7 Blogging Tools I Can’t Live Without

There are so many good and awesome tools available out there to simplify your blogging routine. Some of them are must-haves, while others just make the blogging process more automated and enjoyable. Most of the tools listed here are free and are some of my most favorites. I use them every single day. Well, maybe not on the weekend, but you get what I mean. So, read on for the 7 blogging tools I can’t live without.

1. Keyword Elite 2.0

I have repeatedly mentioned Keyword Elite 2.0 in my previous posts. So, you might already get sick of it and believe that this is just my cheap way to earn some more affiliate income. If so, then you’re wrong. I mentioned it because I do really love the tool. It’s not the most accurate tool on finding the exact searches per month, or the exact cost per click of keywords. Hey, it’s not even close. But, I can say the same to other more expensive keyword research tools out there. I just can’t help but fall in love with its Keyword Surge, Adwords Competition Sniper, and many of its in-built functions that I can ignore its weaknesses.

2. Google Keyword Tool

Boring. I can already hear you say it. Yeah, maybe it is. But, Google Keyword Tool still needs a special mention just because it’s the best free keyword research tool out there. Google have 65% of the US search market, so their data regarding searches per month are somehow…inaccurate. WHAT?! Yeah, you heard me right. So, when Google Keyword Tool says you’ll get 1000 searches per month, you’ll probably only get 500 or less searches. Just use this tool as a rough guideline when choosing keywords. Also remember to look at the exact search number in the Google Keyword Tool, not the broad search number.

3. Read It Later

Sometimes you find a post, an article, or a video that are informative and entertaining when browsing online, but you just don’t have time to finish it. What can you do? Try Read It Later. Read It Later is a Firefox add-on that allows you to bookmark your post with a click of a button, so you don’t have to go through the process of bookmarking itself. But, unlike bookmarking, Read It Later actually shows the site address and how many days have passed since you bookmarked that site. Also, don’t forget that it lets you read the saved sites offline.

4. SEO Quake

Another awesome Firefox add-on. SEO Quake lets you check the most important statistics of a website, which includes PR( Page Rank), number of incoming links & outgoing links, Alexa ranking, and many  other useful information. This tool just makes it so much easier to know what it takes to beat your competitors and what sites can help you do that.

5. Firebug

If you haven’t yet install Firefox by this point, it’s time to do so. Because Firebug is another useful Firefox add-on in my list of blogging tools. With Firebug, you can see and modify the source code of a page easily. It doesn’t matter if it’s JavaScript, CSS, HTML, Firebug just simplify the process of tweaking your web page live.

6. Windows Live Writer

Except for my first few couple of posts, the rest of this blog is written with Windows Live Writer. I can’t recommend this tool enough because of how awesome it is. Imagine having Microsoft Word’s arsenal of tools to simplify your blog posting process. You can easily create tables, justified your paragraphs, make a list, and so much more. I haven’t even mention the best of it all. Unlike other Microsoft’s software, this one’s free. So, if you’re using Windows, check it out.

7. Photoshop CS 4

It’s an expensive graphic design tool, $699 if you purchase it from Adobe official site (I get it slightly cheaper buying offline). But it’s worth it, for me. See all the awesome images in this and many of my other posts, they’re all cropped and enhanced with this tool. But, if I only use Photoshop for cropping and slight adjustments, it’ll be well…not very worth it. So, I also use it to create logos, automate many of my repetitive design chores, and even use it to paint (believe it or not, I’m quite good at this ^-^). If you want a free tool that can perform some simple cropping and image enhancing, try Gimp.

These are the 7 blogging tools that I used every day and can’t live without. What blogging tools do you use yourself? Feel free to leave comments or tweet it if you like it.

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3. Top 6 Blogging for Money Obstacles and the Antidotes
4. 5 Reasons to Wake Up Early and Start Blogging
5. Top 6 Essential Free Blogs Research Sites