45 Free Content material Writing Instruments to Love [for Writing, Editing & Content Creation]

Creating content material is not at all times a stroll within the park. (Actually, it could possibly typically really feel extra like making an attempt to swim towards the present.)

Whereas different components of enterprise and advertising and marketing have gotten more and more automated, content material creation continues to be a really handbook job.

That being stated, there are many instruments on the market to make creating content material a lot simpler.

Beneath, you may discover a checklist of 36 improbable instruments and assets that can assist you analysis, write, edit, and design content material extra simply. (You will discover there are a variety of design instruments in right here — that is as a result of visible content material is commonly the a part of the content material creation course of the place individuals get probably the most nervous and annoyed. So don’t fret, we have a ton in there for you.)

Let’s get began.

36 Free Instruments & Assets to Make Content material Creation Simpler

For Researchers

1) Google Drive Research Tool

Google not too long ago added a instrument to Drive that means that you can conduct Google searches with out ever leaving your Drive window. All you need to do is click on “Instruments” from the menu bar and select “Analysis” from the dropdown menu.

2) Site:search

It is a helpful Google hack I exploit day by day. Principally, it means that you can do a Google search that is restricted to a specific web site.

For instance, if I wished to go looking HubSpot’s weblog for advertising and marketing assets so I can cite considered one of our outdated weblog posts, I might do a web site:seek for weblog.hubspot.com with the search time period advertising and marketing assets. The method for web site search is web site:samplewebsite.com [search query]. So my instance can be web site:weblog.hubspot.com advertising and marketing assets.

3) Google Webmaster Tools

Doing web optimization and key phrase analysis? Your advertising and marketing software program ought to be capable to assist. But when it could possibly’t (otherwise you’d like to reinforce your information), Google’s Webmaster Instruments is usually a nice assist. You possibly can verify issues just like the variety of listed pages in your web site, submit your web site to Google so that you’re getting crawled and listed, and even disavow unhealthy inbound hyperlinks. It additionally can provide you data on search queries which have a big quantity of impressions however low clickthrough charge.

Inside Google Webmaster Instruments, go to “Your web site on the internet” and select “Search queries.” You will see a desk displaying a search question, impressions, clicks, and clickthrough charge (CTR). Evaluating this information to your different analytics information will help uncover some alternatives.

4) Percentage Change Calculator

I am unable to even start to inform you how helpful this little calculator is when in search of and analyzing information. Ever wish to know the proportion change of two values with out having to recollect the method? Merely enter the 2 values into this calculator, and it will spit out the proportion change. Belief me, you may wish to bookmark this one.

Listed below are just a few different helpful calculators:

• 3-Way Percentage Calculator – Calculates solutions to those questions: What’s X% of Y? X is what % of Y? X is Y% of what?
• Conversion Rate Calculator – Spits out a conversion charge once you enter the entire customer rely throughout a particular timeframe and the variety of instances throughout that timeframe these guests took a particular motion.
• A/B Test Calculator – Works for a primary state of affairs with two teams of individuals (A & B) who get to see one model of your web site and for whom you monitor the variety of conversions or objectives (purchases, downloads, clickthroughs, and so forth.).
• ROI Calculator – Analyzes your web site’s month-to-month gross sales and lead technology efforts to find out methods by which advertising and marketing efforts will be optimized.

5) Atlas

Atlas is Quartz‘s information heart, and it is chock-full of graphs, charts, and information visualizations. You possibly can seek for virtually any matter or key phrase, and Atlas could have a graphic based mostly on current analysis information for you. It is a useful gizmo to get background data on a subject you are researching, or to search out contemporary information to make use of in a undertaking you are engaged on. This is a chart based mostly on information from early 2016:

Supply: Atlas

6) Search in a Giphy

You recognize that coworker who at all times appears to search out the proper animated GIFs to your social posts or inside chat shopper? With the free Giphy Chrome extension, you’ll discover nice GIFs simply as shortly.

To make use of the instrument, all you need to do is open the extension in Chrome, search, select a GIF, and drag and drop. To date, the instrument works in Gmail, Twitter, Fb, and extra — they usually’re always increasing assist.

For Writers

7) Evernote

I exploit the free model of Evernote each single day. From to-do lists and analysis notes to writing whole chunks of articles, it is confirmed useful at each step of the writing and modifying course of.

One nice function? Its cellular, desktop, and internet apps sync robotically so long as you’ve gotten an web connection. (And if you happen to work offline, it’s going to sync the following time you’ve gotten web.) Plus — and that is tremendous vital for content material creators like us — it is always saving and syncing your work robotically, making it a protected place to jot down and retailer concepts.

