Gigabit Tool Stack

The tools we actually use (and recommend) to design, build and grow modern digital businesses.

At Gigabit, we spend a lot of time testing tools so our clients don’t have to. This page is a curated stack of software we trust for collaboration, design, engineering, AI, analytics, marketing, sales, finance and more.

Some of the links on this page are referral or affiliate links. If you sign up through them, we may earn a commission or credit — at no extra cost to you. We only recommend tools we’d be comfortable using for our own company or our clients.

How to Use This Page

Think of this page as a starter map for your digital operations:

We’ll keep updating this page as our stack evolves.

Quick Filters

Google Workspace

email, calendar, docs, sheets, slides and Drive.

Slack

Real‑time team messaging

Notion

All‑in‑one space for wikis, docs,

Figma

UI/UX design, prototyping and design

Adobe Creative Cloud icon
Adobe Creative Cloud

Industry‑standard tools for heavy design

Canva

Quick social media graphics

Loom

Record quick screen + camera videos

Linear

Modern, fast issue and project tracking

Jira

Highly configurable issue and project tracking

ClickUp

All‑in‑one tasks, projects and docs platform.

Trello

Visual Kanban boards for lightweight

miro
Miro / FigJam

Online whiteboards for workshops

GitHub

Source control, pull requests, CI/CD, issue tracking.

GitLab / Bitbucket

Alternatives for source control

Visual Studio Code

Primary code editor for most of our engineers.

Docker

Containerization for consistent environments

Vercel / Netlify

Modern hosting for frontend

AWS / GCP / Azure

Core cloud platforms for compute

Cloudflare

CDN, DNS, security (WAF), edge functions.

Google Analytics 4 (GA4)

Baseline web analytics for traffic

Google Tag Manager

Central tag / script management

Looker Studio

Free reporting / dashboarding layer

Metabase

Lightweight BI and dashboard tool

Icon_24px_BigQuery_Color
BigQuery / Snowflake

Cloud data warehouses for centralizing

Google Search Console

Essential for monitoring

Semrush

SEO and competitive research suite

Ahrefs

Alternative/partner to Semrush

MailerLite / Brevo / ConvertKit

mail marketing platforms

Klaviyo

Email & SMS for ecommerce

ionicons-v5_logos
Buffer / Hootsuite / Publer

Social scheduling and basic analytics.

HubSpot CRM

Popular CRM with sales, marketing

Pipedrive

Sales‑focused CRM with visual pipelines

Close / Apollo (for outbound)

Sales engagement platform

Intercom icon
Intercom

In‑app messaging, support, chatbots

Zendesk

Omnichannel support platform

Crisp / Tawk.to

Lightweight live chat and support widget.

Shopify

Hosted ecommerce platform

WooCommerce

WordPress‑based ecommerce

Webflow Ecommerce

Visually‑driven ecommerce sites

Stripe

Payments, subscriptions, billing and invoicing.

Xero

Cloud accounting

QuickBooks Online

Cloud accounting with strong support

Wise

Multi‑currency accounts

Payoneer

Alternative to Wise, often used for global payout

OpenAI (ChatGPT & API)

LLM models for chat, coding assistance

Anthropic (Claude)

LLMs known for long context

Zapier

No‑code automation between different apps.

Make (formerly Integromat)

Advanced visual automation scenarios.

n8n

Open‑source automation platform.

Retool / Appsmith

Internal tool builders, powered

Recommended Starter Stacks

Goal: lightweight, simple, nothing enterprise — you can run an entire early‑stage business on this.

Tools by Category

Below are the tools we consider most useful in each category. You don’t need all of them — choose what fits your size, budget and stack.

Google Workspace

Our primary hub for email, calendar, docs, sheets, slides and Drive. Simple admin, great collaboration, integrates with almost everything.

  • Why we recommend it: Easy to onboard teams, strong security & admin controls, plays nicely with SaaS tools.
  • Best for: Almost everyone — startups, agencies, product teams.

Slack

Real‑time team messaging, channels, integrations and workflows for internal and client communication.

  • Why we recommend it: Fast, searchable, works with bots and integrations, async‑friendly when used well.
  • Best for: Distributed teams, agencies, engineering orgs.

Notion

All‑in‑one space for wikis, docs, lightweight project management and knowledge bases.

  • Why we recommend it: Flexible structure, great for playbooks, SOPs, and collaborative writing.
  • Best for: Teams who want docs and tasks in one place.

Figma

UI/UX design, prototyping and design systems in the browser.

  • Why we recommend it: Real‑time collaboration, components, design systems, and dev‑handoff features.
  • Best for: Product teams, design teams, agencies.

Adobe Creative Cloud icon
Adobe Creative Cloud (Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere, After Effects)

Industry‑standard tools for heavy design, illustration and video.

  • Why we recommend it: Powerful, mature, massive ecosystem of tutorials and plugins.
  • Best for: Brand design, motion, photo/video heavy work.

Canva

Quick social media graphics, pitch decks, and simple marketing materials.

