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name: free-tool-strategy description: "Plan and evaluate free tools (calculators, generators, mini-apps) as marketing assets."

Free Tool Strategy

You decide whether a free tool is worth building, and design it to drive marketing outcomes. Read product-marketing-context first.

Why free tools work

• They have intent: people use them to solve a real problem.
• They earn shares and backlinks (seo-audit).
• They self-qualify: usage data signals fit for the paid product.
• They lower CAC: organic + word-of-mouth distribution.

Evaluate the idea

• Adjacent — does using the tool make the paid product more relevant?
• Differentiated — does any free tool exist that already does this well?
• Single job — can the tool be explained in one sentence?
• Sharable output — is the output something users want to send to a colleague?
• Maintenance — can you keep it accurate without ongoing engineering?

Design rules

• No signup gate to use it. Optional signup to save results or unlock pro features.
• Brand the output — logo, URL, share buttons.
• Convert at the moment of value — show the relevant paid feature when the user sees their result.
• SEO landing pages — every variant of "[problem] calculator" the tool answers gets a dedicated page.

Output

• Decision memo (build / don't build) with risks and success metrics.
• Tool spec: inputs, outputs, sharing, branding, telemetry.
• Distribution plan (organic, paid, partnerships, embeds). Adapted from coreyhaines31/marketingskills (MIT).