Picking the right SEO Company in Texas

Picking the Right SEO Company in Texas

Texas is one of the most competitive business environments in the United States. From Houston and Dallas to Austin, San Antonio, and fast-growing suburban markets, businesses across the state are fighting for online visibility. That makes one decision especially important:

Picking the right SEO company in Texas.

The wrong SEO agency can waste your budget, damage your rankings, or lock you into long-term contracts with little return. The right SEO company, on the other hand, can become a growth partner—driving qualified traffic, increasing leads, and helping your business dominate local and statewide search results.

This guide will walk you through how to choose the right SEO company in Texas, what to look for, what to avoid, and how to make a confident, informed decision.


Why Choosing the Right SEO Company Matters

Search engine optimization is not a one-time task—it’s a long-term strategy that impacts:

  • Website traffic

  • Lead generation

  • Brand credibility

  • Sales growth

  • Competitive advantage

SEO affects how customers find you, trust you, and choose you. In a state as large and diverse as Texas, a generic or inexperienced SEO provider simply won’t cut it.


Understand the Texas SEO Landscape

Texas SEO is unique because it often requires local, regional, and statewide optimization simultaneously.

Common Texas SEO Challenges:

  • Highly competitive metro markets (Houston, Dallas, Austin)

  • Strong local SEO competition in suburbs

  • Multi-location businesses

  • Service-area businesses covering large regions

  • Industry-heavy markets (oil & gas, healthcare, construction, IT, legal)

An SEO company in Texas must understand local search behavior, not just generic SEO theory.


Define Your SEO Goals Before Hiring an Agency

Before you evaluate SEO companies, clarify what you want to achieve.

Common SEO Goals:

  • Rank higher for local searches

  • Generate more inbound leads

  • Increase organic website traffic

  • Improve conversion rates

  • Dominate a niche or service area

  • Support paid ads with organic growth

A good SEO company will align strategy with your goals—not push a one-size-fits-all package.


Look for Proven Experience in Texas Markets

Not all SEO experience is equal.

When evaluating an SEO company in Texas, ask:

  • Have they worked with Texas-based businesses?

  • Do they understand local competition?

  • Can they optimize for Texas cities and suburbs?

  • Do they have case studies in similar markets?

Local experience matters because ranking in Houston, Dallas, Austin, or San Antonio is very different from ranking in a small, low-competition area.


Evaluate Their SEO Strategy (Not Just Promises)

One of the biggest red flags is vague promises like:

  • “We guarantee #1 rankings”

  • “Instant SEO results”

  • “Secret ranking methods”

No legitimate SEO company can guarantee rankings.

Instead, look for companies that explain:

  • Their keyword research process

  • How they approach technical SEO

  • Their content strategy

  • How they build authority and backlinks

  • How they measure success

Transparency is a sign of expertise.


Ask About Their Local SEO Capabilities

For many Texas businesses, local SEO is the most profitable form of SEO.

A strong Texas SEO company should offer:

  • Google Business Profile optimization

  • Local citation building

  • Review strategy and reputation management

  • Location-specific landing pages

  • Service-area optimization

If local SEO isn’t part of their core offering, that’s a problem—especially in Texas markets.


Understand Their Approach to Content

Content is the foundation of SEO success.

Ask potential SEO companies:

  • Do they create original content?

  • Is content written for search intent?

  • Do they build topic clusters?

  • Do they update existing content?

Avoid agencies that rely on:

  • Thin blog posts

  • AI-only content with no strategy

  • Keyword-stuffed pages

Quality content drives rankings and conversions.


Ask How They Handle Technical SEO

Technical SEO issues can silently kill performance.

Your SEO company should proactively address:

  • Page speed optimization

  • Mobile usability

  • Crawl errors

  • Indexing issues

  • Site structure

  • Core Web Vitals

If technical SEO isn’t mentioned, rankings will eventually stall.


Make Sure They Focus on Conversions, Not Just Traffic

Traffic alone doesn’t grow a business.

The best SEO companies in Texas focus on:

  • Conversion rate optimization (CRO)

  • Clear calls-to-action

  • Lead tracking

  • User experience improvements

Ask:

  • How do you measure leads from SEO?

  • Do you track phone calls and form submissions?

  • How do you optimize pages for conversions?

SEO should generate revenue—not vanity metrics.


Evaluate Their Reporting and Communication

Clear reporting separates professional agencies from amateurs.

Quality SEO reporting includes:

  • Organic traffic trends

  • Keyword movement

  • Conversion data

  • Technical improvements

  • Action plans

Avoid agencies that:

  • Send confusing reports

  • Hide behind jargon

  • Avoid explaining results

You should always understand what’s being done and why.


Avoid Long-Term Contracts Without Proof

Some SEO companies lock clients into 12–36 month contracts upfront.

While SEO takes time, reputable agencies:

  • Earn retention through results

  • Offer flexible agreements

  • Set realistic expectations

A short-term trial or phased approach is often a safer option.


Ask About Link Building (Carefully)

Backlinks still matter—but bad links can harm your site.

Ask:

  • How do you earn backlinks?

  • Do you use outreach or digital PR?

  • Do you avoid link farms and spam networks?

Ethical link building is slow—but effective.


Watch Out for Common SEO Red Flags

Avoid SEO companies that:

  • Guarantee rankings

  • Own your website or content

  • Refuse to explain strategy

  • Use black-hat tactics

  • Rely on outdated SEO tricks

  • Offer extremely cheap pricing with big promises

Cheap SEO often becomes expensive to fix later.


Understand Pricing for SEO Companies in Texas

SEO pricing in Texas varies based on:

  • Market competitiveness

  • Scope of work

  • Business size

  • Number of locations

  • Industry difficulty

Typical SEO Pricing Ranges:

  • Small local SEO: $750–$1,500/month

  • Competitive local markets: $1,500–$3,000/month

  • Multi-location or statewide SEO: $3,000+/month

Be wary of prices that seem too good to be true.


Ask the Right Questions Before Hiring

Here are smart questions to ask any SEO company:

  1. How do you approach keyword research?

  2. How do you measure SEO success?

  3. How long before we see results?

  4. What industries do you specialize in?

  5. How do you handle local SEO?

  6. Who owns the content and data?

  7. How often do you communicate?

  8. Can you show Texas-based case studies?

The quality of answers matters more than polished sales pitches.


Why Texas Businesses Benefit From Local SEO Agencies

Working with a Texas-based SEO company offers advantages:

  • Local market knowledge

  • Understanding of regional competition

  • Familiarity with Texas customer behavior

  • Faster communication

  • Easier collaboration

Local insight often translates into faster and more sustainable results.


SEO Is a Partnership, Not a Vendor Relationship

The best SEO relationships feel like partnerships.

A great SEO company:

  • Educates you

  • Aligns with your goals

  • Adapts strategy as your business grows

  • Focuses on long-term success

If an agency treats SEO as a checklist instead of a strategy, results will suffer.


How Long Does SEO Take in Texas?

Texas SEO timelines depend on competition.

General Timeline:

  • Technical improvements: 30–60 days

  • Content impact: 2–4 months

  • Ranking growth: 4–6 months

  • Authority building: 6–12 months

SEO compounds over time—the longer it runs, the stronger it becomes.


Final Thoughts: Choosing the Right SEO Company in Texas

Picking the right SEO company in Texas is one of the most important marketing decisions you’ll make.

The right partner will:

  • Understand your market

  • Build a customized strategy

  • Communicate clearly

  • Focus on leads and revenue

  • Deliver long-term growth

The wrong partner will:

  • Overpromise

  • Underperform

  • Waste time and budget

Take your time, ask smart questions, and choose an SEO company that treats your business like a long-term investment—not a quick sale.


Key Takeaway

The best SEO company in Texas isn’t the cheapest or the loudest—it’s the one that delivers sustainable results and earns your trust.

 

Best cPanel Web Hosting

When it comes to hosting a website, performance is usually the first thing that everyone looks for. You want to find a web hosting provider that delivers strong uptime rates, high speeds, and enough resources to run your website.

While performance is obviously crucial, lots of webmasters forget to consider managing their hosting plan after they sign up.

Your current hosting providermay offer strong performance, but if it’s too complicated to manage your account, then you should look for a cPanel web host.

What is cPanel?

cPanel is one of the most popular control panels in the web hosting industry. The interface and dashboard make it easy for webmasters to manage things like domain names, backups, email addresses, files, account preferences, and more.

In my experience, once you’ve used cPanel, there is really no looking back. I’ve experimented with other dashboards, but cPanel is the best for beginners and experts alike.

One of the reasons why cPanel is so popular is because it’s a web-based control panel, meaning you can manage your website from anywhere with an Internet connection, as opposed to needing software on a specific piece of hardware.

Anyone with a website can benefit from cPanel hosting. Whether you’re looking for a shared hosting plan, virtual private server(VPS hosting), or dedicated server, a user-friendly hosting interface will make your life much easier.

Lots of web hosting providers have cPanel hosting. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that you should pick just any host offering this feature. There are other factors that need to be taken into consideration.

Rather than spending time digging through dozens and dozens of hosting trials to try and find the best web hosting provider for your website, you can just refer to this guide to learn the best cPanel web host.

These are my top 6 picks for the best cPanel web hosting providers for 2020:

Top 6 Best cPanel Web Hosting Companies for 2020

  • Bluehost— Best cPanel for ease of use.
  • HostGator— Best cPanel for scaling resources on-demand.
  • InMotion— Best cPanel hosting for small businesses.
  • SiteGround— Best cPanel for cloud hosting.
  • iPage— Best cheap cPanel hosting (for VPS plans).
  • A2 Hosting— Fastest cPanel web hosting.

cPanel Web Hosting Reviews

I’ve already done the research for you. Read my reviews below to determine which option best fits the description for your cPanel hosting needs.

Bluehost

BlueHost

Visit BlueHost

Normally $7.99/month
Free domain and SSL certificate
Recommended by WordPress
30-day money back guarantee
Get a 63% discount

I ranked Bluehostas the best overall hosting provider for its user experience. So it should be no surprise that they rank high on my list of cPanel web hosts.

More than two million websites across the globe rely on Bluehost, so you know that this is a provider that you can trust.

  • Shared Hosting— Starting at $2.95 per month
  • VPS Hosting— Starting at $18.99 per month
  • Dedicated Hosting— Starting at $79.99 per month

Bluehost lets you manage access control from your cPanel dashboard. This allows you to restrict access to certain areas of your hosting account, which is ideal for those of you who will have multiple users logging in. For example, as a small business owner, you may not want to give your blogger access to your billing account or server resources.

For those of you who are looking for a VPS plan or dedicated server, you’ll have root access from cPanel as well. This will give you complete control over your server to make any custom changes, without needing any additional software or hardware.

Dedicated plans allow you to increase storage on-demand from cPanel as well. You’ll be able to do this without any assistance from a server administrator.

All Bluehost plans come with a free SSL certificate, 24-7 customer support, and a 30-day money-back guarantee.

Check out my full BlueHost hosting reviewto learn more about the company.

HostGator

Hostgator

Visit HostGator

Normally $6.95/month
Month-to-month at $10.95
Free domain and SSL certificate
45-day money back guarantee
Get a 61% discount

HostGatoris one of the most popular names in web hosting. They offer affordable plans and deliver quality performance.

No matter what type of web hosting service you’re looking for, HostGator has a plan for you.

  • Shared Hosting— Starting at $2.75 per month
  • VPS Hosting— Starting at $29.99 per month
  • WordPress Hosting— Starting at $5.95 per month
  • Dedicated Servers— Starting at $118.99 per month

Altogether, this provider has 12 different web hosting plans to choose from; all of which come with cPanel.

With HostGator, you’ll always get the latest version of cPanel with your hosting plan. HostGator also provides some additional incentives like:

  • Free website builder
  • Free site transfer
  • Free domain transfer
  • Google Ads credits
  • Bing Ads credits
  • Free SSL

All shared hosting plans come with a 99.9% uptime promise and a 45-day money-back guarantee. Hostgator is compatible with the most popular CMS platforms including WordPress, Drupal, Joomla, and Magento.

HostGator is one of the best web hosting providers for websites that need to scale their resources. Having access to cPanel for managing all of this makes everything easier.

If you are interested in cloud hostingbe sure to check out my HostGator Cloud hosting review.

InMotion

InMotion Hosting

Visit InMotion

Normally $7.99/month
Free domain and SSL certificate
Free and unlimited email
90-day money back guarantee
Get a 57% discount

As a business owner, InMotionshould be one of your top considerations for hosting your small business website.

cPanel comes standard for managing your Linux-based server, regardless of which plan you choose. This makes it easy for you to set up your domains, manage resources, handle site automation, and more.

Furthermore, InMotion allows for one-click app installations with more than 400 applications that can be managed directly in cPanel.

Whether you’re using WordPress, Drupal, or other CMS systems and shopping carts, InMotion is an ideal solution for your website. The one-click installer also allows for easy upgrades, convenient maintenance, as well as rollbacks to previous versions.

Here’s a look at the introductory pricing rates for InMotion web hosting:

  • Shared Business Hosting — Starting at $6.39 per month
  • WordPress Hosting — Starting at $6.99 per month
  • VPS Hosting— Starting at $21.04 per month
  • Dedicated Servers— Starting at $105.69 per month

All of these plans come with cPanel for free.

In addition to the one-click app installer, you’ll also benefit from data backups, free SSD drives, SSH access, secure email, and other great freebies.

InMotion has been using cPanel with their hosting plans for more than a decade. This has allowed their IT team to customize the backend specs to speed up its responsiveness and ultimately allow for a more seamless user experience.

My InMotion hosting reviewalso found that plans are backed by a 90-day money-back guarantee, which is an industry-leading offer. So if you’re looking for a reliable web host with a feature-rich cPanel, look no further than InMotion.

SiteGround

Siteground

Visit Siteground

Normally $11.95/month
Free SSL, email, CDN, & backups
Recommended by WordPress
30 day money back guarantee
Get a 67% discount

SiteGroundis another well-known hosting provider that uses cPanel. These are some of the top cPanel features for SiteGround:

  • Install your CMS (like WordPress)
  • Backup your website content
  • Make changes to the server
  • Set up your email accounts
  • Manage domains
  • Manage your security features
  • Manage your databases
  • View and manage your resources

Managing files through cPanel is something else that SiteGround makes extremely easy for webmasters. All you have to do is upload files and add new folders to keep everything neat and organized. This will ultimately make things easier for you whenever your site needs maintenance.

For advanced users, you’ll be able to manage complex settings, like “Chron Jobs” in cPanel as well. This allows you to run specific commands to optimize your disk space.

SiteGround has shared hosting plans starting at just $3.95 per month. They also offer cloud web hosting, which starts at $80 per month.

Regardless of which option you choose, you’ll be able to manage everything with ease through the platform’s responsive interface and dashboard. Read more about their different plans and services in my complete SiteGround review.

iPage

iPage

Visit iPage

Normally $7.99/month
Free domain and SSL certificate
FREE drag and drop site builder
30-day money back guarantee
Get a 75% discount

With introductory plan rates starting as low as $1.99 per month, iPageis one of the best cheap web hostingproviders on the market today.

