We’re bloggers… writing is our bread and butter. But it’s tough to write consistently high quality content and avoid blogger burnout. Oftentimes, managing all the elements required in writing a blog post is just too much and we need help to lighten the load. And so I come to the point of this post: blog writing tools.
I’m going to modify a quote to outline the whole purpose of this discussion here:
If you want to write fast, do it on your own. If you want to write better, use blog writing tools!
Erm… this is NOT a quote!
Okay, I know that’s a bit cheese-laden… but truth sometimes comes in a little cheesy nugget. The fact of the matter is it’s impossible to grow a blog without using tools.
If you don’t believe me, try it and you’ll find out how much more of an uphill struggle growing a blog really is.
We use tools to help with SEO, analysis and of course there’s our blogging platform of choice, whatever that may be.
Your approach to writing should be no different. Why wouldn’t you use tools for blog writing if it results in more compelling content and less reliance on you to remember everything you need to consider whenever you prepare a blog post?
With this in mind I’ve put together a list of 18 useful tools for blog writing. These are tools that’ll help you with all the elements you’ll need to write the perfect blog post!
Tools to Inspire Blog Post Ideas
Do you struggle to continually come up with blog post ideas? You may find inspiration everywhere when you start writing blog posts, but you will probably suffer from writer’s block at some point down the road. If your creative well has run dry, try these blog writing tools to help get you back to your best again.
1. HubSpot’s Blog Topic Generator – HubSpot’s Blog Topic Generator is a neat little blog writing tool to help give you some ideas. You provide it up to 5 words and in return it gives you 5 suggestions per each one. However, if you sign up to HubSpot you can download up to 250 suggestions!
2. AnswerThePublic – AnswerThePublic references autocomplete search queries harvested from search engines to serve you questions that real people require answers to. You submit a word or two to AnswerThePublic’s search form and it returns however many questions it knows about related to the terms you’ve supplied it.
3. BYOB’s Blog Post Ideas Generator – Unlike the previous two tools, BYOB’s Blog Post Ideas Generator doesn’t require a keyword to make suggestions for you. It literally provides you with the components of a blog post title idea for you to customize it to fit your needs.
4. Google Trends – Google Trends provides insights into trending search queries in Google Searches for different regions and languages. It uses graphs to compare search volumes for different queries over time. You can supply a search term to Google Trends and it will supply related trending search queries you can use as the basis for a blog post.
Tools for Managing Blog Posts
It’s not just coming up with ideas that’s important… you need a place to manage those ideas and shape them. While the following won’t necessarily help with hardcore blog writing, they’ll help to shape your content ideas for the time you’re ready to start hitting the keys on your keyboard.
5. Evernote – Evernote is an amazing tool for bloggers… or anyone actually! It’s a cloud-based app that helps you create and organize a bunch of different media, from text files to images.
I include Evernote in this list of blog writing tools since I use it to:
- Collect ideas for posts.
- Create content snippets for posts when an idea enters my head.
- Save useful links related to blog post ideas.
- Save images I like.
The real beauty of Evernote is that I can use it anywhere and on any device, meaning I can save things while using my mobile, edit them on my tablet or update them when using a public computer.
6. Trello – In terms of managing your post ideas and blog writing, you can use Trello in a similar way to Evernote. Its another cloud-based tool so it’s always with you when you’re on the move. You can use it to create notes for specific blog post ideas, to which you can include links, video, images and content snippets in readiness for your actual blog writing.
Tools for Writing Blog Headlines
People tend to skim read to look for content they feel is relevant. The majority of people focus on the headline, so you need to make it as engaging as you possibly can. One of the best blog writing skills you can improve relates to how well you write headlines. These tools will help!
7. Coschedule’s Headline Analyzer – Coschedule’s Headline Analyzer is a free tool but it requires you to submit your name, email and domain for you to use it. You input a headline you’re thinking of using and on submission it compares this to its database of headlines it knows have high engagement. As a result of this comparison, Headline Analyzer offers suggestions for more engaging words to make your headline more likely to draw attention.
8. Content Row Headline Analyzer & Headline Generator – Content Row offers a number of tools that will help in writing blog headlines. There’s the Headline Analyzer, which checks your headlines for quality and clickability. Then there’s the Headline Generator to give you ideas for headlines. They’re both simple to use, requiring you to submit your headline (Headline Analyzer) or a keyword (Headline Generator). Free users get 5 Headliner Analyzer searches and 3 Headline Generator searches per day. PRO users who pay a monthly subscription have unlimited access.
Dictation Tools
What better way to boost your blog writing speed than dictating. Dictation tools can help your writing flow and often result in producing content much more quickly than typing it.
9. Apple Dictation – If you’re a Mac user, you can use Apple Dictation in any app where you can type text. In your text editing tool of choice you place the cursor where you want to start writing, click your microphone icon (or in the menu select “Edit > Start Dictation”) and away you go. The great thing is this blog writing tool won’t cost you a penny!
