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Hi everyone! Today’s a great day because I’m sharing some of my favorite tools I use every day on my blog.
When you first start a blog, it’s difficult to find your way among all the tools and resources that are out there. Which ones are good? Which ones aren’t? What are my free options?
Over the past several years, I’ve had the opportunity to try a lot of tools. Here’s a list of all the tools I still use and highly recommend to any blogger.
1. Tailwind
I’m a heavy Pinterest user. Aside from running a group board, I also pin 100 times per day. Pinning as much as I do manually would take up my entire day.
Tailwind is a scheduler app that makes scheduling pins and Instagram posts simple. Although this isn’t a free app, it’s worth paying for if you are looking to save time.
If you want to try it out, here’s my referral link.
2. Canva
If you haven’t heard out about Canva yet, you are really missing out on a great tool. Although there are some paid features of Canva, the free features are more than enough for what I need to make sparkling graphics for my blog.
The great thing about Canva is you don’t have to know anything about coding or advanced graphic design techniques. Canva makes it easy with pre-made templates to make every design look stunning.
If you are looking to make business cards, infographics, blog headers, social media graphics and banners and more, Canva is a great free alternative to other paid options.
3. Visme
Another great graphic design tool you can use as an alternative is Visme. Visme is very similar to Canva. I like Visme because it’s very easy to use, requires no advanced skills and has a lot of cool graphic features.
Just like Canva, there are different levels of options. If you are looking for all features, there are paid versions that won’t break the bank.
Thank you to the great people at Visme for giving me free access to the premium version to try out Visme and write a review about it.
4. Hootsuite
I honestly don’t know what I’d do without Hootsuite. Hootsuite is an online scheduling application that makes scheduling to multiple social media accounts quick and easy.
Hootsuite is free up to 30 scheduled posts at once, or if you need more than 30, there is a paid version.
I love Hootsuite because I can schedule posts to go live while I’m out of town or away from my desk. For a business blogger, this is a critical piece of keeping in touch with my followers!
5. WordPress
WordPress is my go-to tool for running my blog. I’ve never even considered trying another blogging platform.
I love WordPress because it offers so many great plugins and widgets to make my blog look and feel professional.
You’ll hear some bloggers talk about the free version vs the paid version. I do not use the free version because there are limitations. If you are a serious blogger like I am, self-host your WordPress blog for maximum results.
6. Google Analytics
If you haven’t yet taken advantage of everything Google Analytics has to offer, what are you waiting for? Google Analytics offers tools to help monitor almost any visitor and website statistic imaginable.
As a blogger, knowing who my readers are, where they come from, which posts are getting the most traffic and more is critical to growing my business.
While there are some paid features, the basic version provides more than enough data to successfully analyze your site’s traffic.
7. Mailchimp
Every blogger needs a functioning and effective mailing list. Mailchimp is a great free tool if you are looking to grow your blog’s subscriber list.
With Mailchimp, I can create custom email courses, create my own sign up forms and manage my subscriber list.
Like most applications, once you hit a certain subscriber threshold (12,000), you have to upgrade to the paid version.
8. Grammarly
I use Grammarly on just about every post I write to check for spelling, punctuation and grammar errors. Yes, I do use the built in WordPress tool as well as the one in Word, but Grammarly gives me more details behind the errors to make me a better writer.
Grammarly can even be used to check your grammar usage in your email communications. How cool is that?
There are free features as well as paid features of Grammarly. If you are interested in checking them out, click here.
9. Wave
Wave provides free financial software for small businesses. I use this app daily as I gain income and incur expenses. Wave makes it very easy for me to analyze my entire blogging business.
Although QuickBooks is a more intuitive platform, Wave’s basic services are free and are all I really need to manage the financial side of blogging.
10. VideoPad
I recently started recording videos for my YouTube channel and found that VideoPad is one of the best free options out there to edit and convert videos for YouTube. There is a paid version, so if you are looking for more, you’ll want to upgrade eventually.
I love VideoPad because I can add images, text effects, transitions and more all in a drag and drop format. If you are looking for an easy tool to get up and running on YouTube, VideoPad is the best.
Have you heard of Totum? They’re a socila media marketing company. Check them out! https://www.socialtotum.com/
I have not but will definitely check them out. Thanks for the tip!