Web toolbox

The right tool always makes the job easier — and the work better. Following are several services and tools (most of which are free and open-source), designed for a variety of digital and web activities.

This Web Toolbox was created by the Local Group Logistics Committee in collaboration with National Office staffers.

Communication

Bulk Mailer

Bulk Mailer is an email marketing software created to design, send and monitor bulk messages.

Leadership roles: Circulation
Cost: Free (premium plans available)

Campaign Monitor

Campaign Monitor is an email marketing software created to design, send and monitor bulk messages.

Leadership roles: Circulation
Cost: Free (premium plans available)

Google Hangouts

Google Hangouts lets you video call, phone, or message the people you contact most. Sync your chats from device to device and keep the conversation going wherever you are.

Leadership roles: Executive Committee
Cost: Free

GroupMe

It's like a private chat room for your small group. Have as many as you want, and it's always free. Now, you can coordinate with coworkers, organize a game night, and keep in touch with family all in the same place. (Group limits: 200)

Leadership roles: Area Coordinator, SIG coordinator, Gifted Youth Coordinator, RG Committee
Cost: Free

MailChimp

MailChimp is an email marketing software created to design, send and monitor bulk messages.

Leadership roles: Circulation
Cost: Free (premium plans available)

ooVoo

ooVoo is a free video chat and instant messaging app for desktop, mobile, tablets and Facebook. ooVoo lets you chat with up to 12 people for free anytime, anywhere.

Leadership roles: Executive Committee
Cost: Free

SendBlaster

Send Blaster is an email marketing software created to design, send and monitor bulk messages.

Leadership roles: Circulation
Cost: Free (premium plans available)

Skype

Skype is for doing things together, whenever you’re apart. Skype’s text, voice and video make it simple to share experiences with the people that matter to you, wherever they are.

Leadership roles: Executive Committee
Cost: Free

Slack

Slack brings all your communication together in one place. It’s real-time messaging, archiving and search for modern teams.

Leadership roles: All
Cost: Free (premium plans available)

Publishing

Adobe Creative Cloud

Creative Cloud gives you Adobe's entire collection of creative tools for your desktop, like Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign and Adobe Premiere Pro.

Leadership roles: Webmaster, Newsletter Editor, Press Relations
Cost: $20-$50/mo

OpenOffice

Apache OpenOffice is the leading open-source office software suite for word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, graphics, databases and more. It is available in many languages and works on all common computers. It stores all your data in an international open standard format and can also read and write files from other common office software packages. It can be downloaded and used completely free of charge for any purpose.

Leadership roles: Newsletter Editor
Cost: Free

PDF Architect

PDF Architect is exceptionally light, easy-to-use and flexible. It is the advanced PDF solution with everything you need to customize, secure, and collaborate on your PDF documents. We've included all the necessary features for home and professional users alike who wish to streamline their workflow.

Leadership roles: Newsletter Editor
Cost: Free (paid plugins available)

Scribus

Scribus, a free, open-source page layout program for Linux, FreeBSD, PC-BSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Solaris, OpenIndiana, Debian GNU/Hurd, Mac OS X, OS/2 Warp 4, eComStation, Haiku and Windows.

Leadership roles: Newsletter Editor
Cost: Free

Events

batchgeo

Mix location with other data, such as pricing, sales volume, or other categorization to get a map that lets you — or anyone you share it with — really explore the data. BatchGeo can place multiple marker designs and even provides clustering to help aggregate the information within your data.

Leadership roles: Gifted Youth Coordinator, SIG chair, Executive Committee
Cost: Free w/ads (premium plans available)

Doodle

Doodle's polling software radically simplifies the process of scheduling events, meetings, appointments, etc. Herding cats gets 2x faster with Doodle.

Leadership roles:
Cost: Free (premium plans available)

Eventbase

Whether you’re hosting an enterprise conference, a trade show, a festival, or a sporting event — having a bold-looking mobile event app can make a big impact. Every app Eventbase creates incorporates stunning design and an award-winning user experience, all to effectively reflect your brand. Best of all, your attendees will appreciate having an app that’s a joy to use.

Leadership roles: Newsletter Editor, Webmaster, RG Chair
Cost: Free (premium plans available)

Meet-Up

Meetup is the world's largest network of local groups. Meetup makes it easy for anyone to organize a local group or find one of the thousands already meeting up face-to-face. More than 9,000 groups get together in local communities each day, each one with the goal of improving themselves or their communities.

