Amazing Tools Every Professional Blogger Will Find Useful
Blogging is not as easy as people like to think. There is a common misconception that bloggers just write, but this is just one of many responsibilities. Beyond writing, bloggers must develop attention-grabbing topics, promote their posts on social media and create eye-catching visuals. Other responsibilities can include tracking time, signing contracts, and in some cases even the collecting of payments.
Because of all of this, it’s so important for bloggers to use tools that make their lives less chaotic and streamline work. Here’s a list of a few great tools every pro blogger should find useful.
1. Hubspot’s Blog Topic Generator
You sit down at your computer, knowing that it’s time to write, and then just stare at the screen for 30 minutes because those creative juices are not flowing. This is commonly referred to as writer’s block.
For help breaking through this mental barricade, use Hubspot’s Blog Topic Generator. This tool helps you when it comes to brainstorming blog ideas fast. Just by typing in a few terms, you can expect the generator to produce your whole week’s worth of blog topics.
2. Grammarly
The act of writing probably only takes up to 20% of a blog writer’s job. The other 80% is taken up by editing. Grammarly, a productivity-boosting tool also recommended by the professionals behind Fat Stacks Blog, helps you to better spot grammatical errors and even offers the writer synonym suggestions. It is like having a virtual editor, so you can deliver an even more polished final piece than before.
It allows you to manage and eliminate almost every type of mistake that could potentially sneak through your editing endeavors. Grammarly leads to fewer headaches for everyone by allowing you to streamline the editing and content-creating process.
3. Hemingway App
Having a good blog is not just about having good grammar. You would ideally like your writing to be impactful and for it to be an enjoyable read. The Hemingway App assists you by highlighting areas that need improvement by just copying and pasting them into the application. It highlights your text and offers suggestions for adjusting the reading level of your article, choosing better adjectives or adverbs, and removing passive voice.
4. CoSchedule’s Headline Analyzer
Headlines are one of the most significant parts of a blog post. They need to be attention-grabbing and if it does not capture someone’s attention in a few seconds it is very likely that your article will never be read. This tool helps you solve this problem by analyzing your headlines, looking at grammar, structure, readability, and emotion.
5. BuzzSumo
Blogging is a very competitive field, especially with the increasing number of content pieces being published every day. If you want to know what topics or keywords are popular and getting lots of clicks at the moment give BuzzSumo a try. It lets you scope out your competitors and learn who is sharing what sort of content and how it compares to your own.
It is a tool that can really help you get ahead of your competition and improve your reader time.
6. Canva
Research has shown that when you pair your content with an image that is relevant it boosts people’s retention of the information by up to 65%. Because of this, it’s really important that your article contains memorable but relevant images.
This tool allows you to make high-quality, eye-catching graphics for your post. There are millions of images to choose from, as well as hundreds of fonts. It is as simple as drag-and-drop, making it a great option for beginners. It also has interactive tutorials for those who need a little extra help and inspiration.
7. Google Keyword Planner
How will people, specifically your target audience, be able to find your content among all the other pages online? You need to boost your organic search traffic and get your page up higher in the search pages.
This tool is effective for forming keyword ideas, generating a traffic forecast, as well as viewing historical statistics. It’s a great place to look at keywords that are relevant to your site and to see what the competition for each of those keywords is. This will help eliminate the ones you shouldn’t be optimizing, showing which ones you should, that will drive traffic to your site.
8. Buffer
Content promotion amplifies the reach of your work, so it makes sense to use social media to spread your content to a more diverse audience. However, it is quite a time-consuming task to manage multiple platforms.
Buffer helps with this. It lets you schedule and publish content across several social channels, also analyzing it and identifying your best content. With it you are able to discover trending topics in your mentions, allowing you to supply better content to your target audience.
9. Sortd
When you receive countless emails a day it’s difficult to stay productive. The chaos erupts when a few important emails manage to slip through the cracks. This tool maximizes your productivity by turning your inbox into an organized workspace allowing you to sort your mail into a list to follow up on, receipts, new orders, etc. It’s as simple as drag and drop into the lists you’ve created.
10. DocuSign
No one likes dealing with heaps and heaps of paperwork. Whether it’s signing a brand partnership agreement or a new client contract, you don’t want the burden of paperwork. Most companies tend towards a digital solution these days.
DocuSign starts the process of signing with quick access to all of your documents. You can confidently trust that your electronic signature is secure as the platform uses the strongest data encryption to protect your privacy. On top of all of this, your digital signature is still legally binding.
Although the blogger life can seem very disorganized and is often extremely stressful with back-to-back deadlines there are a bunch of tools out there to make your problems easier and to keep things moving in a positive direction.
