12 Essential Tools and Software to Start a Business in 2025

Starting a new business comes with some of its own challenges. You’re starting as a rookie entrepreneur, you don’t know all the processes and how things work, and you also don’t have a million-dollar cash in your business account. 

That’s where tools like these become your companion and help you get through. Whether you need help with communication, project management, finance, or marketing, there are a variety of tools that can help you operate more efficiently and effectively.

In this article, we will explore the top 12 tools you need to start a business in 2025. We tried covering most of the common startup requirements, so you have every tool you need in your journey. So, let’s get started.

Article Shortcuts: 

• Bizplanr - Best for AI-Generated Business Plans in Minutes
• Slack - Best for Team Communication
• Trello - Best for Project Management
• Notion - Best for All-in-One Workplace
• Venngage - Best AI Infographic Generator
• QuickBooks - Best for Accounting and Finance
• Canva - Best for Graphic Design
• Mailchimp - Best for Email Marketing
• Hootsuite - Best for Social Media Management
• Stripe - Best for Payment Processing
• Zapier - Best for Workflow Automation
• Refrens - Best All-in-One Accounting Software
• FAQs

Source: Freepik

When launching a business, you need tools that handle your daily tasks while keeping your team connected, your finances in order, and your marketing efforts on track. The following tools (or custom AI development services, if you need tailored automation) are essential for building a solid foundation for your startup.

1. Bizplanr – Best for AI-Generated Business Plans in Minutes

Bizplanr is an AI-powered business plan generator designed for entrepreneurs, small business owners, business advisors, educators, and students.

It simplifies the process by asking simple questions about your business and automatically crafting a professional business plan. Ideal for those looking for a fast, effective, and free solution to create comprehensive business plans to scale a startup without hiring costly writers.

Key Features:

• AI Business Plan Generator: Get your business plan crafted in minutes by answering a few context-aware questions. The AI structures the plan for you, covering all essential components.
• Detailed business plan samples: Bizplanr offers an extensive collection of fully detailed and practical business plan samples from diverse industries.
• Startup Launch Tool: Create a detailed plan that covers operations, marketing, and financials, ensuring your startup’s roadmap is fully mapped from conception to market entry.
• Idea Validation: Bizplanr's quick AI generator lets you test the viability of different business ideas within minutes.
• Academic Planning Assistant: Bizplanr is perfect for students who need to prepare business plans for their presentations.

Why You Need It:

Bizplanr is perfect for anyone needing a fast, reliable, and free way to create professional business plans. 

Whether you're an entrepreneur, student, or startup, AI assistance allows you to focus on your ideas while the system handles the technicalities of structuring and writing the plan.

Pros and Cons

Pricing:

• Basic Plan: Free – Generate and download your business plan by answering simple questions.
• Starter Plan: $7/month.

2. Slack – Best for Team Communication

Slack is a messaging and collaboration tool that helps you communicate with your team in real time, while also integrating with access management tools to control user permissions across channels.

This tool replaces clunky email threads and unorganized communication with channels, direct messages, and seamless integrations. Just to emphasize, Slack integrates with over 2400 tools, meaning you can easily streamline your workflow without major disruptions. 

Key Features:

• Channels: Slack organizes messages into dedicated channels, which can be public or private.
• Direct Messaging: Slack allows you to send direct messages to your team members in private.
• App Integrations: Slack integrates with over 2,400 tools, making it perfect for project management as well.
• File Sharing: With Slack, you can share files, documents, and images within a conversation.
• Slack AI: Summarizes conversations and threads, schedules messages, drafts meeting notes, and answers questions after referring to conversations and files.

Pros and Cons

Pricing:

• Free version available with limited features
• Paid plans start at $7.25 per user/month

3. Trello – Best for Project Management

Trello is a project management tool that helps you capture, organize, and tackle your to-dos using inbox, boards, and planners. It turns your communication into to-dos while keeping all your discussions and tasks organized in one place. 

With Trello, you get a no-code automation builder to automate your workflow. You can create rules, buttons, and commands to automate any action. 

Not only that, it seamlessly integrates with leading project management, file management, sales, and automation tools. Meaning you don't have to play around with different apps trying to manage your productivity.

