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Blogging Tools For Beginners:
What really is worth investing in?
In today’s post, I am sharing my favorite blogging tools for beginners. These resources and tools have helped me keep my blog looking professional, and some of these are real time-savers.
If you’ve been wondering about what blogging tools are worth getting, or you’d like to know what I use and recommend to all bloggers, keep on reading.
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you choose to purchase anything I promote, I will receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. I am only promoting what I truly use and find helpful for my blog. You can read my disclosure policy by clicking here.
Pin to spread the word! 🤗
Your hosting platform
One of the most important decisions you will make in your blogging journey is which hosting platform to go for.
Now, if you follow me on Twitter, you might know the complete mess that changing my hosting platform caused me a while ago.
I had transferred my site from Bluehost (which is a very good option if you are on more of a budget) to another VERY popular platform which many bloggers rave about. That new platform broke my site for 2 whole days. That is why doing your own research is super important.
I then transferred again, this time to Skystra. Remember how I said the other host broke my site? Skystra transferred me over to them AND fixed all the errors in just over an hour.
If you’re looking for a new hosting platform, Skystra have excellent customer service and I’m really enjoying their platform. To get you started, they are offering you your first month for free which you can get by clicking here!
You can also check out the free email course I offer on how to start a blog by leaving your email down below:
Your theme
Looking for the perfect theme can be overwhelming since there are SO many WordPress themes out there!
I got both my old theme and this one from Creative Market. They have themes on there starting at just under $20. That’s perfect if you’re not willing to spend a lot on your blog, especially in the beginning.
Graphic design
I use Canva for all my graphic design needs. PicMonkey is another good one, but you end up having to pay for it after your free trial. Canva, on the other hand, is free. Unless you want to upgrade to their paid membership, which I personally don’t think is necessary.
You can use it to design your logo, pin graphics, and literally anything else your blog might need.
Newsletter service
The website I use for all my opt-in freebies and newsletters is ConvertKit. Although a bit of a monthly investment, I think it’s totally worth it.
They make it very easy to create opt-in forms and attach email sequences to those forms, unlike some of the free websites.
If you are just starting out with opt-in forms and newsletters, Mailerlite and Mailchimp are both good options.
However, if you want to step your game up, try out ConvertKit free for a month by clicking here.
I used The Email Marketing Fairy to set up all of my welcome sequences and can’t recommend it enough! It has 50 word-for-word emails you can send your list. SO handy if you have no idea what to send your mailing list.
Related:
HOW TO BUILD A MAILING LIST QUICKLY AND FOR FREE
BEST OPT-IN FREEBIE IDEAS TO EXPLODE YOUR LIST
Pinterest tools
If you don’t yet know, Pinterest is my favorite platform for driving traffic to my blog. When I first started blogging, I had no idea how to manage Pinterest.
Since then, my profile has grown to nearly 7 thousand followers, and 5.4 million monthly viewers. Now, monthly viewers don’t mean that 5.4 million people click on my blog a month. But it does mean that a LOT of people see my pins.
At the time of writing this, I am generating around 90,000 monthly views. Over 90% of my monthly traffic comes from Pinterest.
I love Pinterest so much that I wrote an ebook on the exact strategies I use. Click here for your copy of Pinterest Perfect!
I also use Tailwind to schedule pins every day. There have been some concerns about whether or not Tailwind is still useful due to the recent changes in Pinterest’s algorithm.
I still use it and think it is worth it, especially because I also share my pins in their Tribes, which work well to push my pins out.
If you’d like to try Tailwind for free for a month, click here.
Related:
10 PINTEREST MISTAKES AND HOW TO FIX THEM
HOW I GREW MY BLOG VIEWS BY 80% IN ONE MONTH
Grammarly
I’ve used Grammarly since I started blogging, and it quickly became one of my favorite blogging tools. It is like spell-check, but better.
I recommend signing up for their Premium plan which has a lot of great features. It checks for overused words, plagiarism, inconsistent writing style and unclear sentence structure among others. But, if you don’t a more affordable option, their free plan is great as well.
You can sign up with Grammarly here.
Stock photos
If you, like me, aren’t very skilled with the camera, stock photos are going to be your best friends. I don’t have the time nor the patience to take my own photos, which is why I use stock photos.
The stock photos I use on my blog are all either from Pixi Stock, Ivory Mix or Styled Stock Society. Between them all, I like Styled Stock Society the best, but they’re all amazing!
For a free option for beginners, I recommend Unsplash and Pixabay!
Ebooks and courses
I could not have grown my blog as much as I have in this short period without learning from other bloggers. Here are some of the BEST courses and ebooks I recommend to all bloggers:
- This affiliate marketing guide. The author of this ebook is a good friend of mine who makes thousands of dollars a month with JUST affiliate marketing. This guide will show you how to get the same results.
- An ebook all about SEO for bloggers. A godsend, if I do say so myself. I’ve learned so much and improved my SEO by a lot since implementing the strategies found in this ebook.
- The Email Marketing Fairy which helped me grow my mailing list to over 3000 subscribers in a few short months.
I hope you enjoyed this post on my favorite blogging tools for beginners! If you use something which helps your blogging that you think I would also enjoy, please leave it in the comments!