For such a low price, iPage comes with a surprising amount of benefits like unlimited disk space, scalable bandwidth, unlimited domains, and a free SSL certificate. They also offer a free domain for the first year after you sign up.

In addition to web hosting, iPage is known for its website builder. But the free version that comes with the shared hosting plan is only good for building six pages, so it’s not realistic for you to create an entire website with it.

iPage uses, cPanel, but there is one catch—you need to sign up for one of their VPS hosting plans or dedicated servers in order to get it.

Those start at $19.99 per month and $119.99 per month, respectively.

Unfortunately, in my iPage hosting reviewresearch I found that the shared plans do not come with cPanel. Instead, iPage uses something called vDeck Control Panel as an alternative.

vDeck is fine, but it definitely lacking compared to cPanel in terms of its capabilities and interface. Learning how to use it is a bit more challenging as well.

With that said, the iPage VPS plans are very cost-effective compared to other providers out there. So it won’t cost you too much for an upgrade to get cPanel included with your hosting.

A2 Hosting

A2 Hosting

Visit A2 Hosting

Normally $7.99/month
Month-to-month pricing at $9.99
Free domain and SSL certificate
30-day money back guarantee
Get a 63% discount

A2 Hostingisn’t the most well-known name in the web hosting world, but this provider offers the fastest speeds on the market today.

Speed, reliability, green hosting, and excellent customer support make A2 a top option for anyone. They also have a wide range of hosting plans and prices.

  • Shared Hosting — Starting at $2.96 per month
  • VPS Hosting— Starting at $5.00 per month
  • Reseller Hosting— Starting at $9.80 per month
  • Dedicated Hosting— Starting at $99.59 per month

All of the A2 plans come with cPanel for free. If you recall, iPage’s cheapest plans don’t with cPanel. So being able to get cPanel from A2 for less than $1 more per month is a great deal.

With A2 Hosting, cPanel allows you to do things like:

  • Manage email usage
  • Configure SSH keys
  • Create a Node.js app
  • Install an SSL certificate from a third party
  • Manage your files
  • Manage databases
  • Manage domains

A2 also uses Softaculous, which is made for installing software to your account with just one click. Softaculous and all auto-updates can be handled directly from your cPanel dashboard. Read more about A2’s features in my complete A2 hosting review.

How to Find the Best cPanel Web Host For You

As you can see, every cPanel web hosting provider is unique. Whether it be the price, type of hosting, or other features, some hosts will be a better option depending on the needs of your website.

When you’re evaluating a cPanel web hosting provider, there are elements that need to be taken into consideration.

Performance metrics like uptime and speed are a given. So rather than focusing on those, I’ve identified some other factors that you should look out for when evaluating prospective web hosts.

Free cPanel License

First and foremost, if you want to use cPanel then you need to find a provider that offers a free cPanel license. There are plenty of hosts out there that offer cPanel for an upcharge, but there’s no reason to do go with them if you can get it for free elsewhere.

With the exception of the iPage shared hosting plan, every provider on our list offers cPanel for free.

One-Click App Installations

A major cPanel benefit is its user-friendly dashboard. So for those of you who plan to install third-party apps, it will be easy for you to manage everything in one place.

Look for a web hosting provider that advertises one-click app installs. In my experience, this is much easier than complex downloads and installations. Whether it be CMS integration, ecommerce functionality, or anything else, a simple app installation will make your life much easier. Once installed, cPanel usually will allow for one-click or auto-updates as well.

Site Builder Tools

This shouldn’t be a deal-breaker, but it’s a nice feature for those of you who are building a new website from scratch. If your web hosting provider has an adequate site builder, you can essentially benefit from a one-stop-shop for your website needs.

Normally, I would not recommend bundling a hosting provider and website builder. I think it’s best to stick with providers that specialize in web hosting and platforms that specialize in website builders. Usually, there isn’t any overlap between the two.

With that said, if you’re just building a simple website like a small personal site or blog, then you can get away with this for sure.

Freebies

Price always needs to be taken into consideration when you’re looking at different web hosting options. Some hosts appear cheap, but then upcharge you for basic features. So it’s in your best interest to identify the features you need and then look for a host that offers them for free.

  • SSL certificate
  • Site migrations
  • Domain name
  • Advertising credits
  • Developer tools
  • WordPress installation

These are some common freebies offered by hosting providers. I’d also keep on eye on their money-back guarantees. 30 days seems to be the industry standard. But I’ve seen 45 days, 60 days, and even as high as 90 days.

Resources

It doesn’t make sense to choose a cPanel hosting plan that doesn’t accommodate the needs of your website. While cPanel is a great tool, it doesn’t make up for poor performance.

  • RAM
  • Storage
  • Bandwidth
  • CPUs

You need to make sure that these types of resources accommodate your website traffic. For new or growing sites, it’s in your best interest to find a cPanel hosting provider that gives you the opportunity to scale.

Alternatives to cPanel Hosting

Not every web hosting provider offers cPanel, so you’re not forced to use it.

In most cases, people think cPanel is easier to use. While I agree with that statement, it all comes down to personal preference.

For example, earlier we talked about iPage’s hosting plans. For less than $2 per month, you can sign up for shared hosting, a free website builder, and plenty of other freebies. But this comes with vDeck Control Panel. So if you prioritize price over convenience, you might decide to go with this option instead.

Alternatively, DreamHostis popular web host on the market today. But instead of using cPanel, they have their own custom control panel. I know plenty of webmasters who love it.

Hostingeris another great hosting provider that does not offer cPanel. Even so, I would still strongly recommend them.

So don’t let cPanel availability be the determining factor in your web hosting decision. While I personally think it’s a great feature, you can still explore alternative solutions.

With all of this in mind, here is a recap of the best cPanel web hosts on our list.

Top 6 Best cPanel Web Hosts for 2020

  • Bluehost— Best cPanel for ease of use.
  • HostGator— Best cPanel for scaling resources on-demand.
  • InMotion— Best cPanel hosting for small businesses.
  • SiteGround— Best cPanel for cloud hosting.
  • iPage— Best cheap cPanel hosting (for VPS plans).

A2 Hosting— Fastest cPanel web hosting.

Best Email Marketing Services

In-depth reviews of the best email marketing service providers for 2020

Our content is reader-supported, which means if you click on some of our links in this post that we may earn a commission.

Email is the king of the marketing world.

No other distribution channel drives engagement and builds customer relationships like email marketing. Email campaigns deliver a higher ROI than every other type of marketing category. So if you can set up your emails properly, it can be extremely lucrative for you.

But to have a successful email marketing strategy, you need to find the best email marketing service to manage your subscribers, content, and campaigns.

Most email marketing services will have similar features. That’s why finding the best email marketing software for your business or website can be difficult.

What makes one email platform better than others?

Trust me, all email services are not the same. Throughout my career, I’ve managed multiple email lists with more than 100,000 subscribers and used about every email marketing tool in existence. I know what it takes to run successful email marketing campaigns, and I know which software will get the job done.

Whether you’re starting a new email list from scratch or looking to switch to a new provider, this guide will help you find the best email marketing service for your situation.

Top 10 Best Email Marketing Services

Constant Contact

AWeber

GetResponse

ConvertKit

Mailjet

Drip

ActiveCampaign

MailChimp

MailerLite

Hubspot

Hundreds of providers offer email marketing services. But you should really only be considering these top ten for your business.

I’ve reviewed each of these platforms in greater detail below.

I’ll highlight the top features, price, benefits, and any potential drawbacks or downsides for you to consider. Let’s begin.

Email Marketing Service Reviews

#1. Constant Contact

Constant Contact Free Trial

Visit Constant Contact

Price starts at $20/mo
Drag-and-drop email builder
100+ mobile-friendly templates
Simple automation tools
Get a 60 day free trial

Constant Contact is an industry leader in the email marketing space. For more than 20 years, this software has been a top choice for small business owners and large corporations alike.

Creating new email campaigns with Constant Contact is easy. Just choose from more than 100 of their pre-built and mobile-optimized templates. Then customize your message with the easy to use drag-and-drop builder.

Adding text, image, video, coupons, polls, and events to any message is simple and straightforward.

With Constant Contact, you can track the results of your campaigns in real-time. You’ll see everything from open rates to click-through rates, as well as data for each individual subscriber.

Automation is a key benefit of Constant Contact. You can trigger welcome messages for new subscribers and set up drip campaigns based on their actions.

Constant Contact has easy integration with other platforms you might be using, like Salesforce, Shopify, Eventbrite, WordPress, QuickBooks, Gmail, and much more.

Constant Contact offers a 60-day free trial, which is one of the best offers you’ll find in the industry.

Constant Contact Free Trial

Pricing for Constant Contact email software is straightforward. There are two plans for you to choose from; Email and Email Plus.

Like most email marketing platforms, your rate will be based on the number of subscribers on your list. Here’s what some of the prices look like for each plan:

Email

0 – 500 Subscribers — Starting at $20 per month

501 – 2,500 Subscribers — Starting at $45 per month

2,501 – 5,000 Subscribers — Starting at $65 per month

5,001 – 10,000 Subscribers — Starting at $95 per month

Email Plus

0 – 500 Subscribers — Starting at $45 per month

501 – 2,500 Subscribers — Starting at $70 per month

2,501 – 5,000 Subscribers — Starting at $95 per month

5,001 – 10,000 Subscribers — Starting at $125 per month

These tiers continue all the way up 50,000. Once you eclipse 10,000 subscribers, you’ll automatically be upgraded to the Email Plus plan.

For basic and professional emails, the cheaper plan will be fine. But for those of you who want to get the most out of your email campaigns, I highly recommend Email Plus.

This plan comes with more advanced features like subject line A/B testing, dynamic content, and automated behavioral campaigns.

#2. AWeber

AWeber

Visit AWeber

Price starts at $19/mo
700+ pre-built templates
A/B testing and automation tools
24/7 live chat & email support
Get a 30 day free trial

AWeber is a traditional email marketing service that’s reliable and very affordable. The company has been around for 20 years. During that time, they’ve provided email marketing software to more than one million entrepreneurs and small businesses.

I like AWeber because it’s simple and straightforward. Unlike other platforms that add features and capabilities for plans at different price points, AWeber offers all of its features with every plan.

Pricing is based strictly on the number of subscribers on your list. So you’ll get the same features whether you have 20 contacts or 20,000 contacts.

Here’s an overview of the pricing tiers.

0 – 500 Subscribers — $19 per month

501 – 2,500 Subscribers — $29 per month

2,501 – 5,000 Subscribers — $49 per month

5,001 – 10,000 Subscribers — $69 per month

10,001 – 25,000 Subscribers — $149 per month

Another reason to love AWeber is because they offer outstanding customer support.

AWeber Customer Support

You can reach them 24/7 via email and live chat. They also have phone support available during business hours on weekdays.

With AWeber, you’ll get all of the basic features that you expect with an email marketing service:

700+ pre-built templates

Drag-and-drop email builder

Email analytics

A/B testing

Sign up forms

Automation

Third-party integrations

Subscriber segmentation

AWeber is an industry leader in email deliverability rates. They make sure that your content is optimized to reach your subscribers’ inboxes.

You can try AWeber for free with a 30-day trial.

#3. GetResponse

GetResponse

Visit GetResponse

Price starts at $15/mo
Automated sales funnels
200+ email templates
24/7 live chat support
Get a 30 day free trial

GetResponse is a bit more than a basic email marketing service. It’s more of an all-in-one solution that specializes in automation.

In addition to traditional email campaigns, GetResponse can help you build high-converting landing pages for lead generation.

The platform has a really cool feature called Autofunnel. This tool can be used to create funnels for sales, leads, webinars, and more. It’s fully automated and very easy to use.

Funnels include things like emails, landing pages, exit popups, marketing automation, Facebook ads, and ecommerce integration. It all depends on your goals and how you want to set it up. But GetResponse provides all the tools you need to grow your subscriber list and monetize those contacts.

GetResponse Features

Once a user enters your funnel, everything is fully automated by GetResponse. It’s the perfect way to guide customers through the conversion process with multiple digital touchpoints.

Let’s take a closer look at GetResponse’s plans and pricing.

Basic — Starting at $15 per month

Autoresponders

Unlimited landing pages

1 sales funnel

Unlimited lead funnels

Sell e-products

Plus — Starting at $49 per month

Automation builder with 5 workflows

5 sales funnels

Contact scoring capability

Webinars with up to 100 attendees

CRM software

Professional — Starting at $99 per month

Automation builder with unlimited workflows

Paid webinars with up to 300 attendees

Unlimited sales funnels

Unlimited webinar funnels

Enterprise — Starting at $1,199 per month

Transactional emails

Dedicated IP

Webinars with up to 500 attendees

Consulting services for email campaigns

Dedicated account manager

These prices are all based on 1,000 subscribers. The rate will increase as your list grows. As you can see, even the entry-level plan offered by GetRetresponse comes with advanced features like autoresponders, lead funnels, and sales funnels.

All plans come with 220 email templates, 180 landing page templates, 700 form templates, 40 autofunnel templates, 150 integrations, and 24/7 live chat support.

But to really get the most out of this software, I’d recommend the Plus plan, especially if you don’t already have a CRM software. The base rate is definitely higher compared to the other services we’ve seen. However, the plan just comes with so much more.

Instead of just getting email software, you’re benefiting from building automated lead funnels, landing pages, webinars, and lots of other extras that just aren’t included from other providers.

GetResponse offers discounts for annual and 24-month contracts if you pay in advance. At the very least, you can try GetResponse free for 30 days.

#4. ConvertKit

ConvertKit

Visit ConvertKit

Price starts at $29/mo
Build automated email funnels
Custom forms & reporting
Tag and personalize subscribers
Get a 14 day free trial

ConvertKit is one of my favorite email marketing services. However, it’s definitely not for everyone.

If you’re looking for drag-and-drop builders and tons of pre-built templates, then you’ll be better off using another software. In fact, ConvertKit only has a few templates, all of which are pretty plain. But that’s not to say they don’t get the job done.

ConvertKit is best for creators selling products. The platform focuses more on building integrations with landing pages, ecommerce platforms, and membership sites.

For those of you who want to build automated email funnels at an affordable price, ConvertKit will be a top option for you to consider.

ConvertKit Features

To set up automated emails, you’ll be guided through a simple visual flow chart.

Instead of having multiple lists of contacts, ConvertKit groups all of your subscribers into one list. But you’ll still be able to tag them manually, or with auto tags based on their behavior to improve the personalization of your campaigns.

ConvertKit is best for sending quick emails with clean formatting. There are no complex designs or distracting elements here.

Like most email marketing software, ConvertKit pricing is based on the number of subscribers you have.

0 – 1,000 Subscribers — $29 per month

1,000 – 3,000 Subscribers — $49 per month

3,000 – 5,000 Subscribers — $79 per month

If you switch to ConvertKit with more than 5,000 subscribers, you’ll benefit from their free concierge migration service. You can save some money and get two months for free if you sign up for an annual plan.

ConvertKit has more than 70 third-party direct integrations, customizable forms, and custom reporting. Email and live chat are available for 12 hours per day, Monday-Friday, with limited support on nights and weekends.

