Score every tool on four axes: does it do the job, what happens if it goes wrong, what does it truly cost, and can you actually use it here.
Do now: Score two candidate tools on all four before choosing either.
A tool you cannot pay for, on a connection you do not have, is not an option.Most tool recommendations are made on task fit alone, by people whose risk, cost and access situation is nothing like yours. The other three criteria are where decisions actually fail locally.
Task and risk
Task fit: does it do the specific job, at the quality you need, in your language, at your volume? Test with your own material rather than the demonstration. Demonstrations are chosen to flatter, and your material is what you will actually use.
Risk: what happens to your data, what happens if the output is wrong, and what happens if the service disappears. A tool handling public marketing copy and a tool handling member records are different decisions even if they are the same product.
Ask specifically whether your data is retained, whether it may be used to improve the service, where it is stored, and whether that is compatible with your obligations. For anything covered by a data protection framework, that last question is not optional.
Test on your own material. Demonstrations are selected to succeed.
Cost and access, which is where most decisions actually fail
Total cost is more than the sticker price. Add the data cost of using it, the time cost of learning it, the cost of the work when it is wrong, and the cost of leaving — can you export your material, or is it trapped?
Access is the criterion that international recommendations ignore entirely. Does it accept payment methods available to you? Is it available in your country? Does it work on the device you actually have, at the connection speed you actually get, and does it degrade gracefully or simply fail?
Check the free tier's real limit before building anything on it, and check what happens when you exceed it — some tools stop, some charge, and the difference matters a great deal at the end of a month.
Decide, and write down why
Score two or three candidates across the four criteria rather than seeking one recommendation. The scoring takes twenty minutes and produces a decision you can defend, revisit and hand to someone else.
Record the decision with its date and its assumptions. Prices change, availability changes, and free tiers shrink. A dated decision with stated assumptions can be re-examined quickly; an undated preference cannot.
Prefer reversible decisions where you can. A tool you can leave, with your material exported, is worth more than a marginally better one that holds your work.
Write the decision down with its date. In six months you will not remember what you assumed.