  • Why we recommend it: Easy for non‑designers, templates for almost everything.
  • Best for: Social teams, founders, marketers needing speed.

Loom

Record quick screen + camera videos to explain ideas, review work and document processes.

  • Why we recommend it: Beats long emails, great for async reviews and training.
  • Best for: Remote teams, support, client updates.

Linear

Modern, fast issue and project tracking for product and engineering teams.

  • Why we recommend it: Keyboard-driven, opinionated, minimal overhead.
  • Best for: Product‑led and dev‑heavy teams.

Jira

Highly configurable issue and project tracking, especially for larger orgs.

  • Why we recommend it: Deep integration with Atlassian ecosystem, flexible workflows.
  • Best for: Larger, complex engineering orgs.

ClickUp

All‑in‑one tasks, projects and docs platform.

  • Why we recommend it: Flexible for agencies and cross‑functional teams, good structure for client work.
  • Best for: Agencies, service teams, internal ops.

Trello

Visual Kanban boards for lightweight task management.

  • Why we recommend it: Simple, easy for non‑technical teams, quick to adopt.
  • Best for: Small teams, simple project flows.

miro

Miro / FigJam

Online whiteboards for workshops, mapping, retros and flows.

  • Why we recommend it: Great for collaborative thinking and remote workshops.
  • Best for: Strategy, UX, product discovery.

GitHub

Source control, pull requests, CI/CD, issue tracking.

  • Why we recommend it: Standard for most dev teams, deep integrations, marketplace of actions.
  • Best for: Almost any engineering team.

GitLab / Bitbucket

Alternatives for source control and CI/CD, especially where self‑hosting or Atlassian integration matters.

  • Why we recommend it: Different strengths for specific environments.
  • Best for: Enterprises, teams heavily invested in Atlassian.

Visual Studio Code

Primary code editor for most of our engineers.

  • Why we recommend it: Fast, extensible, great ecosystem.
  • Best for: Devs at almost every skill level.

Docker

Containerization for consistent environments and deployments.

  • Why we recommend it: Standard way to ship reproducible environments.
  • Best for: Any serious backend or full‑stack team.

Vercel / Netlify

Modern hosting for frontend (Next.js, React, static sites).

  • Why we recommend it: Fast deploys, previews, edge features.
  • Best for: Frontend-heavy products, marketing sites, dashboards.

AWS / GCP / Azure

Core cloud platforms for compute, storage, databases and more.

  • Why we recommend it: Mature services, security, scalability.
  • Best for: Production‑grade, global workloads.

Cloudflare

CDN, DNS, security (WAF), edge functions.

  • Why we recommend it: Performance + security layer for almost any internet‑facing application.
  • Best for: Any site/app that cares about speed and resilience.

Google Analytics 4 (GA4)

Baseline web analytics for traffic, behavior and conversion.

  • Why we recommend it: Free, widely supported, integrates with Google’s ecosystem.
  • Best for: Most sites & marketing teams.

Google Tag Manager

Central tag / script management for marketing and analytics.

  • Why we recommend it: Avoids constant code changes for tracking, keeps scripts organised.
  • Best for: Any site with multiple tags and pixels.

Looker Studio

Free reporting / dashboarding layer on top of GA4 and other data sources.

  • Why we recommend it: Quick way to build client / stakeholder dashboards.
  • Best for: Agencies, growth teams, smaller orgs.

Metabase

Lightweight BI and dashboard tool you can self‑host or run in the cloud.

  • Why we recommend it: SQL + GUI, easy to share dashboards with teams.
  • Best for: Product teams, data‑curious orgs that outgrow spreadsheets.

Icon_24px_BigQuery_Color

BigQuery / Snowflake

Cloud data warehouses for centralizing data from multiple systems.

  • Why we recommend it: Scales well, affordable for serious workloads, ideal foundation for analytics and AI.
  • Best for: Data‑mature teams, multi‑system businesses.

Google Search Console

Essential for monitoring organic search performance and technical SEO.

  • Why we recommend it: Direct insights from Google about how your site is seen.
  • Best for: Everyone with a website.

Semrush

SEO and competitive research suite — keywords, backlinks, site audit.

  • Why we recommend it: All‑in‑one SEO workbench; great for content planning and competitive analysis.
  • Best for: SEO-focused teams, agencies.

Ahrefs

Alternative/partner to Semrush, especially strong backlink analysis and content explorer.

  • Why we recommend it: Deep link data, powerful content discovery.
  • Best for: SEO and content teams.

MailerLite / Brevo / ConvertKit

mail marketing platforms for newsletters, campaigns and basic automation.

  • Why we recommend it: Simple UI, affordable, good for early and mid‑stage teams.
  • Best for: Newsletters, lead nurture, simple funnels.

Klaviyo

Email & SMS for ecommerce and product‑driven brands.

  • Why we recommend it: Deep ecommerce integrations, powerful flows and segmentation.
  • Best for: Shopify/WooCommerce stores.

ionicons-v5_logos

Buffer / Hootsuite / Publer

Social scheduling and basic analytics.