Still not sold? Take advantage of ConvertKit’s free 14-day trial to test it out on your own.

#5. Mailjet

MailJet

Visit MailJet

Price starts at $9.65/mo
Real-time collaboration tools
A/B testing features
Drag-and-drop email builder
Try Mailjet for free

More than 130,000 businesses use Mailjet for email marketing. While this number is impressive, Mailjet is not nearly as popular as some of the other services on our list.

But Mailjet is unique. It’s the only email marketing software I’ve seen that offers real-time collaboration, making it a top option for marketing teams.

This is a huge advantage for businesses that have multiple departments weighing in on an email campaign. Without real-time collaboration, it’s easy for things to get messy and complicated.

Mailjet makes it easy for you to manage the permissions for team members collaborating on email campaigns as well.

mailjet collaboration

Creating emails with Mailjet is easy. The platform has an intuitive drag-and-drop builder that allows for complete customization. You’ll also have access to tools for personalizing content for your subscribers.

You can send dynamic content and view advanced statistics and reports for all of your email campaigns.

The pricing structure for Mailjet is a bit different as well. Rather than your rate being based on subscribers, it’s based on how many emails you send per month. Although your subscriber count will obviously be directly tied to this number.

Mailjet has a free plan that allows you to send 6,000 emails per month. Although the plan limits you to just 200 emails per day, which isn’t really enough to run a successful campaign. This free plan is more of a never-ending trial so you can test out the platform.

Here’s an overview of the plans and pricing:

Basic

30,000 emails per month — $9.65

60,000 emails per month — $18.95

150,000 emails per month — $68.95

450,000 emails per month — $166.95

900,000 emails per month — $333.95

Premium

30,000 emails per month — $20.95

60,000 emails per month — $41.95

150,000 emails per month — $96.95

450,000 emails per month — $229.95

900,000 emails per month — $398.95

Mailjet offers a 10% discount on all plans if you get billed annually instead of month-to-month.

I’d really only recommend Mailjet if you plan to take advantage of the team collaboration tools. You’ll need a Premium membership to access multi-user collaboration. The Premium plan also comes with segmentation capabilities, A/B testing, and automation tools.

#6. Drip

drip

Visit Drip

Price starts at $49/mo
24/7 live chat and email support
CRM for ecommerce stores
Automatic revenue attribution
Get a 14 day free trial

Drip is a relatively new platform. It’s a CRM that offers email marketing for ecommerce businesses. So if you’re selling physical or digital products online, Drip will be a top choice for you to consider.

With Drip, you can track valuable commerce metrics related to customer intent and purchase behavior.

You’ll be able to segment new website visitors from returning customers. Drip also lets you target users who abandoned their carts.

Drip integrates with WordPress, WooCommerce, Facebook Ads, and many more tools that you’re using to sell online.

I like Drip because the CRM helps you reach customers through multiple touchpoints online, including email. Drip also has a revenue attribution feature, giving you a clearer view of which campaigns are actually making you money.

Drip Reporting

Again, this is ideal for ecommerce shops.

With personalization capabilities, powerful segmentation options, and detailed analytics, Drip has everything you need to succeed with email marketing.

Pricing is based on the number of customers in your account. All plans come with the same features and benefits.

2,500 subscribers — $49 per month

5,000 subscribers — $122 per month

10,000 subscribers — $184 per month

15,000 subscribers — $246 per month

20,000 subscribers — $308 per month

25,000 subscribers — $370 per month

35,000 subscribers — $494 per month

50,000 subscribers — $680 per month

130,000 subscribers — $1,630 per month

All Drip plans come with 24/7 live chat and email support. You can try it out free for 14 days and have access to all of the features.

#7. ActiveCampaign

active campaign

Visit ActiveCampaign

Price starts at $15/mo
Segment based on user behavior
Advanced personalization
Integration with 250+ apps
Get a 14 day free trial

ActiveCampaign is a sales CRM with email marketing capabilities. With ActiveCampaign, you’ll be able to run split tests, send dynamic content, and segment your subscribers for enhanced personalization.

Broadcast emails

Targeted emails

Scheduled emails

Triggered emails

Autoresponder emails

Email funnels

You can easily run all of these campaign types using the email software from ActiveCampaign.

I like ActiveCampaign because their email builder simplifies complex and personalized messages. You can add personalization and contingencies to nearly every element of a message.

ActiveCampaign Personalization

ActiveCampaign integrates with more than 250 apps like Shopify, WooCommerce, Facebook, Zapier, Unbounce, Stripe, and PayPal.

You can set up campaigns and improve your customer database with geotracking, site behavior tracking, custom data, and link actions. ActiveCampaign also sends you reports showing which content is generating the most conversions and revenue.

Here’s a quick overview of the plans price points based on the amount of subscribers you have:

Lite

500 contacts — $15 per month

1,000 contacts — $29 per month

2,500 contacts — $49 per month

5,000 contacts — $89 per month

10,000 contacts — $139 per month

25,000 contacts — $225 per month

Plus

1,000 contacts — $70 per month

2,500 contacts — $125 per month

5,000 contacts — $169 per month

10,000 contacts — $249 per month

25,000 contacts — $339 per month

Professional

2,500 contacts — $159 per month

5,000 contacts — $239 per month

10,000 contacts — $349 per month

25,000 contacts — $599 per month

ActiveCampaign offers enterprise-level plans as well. Just contact their team to get a custom quote if you have a large list of contacts.

If you’re currently using another CRM or email software, ActiveCampaign will give you a free migration from any platform. You can take advantage of a 14-day free trial and save roughly 20% per month if you sign up for an annual billing instead of month-to-month.

#8. MailChimp

MailChimp

Visit MailChimp

Price starts at $0
Premium plans start at $9.99/mo
300+ app integrations
24/7 customer support
Try MailChimp for free

MailChimp is another popular email marketing solution. It’s geared toward startups since it’s flexible, affordable, and can grow with your business.

Lots of people choose MailChimp because they can start for free. You won’t be charged anything if you have less than 2,000 subscribers on your list.

As a new business, it’s nice to know that you can start an email list with MailChimp without paying a monthly fee early on. This gives you time to grow your list and get the most out of it before you have to pay. By the time you reach 2,000 subscribers, your business should be in a position where it can afford the added cost.

MailChimp Plans

Here’s an overview of the plans and rates for the other plans offered by MailChimp.

Free — $0

Up to 2,000 contacts

7 marketing channels

1 audience

Basic templates

Behavioral targeting

Essentials — Starting at $9.99 per month

Up to 50,000 contacts

3 audiences

Access to all MailChimp templates

A/B testing

Custom branding

24/7 support

Standard — Starting at $14.99 per month

Up to 100,000 contacts

5 audiences

Event-based automation

Retargeting capability

Custom templates

Advanced insights

Premium — Starting at $299 per month

Up to 200,000 contacts

Unlimited audiences

Advanced segmentation

Multivariate tests

Phone support

The Standard Plan would be my recommendation for the majority of you. It comes loaded with plenty of advanced features to get the most out of every campaign.

Again, your actual rate will be based on the number of subscribers on your list. For example, if you sign up for the Standard Plan with 5,000 contacts, the rate is $74.99 per month.

MailChimp has templates designed specifically for the goals of each message. It’s a top choice for building and managing relationships with your customers.

In addition to award-winning customer service, MailChimp has an extensive knowledge base with guides and tutorials for learning and self-help.

#9. MailerLite

mailerlite

Visit MailerLite

Price starts at $0
Premium plans start at $10/mo
All basic email features
A/B testing tools
Try MailerLite for free

As the name implies, MailerLite is a basic email marketing service. Instead of adding on lots of extra features and functionality, MailerLite sticks to the essentials.

The platform still offers tools for automation, landing pages, pop-ups, and surveys. So it’s not like you’re extremely limited.

MailerLite has a drag-and-drop editor, which makes it easy for anyone to design a high-quality message. Segment your subscribers to enhance personalization, and optimize your campaigns with features like A/B testing.

MailerLite AB Testing

I’d recommend MailerLite for those of you who want simple email software at an affordable rate. Here’s a look at the price points for MailerLite:

Up to 1,000 subscribers — $10 per month

1,001 – 2,500 subscribers — $15 per month

2,501 – 5,000 subscribers — $30 per month

5,001 – 10,000 subscribers — $50 per month

10,001 – 15,000 subscribers — $75 per month

15,001 – 20,000 subscribers — $100 per month

20,001 – 25,000 subscribers — $120 per month

25,001 – 30,000 subscribers — $140 per month

The pricing tiers continue to rise at about $20-$40 per 10,000 subscribers. MailerLite offers a 30% discount if you sign up for annual billing, making it one of the most affordable options on our list.

There is a free plan for up to 1,000 subscribers, but you’re limited to just 12,000 emails per month. You can use this option as an extended free trial when you’re just starting out.

#10. HubSpot

Hubspot

Visit Hubspot

Price starts at $0
Create stunning email templates
Contact insights and activity
Traffic and conversion analytics
Try Hubspot for free

Hubspot offers a wide range of awesome tools including their robust email marketing platform. Their email marketing tools allow you to quickly and easily create, personalize, and optimize your emails without the need for designers or IT.

They provide you with dozens of pre-made templates and they also allow you to make your own using their simple drag and drop editor.

The Hubspot editor is simple to use and allows you to customize your layout, add calls-to-action and images, and modify your content and colors to match your brand.

Use their advanced personalization tools to personalize your emails in order to boost your open rates and clickthrough rates with ease.

You can use any information in an email subscriber’s contact records to automatically serve up the most relevant subject lines, content, links, attachments, and calls-to-action.

They also will provide you with A/B testing tools and detailed analytics that will help you maximize all of your efforts.

Hubspot email reports

Use this data to determine which subject lines get the most opens, and the content and calls-to-action that will earn you more sales.

The HubSpot email tool is free for up to 2,000 email sends per month, with upgrade solutions starting at $50/month.

Join Hubspot for free to create and send email campaigns that look professionally designed and display perfectly across any device – all by yourself.

How to Find the Best Email Marketing Service For You

The best email marketing software for you won’t necessarily be the best for me or everyone else. There are factors that need to be taken into consideration during the evaluation process.

I’ll break down the details of our process for making this list. I’ll explain what matters, what doesn’t, and what you need to know to find the best option for you.

Price

The cost of most email software is based on the number of subscribers on your list. In some instances, the price might be based on the number of emails you can send per month (like Mailjet), but that is still directly tied to your contact list.

Keep in mind, as you continue to add subscribers to your list, the price will go up. So you need to have a budget in mind from the beginning, as well as some contingencies for the future.

As long as you’re able to successfully monetize your email campaigns, price increases won’t matter as your list grows.

There are some free options out there, but in most cases, you really won’t be able to get the most out of free email marketing software. Your capabilities will be pretty limited.

Functionality

What are you planning to use your email marketing software for?

Every legitimate email service will let you send bulk emails, segment your subscribers, and learn analytics results for each campaign. Do you want to craft unique, beautiful, and custom designs? Then look for software with a drag-and-drop builder. Otherwise, find the platform with the biggest library of free templates.

When you compare the email features of the services on our list, you’ll see that the majority are very similar. Sometimes advanced functions like enhanced personalization, behavioral tracking, email funnels, and A/B testing require plan upgrades.

You can automatically eliminate certain email services that offer functions you’ll never use.

For example, GetResponse helps you build landing pages, webinars, and has sales funnel automation. ActiveCampaign is a full-service sales CRM. Drip is a CRM and email software specifically for ecommerce websites.

If you don’t need those types of advanced features or capabilities then look for something simple, like MailChimp or MailerLite.

Customer Support

The day is going to come where you have questions, problems, or need some type of assistance. So it’s important to find an email service that offers great customer service.

The best email marketing services have 24/7 live chat and email support. Some plans include phone support as well.

Platforms like ActiveCampaign will migrate you to their platform for free if you’re already using an existing service, which is a great incentive to sign up.

However, if you’re building a new email list from scratch, a benefit like that doesn’t really matter for you.

Summary

What’s the best email marketing service? It depends on what you’re looking for.

Here’s a quick recap of the top ten options on my list.

Best Email Marketing Services for 2020

Constant Contact

AWeber

GetResponse

ConvertKit

Mailjet

Drip

ActiveCampaign

MailChimp

MailerLite

Hubspot

I made sure to include something for everyone here. Whether you’re starting a new list from scratch, switching providers, need team collaboration tools or looking for a full-service CRM, there’s an option for you above. From ecommerce specific CRMs to basic and budget-friendly emails, you can find what you need using this guide.

 

44 Common IT Problems

it problem, it problems, it help, it support

IT problems are persistent technology issues that cause risks and costs. By contrast, an incident is a single event that causes business disruption. Where incidents are usually resolved in minutes or hours, problems can last years or decades. The following are common types of IT problems.

IT Problem 1: Architectural Complexity

A large number of systems or an architectural landscape that is too complex for the business functions it addresses. Complexity tends to result in cost and a higher rate of incidents.

HOW SOLUTION PROVIDERS ENHANCE COMPANY PRODUCTIVITY

A lack of logs and information to aid audits and investigations.

Authentication And Authorization

Weakness in basic security controls that authenticate users and authorize information access and transactions.

Availability

A technology service with too much downtime. In many cases, any system that is available less than four nines is a problem.

Backup And Restore

Data that isn’t sufficiently backed up or that lacks established restore procedures. Precise Business Solutions partners with MSP360 to backup and restore files.

IT Problem 5: Brittleness

Technology that easily breaks such as upgrades that always seem to fail.

Business Technology Alignment

Technology that the business doesn’t need or that fails to support business functions.

Capacity

Capacity limitations such as data storage or bandwidth.

IT Problem 8: Change Control

Changes that are made to code, configurations or infrastructure outside of a properly controlled process. For example, ad hoc maintenance without approvals or notifications.

Compliance

Technology functions and conditions that fail to comply with laws and regulations.

IT Problem 10: Configuration Management

Configuration management is the practice of controlling and recording the configuration of hardware and software including code changes. It is used to analyze the impact of change and troubleshoot incidents. Operating a technology platform without configuration management tends to be a problem. For example, it can be difficult to determine which update caused a new issue.

Data Integration

Data that is needed by multiple processes and systems that isn’t properly integrated. Precise Business Solutions offers software development to help with this common IT problem

Data Proliferation

Data that is maintained in multiple systems and documents, typically resulting in inconsistencies.

Data Quality

Data that is missing, wrong, poorly formatted or difficult to access to support business processes.

Defects

Software and hardware bugs can be considered problems if they are a persistent issue.

IT Problem 15: Design Debt

A design debt is a poor software design that causes future costs. In many cases, projects are rushed and design shortcuts are taken. Such savings in short term costs tend to result in future maintenance, incidents and additional costs to projects that rely on the design.

Disaster Recovery

A technology platform that is vulnerable to disasters. For example, a platform that runs from a single physical location or that relies on a single resource such as a particular telecom provider.

Enterprise Architecture

An IT organization that lacks a consistent structure such as shared services, platforms, standards, practices and designs.

Fault Tolerance

Services that easily crash when they encounter an error.

Information Security Vulnerabilites

Vulnerabilities that allow threats to compromise information security.