Key Features:

• Inbox: Integrate communication from Slack, Emails, and other apps into your Trello app.
• Templates: Trello offers extensive ready-to-use templates for design, HR, marketing, education, and business purposes.
• Diverse views: Lets you see your project with board, timeline, table, calendar, dashboard, map, and workspace views.
• Butler Automation: Automate repetitive tasks such as moving cards to different lists or assigning team members.

Pros and Cons

Pricing:

• Free version available
• Paid plans start at $5 per user/month

4. Notion – Best for All-in-One Workspace

Notion is a productivity and note-taking application that combines all your projects, goals, calendars, and roadmaps in one place.

It's building an AI enabled MVP that lets you find answers to important questions from Notion, Google Drive, Slack, and other connected apps. It can gather insights from PDFs and images, and can also create and edit documents in your own style.

Key Features:

• Notes and Docs: Create and organize notes, meeting minutes, or project documentation.
• Wikis: Centralize your scattered knowledge into easy-to-access information.
• Board views: Let you view projects as a timeline for a bird’s eye view.
• Metrics tracking: Craft a perfect workflow with priority labels, status tags, and more.

Pros and Cons

Pricing:

• Free plan available
• Paid plans start at $8 per user/month

5. Venngage - Best AI Infographic Generator

Venngage's AI Infographic Generator transforms the way you create visual content.

With just a simple text prompt, it turns complex data into clear, engaging infographics. Ideal for marketers, educators, and business professionals, this tool offers an intuitive platform to craft compelling visuals effortlessly.

If you aim to enhance presentations or social media posts, Venngage's AI Infographic Generator streamlines the design process, saving you time and effort. 

Key Features:

• AI-Powered Design: Generate infographics instantly from simple text prompts, turning complex data into clear, engaging visual stories.
• Customizable Templates: Access a wide range of eye-catching designs, each tailored to suit any subject matter.
• Full Customization: Edit and personalize every detail of your infographic to ensure your story shines. 
• Brand Consistency: Maintain your brand identity while enhancing your visual narrative, ensuring consistency across all your communications. 
• Easy Sharing: Export your finished infographic in your preferred format and easily share or collaborate using link generation features for wider distribution.

Pros and Cons

Pricing:

• The free plan is limited, while the premium plan starts at $10/month with advanced features, and the business offers full branding tools at $24/month; the enterprise has custom pricing.

6. QuickBooks – Best for Accounting and Finance

QuickBooks is accounting software for small businesses that allows you to accept business payments, manage bills, and handle payroll functions. This accounting software is developed and marketed by Intuit.

Key Features:

• Multiple currency accounting: Lets you record transactions in other currencies without worrying about exchange rates.
• Inventory management: Track products and cost of goods, create purchase orders, and manage vendors.
• Invoice and payments: Accept credit cards and bank transfers in the invoice with QuickBooks Payments.
• Bookkeeping automation: Captures real-time data and maintains your accounting books per the GAAP standards.

Pros and Cons

Pricing:

Starts at $25/month for Simple Start

7. Canva – Best for Graphic Design

Canva is a design tool that empowers non-designers to create professional-looking graphics, presentations, and marketing materials. 

Whether you need to create social media graphics, posters, or business presentations, Canva’s intuitive drag-and-drop editor and a large library of templates make design simple and accessible for everyone.

Key Features:

• Templates: Thousands of customizable templates for social media posts, flyers, presentations, and more.
• Drag-and-Drop Editor: Easy-to-use editor for creating graphics with custom text, images, and icons.
• Brand Kit: Store your brand’s logo, fonts, and color palettes for consistent branding.
• Access to Stock Photos and Videos: Millions of free and premium stock images, videos, and icons.

Pros and Cons

Pricing:

• Free version available
• Paid plans start at $12.99 per month

8. Mailchimp – Best for Email Marketing

Mailchimp is one of the most popular email marketing platforms for small businesses, offering tools to create, send, and analyze email campaigns. It allows you to automate email sequences, segment your audience, and use customer data to send personalized emails. 

Key Features:

• Email Automation: Automate email campaigns such as welcome series, abandoned cart emails, and more.
• Audience Segmentation: Segment your email list based on customer behavior, demographics, or purchase history.
• Drag-and-Drop Builder: Create professional email campaigns without coding knowledge.
• Analytics and Reporting: Understand and track campaign performance.