10. Google Docs – As long as you use Chrome, you can dictate and edit by speaking directly into a Google Docs file. You select “Tools > Voice typing” and you’re all set to start dictating your content rather than hammering away at your keyboard. Google Docs is a free tool… you just need to create a Google account to access it.
Grammar & Writing Style Checking Tools
You’ll find grammar and style checking functions in many of your favorite text editing tools. However, if you’re looking for grammar and style checking tools turned up to 11, some of these might be of interest!
11. Grammarly – Grammarly is one of the most well-known digital writing tools on the market. It offers grammar, spelling and punctuation checking functions as well as suggestions for word choice, tone and style. You can use Grammarly for free to check spelling, grammar and punctuation but you’ll need to pay for a subscription if you want to access the tools that’ll really help your blog writing style.
12. WhiteSmoke – Like Grammarly, WhiteSmoke is a proofreading tool you can use to check grammar, spelling and writing style. WhiteSmoke offers Web, Premium and Business packages, which offer varying functions and benefits. Each package is subscription only so if you want to use its basic functions you’d probably be better off using Grammarly for free.
13. Hemingway – The Hemingway app is another writing tool but one that’s designed to improve style rather than being purely a grammar and spelling checker. Named after Ernest Hemingway, who was famous for his simple and yet powerful writing style, the Hemingway app aims to remove the fluff from your writing to leave a more meaningful and impactful style.Hemingway is available as a download for Mac and Windows at a proce of around $20.
14. Cliché Finder – Clichés are words and phrases that have become weak and meaningless through overuse. We all use them from time to time but the last thing you want when you’re writing blog posts is for your copy to be weak and meaningless! This free writing tool, into which you can copy and paste your content, will highlight any clichés it finds so you can replace them with something more meaningful and powerful!
SEO Writing Tools
If you’re serious about improving the position of your blog posts in search results, you’ll need to be proficient at writing for SEO. SEO blog writing tools will help to handle the heavy lifting of SEO analysis on a post by post basis to make sure you’re optimizing your content in the best way possible.
15. Yoast SEO – If you’re a WordPress blogger and need something to help you optimize your blog and all the posts you write, you could do a lot worse than Yoast SEO. As well as creating sitemaps for you, optimizing your page titles and descriptions, Yoast lets you know about keyword density, readability and all the important on-page elements of your blog posts. Yoast is a free SEO plugin (you can upgrade to a pro version) and one of the blog writing tools I rely on every day for SideGains.
16. Rank Math – The WordPress Rank Math plugin is another SEO tool designed to optimize your writing for better search engine rankings. Some people swear by Yoast, others Rank Math. I’ve used both, and I still use Rank Math on two of my blogs. I prefer Yoast, but the reasons are mostly related to habit to be honest.
Yoast or Rank Math will do the job for you SEO-wise, but both should be used really as a helper to optimize rather than simply expecting that they’ll make your content rank just by using them. Even though they’re both super-helpful blog writing tools, you’ll need backlinks to really make an impact on organic traffic.
Tools for Checking Plagiarism
It’s always worth checking your content for duplication, especially if you outsource some of your blog writing. Some writers may take shortcuts and copy large sections of what they produce for you, so it’s a good idea to check for plagiarism as Google will not reward you for it!
17. Copyscape – I’ve used Copyscape for over a decade as a tool to check for plagiarism. It’s not just useful for checking guest post submissions and outsourced blog post writing. Sometimes it’s worth using to check what you write, especially if you have to research before you write. Copyscape is one of the most reliable tools for checking duplicate content and therefore helping you to protect your blog against Google penalties.
Copyscape isn’t free: you buy credits, which you consume each time you run a plagiarism check. However, it costs only a few cents for each check you make.
Tools for Finding Statistical Data
Sometimes you’ll need stats or empirical data to support the points you make in your content. Even if you know in your bones that something is true, you’ll need to back it up with statistical data.
18. Statista – As you can tell from the name, Statista provides statistical data and the results of surveys of interest to businesses, academics and researchers. Such information can relate to marketing, consumer behavior or industry specific research.
The data Statista makes available can be extremely useful when you’re writing blog posts, since it’s authoritative and can help to support ideas and speculations you might have.
Summary
Producing blog content on a consistent basis is a real challenge. It’s hard enough to commit to a publishing schedule without trying to manage all the elements you need to think about when it comes to writing.
That’s why using tools for blog writing makes absolute sense. We might feel reluctant to pay for tools to help out here. But this can be a totally false economy.
Using tools to help your blog writing can end up saving you hours on each post. If you value your time correctly you’ll soon see that using these tools will save you huge amounts of time in the long run.
That’s all for now.
Paul
Do you use tools for blog writing? Are they on this list? What are you thoughts on using writing tools? Do you use others I can add to this list? Let me know in the comments below.
Hi Paul, This is a useful list. Personally I use Sapling Writing Assistant to check for errors. I find it catches more errors than Grammarly does.
Nice… I’ll check Sapling out. Thanks for the tip!