IT Problem 20: Interoperability

Components and platforms that don’t work together seamlessly.

Knowledge Management

Missing knowledge related to your IT platform. In some cases, organizations have systems with millions of lines of code that have no design documentation or maintenance procedures.

Legacy Technology

Technology that has aged to the point that it is expensive to support, difficult to extend and at risk of failing.

Maintainability

Components of information technology that are expensive and high risk to maintain.

Mean Time To Repair

A common measure of the average time to fix an incident when it occurs. A high mean time to repair (MTTR)is indicative of problems such as missing knowledge, skill gaps and poor designs.

IT Problem 25: Operations Processes

A lack of mature IT operations processes for support, maintenance and improvement.

Ownership

Applications or services that have no identifiable owner in your organization.

Performance

Services that are generally slow or that fail when business volumes peak.

Privacy

Insufficient privacy controls that represent compliance, liability and reputation risks.

Process Integration

Problems related to process integration such as event processing limitations and failures.

IT Problem 30: Reliability

A tool or component that doesn’t perform consistently such as errors that appear to be erratic.

Retention Policy

Unclear or insufficient procedures and policies for data retention.

Scalability

Services and systems that fail to support increased business volume in an efficient way.

Service Desk

A single point of contact for support of information technology. Service desk problems range from a complete lack of support to the need to further optimize support performance.

Service Management

Service management is a broad term for the comprehensive set of processes that deliver information technology to business. Problems in this area include financial, design, implementation, deployment and operations management issues.

IT Problem 35: Software Bloat

Software that is far too complex for its function.

Software Entropy

The tendency for software to age quickly due to its overall complexity and the laws of thermodynamics. In other words, software becomes less reliable with time.

Software Quality

Software that fails to function or behave as documented in specifications such as business requirements.

Structural Integrity

A poorly designed technology stack that is difficult to maintain, improve and extend.

Subject Matter Experts

A lack of highly skilled experts in areas such as architecture, security, infrastructure, design and programming.

IT Problem 40: Technology Silos

The tendency for organizational units such as departments and teams to create their own technology platforms and data repositories. Can result in an extremely complex, duplicative and expensive architecture that is poorly understood, brittle and vulnerable.

Testability

An inability to regression test changes due to poor documentation of existing functionality.

Transactional Integrity

Transactional integrity refers to the atomicity of business functions. For example, a financial transaction such as a stock trade should either succeed or fail with nothing inbetween. Transactions that partially succeed result in data issues that have negative business impacts such as a stock trade that purchases shares but fails to debit the client’s account for the cost.

Usability

Interfaces that are difficult to use resulting in low employee engagement, productivity issues and human error.

IT Problem 44: Vendor Lock In

A dependency on a vendor specific tool or service that would be expensive and high risk to change. In such cases, vendors may hold strong negotiating power and be unresponsive to your business needs or may escalate fees.

 

Best VoIP Providers

best voip, voip, voice over ip, pbx systems

Understanding Voice over IP

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) is a protocol that you can use to make calls using your internet connection as a phone line. Since you’re already paying for internet access, the only added cost is purchasing the VoIP service, thereby reducing your cost of phone services.

Mobile apps are also available from the top VoIP providers, allowing you to use your mobile phone to make and receive calls from anywhere.

Especially useful for business, some of the more important aspects of using a VoIP system include video calling, screen and file sharing, web conferencing and chat. Additional high-end features include solutions also offer digital assistants, call queues and integrated email.

More prominent VoIP providers include Avaya, Skype, 8×8 and Viber. Our team of B2B experts provide comprehensive reviews of these platforms, including RingCentral, one of the highest scoring solutions in the VoIP category.

Choose the Best VoIP Provider for Your Needs

VoIP cuts the traditional landline wires often used in a business telephone system and anticipated to diverge and effectively displace traditional landlines in modern businesses for the foreseeable future. Realistically, the increasing volume of worldwide VoIP service providers demonstrates that fast and reliable online phone service will permanently institute Voice over Internet Protocol as our standard communication outlet more quickly than we can imagine.

Why cut the cord on traditional landlines for VoIP? It’s elementary – Today’s VoIP systems for nearly any businesses and SMBs are multi-faceted, customizable, omnipresent, and cost so much less than the convoluted landline systems! Although the benefits of software-based VoIP systems vary from one platform to the next, what remains a common thread is that they all rely on IP networks to transmit voice calls. This translates to a much more efficient customer connection throughout your entire business system.

VoIP: First Things First

You may dream of having a more state-of-the-art business; however, you should consider whether a VoIP solution would be beneficial to your needs. Two benchmarks must be met first before opting for a VoIP system: One – will a VoIP system minimize the call traffic you receive each day? Second – do you have the necessary internet systems prepared to install and initiate an advanced VoIP platform to handle those calls?

The basis of any VoIP platform requires a stable broadband internet connection and solid bandwidth, followed by the flawless performance of all of your switches and routers. VoIP translates voice calls to data, so your internet system will be data-heavy. This requires a system that can compile traffic according to priority and help you select the correct system provider, specifically one that offers caps on bandwidth so you don’t have to set them yourself.

Not only does your internet system need to be adequate, you also require the correct hardware (telephones, fax machines, routers, adapters, etc.) that can recognize and protect against probable security threats. Defense against your security include anticipating traffic volume, installing DDoS and password control to prevent hacks to your network.

Installing and Launching VoIP

Often the VoIP service is hosted elsewhere, eliminating any difficulties you may have with its installation. You can also bypass the need of redirecting or forwarding calls without added hardware installation.

A more complicated option is investing in a VoIP compatible PBX system that uses a PSTN gateway that converts data to voice calls. While this type of a system may be less expensive, it also requires a much more arduous installation process and may not be worth the investment in the long run.

The basis of VoIP technology itself is three-fold, all working toward the primary function of any VoIP system – the ability to make virtually free phone calls.

One installation option is to use IP phones. They look like conventional telephones; however they use an RJ-45 Ethernet connection rather than the standard RJ-11 connection. Via the Ethernet, all calls are transmitted to your network router so you can implement them online via Wi-Fi.

Secondly, and also requiring a solid and quick internet connection, is to install an analog adapter. With this installation, the analog adapter converts all analog phone calls to digital data. Although this seems like a convoluted approach, it is one of the easiest ways to install and launch your VoIP system quickly.

The third installation option also manages long-distance calls. In this instance, you must establish a connection between multiple devices through a DSL modem. Since you will also have monthly payments to your ISP for the modem and services, this once again spotlights the lower cost features of VoIP.

Testing Providers Through Free Trials

The try-before-you-buy concept is critical before making the final decision on your new system. It’s important that you thoroughly understand what each service option is, what it does and how it can positively affect your business’s productivity.

Targeted Businesses for VoIP Providers

  • Small and mid-sized businesses and organizations can lower costs with VoIP systems.
  • Larger operations can take advantage of the higher-end services with business-level VoIP services.

6 Featured Top-Rated Platforms

  1. 3CX: an advanced open source phone system that is customizable to your needs. Precise Business Solutions offers VoIP Consultation and Installation of this system.
  2. Nextiva: an all-in-one cloud-based system for voice calls, business conferences, online meetings, and more. They also offer a free online demo.
  3. 8×8: another cloud-based VoIP service for small to large enterprises with advanced features that include web conferencing, internet faxing and Smartphone integration.
  4. Skype: a web-based communication tool, Skype is more than text software. It also offers video chat and international calling services.
  5. Mitel: Mitel Communications offers a suite of cloud-based services to integrate any size business including phone and video conference calls, web sharing capabilities, and mobile communications.
  6. Google Hangouts: a communications platform developed by Google that offers a variety of communications services including text, phone calls and video chats.

4 Typical Categories of  VoIP Providers

  1. Integrated platforms – For the beginner just learning about VoIP systems, integrated systems utilize traditional phone equipment and legacy systems integrated with VoIP service. Users are familiar with their current phone systems while the system works in the background to enhance the legacy system.
  2. SIP Trunks – Session Initiation Protocol is an ideal solution for companies still using PBX systems yet want all of the benefits of VoIP including mobile phone capabilities.
  3. Managed IP PBX – Comparable to SIP Trunks, but the provider manages the details and maintains the technology. The equipment is provided from the IP vendor and charges for its services.
  4. Hosted IP PBX – a cloud-based system similar to managed IP, however the business does not receive hardware from the service provider.

7 Key Features of  VoIP Providers in Texas

  1. Find Me/Follow Me – an advanced call routing, call-forwarding feature for mobile teams. Users provide a list of phone numbers where they can be reached prior to the call being forwarded to voicemail.
  2. Voicemail to email Transcription – this feature will transcribe your voicemail messages into text and send them to your email inbox.
  3. On Hold Music – Callers placed on hold will hear music while they’re on hold.
  4. Call Screening – Using a Caller ID feature, you can see the phone number of the caller, allowing you to decide how to handle the call.
  5. Auto Attendant – Callers are greeted with an automated voice menu system allowing callers to select the proper menu option for their needs.
  6. Conferencing – This feature allows you to seamlessly coordinate a conference including a floor monitor, inviting participants, muting callers and even “hand raises” for participants who want to ask questions or comment.
  7. Do Not Disturb – Use this option to put a temporary block on incoming calls while you are busy.

Service Benefits

In comparing various VoIP service platforms, we found the following two benefits:

  1. VoIP is relatively inexpensive, thereby keeping you within your budget.
  2. VoIP keeps your up-front costs low, regardless of the size of your company, especially those who already maintain a strong broadband internet connection for their current calls and instant messaging. With the exception of SIP, most times there is no need for high-end hardware to support a VoIP system. Most providers also offer package subscriptions without contracts, so you only pay for the services or data that you use. If you operate a global unconsolidated business, you can save on the free international calling benefit, which further enhances the attractiveness of the low-cost startup.

Redirected Mobile Calls

This is another benefit for the discerning businessperson who is always on the go. You can use your cell phone to call and receive calls right from the home office just by installing an app.

VoIP – Powerful and Multi-Faceted

Unheard of with traditional landline phone services, VoIP provides multi-faceted, powerful and timesaving services including, but not limited to instant notifications, voice mail, voice recording and transcription.

Are There Risks with VoIP?

Depending on the quality of your internet connection, you may experience disruptions in your phone service or poor quality calls. While these risks are not seen in traditional landline systems, if your internet provider is stable and your connectivity is solid, the cost and timesaving features far outweigh the risks.

To offset any disruptions, if your employees’ internet connections are reliable, you can offer them the option of working from home if your office experiences a loss of connection so you don’t miss many calls if any.

Special Calls May Require Extra Fees

Some unique calls require additional payment, for example, emergency calls or international calls to countries with higher rates. You should inquire about free-minutes packages if you know you’ll be calling overseas often.

Traffic Going Through the Internet May Not Be the Most Secure

If you regularly route unencrypted confidential or critical business information toward the internet, you risk hackers getting that information. Having a virtual private network (VPN) offers relative protection but it isn’t 100% foolproof and shouldn’t be completely relied upon.

Furthermore, unless you configure your wireless security during installation, your network may be exposed to a number of vulnerabilities in the VoIP system.

Overview of VoIP Provider Pricing

There are myriad VoIP providers today, and they may continue to increase in the near future. Taking this into consideration, there is obviously a wide range of pricing structures that vary from one provider to the next.

There are also varying degrees of features, all with their own costs including specific hardware necessary to run the service and additional costs for hosting, installation and maintenance. Some providers detail the total costs before you purchase and install the system. Others offer contract-specific costs based on your needs and the detailed costs involved, including any special add-on services.

Overall, you can find a VoIP provider from as little as $19.99 in case of popular solutions like MightyCall up to $5000 for enterprise tools; however we advise you to check and compare providers and use their trial or demo programs first before making a final decision.

Expert insight about the business VoIP providers comes from our partners.

The Fundamental Project Management Skills You Must Have in 2020

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The business world needs more highly skilled project managers. Otherwise, it will continue to bleed around a hundred million dollars (ouch!) for every billion it spends on projects and programs. Without the right talent and strategy, project schedules and budgets will remain elusive — with only 57% of all projects completed without additional funding, and only 51% successfully making the original deadline.

If you are a project management professional or planning to become one, the coming year will be a great time to progress your career and help businesses overcome the challenges ahead. But you’ll need the right project management skills to make an impact.

According to the Project Management Institute (PMI), a project’s success rate improves by approximately 40% when project managers possess and nurture the ideal skill set (a powerful mix of technical, leadership, and business management expertise).

Those in the know have been shining a spotlight on the increasing demand for project management skills in recent years. Computer World ranked project management among the hottest skills for 2017, while PMI projected a dramatic increase in the demand for project-oriented skills from 2017 through 2027. For each year during this period, companies around the world will need to fill an annualized figure of 2.2 million new project-oriented roles.

Despite the growing number of jobs, the serious lack of candidates with adequate project management skills creates a huge talent gap. With competition expected to become more intense across industries in the coming year, the scramble among recruiters for professionals with excellent project management skills will remain fierce in 2020, to say the least.      

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How much do project managers make?

When strong demand meets scarce supply, prices go way up north. This can be alarming to employers but quite a good thing for project management practitioners. Entry level project managers in the U.S. receive a median annual salary of $70,249 while senior project managers easily take home $102,318 on average. The most skillful and ambitious — those at the high end of the scale — are worth more than $142,000 according to Glassdoor. 

Project managers who obtain an industry-recognized credential like PMI’s Project Management Professional (PMP) certification have an extra edge. Research by the Project Management Institute revealed that project managers who earned a PMP Certification received a 20% higher median salary than non-certified project managers. The study found the median salary of a PMP was $111,000, compared to the median salary of $91,000 for those without a PMP certification.

project-management-skills

Top 25 project management skills needed in 2020

Project management may well be the career where technical, business, and people skills routinely intersect.

To become a good project manager, technical skills are must-haves. You need full proficiency in the tools (such as project management software) and techniques (such as the Agile framework) of the trade.

While you don’t necessarily need to be a domain expert (e.g., non-architects or non-engineers can be project managers in construction while non-programmers can serve as project managers in software development), you need basic familiarity and topview knowledge of the field you are in.

In addition, you need to have a strategic and logistical perspective on each project you undertake to optimize cost efficiencies and benefits. And lastly, you need to possess leadership and people skills to effectively manage a diverse team of people who are also bringing their unique personalities and skill sets to the table.

We have broken down the top 25 project management skills for 2020 into 3 categories – technical skills, business management skills, and personality traits – in the handy matrix below.

