificate.
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Rockbase
The Rockbase theme truly makes it easy to quickly create a WordPress website, using beautifully designed blocks that are easy to assemble. That’s why we used it to build this website. Created by talented creators for talented creators—just like you.
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Form an LLC
When you build a business, it is important to separate your personal finances from your business finances. Part of how you do that is by establishing a business entity; typically in the United States, most small businesses begin with a Limited Liability Company (or LLC). You should consult an attorney in your area to find out what is best for your individual circumstances. If you want to manage the filing yourself, either of these services can walk you through the process.
Doola
Doola, formerly Startpack.io, helps global online entrepreneurs form US LLCs, supporting customers through the incorporation process so they can confidently collect payments, build credibility, stay legal, and make more money.
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ZenBusiness
ZenBusiness provides the essential tools and guides entrepreneurs and small business owners need to create a successful business. Officially filing an LLC is a great first step… but that’s only the first step. ZenBusiness provides the ongoing education, support, and tools to quickly and easily set up and run a business on their platform.
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If you are starting a community
If the business you are planning involves creating an online community, then we highly recommend the Circle platform. It’s the one we use to run our community, and it supports including online courses and events as benefits for your members.
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 our communities.
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.
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What we use as an established business
We often get asked about the tools we use to run the SPI business. Before we recommend those tools, it’s important that we stress that SPI has been around for 15+ years, and so we require a set of tools and services that are far more complicated than a beginner needs. With that caveat, here’s what we use to run SPI.
Managing employee benefits
Bonusly
Bonusly made it easy for us to create an employee recognition program. We use Bonusly in two ways: to give our employees annual rewards based on longevity with the company; and as a peer recognition program, with points that employees. Employees can choose how to redeem their Bonusly points from a catalog that includes retail gift cards or cash to a PayPal account.
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. Follow this link for three months off of your employer fees.
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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, capturing important documents such as the employee handbook, and more. Oh, and their concierge team is dynamite.
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Tools for collaboration
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, such as contractors for audio and video editing.
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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.
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SavvyCal
SavvyCal makes scheduling easy by allowing your recipient to compare their calendar with yours to find availability. You can connect multiple calendars and offer different meeting types. Our link gets you your first paid month free after your 7-day trial.
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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.
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Marketing platforms
Kit
Kit is the only email marketing platform we use, and will ever use. Kit 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 Kit.
This is an affiliate link
Poppy AI
Poppy AI is a fantastic time saver for us in the process of creating email copy for nurture sequences. We feed in a bunch of historical content (past emails, lead magnet PDFs, YouTube videos), and then Pat records an audio file with his focus for the email, and Poppy converts it into a written email using AI.
We use Poppy as a jumping off point — from there we edit and revise to make sure the email is a true SPI email. It’s a great time saver that we recommend.
This is an affiliate link from a current SPI sponsor
RightMessage
RightMessage gives us the ability to dynamically display content and user experiences on our website tailored to individual audience types. One of our favorite tools is the toaster widget, which has helped us boost website event registration. With A/B testing, pop-up questions and forms, and dynamic page editing, RightMessage gives you a huge bang for your buck.
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Rewardful
It can be hard (and expensive) to grow a SaaS business — that’s why Rewardful offers a simple way for companies to set up affiliate and referral programs with Stripe. Just connect your account and let us track referrals, discounts, and commissions for you!
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Stan Store
Stan Store is the fastest, easiest way for entrepreneurs to launch their online businesses. It’s an all-in-one storefront where you can sell digital products, manage income, track analytics, and more — all in just a few clicks. Set up your Stan Store in 5 minutes and start monetizing your knowledge and passions today!
Get started today with a 30 day free trial of Stan Store.
This is an affiliate link
Tools for your website
Iubenda
Iubenda ensures that your website is compliant with the latest privacy laws. They have a variety of services, including policy and term generators, cookie management, and consent solutions. Of the solutions available, we’ve found this one easiest to use.
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Rockbase
The Rockbase theme truly makes it easy to quickly create a WordPress website, using beautifully designed blocks that are easy to assemble. That’s why we used it to build this website. Created by talented creators for talented creators—just like you.
This is an affiliate link
Podcast and video gear and software
Podcast and video production requires both gear and software. We’ve rounded up our top recommendations for both.
The gear we recommend
We’ve put together gear lists on Amazon to make it easy for you to get started with your podcast or YouTube channel. The lists below are Amazon affiliate links, and if you purchase through those links, SPI will receive a commission from Amazon, at no additional cost to you.
The Basic Podcasting Kit
Consisting of only three items: a simple, high-quality USB microphone, pop filter, and a basic microphone stand, this kit will get you started as inexpensively as possible without sacrificing quality.
We have two microphones recommended here; the AudioTechnica microphone is easier to get in the USA and Samson microphone is easier to source outside the USA.
These are Amazon links
The Advanced Podcasting Kit
This kit is for serious audiophiles or podcasters ready to upgrade their setup. If you haven’t podcasted yet, please consider starting with the basic kit to make sure that you’ll stick with podcasting before splashing out on this more expensive gear.
We have two high-end microphones recommended here, but you only need one.
This is an Amazon link
The YouTube Add-on Kit
We often get asked which camera we’d recommend for a high-quality YouTube setup. This camera is our top pick.
Combine this kit with either of the podcasting kits to handle your audio recording.
This is an Amazon link
SwitchPod
This minimal, versatile, handheld tripod was specifically designed by Pat Flynn and Caleb Wojcik with video creators in mind. It’s quick to set up and comfortable to hold.
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Podcasting software
Descript
Descript offers simple and powerful collaborative tools to edit your audio and video just like a text document! Remove the tedious work that often stands between an idea and its expression and focus on developing your craft instead of getting side-tracked with platform fatigue.
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Fusebox
The official podcast player used by SPI! Fusebox provides your website visitors with a superior listening experience. From its powerful podcast hosting and analytics to the industry’s most elegant and responsive web players, Fusebox is a must-have tool for starting a podcast.
Get three months free when you join using our affiliate link. After creating your account, email [email protected] with the subject line “Three month credit for SPI readers” to receive your free three months.
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Riverside
Riverside is a recording and editing platform built for creators, podcasters, and entrepreneurs. You can capture remote interviews in up to 4K video and crystal-clear audio, then edit and repurpose everything in your browser. It’s trusted by thousands of creators who want to publish faster and skip the tool-juggling.
As an SPI listener, you’ll get 30 days of our Pro Plan for free. That means full access to everything you need to create faster and free up hours in your week.
Use code SMART at checkout to access all Pro features.
This is an affiliate link from a current SPI sponsor
Video software
Ecamm
Ecamm is a livestreaming platform for Mac that allows you to manage multiple inputs, bring in pre-recorded segments or slides, and add effects to your live broadcast. It will help you greatly increase the quality of your live video.
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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 secure too. If you’re a video pro like Pat, definitely check out Frame.io.
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SwitchPod
This minimal, versatile, handheld tripod was specifically designed by Pat Flynn and Caleb Wojcik with video creators in mind. It’s quick to set up and comfortable to hold.
This is an affiliate link
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.
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