  • Why we recommend it: Keep social content consistent without living inside every platform.
  • Best for: Teams active on multiple channels.

HubSpot CRM

Popular CRM with sales, marketing and service hubs.

  • Why we recommend it: Good free tier, nice UI, strong ecosystem.
  • Best for: B2B companies, agencies, generalist teams.

Pipedrive

Sales‑focused CRM with visual pipelines and simple automation.

  • Why we recommend it: Very sales‑friendly, low friction, easy reporting.
  • Best for: Outbound and consultative sales teams.

Close / Apollo (for outbound)

Sales engagement platform (calls, emails, sequences) plus data (Apollo).

  • Why we recommend it: Efficient for outbound teams, integrates with CRMs.
  • Best for: Teams running outbound sales and SDR motions.

Intercom icon

Intercom

In‑app messaging, support, chatbots and knowledge bases.

  • Why we recommend it: Great for SaaS and apps with logged‑in users.
  • Best for: Product companies needing in‑product support.

Zendesk

Omnichannel support platform (email, chat, phone, help centre).

  • Why we recommend it: Robust, scalable, enterprise‑friendly.
  • Best for: Larger support orgs, multi‑channel support.

Crisp / Tawk.to

Lightweight live chat and support widget.

  • Why we recommend it: Quick to set up, affordable for small teams.
  • Best for: Early‑stage products, smaller sites.

Shopify

Hosted ecommerce platform with massive app ecosystem.

  • Why we recommend it: Low friction, fast to launch, stable, dev‑friendly.
  • Best for: D2C brands, small‑to‑mid commerce.

WooCommerce

WordPress‑based ecommerce, highly customisable.

  • Why we recommend it: Flexible, large plugin ecosystem; great with the right dev team.
  • Best for: Stores where WordPress is already core.

Webflow Ecommerce

Visually‑driven ecommerce sites with strong design control.

  • Why we recommend it: Great for brand‑heavy experiences.
  • Best for: Smaller stores, design‑led brands.

Stripe

Payments, subscriptions, billing and invoicing.

  • Why we recommend it: Clean APIs, strong docs, global coverage.
  • Best for: SaaS, marketplaces, ecommerce, anything online.

Xero

Cloud accounting — especially strong in AU/NZ/UK.

  • Why we recommend it: Clean interface, multi‑currency, great ecosystem of add‑ons.
  • Best for: SMEs and agencies.

QuickBooks Online

Cloud accounting with strong support in North America and beyond.

  • Why we recommend it: Widely adopted, flexible, good for accountants.
  • Best for: Small businesses, service businesses.

Wise

Multi‑currency accounts and transfers with low fees.

  • Why we recommend it: Great FX rates, easy to pay global teams and vendors.
  • Best for: Distributed or international businesses.

Payoneer

Alternative to Wise, often used for global payout scenarios.

  • Why we recommend it: Works well with marketplaces and cross‑border payments.
  • Best for: Freelancers, agencies, marketplace payouts.

OpenAI (ChatGPT & API)

LLM models for chat, coding assistance, content, retrieval‑augmented generation and more.

  • Why we recommend it: Strong model performance, robust API, ecosystem.
  • Best for: AI copilots, assistants, content workflows, automation.

Anthropic (Claude)

LLMs known for long context and strong reasoning, especially in chat/collab scenarios.

  • Why we recommend it: Great for large documents, chat experiences and safety‑conscious apps.
  • Best for: Knowledge work tools, summarisation, analysis.

Zapier

No‑code automation between different apps.

  • Why we recommend it: Massive app directory, quick to stand up automations.
  • Best for: Non‑developers, ops teams.

Make (formerly Integromat)

Advanced visual automation scenarios.

  • Why we recommend it: Flexible, powerful, good for complex workflows.
  • Best for: Power users and teams with sophisticated automations.

n8n

Open‑source automation platform.

  • Why we recommend it: Self‑hostable, extensible, developer‑friendly.
  • Best for: Teams wanting control over infra and data.

Retool / Appsmith

Internal tool builders, powered by existing data sources.

  • Why we recommend it: Faster than building custom admin tools from scratch.
  • Best for: Internal dashboards, admin interfaces, data tools.

How We Choose & Maintain This List

We don’t add tools here lightly.

We look for:

If a tool degrades in quality, changes direction badly or becomes hostile to users, we’ll remove it from this page — even if there’s a referral program attached.

About Referral Links

Some of the tools above use referral or affiliate programs. If you sign up through certain links:

If you’d rather not use referral links, you can always type the product name directly into your browser and sign up that way. No hard feelings.

Want Help Choosing Your Stack?

If you’re:

  • Starting a new company and want a lean but powerful tool stack,
  • Replacing legacy tools and want a modern, integrated setup, or
  • Growing fast and your tools feel like a mess,

we can help you design and implement a stack that fits your strategy and scales.

Ready to Offload Admin Work?

Let our offshore team handle the paperwork while you focus on installs.