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Project management skills matrix

Based on studies and recommendations from PMI, KPMG, EY (Ernst & Young), APM (Association for Project Management) and other domain experts, here’s a comprehensive project management skills matrix that can help you make a positive impact in 2020:

Technical skills and functional knowledge

Skill NameDescription
Project Management SoftwareProficiency with commonly used technology tools such as Microsoft Project, Asana, and Trello.
Project Management Methodologies and FrameworksAbility to apply frameworks and methodologies such as Agile and SCRUM throughout a project’s lifecycle.
Reporting/Stakeholder ManagementCoordinate with managers, clients and team members to set expectations, deliverables, and objectives.
Team Building/ManagementBuild and lead a team of people with different skill sets towards a unified goal by guiding each member to complete their unique deliverables on time.
Resource Planning and ManagementFormulate and implement a strategy on how project objectives can be met efficiently in the right sequence, by a group of people with unique skills within project constraints (time, budget, quality, etc.)
Time Management/SchedulingAbility to 1) accurately map out talent resources, tasks, and dependencies; 2) make timeline estimates and set specific and general schedules; and 3) keep everyone up to speed.
Cost Assessment/Budget ManagementAchieve cost efficiencies by optimizing work hours and establishing rationale for key procurements and other expenses.
Review/MonitoringTr
ack overall project and individual stakeholder progress throughout the project lifecycle, resolving conflicts and optimizing gains along the way.
Conflict Management and ResolutionFix project discrepancies, overlaps, stalled workflows, and other issues due to internal roadblocks or unforeseen external setbacks. Help address interpersonal conflicts among team members.
Policy KnowledgeAn adequate grasp of the regulatory regime governing the sector, including health, safety, business best practices, and environment.

Business management and soft skills

Skill NameDescription
LeadershipEnable, motivate, and inspire the team to meet deliverables within project constraints by demonstrating commitment, expertise, confidence, genuine concern, and ability to help everyone solve challenges and achieve goals.
Business CommunicationsUse the right language, tone, and storytelling techniques when communicating, describing, or explaining issues over email, chat, reports, presentations, and other forms and channels of communication. Generate the right impact or response from specific audiences (team members, managers, clients, vendors, partners, other stakeholders).
Collaboration/Relationship buildingEstablish a collaborative culture where people with unique personalities and skills happily work together towards a unified goal.
Decision-MakingMake prompt, informed, and fact-based decisions for the good of the project.
AccountabilityEmbrace ownership of and accountability for the project.
Problem Solving/Critical ThinkingAssess issues from different vantage points and formulate the best solution in addressing specific challenges.
Active ListeningPractice active listening to glean insight and truly understand the needs or message of all project stakeholders.
NegotiationApply the appropriate framework (SWOT, risk-reward, etc.) to arrive at a best-case scenario for all parties involved.
Research/Information GatheringFill knowledge gaps through active research or by directly engaging resource persons.

Personality traits

Skill NameDescription
Commitment/Motivation/DriveThe project manager owns the project and should be the person with the highest level of commitment and motivation to see it through from start to finish.
Goal-OrientednessNo one can become a decent project manager without a personality that places tremendous value on outcomes, objectives, and results. Project managers should be focused on the goal and the most efficient route to get there.
ConfidenceProject managers should exhibit process mastery with confidence and humility. Bragging, bullying, and bossing around don’t work.
Open-mindedness/TrainabilityBecause continuous learning and self-improvement are integral to project management, practitioners should be open to new technologies, approaches, and experiences.
Adaptability/ProactivityWorkplaces, workflows and project development practices rapidly change over time. Hence, project managers should possess the required agility to nimbly adapt to different situations and make proactive adjustments when necessary.
Inclusivity/SociabilityThe workplace is becoming more global and more diverse in terms of gender, race, ethnicity, and other demographics. As such, project managers should embrace everyone in the team and help nurture a culture of fairness, diversity, and inclusivity.

Key takeaways for project management job seekers in 2020

In addition to technical skills, companies are probing the job market for project management professionals with the right emotional intelligence, critical thinking, mentoring, and communication skills.

Here are some key takeaways for jobseekers who wish to participate in the project management field:

  1. A project is a unique and temporary undertaking that is defined via a specific scope, timeline, budget, quality standards, and a set of desired outputs, outcomes, or benefits. A project is often contrasted with “normal,” “as usual,” or “ongoing” business operations to describe or distinguish its nature. For example, corporate finance is a “business-as-usual” operation while the development of a mobile financial app for Android devices is a project.
  2. Project management refers to the systematic application of frameworks, processes, tools, and techniques to achieve the desired outcome for a project within a set of constraints such as quality, budget, and schedule. It covers strategic planning, resource allocation, process administration, overall monitoring, risk management, documentation and reporting.   
  3. With a projected job growth of 33% through 2027, a career in project management faces much-better-than-average outlook compared to other occupations.
  4. Project managers are in demand across many industries as the project-based approach to doing business becomes more widespread. While project management has reached high maturity levels in IT and construction, industries with the greatest current demand  include healthcare, telecommunications, manufacturing, and energy.     
  5. Project management ranks among the highest-paid careers, with well-experienced practitioners typically bringing home six-figure salaries.
  6. Because it is radically goal-oriented and requires collaboration with people of diverse backgrounds, project management is among the most fulfilling and satisfying career paths. Success (or failure) of each project has a palpable impact not only on the company’s bottom line but also on its morale and culture.     
  7. Success in project management requires a range of diverse skills spanning technical, strategic, business management, and leadership competencies. Examples of project management skills include negotiation, team-building, and technical proficiency in tools such as Microsoft Project, Asana, PowerPoint, Slack, and Trello.
  8. Project management takes its practitioners on a path of continuous learning, training, and skills development. Moreover, most skills learned in managing projects for one sector are easily transportable to other fields and industries.
  9. Certifications matter. Project managers with accredited certifications outearn non-certified practitioners by 20% on average.  
  10. Like sales, a successful stint in project management is considered a stepping stone towards executive leadership in many global companies. Simply put, if you are a successful project manager, then you have bragging rights to claim that you “literally get things done” pretty much all the time.

How strong are your project management competencies?

It’s easy to see why the appeal of a project management career can be very strong. The demand is high, the outlook is good, and the pay is head-turning. Job satisfaction, relevance, corporate impact, and self-worth similarly score very high on just about any metric.  

But project management is not for everyone. This skill-intensive role fits people who actively seek out learning opportunities so they can discover new things, improve competencies and build their skill sets over the course of their career.

If you are that person — someone who likes to get
things done and embark on a journey of continuous learning — then nothing is stopping you from becoming the best project manager you can be.        

Here’s a good place to start.

Looking for more project management resources around the web? Check out our list of the Top PM Blogs in 2020.

Want to learn more?

Take your project management skills to the next level with our comprehensive (and free) ebook!

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Joseph Mapue

Joseph Mapue

Joseph Mapue wears his writer’s hat wherever he goes, crafting top-notch content on business, technology, creativity, and innovation. He is also a dreamer, builder, father, and gamer.

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The Best Web Design Companies of 2020

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Last Updated November 1, 2019

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Top 10 list: Best web design agencies of 2020

Here is our list of the top design companies:

6 qualities of the best web design companies

Defining the best website design company isn’t based on design alone. Not only is design subjective, it is also impossible to rate all the top web design companies based on only that set of criteria.

This means that you can’t determine if a company is one of the best, based on just their design portfolio. There are many other factors to consider as well.

So if it’s not just the quality of web design that qualifies a firm as a “best web design company,” then what does?

Here are the qualities that we feel the best web design company in the world should have.

1. Award-winning design

This is the most obvious on our list of criteria for the best web design company. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that an agency’s work has to be recognized for its quality and effectiveness to be considered one of the best.

graphic of award

National awards available for stellar website design include the Horizon Interactive Awards, the Webby Awards, and The Interactive Media Awards. There are also many awards available in specific regions or states that can be given to the best local web design.

2. Innovative approach

Because web design is a constantly-changing industry, the best web design companies are those who keep their clients’ sites up to date with the latest technology. Even the coolest designs are bound to feel outdated within a few years, and with modern consumers who are used to constant updates and innovation, it’s important for the best design company to provide cutting edge ideas that are unique, fresh, and satisfying for the customer.

graphic of cutting edge web design

Some companies may think that simply updating visual elements is enough to make clients happy, but true innovation means embracing change in all forms. To be a top design company, you need to do more than follow the trends—you need to be a trailblazer.

For example, the recent shift towards browsing the web on devices other than desktop computers led the best web design companies to develop an entirely new approach to design that is compatible with smartphones, tablets, and other devices.

This approach, called responsive design, is now essential for success in search engines.

Although most companies will eventually jump on the bandwagon if a new strategy or trend becomes popular enough, the best web design companies are those who stay at the forefront. True dedication to clients means always wanting them to have the best, and sometimes the way to give them that is by creating it.

3. Expansive portfolio

The best web design companies should have a wide range of past work.

To qualify for the “the best web design company” title, a firm needs to show that they’ve worked in a variety of industries. It’s not enough to build and design websites for just one industry or area of focus.

For example, does their portfolio include as diverse project as a roofing company website, followed by an online ecommerce store website? These different designs force the best web design agencies to get creative and change perspective.

graphic of expansive portfolio

In short, the best website design and development firms can display work with dozens of clients across multiple industries, showing strong elements of versatility and adaptation that is indicative of any good web design company. The best web design company could tailor their user experience and results to accommodate the needs of any business, from construction to textiles and more.

The more clients a design company works with, the better! Customers want to know that you can, without a doubt, work with their company to design the best possible website.

4. Extensive services offered

It would be easy to rank as the best web design company if the focus was solely on web design. To us, that’s not good enough.

To qualify as one of the best, a web design firm has to do more than just web design. The best website design companies offer a full-range of services to meet all the needs of clients, from Internet marketing to development.

The best website design and development firm should offer services like search engine optimization (SEO), pay-per-click (PPC) management,interactive coding, and more.

web design statistics chart

5. Track Record of Success

Just like only offering web design, not having proven records of successful work can easily knock an agency off the best web design company list.

To be considered in the running, a company needs to provide proof to show potential customers that their work has continuously satisfied customers.

To make our list of website design companies, a firm needs a history of satisfied clients that report success. Testimonials offered to web design companies are an excellent indication of happy customers, as are long-standing accounts and a high client retention rate. Combined with other important elements behind each company, these factors can all help indicate the best web company.

6. Company growth

Like any successful business, the best design company in the world should be constantly growing and increasing its revenue. These are both signs of continued development, and they’re good indicators that a company is worthy of being considered one of the best in the industry.

graphic showing company growth

This doesn’t necessarily mean that the largest web design company is the best, though.

Continued growth is integral to any business model. The top web designing company will show growth with its customer base, employees, revenue, and other elements which clearly sets them apart from their competitors.

Where does WebFX fall on the top web design companies list?

Knowing where WebFX ranks on the best website design companies list requires first, studying the other companies on the list.

Since we are a United States-based firm, the majority of the companies we researched were websites written in English, so our study might be better titled “The Best Web Design Company in the U.S. and Europe.”

In conducting our research on the best web design companies, we also limited our review to firms that had over 30 customers and had been in business at least three years. This is because we feel that a proven track record of success is necessary for being considered the world’s top web design company. We didn
‘t look at just the biggest web design companies, though, because we know bigger doesn’t always mean better.

After our research, we came up with our own list of web development companies we believe to be the top of their game.

How much does a web design from the best web design companies’ cost?

Professional web design costs vary, especially when looking at the rates of the best web design companies. Businesses can spend anywhere from $1000 to $100,000 on a custom design. For the most accurate rates, request a custom quote or use a free web design cost calculator, like from WebFX.

How long does a web design, from a top web design company, take?

A web design from a top web design company can take 12 to 16 weeks to complete. Depending on your site’s size, complexity, and design requirements, you may see a longer or shorter turnaround time. For the most accurate answer, talk with potential design agencies about your site and its needs.

How does a top web design company help my website perform after launch?

A top web design company can help your business (and its site) after launch a few ways. How your web design agency assists your team, however, will depend on their services and specializations. If they only do web design, for instance, they probably won’t offer post-launch services, like site maintenance.

Either way, the best web design agencies will prep your website for success with the following:

  • A responsive design so that any device, from mobile to desktop, can use your site
  • A fast site so that users can access and browse your site fast
  • An SEO-friendly site so that your site has a better chance of appearing in Google search results

If you partner with a design company that specializes in other areas, like search engine optimization, they can help you grow your site’s presence in search results. A bigger presence (and position) in search results can drive more qualified traffic to your website, which can lead to more leads and revenue.

We don’t just want to tell you about the beautiful work we do.

WE WANT TO SHOW YOU

We’ve built over

WEBSITES IN INDUSTRIES LIKE YOURS

View Our Past Work

Is WebFX the best web design company in the world?

Even though WebFX has many of the qualities necessary to be the best web design firm in the world, we understand that there are always improvements to be made. We also can’t be the best judge since we aren’t completely objective.

But what we can comfortably say is that WebFX is one of the best web design firms out there. We have all the qualities that we defined as crucial—and then some! Read on to learn more about what makes us great.

Award-winning design

Our team of talented web designers has won numerous awards for their work, including the prestigious Horizon Interactive Awards. We create the best company website design for all our clients.

And our efforts pay off.

Clients who have a website designed by WebFX receive attractive, well-converting presences online. In other words, we offer the best web design services possible to make sure a website not only looks good, but functions well, too. Our testimonials speak for themselves: we know how to make customers happy!

Our award-winning designs are what put us on the list of best web design firms. Contact us to learn how we can provide the best company website design for your business.

Expansive portfolio

Our portfolio is massive. We’ve worked with hundreds of clients in many different industries. Our varied works show we’re one of the top web design companies out there, and that we’re flexible enough to meet almost any need.

We’ve worked in numerous industries, and with both B2B and B2C companies. We’ve designed websites for everything, including ecommerce stores, local businesses, and national service providers, always using the most current approaches, like responsive design.

No matter what kind of business you have, we can design something great for you.

Extensive services offered

Take a look around and you’ll see we aren’t just a web design company. What puts us on the list of the top web design companies is our ability to provide clients with a comprehensive solution. We know it takes more than just visual elements to be one of the top website design firms, and we’re prepared to go the extra mile for you.

Being one of the best web design companies means providing exceptional designs, integrating innovative development solutions, and increasing brand exposure through top-notch search engine optimization and other Internet Marketing strategies. We do just that, which is why we’re in the running for the best web design company title.

Track record of success

Our record of success is our pride and joy. Just take a look at our portfolio and you’ll find a slew of case studies, client testimonials, and search engine position results, that make us one of the top web design companies on the market.

WebFX customers praise us for our professional website design, our flexibility, and our great communication. We also have proven success in ranking websites for competitive keywords, and for building valuable links to websites. We have a track record of improving online business for customers in many industries.

You’ll find we easily qualify for one of the top web design companies because our work is not only innovative and cutting-edge, but also effective. Our site designs not only drive traffic, but also help create conversions.

We believe that in order to be the best website company, we have to please the ones that matter — the client.

Company growth

WebFX has enjoyed positive growth consistently over the past five years. We’re constantly expanding our team with the best talents in the industry. And our client list is swelling.

The growth of our agency also allows us to be closer to our clients and their businesses.

With offices in Pittsburgh, D.C., Orlando, and more, we make it easy for companies like yours to work with a leading web design agency that’s close by. Even if we aren’t near your business, you can easily call and connect with your site’s project manager to ask questions, provide feedback, and more.

While we may not be the very best web design company in the world, we’re definitely one of the best web design companies out there – and we’re committed to improving until we reach the top spot!

How is WebFX different from other top w
ebsite design agencies?

Quality and experience aren’t the major differing factors between WebFX and the others on the best web design companies list.

The major difference between WebFX and the biggest web design companies out there is the price. Those companies have project bill rates approximately 25 to 50 times higher than ours. That’s a lot of money to spend on website design!

