Building anything of worth takes time. It also includes having all you need to make it work in order for it to run smoothly and efficiently. Likewise, building your blog into some valuable global brand requires that you put in a lot of work. If you want to see the result, you have to be committed to the process it takes. This includes having to ensure that you have the right blogging tools at your beck and call.
Below, I have put down a quick round-up of a number of free tools I use daily for my blog. These blogging tools should help you to kick start your blog journey and get things done more efficiently at your end if you are a newbie. I hope you try it out and let us know which of the tools you loved the most!
1. Grammarly
Grammarly is an important tool for writers and since you will be writing down a lot of blog posts, it’s important you add this to your list. I didn’t feel the need for it when I started my blog journey until recently and it has been most helpful.
The interesting part is that you get to add the Grammarly Chrome extension to your browser which makes it easier to correct your writing errors, grammar, and mistakes.
2. Google Analytics
I use Google Analytics to view my site statistics, demographics, and analytics. As a blogger, it’s important you know which of your blog posts have the best views, including the popular keywords used in order to know exactly what to improve and focus on.
3. Google Docs
Google docs are the best for sharing documents online, but best of all you can use them to create free e-books, online surveys, etc. I do a lot of file sharing as to handling my blog’s guest posts and contributors posts, and this is where all the magic happens.
4. Google Keyword Planner
This is a powerful keyword research free tool for blog post keyword suggestions based on your level of reach and competition. It gives you the opportunity to know what exact keywords are receiving great hit on the internet.
5. Canva
Canva is a free graphic design and photo editing tool. It has everything you need to create your own stunning and beautiful brand images. It’s a creative tool, which means that the more creative you get with canva, the better your graphics and designs.
6. MailChimp
MailChimp is an email marketing tool and management system that helps you collate your blog subscribers, track and message them by mail.
It’s a free blogging tool for an email list with up to 2,000 subscribers which should be enough for you if you are a new blogger. Then there’s a monthly charge after that for lists with more subscribers.
7. Pexels, Pixabay, and Unsplash
These tools help you find high-quality images and stock photos for your blog posts with no copyright restrictions. You can use them as featured images or cover photos.
8. Yoast SEO
The Yoast SEO tool is a free WordPress plugin and literally one of the best search engine optimization (SEO) tools to use for your blog.
It helps you analyze your blog posts quickly including your headline and meta description. It also suggests what you can do to make your content rank higher on Google’s search engine results.
9. Click To Tweet
Click to tweet is a Twitter plugin for WordPress that enables your readers to share tweetable quotes from the contents on your blog directly to their account while linking back to your site and username. It offers more visibility for your blog on twitter.
10. PayPal
Despite their stringent policies and rules, this is still by far one of the best ways to send and receive money internationally. At least for now.
If you’re into selling digital products and services on a global level, then you need to find how to make things work with Paypal.
You have to be careful and watchful too especially not to break any of their policies.
For the Nigerian market, I make use of Paystack and they’ve been pretty awesome.
Now that I have shared my free blogging tools with you, I hope you now know the right tools to use for your blog. Let me know which of the tools were most useful to you.