Leadership roles: Program Chair, Membership Officer
Cost: Free/paid

My Attendance Tracker

My Attendance Tracker is an online attendance tracker that helps you simplify the tedious task of keeping attendance.

Leadership roles: Meeting Chair, Membership Chair, Local Secretary, Regional Vice Chair
Cost: Free

Committees

Financial Projections Template from Score

Download this financial projections Excel template to calculate your startup expenses, payroll costs, sales forecast, cash flow, income statement, balance sheet, break-even analysis, financial ratios, cost of goods sold, amortization and depreciation for your small business.

Leadership roles: Treasurer, Executive Committee, RG Chair
Cost: Free

FreeConferenceCall.com

HD audio conferencing. Host or join conference calls with up to 1,000 callers via phone or VoIP with domestic and international numbers. U.S. toll-free numbers are also available.

Leadership roles: Executive Committee
Cost: Free

GNUCash

GnuCash is personal and small-business financial-accounting software, freely licensed under the GNU GPL and available for GNU/Linux, BSD, Solaris, Mac OS X and Microsoft Windows.

Leadership roles: Treasurer
Cost: Free

Google Hangouts

Google Hangouts lets you video call, phone, or message the people you contact most. Sync your chats from device to device and keep the conversation going wherever you are.

Leadership roles: Executive Committee
Cost: Free

GroupMe

It's like a private chat room for your small group. Have as many as you want, and it's always free. Now, you can coordinate with coworkers, organize a game night, and keep in touch with family all in the same place. (Group limits: 200)

Leadership roles: Area Coordinator, SIG coordinator, Gifted Youth Coordinator, RG Committee
Cost: Free

ProjectLibre

ProjectLibre is the leading open source alternative to Microsoft Project and is compatible with Microsoft Project 2003, 2007 and 2010 files. You can simply open them on Linux, Mac OS or Windows. ProjectLibre's key features: Compatibility with Microsoft Project, Gantt Chart, Network Diagram, WBS/RBS charts, Earned Value Costing, Resource Histograms.

Leadership roles: Local Secretary, Executive Committee
Cost: Free

Skype

Skype is for doing things together, whenever you’re apart. Skype’s text, voice and video make it simple to share experiences with the people that matter to you, wherever they are.

Leadership roles: Executive Committee
Cost: Free

Slack

Slack brings all your communication together in one place. It’s real-time messaging, archiving and search for modern teams.

Leadership roles: All
Cost: Free (premium plans available)

Surveys & Elections

Google Forms

Collect and organize information big & small with Google Forms. For free. Plan your next camping trip, manage event registrations, whip up a quick poll, collect email addresses for a newsletter, create a pop quiz, and much more.

Leadership roles: Membership Officer
Cost: Free

SurveyMonkey

Create and publish online surveys in minutes, and view results graphically and in real time. SurveyMonkey provides free online questionnaire and survey software.

Leadership roles: Executive Committee, Membership Officer
Cost: Free (premium plans available)

Web Development

FileZilla

A free FTP solution for both client and server. FileZilla is open source software distributed free of charge.

Leadership roles: Webmaster
Cost: Free

git

Git is a free and open source distributed version control system designed to handle everything from small to very large projects with speed and efficiency.

Leadership roles: Webmaster
Cost: Free

Squarespace

A combined website design and hosting service. Focused on both ease-of-use and professional design. E-commerce available. All sites are mobile-optimized by default.

Leadership roles: Webmaster
Cost: $100/year and up

Sublime Text

Sublime Text is a sophisticated text editor for code, markup and prose. You'll love the slick user interface, extraordinary features and amazing performance. Sublime Text may be downloaded and evaluated for free, however a license must be purchased for continued use. There is currently no enforced time limit for the evaluation.

Leadership roles: Webmaster
Cost: $80 (unlimited licenses, no limit for free evaluation)

Weebly

Weebly makes it surprisingly easy to create a high-quality website, blog or online store.

Leadership roles: Webmaster
Cost: Free (premium plans available)

Visual Studio Code

Visual Studio Code is a code editor redefined and optimized for building and debugging modern web and cloud applications. Visual Studio Code is free and available on your favorite platform - Linux, Mac OSX, and Windows."

Leadership roles: Webmaster
Cost: Free

Miscellaneous

Greenshot

Greenshot is a light-weight, free and open-source screenshot software tool for Windows. Greenshot allows quick creation of screenshots, easy annotation, highlighting and obfuscating using the built-in image editor and sending the screenshot to a file, the clipboard, a printer or as email attachment.

Leadership roles: Any
Cost: Free