WebFX offers professional, inspiring, and attractive website design at a fraction of the cost of our competitors, including those on our web design companies list. We strive to keep our prices reasonable so that we can deliver great design without draining your entire marketing budget.

And as a full-service marketing agency, our portfolio goes beyond design: we also offer Internet marketing services, SEO, social media management, content marketing, and so much more.

Want to work with the best web design company?

If you’re in the market for a new web design for your company’s website, some SEO, a PPC campaign, or just an update to some stale content, WebFX can help.

We’re one of the best in the industry, and have some of the best employees to prove it. Whatever website design or development project you may have, we can take it on and deliver extreme success.

Take a look at our custom web design plans, and contact us today to learn more. Did you know that we provide our web design services to clients located in New York to California? It’s true!

Want to work with one of the best web design companies in the world, but don’t have an unlimited budget? Call 888-601-5359 or contact us online today to get a free quote on our web design services.

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How to Build a Youtube Backlinks Strategy

People are now watching one billion hours of videos on YouTube every day. We’ve all fallen down the YouTube “rabbit hole,” losing hours of time after intending to watch a single video. But did you know that YouTube backlinks can give you as a serious boost in the search rankings?

Many people are still ignoring the incredible link building strategies waiting on YouTube. It’s easy to consider YouTube as “just video marketing” or a good place for “brand exposure.” Unfortunately, this means they’re missing out on a massive link building opportunity.

Luckily, this post will cover everything you need to know about YouTube backlinks. Let’s get started.

Building links on YouTube can seem complicated at first glance. But with a little practice, you’ll be a pro in no time. Here’s how to get started:

Keyword Research

By now, you probably know that anything in SEO begins with keyword research. And YouTube SEO is no different.

Your aim is to look for keywords that have results from YouTube on the first page of Google. These are known as Video Keywords.

In general, the search engine will use video results for the following keywords:

  • Funny videos (“Charlie bit my finger”)
  • Sports and fitness related (“Tae Kwon Do videos”)
  • Tutorials (“How to curl your hair with a straightener”)
  • Reviews (“Hostgator review”)
  • How-to keywords (“How to train a puppy”)

Why is this so important?

If you optimize your video around keywords that don’t have any video results within Google, you’ll only be getting traffic from people who search on YouTube. But if you optimize your video for Video Keywords, you can snag a whole lot of targeted traffic to your videos straight from the first page of Google.

How do you Find Video Keywords?

The first step is to simply look for keywords in your chosen niche. Then you can see if those keywords have video results on Google.

Next, you need to check if enough people are searching for that particular keyword. Look for one that’s getting at least 300 searches a month, which will mean it would also be getting plenty of searches within YouTube.

The goal is to get that video to rank well in Google so that those 300 people searching for your keyword will choose your video. That will mean that your video will be getting high-quality traffic which can be passed on to your website.

Create the Best Possible Video

The more effort you put into creating your videos, the more you’ll get out of them. If your videos stink, they won’t rank- regardless of how well you optimize them for SEO.

YouTube judges the quality of your videos based on how many people are interacting with them.

These metrics include:

  • Video retention (how many people watch)
  • Comments (how many people are engaging)
  • Subscribing after watching (a signal that your video is useful)
  • Shares (on social media sites)
  • Favorites (people adding it to “watch later” or favoriting it)
  • Thumbs up/down

Longer videos rank the best on YouTube. If you have something interesting to say, don’t worry about it being too long. Aim for at least five minutes.

Upload with YouTube SEO

Here’s how to make the most of YouTube backlinks with your video:

Filename

Use your keyword in your video’s filename. For example, if you’re aiming to rank for “meal prep recipes,” you’ll name your YouTube video meal_prep_recipes_video.mp4.

Title

This should be at least five words long. That way you can use your full keyword while avoiding keyword stuffing. Put your keywords at the beginning of your title for a slight SEO boost.

Description

This is hugely important. YouTube and Google can’t yet “listen” to your videos, which is why they rely on this description. They use it to determine the content of your videos.

Put your YouTube backlinks to your site at the very top of your video. This will maximize your click-through rate.

Make sure you include your keyword within the first 30 words of your description. Aim to include your keyword at least 4-5 times, and write at least 250 words for your description. This will tell YouTube and Google what your video is about without looking like spam.

Tags

Tags also help show Google and YouTube what your videos are about. They help you rank for your keywords, and help you show up as a related video in the sidebar on the right-hand side.

Using Annotations for YouTube Backlinks

Another place you can use backlinks for your website? In the YouTube Annotations.

These are little boxes that pop up while a viewer is watching your video. Use a compelling call-to-action and add your website, and you’re likely to see a huge increase in visitors for that page.

It’s often a good idea for the presenter to draw attention to the annotation when it pops up. Tell your viewers what the link is for, and let them know why they should click on it.

Using YouTube Cards for Backlinks

These are different from annotations in a big way: They work on mobile devices. This can make a massive difference to your clickthrough rate since so many people use their smartphones and tablets to watch YouTube videos.

Walmart uses YouTube cards incredibly well. They use a little “i” icon (for information) in the top right corner of their videos. When you click on that button, a “more info” button appears. These clickable links lead to the landing pages on the Walmart website for the items shown in the video.

If you do this well, with compelling images and links leading back to your site, you’re likely to see a massive increase in your visitors for those pages.

Wrapping Up

Ready to get started with your YouTube backlinking strategy? It doesn’t need to be complicated. Simply create an interesting video, choose the right keywords, use SEO effectively, and make the most of annotations and cards.

Have you been making the most of the backlinking opportunities available on YouTube? Get in touch to learn how we can help you get high-quality backlinks for your website.

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51 Best Project Management Tools Software for 2020 ProofHub

Are you looking for a project management tool that can help you manage your projects and team members in a better manner?

If the answer to the above question is yes, then you’ve come to the right place. It won’t be wrong to say that adopting new methodologies, implementing new technologies and tools has become the need of the hour to boost your standing in the current scenario

We have compiled the best project management tools to improve your game. Before we take a look at them, let’s understand why it’s important to use them in the first place.

Table of Contents

What is a project management tool?

A project management tool is what brings projects and team collaboration at one place for everyone to be on the same page.

Why should we use project management tools?

You might be living under a rock if you’re really not aware of the benefits that come along with project management tools. We’ve outlined some common benefits below:

  • Faster collaboration
  • Easier delegation
  • Accurate project tracking
  • Central data storage
  • Seamless communication
  • Quick file-sharing
  • Time tracking
  • Automated invoicing
  • Quick reporting

Now that you know the advantages offered by online project management tools, let’s learn how to choose the right one.

How to select the best online project management tool?

Make sure to check if your preferred project management software offers the following features or not.

  • Advanced feature-set
  • Intuitive user interface
  • Cloud-based access
  • Customizability
  • Security
  • Integrations
  • Cost-effective

Best Project Management Tools & Software in 2020

1. ProofHub

top Project management software- ProofHub

top Project management software- ProofHub

ProofHub is a versatile project management software used by leading organizations like NASA, Disney, Taco Bell and many more. This all-in-one tool comes packed with powerful features to eliminate the need of having too many different tools to run your business.
Features:

  • Online proofing software saves a lot of time during the feedback-sharing process
  • Makes task-management less stressful for teams
  • Get a visual picture of projects using Gantt charts in ProofHub
  • Also available as a mobile app for Android and iOS users.

See how ProofHub is the best of all project management tools. Try now!

2. Scoro

Scoro as project management tool

Scoro as project management tool

Scoro is known as one of the most comprehensive business management software for professional and creative services. For those who wish to bring structure to your work, Scoro is the right pm tool for you.

Features:

  • A single place for projects, clients, and teams
  • Be organized in every aspect of your business with seamless workflow
  • Get a real-time overview and automated reports
  • Can be integrated with tools like DropBox, Mailchimp, Outlook, and more

Pricing: Premium plan starts at $33/user/month

3. Workzone

Workzone - project management tool

Workzone - project management tool

Workzone is built by a highly dedicated team to help individuals and organizations gain better control and visibility in work management. It gives them a central place to manage and share work, so everyone stays on the same page.

Features:

  • Get top-level reports so everyone knows what’s next on the list
  • Makes way for faster communication
  • Features like creating tasks, to-do lists, sharing files easily improves collaboration
  • Set permission for different users including clients

Pricing: Starts from $200 per month

project management software

project management software

4. Zoho ProjectsZoho Projects as project management software

Zoho Projects as project management software

Without a doubt, Zoho Projects stands out as one of the best simple project management software that can help you streamline your upcoming work and tasks with a click.

Features:

  • Effective file management
  • Gantt charts to oversee project progress
  • One tool for teams to create, collaborate, and communicate
  • Can be integrated with ZOHO CRM and other tools to manage every aspect of a growing agency

Pricing:$25/month for up to 20 projects

Read on: Zoho Alternatives – 13 Tools Your Team Will Love

5. GanttPROGanttPRO as project management software

GanttPRO as project management software

GanttPRO is one of the best pm software, appreciated already by 250k project managers around the globe. It helps build project plans and timelines, track workflow, control expenses,  follow deadlines, and arrange productive collaboration in a single place. The solution offers ready-made templates for an easy start.

Features:

  • Workload: keep all resources engaged and balanced
  • Collaboration: comments, attachments, and notifications
  • Workspace: Gantt charts and Board view
  • Project templates for easy start

Pricing: Team plan starts from 7.90$ per user/month (billed annually)

6. nTask

ntask as project management tool

ntask as project management tool

New on the market, nTask is still in its burgeoning state of development, with new features and AI that are being introduced as the tool matures. Its intuitive software design that is easy on the eyes as well as easy to adopt, is one of the many reasons why start-ups, solopreneurs, and even enterprises will readily switch to this newcomer pm tool.

Features

  • Task & Project Management: Simple task & project creation using task checklists, updates, progress meter.
  • Risk Management: Use risk matrix to identify and assess potential risks and their frequency of occurrence.
  • Issue Management: Create and manage issues with customizable severity, priority, and status options.
  • Time Management: Beautifully designed weekly timesheets with manual hours linked to a suitable task or a project.
  • Resource Management – Manage resource allocation, project budget and currency using the Project Planner.
  • Meeting Management – Schedule multiple meetings at a time with a clear concise agenda, discussion points and follow-up actions

Pricing

  • Free plan- Unlimited workspaces, 100MB storage.
  • Pro Plan – $2.99, Unlimited everything.

7. FunctionfoxFuctionFox as project management software

FuctionFox as project management software

Functionfox is a timesheet tool trusted by creative professionals all around the world. It is both powerful and easy-to-use. You can track your projects accurately from conceptualization to completion, reduce admin time, and increase productivity and profits.

Features:

  • Simple project creation and management
  • Interactive real-time reporting
  • Compare budget estimates with actual figures

Pricing: From $5 user/month ($35/month for the 1st user)

8. Workbook

Workbook as project management tool

Workbook as project management tool

Workbook is a grown-up software suite for project and resource management, CRM, collaboration, file-sharing, forecasting, and accounting. You can choose exactly as per your requirements and only pay for it.
Features:

  • Create projects and tasks easily
  • Easily customizable
  • Supports a client portal

Pricing: $19 user/month, minimum 30 users

project management software

project management software

9. Redbooth

Task management software - Redbooth Task

Task management software - Redbooth Task

Redbooth is an easy-to-use online task and pm software for busy
teams. Moreover, you can keep your entire team organized, in alignment, and always on schedule with Redbooth.

Features:

  • Intuitive task and project management
  • Easily delegate and assign tasks
  • Mobile apps for iOS and Android

Pricing: From $5 user/month

10. Celoxis

Celoxis as project management tool

Celoxis as project management tool

Celoxis is an award winning all-in-one pm tool. It helps organizations to plan and track their portfolios, projects, tasks, resources, timesheets, issues and risks from one place. It has extensive collaboration features including a customizable free client portal. It’s dashboards and reporting capabilities are superb and one of the best in the market. It is feature rich, intuitive and highly customizable.

If you are comfortable with the Microsoft Project scheduling paradigm, Celoxis is one of the best alternatives to microsoft project.

Features:

  • All-in-one project management tool
  • Easy collaboration, share files, discuss and exchange comments not just with your colleagues but with your clients
  • 360-degree real-time insights with our super powerful reports and dashboards
  • Easy to customize and intuitive
  • Easily allocate resources to tasks based on availability, demand, and skills.

Pricing: SaaS: $25/user/month & On-Premise: $450/user

11. 10,000FT Plans

10,000FT as project management tool

10,000FT as project management tool

10,000ft is a simple yet powerful pm software that helps you make confident operational decisions about your teams and projects. Apart from this, it has resource management and time-tracking capabilities as well.

Features:

  • An effective visual resource planning software
  • Detailed project tracking
  • Flexible planning interface

Pricing: Basic plan starts from $10/month

12. TeamGantt

TeamGantt as project management software

TeamGantt as project management software

TeamGantt is a refreshing pm solution that brings project scheduling software online. You can manage projects with this super-easy Gantt software. Inviting your co-workers, teammates, and friends to view and edit your Gantt chart is simple and fun!

Features:

  • Fast drag and drop scheduling
  • Intuitive and easy-to-use
  • Real-time progress updates

Pricing: Standard plan starts from $7.90 /user per month (when billed annually)

Switch to a reliable project management software to deliver projects successfully. Try ProofHub

13. Proworkflow

ProWorkflow Dashboard as best project management tool

ProWorkflow Dashboard as best project management tool

Proworkflow is one of those project management software your teams would love. It’s beautiful, versatile and extremely easy to use. Also, it integrates with all the tools you need – saving you time and streamlining your processes.

Features:

  • Makes it a breeze to assign staff, track time or reschedule projects
  • Quoting and invoicing have never been simpler.
  • Reliable support and consultation

Pricing: From $22 month/user for team

14. Mavenlink

Mavenlink as project management tool

Mavenlink as project management tool

Mavenlink is a modern software designed for services organizations to connect with people, projects, and make profits. In a world where connectedness, transparency, and performance matter more than ever, Mavenlink helps you deliver projects successfully.

Features:

  • Manage multiple projects with ease
  • Handle project schedules in an intuitive interface
  • Gain visibility of all your projects in your portfolio

Pricing: Professional plan starts at $39/month/user

Read more: Mavenlink Alternatives and Competitors: Top 7 Tools You Should Try in 2020

15. Insightly

Insightly as project management software

Insightly as project management software

Insightly is a powerful CRM with a project and business management set. It allows you to grow your business faster than ever by building strong customer relationships over time.

Features:

  • Effortless tracking of project activity
  • Accelerate sales and manage leads
  • Helps you build meaningful relationships

Pricing: From $15 month/user for teams

16. Clarizen

Clarizen as project management software

Clarizen as project management software

If you are looking for a cloud-based project management tool to help your business grow, Clarizen can come to your rescue. It is a single collaborative pm solution that could manage projects and help you connect with team members effortlessly.
Features:

  • Automated processes and workflows
  • Budget tracking and expense management
  • Flexible UI

Pricing: From $60 user/month

17. Comindware

Comindware as top project management tool

Comindware as top project management tool

Comindware is a popular workflow and business process management software. The workflow management software provides key capabilities for task, data and document management.