Related:
10 BLOGGING MISTAKES TO AVOID
BLOG INCOME REPORT
These are all great resources for a blogger, I use quite a few of these resources already. Great post 💗
Thank you so much! 😊
Great tips! Totally agree with your list. Although from Pinterest I haven’t seen much of a result in terms of traffic to my site. For me there’s no point to pay for Tailwind because I see no return for my investment but that doesn’t mean I’d be giving up. I’m trying to post there consistently, maybe one day I hit the jackpot ;D
Really? Pinterest, if used correctly, brings in traffic for every blogger I know! Tailwind I don’t think is absolutely necessary, as people have gotten good results with manual pinning too. Thank you so much for stopping by!
Great resources! I use many of these myself. I’ve been looking around for new themes and will have to check out ones from Creative Market since they are so inexpensive. Love your blog’s theme! Thanks for sharing!
Thank you so much! I think you will like the ones on Creative Market, they have a lot to choose from! 🙂
Great resources! I love using Canva for my pins and Twitter graphics.
Me too! Thank you for stopping by 🙂
Great post and some go-to resources here! I love Unsplash too – you can find some lovely stock photos on there! x
Oh yes I forgot about Unsplash! I used their stock photos too in the past.
Yep, totally agree! I use Tailwind for Pinterest, a great theme, and love canva and grammarly! Love this post of resources. 🙂
tonyalee @ http://vivaciousbibliophile.com/
Thank you so much! 😊
I use Canva and Grammarly for all my posts! I need to take a look at Creative Market—I hear they have a lot of handy-dandy tools for bloggers and illustrators.
They have a LOT of different resources there, it’s definitely a good place to browse through! Plus if you sign up to their newsletter, they send out freebies every week.
Great post with great tips! I love Grammarly!
Thank you so much!
I’ve just started using stock photos are it’s so nice!
They’re such a life-saver!
Great post, I use Tailwind to schedule my pins, very useful tool. I love Unsplash as well. Thank you for these tips
Unsplash have some nice photos too! Thank you for reading! 🙂
All great resources! I also love my Yoast SEO and Add to Any plug-in. Thanks for sharing. Wish I read something like this when I started.
I use Yoast too but I haven’t heard of the other one. I’ll make sure to read up on it, thank you!
Very useful post! I use quite a lot of these myself so completely agree with what you’ve gone with. Canva is pretty much a deity for blogging, but I also find Google Calendar and Trello priceless for scheduling and organisation!
I’ve yet to get into Trello. It looks really helpful but I definitely need to learn how to manage it!
These are great resources – essential resources!! Thanks for sharing!
Glad you think so!
This is such a great guide! I’m yet to use Grammarly – I’ll definitely be giving this service a try. I also love Canva! It’s such a great tool to use. You’re so right, I think the free version is enough without upgrading xxxx
Grammarly comes in handy all the time- especially when I’ve been writing for a long time and my sentences become questionable. 😆
Such helpful info especially for new bloggers. I definitely recommend taking advantage of the free Tailwind trial. Since I switched over from manual pinning I’ve seen a huge increase in traffic.
Thank you! I’ve had the same results with Tailwind but I know many bloggers who swear by manual pinning, so I guess it depends on preference!
Very useful post, thank you! Definitely will keep these in mind when it comes to my blog.
xoxo Olivia | https://www.oliviaandbeauty.com/
Glad you think so! Thanks for stopping by 🙂
Some great tips here – I love Unsplash and Canva, they make life sooooo easy! And I’m also a huge Buffer fan (social media scheduling), I’d be lost without that 🙂 Lisa
I use Buffer for Twitter posts and I love it!
I am using some of these already, they are lifesavers for bloggers. Love the post. Thank you! 😊
Great post, I really need to up my game with pinterest so I’m going to check out your recommendations
Let me know if you need anything! 🙂
I like unsplash too. Blogging ain’t easy 💚
No it’s not, it’s a labor of love for sure!
This post was very helpful, thank you! I started my blog three weeks ago and already use almost all those resources. However it was nice to see that I’m on the right track… 😀
That’s great to hear! 🙂
Love these resources! I use most of these already too! I tried using Tailwind and my brain could no get with it lol! I’m using Mailchimp but I love the look of Convert Kit opt-in freebies!
Watch some videos on it on Youtube. It’s very easy once you get the hang of it! 🙂
Great resources! You’re Pinterest growth is amazing, I hope your course is going to bring me that success too. 🙂
xoxo Simone | https://beautymone.com
I’m sure you’ll see amazing results soon! 😍
I use Canva and Grammarly for every single blog post! Thanks for the other suggestions, I’ll check them out.
My pleasure! I hope you like them. 😊
Yess there are sooo many amazing things in here for all kinds of bloggers!
Rosie
This is such a helpful post, and I love that you included budget/free options where possible – perfect for people who are just starting out or who are keeping their blog as a hobby. I absolutely love Grammarly, it’s one of the best resources for any kind of writing! And Canva is amazing, so raved about but more than lives up to the hype!
Thank you! I also really love Grammarly and Canva, both are must haves for bloggers!
Thanks for the great suggestions! I’ve just started out with Pinterest and I will definitely give Grammarly a go!
I’m sure you will enjoy Grammarly! It helps a lot!
Great Post. I’d like to give Grammarly a try. Thank you so much for the suggestions.