15 Free GTM Planning Resources and Website Checks

Start with the GTM question, then choose the resource that helps answer it. You can do useful research and planning with a document, a spreadsheet, existing reports and public website checks. You do not need fifteen new software accounts to make a first decision.

The resources below avoid promising access to paid features or a particular vendor's changing free quota. Some require an existing account or site permission. Your time and implementation work still have costs.

Use a completed workflow as the guide

Imagine a fictional reporting startup investigating why suitable prospects do not request a trial. It reviews recent customer questions, drafts a clearer use-case page, checks the public page on a phone and records the next test in a shared document.

Its working stack is small: interview notes, a comparison sheet, the existing analytics report and a page check. The team postpones another subscription because the unanswered question is the offer, not a missing dashboard.

Fifteen resources with a specific job

1. A customer interview note. Record the most recent task, current workaround, consequence, buying owner and next action. Keep direct observations separate from your interpretation.
2. A public-alternatives comparison. Read the relevant vendor pages and record the source and date for important facts. Include the customer's manual workaround, not only named software competitors.
3. A buying-journey worksheet. Map who investigates, who uses the product, who authorizes setup and who approves payment. This exposes handoffs a generic persona can miss.
4. A positioning sentence. Write the buyer, task, useful result and alternative in ordinary language. Ask a prospective buyer what they understand before polishing the tagline.
5. A channel-decision record. List audience evidence, offer, owner, required work, approved test limit and review date. The channel guide gives a completed example.
6. Google Search Console. Use the existing verified property to investigate relevant search queries, indexing and sitemap status. A successful submission does not prove every page is indexed.
7. PageSpeed Insights. Run the public diagnostic on an important destination and investigate meaningful loading or interaction problems. A score alone does not establish that the whole customer journey works.
8. Google's Rich Results Test. Check supported structured-data markup on a public page. Match the markup to the visible content; a valid result does not guarantee search appearance.
9. Google Trends. Explore relative search-interest patterns as a research prompt. Do not present the chart as exact demand, traffic or revenue for your product.
10. Your existing analytics reports. Inspect one defined journey and check its event meanings, coverage and reporting window. Keep a completed signup separate from an activated account.
11. Browser developer tools. Inspect rendered HTML, network failures and phone layouts. Use the Chrome DevTools documentation when you need help with a particular check.
12. A content brief. Name the reader, decision, required evidence, completed example and next step. Give the writer an actual job rather than a word-count target.
13. A test log. Record the change, affected population, release date, primary outcome, guardrails and review decision. One reliable sheet can be more useful than an unexplained score.
14. The weekly review worksheet. Download the editable template and fill in the metric definitions, owners and decisions for one journey.
15. The trial activation worksheet. Use the activation guide to define useful value, mature cohorts and an obstacle worth investigating. It links to the editable diagnostic.

Check access and interpretation

For site tools, use the property and account you are authorized to inspect. For customer notes, keep private details in approved systems. A public resource is not permission to upload confidential data into another service.

Learn what a metric means before adding it to the scorecard. A competitor estimate, a search impression and an accepted sales opportunity describe different things. Copying them into one sheet does not make them comparable.

Add software when it removes a real constraint

Consider a paid tool when a repeated task, required control or demonstrated volume justifies it. Check the current plan, limits, rights, total cost and exit process before deciding.

GTM Champion can help organize planning recommendations. Start with the weekly review guide, complete one decision record and identify the information you are missing. Choose the next resource for that job.