Features:

  • Focuses on process optimization
  • Customer order management and CRM capabilities
  • Full process automation, activity monitoring, business analytics as well as enterprise system integration.

Pricing: Starts at $29.99 per user

18. Easy Project

Easyprojects as best project management tool

Easyprojects as best project management tool

Easy Project is a professional project management tool for you, your team, and the whole company. Trusted by top-notch companies like Toyota, Lenovo, Bosch, it is a perfect fit for numerous industries be it IT or educational.

Features:

  • Visual project maps and plans
  • Compatible with modules for Resources, Finances, Help Desk and CRM
  • Integrated with Outlook, Project, Excel, Redmine

Pricing: $21/month per user Pro plan (60 portfolios, and 100 custom fields)

19. Crocagile

Crocagile top Project Management Tools

Crocagile top Project Management Tools

Crocagile is a simple agile project workspace designed to streamline communication and is focussed towards software development teams. It’s powerful pm tools and simple design is uniquely engineered for agile developers. It has all good stuff including collaboration and gamification feature giving a much-needed boost to agile practices with cutting-edge technology.

Features:

  • Activity Streams, Smart Alerts, and Group Chat to eliminate email
  • Team member updates are visible in one place, automatically
  • File Sharing – Store and Share files with commenting

Pricing: Starting from $2.50 per user, per month with the 30-day free trial.

20. Producteev

Producteev as project management software

Producteev as project management software

Producteev has been a task management solution for small and medium-sized teams. Project managers can easily access all their projects, tasks and other collaborators. With this pm tool you can easily plan any projects, map your route, organize files, delegate tasks, and various elements. Users can easily track the progress of each task.
Features:

  • Organize on your fingertips
  • Powerful collaboration
  • Seamless tracking
  • Interface customization
  • Personalized support

Pricing: The Premium plan is available at $99 per month

21. Teamdeck

Teamdeck top project management tool

Teamdeck top project management tool

Teamdeck offers a complete solution for companies to deliver projects faster. It is an essential pm software for managing resources and monitoring time spent on tasks and projects. With Teamdeck you can book your employees on different projects and create accurate timesheets with one-click time tracking.

Features:

  • Resource scheduling
  • Timesheets and time tracking
  • Leave management
  • Measure billable time

Pricing: Free startup plan limited to 6 team members. Business plan starts from $3.99 / team member / month, $1 / basic resource / month

22. Smartsheet

Smartsheet as pm tool

Smartsheet as pm tool

Smartsheet is a portable project management software to help teams collaborate, time-tracking, reporting, resource management, and planning tasks. The cloud-based software has some amazing features that brings it on the list of best project management tools.

Features:

  • Leverage team collaboration
  • Automatic update requests
  • File attachment from Google Drive, Onedrive, Dropbox and more
  • Gain visibility into who’s busy and who’s not
  • Secure permission control

Pricing: Individual plan starts $14 and business plan at $25 per user per month when billed annually.

Read more: Best Smartsheet Alternatives & Competitors for Work Management

23. Freedcamp

Freedcamp as pm software

Freedcamp as pm software

This is an extremely simple and intuitive tool for large organizations including architecture, interior design, IT services, retail, telecommunication and many more. Freedcamp offer functionality to unlimited users making organizing details and tasks quick and super easy.

Features:

  • Gantt chart to keep a bird’s eye view on tasks
  • Split large tasks into smaller subtasks
  • 3rd party integrations
  • Password manager
  • Shared file management

Pricing: Available at $3.99 for the owner and $0.99 for each additional user per month ( billed yearly )

24. Hive

Hive as project management software

Hive as project management software

Hive’s powerful project management and collaboration software put the needs of a team at a single place. The system lets you track project status, provide a Kanban-style status view, Gantt charts for project progress, and everything that a project team needs on a single page.
Features:

  • Provides a central platform for everything
  • Plan and repeat tasks using action templates
  • Move seamlessly between projects, messages, and files
  • Access anywhere from a desktop or mobile apps
  • 100
    0+ integrations

Price: Professional plan at  $12/user/month

25. Freshdesk

Freshdesk project management tool

Freshdesk project management tool

Freshdesk is a pm software with a comprehensive set of tools to help businesses support the need of customers. It’s simple to set up and offers the best value for money.

Features:

  • Integrated Live Chat, Phone Support, and Game Mechanics
  • High customizability
  • Multi-channel, multi-product and multi-lingual support
  • Great email messaging and self-service portals
  • Keep track of conversations
  • Resolve issues together through collaboration

Pricing: Freshdesk offers four price points for various business sizes. You can sign up for Freshdesk free trial.

26. Flock

Flock team collaboration tool.

Flock team collaboration tool.

Flock is every team’s collaboration hub. Packed with tons of productivity features, Flock is a messaging and communication tool for project management. It drives efficiency and boosts the speed of execution.

Features:

  • Collaboration in real time
  • Jump into video calls with just a click
  • Share all types of files and find them easily
  • Invite guests to work with you
  • Create notes and collaborate with teams on the go
  • Share code snippets on the go
  • Access your entire Google Drive from within Flock
  • Manage your GitHub repos without switching tabs

Pricing: Flock offers monthly and yearly billing. Pro plan starts at ₹ 149 per licensed user, per month billed annually (₹199 billed monthly).

27. LiquidPlanner

LiquidPlanner project management tool

LiquidPlanner project management tool

LiquidPlanner is a collaboration tool that combines project management and time-tracking. It has an interesting methodology for project management as it lets teams set realistic deadlines based on different scenarios.

Features:

  • A realistic range of time to complete tasks
  • Integrated time and budget tracking
  • Task-specific collaboration boards
  • Adding notes to projects
  • Cross-project visibility

Pricing: From $39 user/month, billed annually

28. CoSchedule

Coschedule as project management tools

Coschedule as project management tools

CoSchedule is an intuitive marketing project management tool that’s made to help marketers keep their work organized. It improves company visibility by simplifying all project workflows inside one cross-functional calendar. The possibilities of creation are now endless by being able to view all projects, tasks, deadlines, and ship dates in one place.

Features:

  • Complete more work by streamlining marketing workflows.
  • View, manage and approve all projects and tasks in one place with Marketing Campaigns and Marketing Projects.
  • Visualize project progress from start to finish more easily with Kanban Project Dashboard.

Pricing: Pricing begins at $20 a month and scales up to accommodate teams of all sizes.

29. MoneyPenny.me

moneypenny-project as top project management tool

moneypenny-project as top project management tool

The MoneyPenny Project Time Tracker is a smart and professional suite of online pm tools that
keeps projects and teams organized. By live-monitoring team performance against project deadlines, tasks, and budgets, businesses of any size can save more time and streamline
workflows.

Features:

  • Auto timesheet creation, management, and approval on the cloud, from any device
  • Full data integration, live synced online with invoicing, project tracking and team timers
  • Project progress live notifications and instant messaging team communication

Pricing: After the 30-day free trial, from $15/month/1 user (Starter plan) up to $55/month for 30 users (Enterprise plan).

30. BasecampBasecamp as best project management software

Basecamp as best project management software

Basecamp is one of the most popular online pm tool today. It combines all the necessary features at one place helping project members to know what to do and make sure nothing slips through the cracks.

Features:

  • Message boards, schedules, to-do lists
  • Document and file storage
  • Easy-to-use and simple interface
  • Tag team members easily

Pricing: $99/month.

Read on: Top 21 Basecamp Alternatives for Project Management

31. Monday.com

monday.com as project management software for teams

monday.com as project management software for teams

Monday.com is a simple but intuitive tool that enables people to manage work, meet deadlines, and build a culture of transparency. The solution is best for streamlining discussions, to see who is working on what, and keeping everyone in the know.

Features:

  • Centralized communication and document management
  • Visual project management and tracking
  • Analytics and reporting are well-executed
  • Smartly integrated with Dropbox, Zapier, Google Drive, and similar sharing and management tools

Pricing: Monday.com offers a free trial. The Basic plan is priced at $25 per month billed annually.

32. Wrike

Wrike as best project management software

Wrike as best project management software

Wrike is a robust and versatile tool that helps team collaborate better and communicate with greater transparency. Wrike has plenty of best-in-class collaboration, communication and document management tools. The tool allows to set priorities and align your team to work faster and smarter.
Features:

  • Tasks and milestones can be synchronized to Google, iCalendar and Outlook calendars
  • Gantt charts help create visual timelines
  • Helps you to turn strategy into an actionable plan
  • Provide accurate and up-to-date info to clients

Pricing:  Professional Package – $9.80/user/month (billed annually)

33. Asana

Asana as best pm software

Asana as best pm software

Asana is a cloud-based project management software that helps teams to map out every single detail of projects within an organization. Asana enables you to plan your work in a way that’s best for you. It is flexible enough to adapt to you.

Features:

  • The free tool offers a basic dashboard and search
  • Group tasks into sections or columns in a list or board project
  • Notify employees using a personalized inbox
  • A Gantt style view of how projects fit together
  • Schedule and prioritize tasks on a special Asana calendar
  • Generate detailed Progress reports

Pricing: Asana offers three tiers of pricing: Free, Premium and Enterprise. The premium plan starts at  $9.99 per member/month.

If Asana doesn’t come out to be your cup of team, you can pick any best Asana alternative.

34. Podio

Podio as pm tool

Podio as pm tool

Podio is an extremely versatile tool. More than 500,000 organizations use Podio to run projects. It is built with a series of app and tools that help teams organize tasks and track their work.

Features:

  • Break down large projects into simple to-do lists with assigned tasks
  • File uploads, progress statuses, updates, and comments done in real time
  • Real-time comments and deadlines are all laid out on one dashboard
  • Integrates with file sharing services, customer support, and help desk tools
  • Visualized reports to mark team’s progress

Pricing: Podio offers varying pricing tiers, which are priced per employee per month. Premium plan available at $24.

35. Project Insight

Project Insight as pm software

Project Insight as pm software

Project Insight is a simple and user-friendly interface that fits any team and project size. It offers notable integrations with Box, Microsoft Office, Microsoft Outlook, and Quickbooks. It comes with a simple and user-friendly interface. Users can track all steps of their projects from start to finish.

Features:

  • Real-time reports and manages projects from a single location
  • Time and expense tracking, resource management, and more
  • Real-time access to their tasks and project schedules
  • Balance resource work across all projects

Pricing: Business plan starts at $45 per user per month.

36. Teamwork Projects

Teamwork Projects as project management tool

Teamwork Projects as project management tool

Teamwork Projects is designed to work seamlessly with the tools to form smarter workflows.  With a perky interface, easy-to-use toolset, users can create a project, and generate tasks and milestones. Teamwork Projects is available on iOS, Android, Google Chrome, and the Web.

Features:

  • Set start dates and end dates to your projects
  • Get a snapshot view of what your team is up to with the project activity overview
  • ‘Gantt’ style view of your projects
  • Gain valuable insights on your team’s performance
  • Assign low, medium, or high priorities to tasks

Pricing: Free 30 day trial. Pro plan is available at $9/month per user.

37. ProjectManager.com

ProjectManager.com as pm tool

ProjectManager.com as pm tool

Projectmanager.com is an online project management tool that helps users plan, track, and report on projects online. A powerful project planning and scheduling feature that allows users to manage a team of individuals, balance projects, and document effectiveness.

Features:

  • Attach files and comments to collaborate on tasks
  • Seamless importing and round-tripping of MS Project plans, Excel files & CSV files
  • Real-time dashboards show your status at-a-glance

Pricing: business plan with unlimited features at $25 per user per month.

38. ClickUp

ClickUp as pm tool

ClickUp as pm tool

ClickUp is a high-rated productivity solution helping you better manage your tasks, notes, projects, and time. The project management tool helps you figure out who’s doing what and brings all your tasks, projects, and resources in one place. ClickUp lays special attention on views, statuses, features, and processes to give you a better user experience

Features:

  • Customize workflow with stages to keep people on the same page
  • Create spaces to organize work with customized features, workflows, tags
  • Add time estimates for automatic scheduling
  • Control what others can see and what they can do
  • Make goals and track their success  

Pricing: $4.99 per user per month

39. EventCollab

EventCollab as project management software

EventCollab as project management software

EventCollab is a web-based application which focuses on event project management and logistics tracking. Whether it is about contacts, data, tasks, schedules, calendars – you can securely manage everything in EventCollab. The interface is easy to navigate which makes managing complex tasks easier than ever. EventCollab uses a variety of technologies to create effective solutions for project and event management.

Features:

  • Access projects in real-time
  • Keeps track of the details and connects team members
  • Restricted permissions, role settings, and data encryption
  • Available in the cloud at any time from any location

Pricing: From $20 per month

40. Advantage

Advantage as agency software for project management

Advantage as agency software for project management

Advantage software is a management tool best suited for business agencies and marketing companies to manage the business side. It successfully integrates all agency roles into a single solution with robust modules, powerful features, and extensive reporting. It automates all facets of project management, proofing, billing, client relationship management. The good news is that it works well for medium to large agencies.

Features:

  • Automate and manage projects more efficiently
  • Streamlined processes to manage time, tasks, and expenses
  • Complete reporting and forecasting
  • Share files and collaborate

Pricing: Upon request

41. Redmine

Redmine as project management app

Redmine as project management app

Redmine is an open-source tool which works cross-platform along with multilanguage support. It gives registered users the ability to create and manage their own projects meaning once you have registered, you are allowed to create your own projects and get access to their features. Being a free downloadable software, it is definitely worth a try.

Features:

  • Multiple project support
  • Role-based access control
  • Custom fields for issues, time entries, projects
  • Gantt chart, calendar, issue-tracking system

Pricing: Free

42. Nutcache

Nutcache as project management tool

Nutcache as project management tool

Nutcache brings the best of Agile workflow to manage to plan, track, and organize your projects and tasks better. It provides you with all the tools required to complete the project delivery lifecycle. It is trusted by 1,30,000+ companies worldwide to meet their deadlines. With its agile planner which allows you to see at a glance what others are working on.  

Features:

  • Assign cards to manage priorities
  • Set milestones and alerts to never miss a deadline
  • Bill time and expenses accurately
  • Customizable workflows and well-organized tasks

Pricing: $15/user/month

43. Notion

Notion as project management software

Notion as project management software

Notion is an all-in-one workspace where you can write, plan, and collaborate. Unlike traditional tools for project management, Notion has a modern feel both in its looks and features. It is being used to plan and discuss projects, communicate with teams and clients, and keep track of all the important stuff. Notion keeps records of everything and captures unique workflow in the best possible way.

Features:

  • Outline ideas and rearrange them in any way
  • Syncs across various devices and collaborators in real-time
  • Works in the browser and runs offline with the Mac, Windows, and mobile apps

Pricing: Starts at $4 a month

44. Paymo

project management tool for teams - Paymo

project management tool for teams - Paymo

Paymo is a full-fledged task management software helping teams to work better with advanced proper planning, scheduling, task management and time tracking features. It’s a great tool to bring everyone together and on the same page. Whether you’re a part of a creative, marketing, web designing, business consulting team, Paymo lets you work in harmony and help you manage work faster and better.