Pros and Cons

Pricing:

• Free plan available for up to 500 contacts
• Paid plans start at $13/month

9. Hootsuite – Best for Social Media Management

Hootsuite is a social media management platform that enables businesses to manage multiple social media accounts in one place. You can schedule posts, monitor engagement, track performance, and manage interactions across various social media channels like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn.

Key Features:

• Post Scheduling: Schedule social media posts across multiple platforms in advance.
• Social Monitoring: Monitor real-time mentions, comments, and messages from one dashboard.
• Analytics: Access in-depth analytics to track social media performance and engagement.
• Content Library: Store and organize content for reuse in future campaigns.
• Collaboration: Collaborate with team members, assign tasks, and approve posts.

Pros and Cons

Pricing:

• Free plan available
• Paid plans start at $99/month

10. Stripe – Best for Payment Processing

Stripe is a payment processing platform designed for online businesses that need to accept payments globally. It supports multiple currencies and payment methods, including credit and debit cards, digital wallets, and bank transfers.

Stripe’s robust APIs allow businesses to customize payment flows and integrate with e-commerce platforms.

Key Features:

• Multiple Currencies: Accept payments in over 135 currencies.
• Recurring Billing: Manage subscriptions and recurring payments with ease.
• Fraud Prevention: Built-in fraud detection tools to secure transactions.
• Developer-Friendly API: Allows for customization of payment processes.
• Integration: Integrates with popular e-commerce platforms like Shopify, WooCommerce, and BigCommerce.

Pros and Cons

Pricing:

• 2.9% + 30¢ per successful transaction

11. Zapier – Best for Workflow Automation

Zapier is an automation tool that lets you automate any workflows without the need for IT or tech professionals. It has an incredibly smooth interface that can be mastered in minutes.

Zapier offers integrations with over 7000+ tools. With it, you can draft email responses, summarize sales calls, communicate with leads, and do much more with utmost efficiency.

Key Features:

• Interfaces: Build professional apps, forms, and web pages that can connect with Zaps and Tables.
• Tables: Control the data that powers your automation.
• Customizable Zaps: Automate repetitive tasks with customizable workflows.
• Task History: Review and track the history of all automated tasks.

Pros and Cons

Pricing:

• Free plan available
• Paid plans start at $19.99/month

12. Refrens – Best All-in-One Accounting Software

Refrens is a powerful accounting software built for freelancers, small business owners, and growing enterprises looking for a streamlined way to manage finances, invoices, and expenses.

It offers an all-in-one experience by combining multi-currency invoicing, recurring billing, expense tracking, and financial reporting into one easy-to-use platform.

Key Features:

• Multi-Currency Invoicing: Send invoices in different currencies and set automated payment reminders.
• E-Invoices & E-Way Bills: Generate credit/debit notes, e-way bills, and tax-compliant e-invoices effortlessly.
• Recurring Invoices: Automate billing and reminders with set-it-and-forget-it invoicing.

Pros and Cons

Pricing:

• Basic Plan: Free
• Books Essential: $90/year
• Books Pro: $225/year

FAQs

1. How can automation tools help my business?

Automation tools streamline repetitive tasks such as updating data, sending emails, content generation, and creating visuals so that you don’t have to spend time on manual chores. Automation helps you increase the productivity of your entire team, saving you days and weeks at a time. 

2. Are free versions of AI tools sufficient?

Most tools with AI functionality offer a free version with limited features. Slack, ClickUp, Bizplanr are a few to name. These free versions are mostly sufficient for small teams or businesses requiring limited functionality. However, you may need a paid tool with advanced features as your business scales. 

The Bottom Line

AI has become a part of our everyday lives. From writing to managing tasks, communication, and designing, there’s nothing an AI can’t do today, of course, with a nudge from a human. 

If you are a small business owner, integrating AI tools in your workflow can increase productivity, reduce manual back-and-forth, and save you tons of time to focus on important business aspects. 

You know your business better than anyone else. So do your research, understand your needs, study what kind of tools you require, and invest in the ones that can automate your workflows the most.

Author Bio

Jay is an SEO Specialist with five years of experience specializing in digital marketing, HTML keyword optimization, meta descriptions, and Google Analytics. A proven track record of executing high-impact campaigns to enhance the online presence of emerging brands. Adept at collaborating with cross-functional teams and clients to refine content strategy. Currently working with Tecuy Media.

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