Features:

  • Advanced task management tools, Gantt charts and Kanban boards for accurate planning and scheduling
  • Discussions and comments for real-time seamless collaboration
  • Compare initial time estimates against actual work
  • Customizable time and work reports

Pricing: Business plan starts at $15.16/user/month

45. Cage

Cageapp as online proofing review

Cageapp as online proofing review

Cage is a media collaboration software best-suited for designers, creative agencies, and in-house teams. It lets you collaborate with your team directly on the work enabling you to deliver work on time. With its advanced toolkit, you get to gather, discuss, and act on feedback faster. You can also manage projects, teams, and communicate at a single place. It’s also quite effective to get a clear picture of ongoing projects and how your team is performing.

Features:

  • Add annotations directly to images, video, audio, PDFs
  • Share design decisions, customize color palettes and layouts
  • Record different work in progress

Pricing: Professional plan for $14 per user per month

46. Avaza

Avaza as pm tool

Avaza as pm tool

Avaza is productive solution that teams use to collaborate on projects, schedule resources, track time, m
anage expenses for a more efficient business. It helps you get more done faster with quick file-sharing, activity feeds and more. You get to see a bird’s eye view on who’s working on what and manage work assignments and make smarter scheduling decisions.

Features:

  • Visualize, filter, and group tasks within and across projects
  • Flexible project budgeting and billing options
  • Easily manage resource allocated to each project
  • One-click time tracking from every screen

Pricing: Basic plan starts at $19.95 per month

47. Dropbox Paper

project management tool

project management tool

Dropbox Paper launched by Dropbox is a new way to collaborate, organize teamwork and work from anywhere. It is a collaboration app that runs on shared Dropbox space to collect ideas, create documents, chat, and keep everything together in one place.

Features:

  • Help teams collaborate in a distraction-free environment
  • Keeps people in loop with real-time collaboration
  • Link your Google Calendar or Microsoft Office 365 account
  • Visual representation of whatever is happening

48. Evernote

evernote as project management tool

evernote as project management tool

When you’re planning a project, having all the information in one place makes it easier to keep things organized. Evernote is an app for all your needs of taking notes, making lists, reading content online, and having to look up something that you’ve written before. Keeping everyone on the same page will always make sure that you focus on what matters as projects from start to finish.

Features:

  • Set reminders, track deadlines, and gather feedback
  • Save important emails
  • Stay on schedule with checklists and reminders
  • Add keyword tags on notes to find it quickly

49. Todoist

todoist as time tracking software

todoist as time tracking software

Todoist is a customizable solution to meet project management needs of small and midsize businesses. It is a powerful task manager loaded with great features to boost productivity as well as organize tasks and set schedules.

Features:

  • Capture and organize tasks with Quick Add
  • Measure your progress with visualization
  • Email tasks and subtasks directly to your inbox
  • Sync across all your devices and integrates with all your favorite apps

50. TimeCamp

timecamp as time tracking software

timecamp as time tracking software

Time Camp lets you easily track the time spent collectively on each project to keep the team’s work under control and communicate with them efficiently. The tool allows its users to manage unlimited projects and customers without any additional costs.

Features:

  • Track the progress and detect possible delays
  • Collect valuable information about how much time tasks take
  • Plan the work of your team
  • More precisely estimate time needed to do a particular type of task
  • Bill your clients accurately

51. Confluence

Confluence as project management software

Confluence as project management software

Confluence helps you manage the details of all your projects. Atlassian’s Confluence  provides powerful tools for teams to collaborate, complete projects, and review task.

Features:

  • No more separate documentation process
  • Powerful task management to assign a tag, assignee, and due date
  • Organize, track, and review decisions
  • Hassle-free file sharing

Conclusion

With the changing times, the needs of businesses are changing as well. Spend a good amount of time to figure out if you need an invoicing tool, robust reporting software, or a holistic view of projects and processes at one place.

We hope that the above list would serve the purpose and provides you a list of top project management tools to be used in 2020. If you think, we have missed a tool that could make a difference in your life, don’t forget to drop your comment below.

What are project management tools?

Using project management tools is an effective way to deliver projects on time and organize tasks. It is the way to track progress and manage time for successful projects.

What are the top features in project management tools?

Some of the key features are collaboration, task management, file sharing, reports, Gantt chart, & Kanban. To a great surprise, this is all that ProofHub has and a lot more.

What is the best project management tool in 2020?

ProofHub is the most highly rated project management tool today. It is ahead of the rest as it gives all the features at a great price for unlimited users.

How much does a project management tool cost?

Different project management tools have a different plan for everybody but the one like ProofHub has a plan that is available for unlimited users when you pay once.

Vartika Kashyap

Vartika Kashyap

Vartika Kashyap

Vartika Kashyap is the Chief Marketing Officer at ProofHub and has been one of the LinkedIn Top Voices in 2018. Her articles are inspired by office situations and work-related events. She likes to write about productivity, team building, work culture, leadership, entrepreneurship among others and contributing to a better workplace is what makes her click.

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The 8 biggest web design trends 2020

Web design trends are constantly changing. In 2020, the technical possibilities seem endless and we’re seeing designers play with extremes, reinvent previous styles and ceaselessly experiment with new techniques. At the same time, there are some popular styles that just won’t go away, such as the ever-present minimalism and colorful flat illustrations we’ve been seeing for some time now.

So, what will the web design trends 2020 be? If you want to discern the newest trends early on you’ll need help from the experts. We asked some of the top designers in the 99designs community what 2020 web design trends they’re seeing. Here’s what they came up with, based on their knowledge of the craft.

Here are the biggest web design trends 2020:

  1. Dark mode
  2. Imperfections that add personality
  3. Immersive 3D elements
  4. Soft shadows, layers and floating elements
  5. Mixing photography with graphics
  6. Solid frames of white space
  7. Glowing, luminous color schemes
  8. Ultra minimalist navigation

1. Dark mode

Example of 2020 web design trend dark modeby DarkDesign Studio

I believe that one of the main trends of 2020 will be dark design, mainly focusing on UI design giving users an option to enable dark theme. Dark backgrounds make design elements stand out more, creating a higher contrast ratio with the use of other colors, but still improving visual ergonomics by reducing eye strain.

DarkDesign Studio

Dark mode web designs not only look ultra modern, but they’re easy on the eyes and make colors and design elements pop.

Sometimes the most visually stunning web design trends have practical beginnings. Dark themes are better for OLED screens—saving power and extending screen lifespans—but that utility doesn’t stop them from looking good. Dark backgrounds improve the visibility of other accent colors for truly dynamic design.

Dark mode is so hot right now.

– Sam Chang, Product Designer at 99designs

Coincidentally, the dark mode design aesthetic also fits in perfectly with other prevalent 2020 design trends that include dark and moody color schemes combined with glowing neons as well as futuristic yet dark cyberpunk and dystopian styles.

2. Imperfections that add personality

Example of 2020 web design trend hand-drawn icons and elementsvia Zhenya RynzhukExample of 2020 web design trend hand-drawn icons and elementsvia Cuberto

Imperfect, hand-drawn design elements inject emotion and humanity into websites, which users seem to be craving after seeing perfected yet impersonal graphics dominate web designs for years. In 2020, adding some hand-drawn realness gives web designs the heart and soul visitors find appealing.

A big trend next year will be hand-drawn icons. They’re more emotional, but on a positive note. This trend is connected to the fact that we need more positive stuff around, something that can brighten up the day.

Elisabetta Calabritto

Example of 2020 web design trend hand-drawn icons and elementsvia Chelsea Carlson

Indeed, who couldn’t use a little extra positivity these days. Unique and stylized, hand-drawn icons and other elements show off your brand personality and stand out from your competitors. In fact, this rebellious trend is almost a countermovement to the trend of pixel-perfect flat designs—so flaunt your scratchy edges and open shapes to show how human and lifelike your brand is.

Whether it’s hand-drawn icons or hand-made illustrations, in 2020 we’ll see more designers adding purposefully messy-looking elements to their web designs.

3. Immersive 3D elements

Example of 2020 web design trend of 3D elementsvia GG Marmont GucciExample of 2020 web design trend of 3D elementsvia UenoWeb design trends 2020 example: 3d websitevia A-0 Design

I expect to see more use of 3D technology in graphic design and interaction design. Technology pushes the design and vice versa. Designers are armed to their teeth with vast options for creative “roaming” in 3D space. They step up the interaction game by including all of our senses in the experience.

Pinch Studio

3D visuals have always delighted people; what held this trend back was technology and the (previously) expensive price tag. But as Pinch Studio explains, the technology is now in a place where you can design in 3D without NASA-tier equipment, opening the gates to more and more designers.

Until VR becomes more mainstream and cost-effective, hyper-realistic 3D that’s often taking up the whole screen is
the best way to create an immersive experience for your site. That’s not just an advantage for visuals, but for UX as well—interactive 3D design encourages users to stay longer. As 2020 unfolds, expect to see more immersive 3D web designs drawing users in and visually breaking down the boundaries between digital space and reality.

4. Soft shadows, layers and floating elements

Example of 2020 web design trend of soft shadows and floating elementsby Gilles Tossoukpé (via Dribbble)Web design trends 2020 example: layers and shadowsvia Mike, Creative Mints

Soft shadows and floating elements create a pseudo-3D effect and make the design more layered and more interesting.

Alex Ivanov

This trend is all about creating depth. Like the 3D effect from above but want to tone it down? Soft shadows and floating elements add interest and depth and give your web page a “3D Lite” look. It’s not just graphics either: you can use this effect with text and photos, too.

Taking the principles of material design a step further, designers can add a little extra pizzazz to 2D layouts with soft drop shadows and layering elements on top of each other for extended depth. These effects give the design a lightweight feel, as if the elements are floating over each other—a sharp contrast from classic, impenetrable flat design where the layers seem, well, flat.

5. Mixing photography with graphics

Example of 2020 web design trend of mixing real photographs with graphicsvia Zhenya RynzhukExample of 2020 web design trend of bold duotoneBy Ashish Rai (via Dribbble)Example of 2020 web design trend of mixing real photographs with graphicsvia PlanitExample of 2020 web design trend of mixing real photographs with graphicsBy Rosee Byrne (via Dribbble)

Using real photographs mixed with illustrations or graphics communicates a really customized message. Whether photos of products or people, these images can more fully support branding and help websites stand out from the crowd.

Hiroshy

Overlapping original graphics on top of real photographs creates a memorable visual, which lends itself to letting your creativity go wild.

This collage-like trend is a versatile one; you can use it to add a special cuteness and charm to otherwise bland product photo (TSP stoneware, above), or you can use its more serious attributes to better communicate complicated or abstract concepts like tech or finance. It’s a way to customize your imagery and add more personality (a reoccurring trend in 2020) to your web design.

To make the most of this trend’s flexibility, be sure to match the style of the illustrations and graphics with your brand personality. Their style can sway how people interpret the photograph—cartoon squiggles for something more playful, or geometric and detailed illustrations for something more sophisticated.

6. Solid frames of white space

Web design trends 2020 example: web design with neat white space framingby akorn.creativeExample of 2020 web design trend of framing with blank spacevia GladeyeExample of 2020 web design trend of framing with blank spacevia Patrick DavidWeb design trends 2020 example: web design with white space framing imagesby Daan Spits via QVT

I am really digging the white space around websites, steering away from full bleed images and parallax designs. When something is ‘framed’ it gives the image more of a position on the site so that websites tend to ‘pop’ and stand out more.

Daan Spits

Full bleed layouts have been trending in web design for quite some time. Now, designers are gravitating towards solid structures and playing with different ways to use lots of white space (and space of any color, for that matter) to give their designs more structure and make use of clean framing to give their designs stability and a canvas to jump off of.

In 2020, we’ll see wide frames of white space giving web designs a solid structure. By allowing each element on the page a generous amount of space, framing creates the perfect foundation for making visuals shine. Neatly structured frames around websites create a satisfying sense of order and help prioritize and separate all the different parts of a page.

7. Glowing, luminous color schemes

Example of 2020 web design trend of bold duotonevia MONOGRIDExample of 2020 web design trend of bold duotonevia Matthias VambairgueExample of 2020 web design trend of bold duotonevia Magic People Voodoo People

Futuristic color schemes and designs will be on trend next year, continuing with the isometric trend and bringing in colors like blues and purples and hot pink to give designs that futuristic glowing feel.

– Adrianne Mesnard, Art Director at 99designs

As we head into 2020, we’ll be seeing courageous color pairings, used strategically to make web designs jump off the screen. Web design is becoming more bold and daring, using glow-in-the-dark neons and highly saturated colors in combination with darker, muted shades to give the designs a luminous feel.

Duotone web designs in particular make this trend shine. Duotone keeps reinventing itself to maintain its place at the forefront of design. This latest iteration is the boldest yet, relying on futuristic, neon pops of color and stark color opposites to make veritably vivacious visuals.

Unique duotone web designs are visually interesting and appealing. And with the help of the duotone effect, you can transform almost any image into your company’s branding.

deandesign

In 2020, intriguing color schemes will play a critical role in web design. With web design trends like extreme minimalism and dark mode on the rise, glowing and luminous colors can really shine.

8. Ultra minimalist navigation

Example of 2020 web design trend of large photos and videosby Alt*CEVAExample of 2020 web design trend of large photos and videosBy Mike | Creative Mints (via Dribbble)Example of 2020 web design trend of minimalist navigationby Sathish (via Dribbble)

In 2020, website content will be more video with voice script and less text, heading towards precision over description. Overall, web design is going to be more simplistic to facilitate easier navigation.

Ananya Roy

With the rise of wearable devices like smartwatches, web design in general is thinking smaller. The area most affected by this is navigation, the glue that holds a website together. Over the last few years, navigation has been getting simpler and simpler to accommodate extremely small devices and even smaller attention spans.

Extremely minimalist navigation takes away much of the difficulty in usability. The less a user has to think about moving around, the more time they spend immersed in the site, actually moving around instead of wondering how.

At the same time, imagery is becoming more important.  Large-scale photos and videos are your chance to impress users—while only using the bare minimum of text.

Example of 2020 web design trend of large photos and videosA minimalist web design with large photography by David & GeorgeExample of 2020 web design trend of large photos and videosA minimalist web design with large photography by Hitron

Huge photos and videos have some vivid benefits. They draw attention to your business objective. I believe this is why more and more websites are starting to use big images to deliver beautiful visuals to their viewers.

Coincept

With less text on the page large images are being pulled to the foreground and represent the main focus of the composition. Because the image gets the lion’s share of attention, make sure it’s worthy; use a powerful or artful visual that says it all.

Looking forward to web design trends 2020

With those annoying 2010s coming to a close, web design trends 2020 are embracing futurism like never before. Attention-grabbing visuals and colors, 3D effects and old trends reinvented are all clear indicators of this new 2020 style. This movement extends beyond the screen as well, with modern web design emphasizing more user friendly site experiences, as with minimalist navigation and less eye-straining dark design.

At the brink of this new decade web designers are simultaneously looking to the future and to the past for inspiration. And thanks to this multitude of opposing design trends, movements and styles it’s safe to say that web design in 2020 will be full of surprises.

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