Use it to maintain a working checklist of concepts, take notes, retailer inspiring articles or ebooks, or plan your editorial and social media publishing calendars.

8) Word2CleanHTML

In the event you like drafting weblog posts in packages like Microsoft Phrase, Evernote, or Google Drive as an alternative of your content material administration system (CMS), then this easy instrument will be your greatest buddy. Why? As a result of once you copy a doc from Microsoft Workplace and paste it into your CMS, a number of little, bizarre formatting points can crop up in your HTML.

Word2CleanHTML applies filters to repair all these issues added into the HTML, leading to well-formatted HTML you’ll be able to paste straight into an internet web page CMS. Merely paste in your draft, click on one button, after which copy the ensuing HTML straight from the instrument. Whenever you paste that into your CMS (most could have buttons studying “HTML” or “</>” of their instrument bar above your draft), it’ll seem good and clear. No hair-pulling or swimming via code required.

9) WordCounter

There is no such thing as a “proper reply” for how long a blog post should be. So long as it serves its function — whether or not that is thought management, driving leads, explaining a brand new idea, or one thing else — size does not matter. However though we do not advocate writing weblog posts with a phrase rely in thoughts, typically phrase rely can come in useful. WordCounter works precisely the best way you suppose it does: Paste in your content material and it will spit out precisely what number of phrases you’ve gotten.

10) Cofftivity

In response to a study out of the University of Chicago, “A average stage of ambient noise is conducive to artistic cognition.” In different phrases, being the tiniest bit distracted really helps you be extra artistic. That is why for many individuals, myself included, white noise helps promote focus.

There are a variety of white noise mills on the market, however my favourite is Cofftivity. This specific one provides continuous café background sounds at various intensities, from “Morning Murmur” and “College Undertones” to “Lunchtime Lounge” and “Brazil Bistro.” It is obtainable on the internet and as an app on iOS and Android.

11) & 12) Zerys & eLance

Want to start out creating content material however haven’t got the bandwidth? We hear about this roadblock quite a bit. One approach to get round it’s by hiring freelancers from respected marketplaces like Zerys or eLance. These assets provide you with entry to expert freelance writers who can write weblog posts, ebooks, whitepapers, and different items of written content material for you.

13) HTML Hacks for Marketers

Whereas this is not strictly a writing useful resource, primary coding data is shortly becoming a must-have skill for the trendy marketer — bloggers and written content material creators included. However studying from scratch will be daunting. The place on earth do you begin?

In the event you’re a complete newbie, begin with HTML Hacks for Marketers, which my colleagues at HubSpot created with Codeacademy. It’s going to train you fast however helpful hacks anybody — no matter coding data — can use of their advertising and marketing. For instance, you may learn to make small adjustments to HTML like altering headers and spacing, creating textual content in block-quote kind, and inserting social share hyperlinks. My private favourite is the hack to alter font colours.

As soon as you’ve got mastered these primary HTML expertise, transfer on to Codeacademy’s free interactive courses. They discovered a approach to make studying HTML and CSS really enjoyable — and you’ll undergo every lesson at your individual tempo.

14) Blog Topic Generator

If you must get to writing weblog posts however aren’t certain of an angle or title to get your creativity transferring, HubSpot’s Blog Topic Generator can do the be just right for you. Merely enter just a few key phrases that your weblog focuses on, and the Weblog Subject Generator will produce every week’s value of titles and matter concepts for you. It won’t produce the ultimate title of your weblog put up, but it surely helps get you fascinated about artistic new angles for matters you’ve got written about earlier than.

Listed below are the weblog put up titles I acquired after I entered “content material,” “inbound advertising and marketing,” and “running a blog”:

15) Blog Post Templates

All weblog posts aren’t created equal, however we have discovered that there are steps you’ll be able to take to make your posts complete and shareable. With these blog post templates, we’ll stroll you thru a top level view to jot down profitable how-to, listicle, newsjack, and curation weblog posts. As an alternative of ranging from scratch, you may save time and, hopefully, nail your weblog objectives.

For Content material Editors

16) Editorial Calendar Template

Making a balanced editorial calendar will be powerful, particularly if you do not have one centralized calendar that you simply and your workforce can confer with. To avoid wasting you time and headache, we have created editorial calendar templates for Google Calendar, Google Sheets, and Excel which you can fill in and share together with your workforce to start out the following month or 12 months off on the best foot.

17) & 18) Grammarly & Correctica

Whereas human editors will be capable to catch most grammatical errors, modifying instruments like Grammarly and Correctica are nice instruments for triple-checking earlier than you press “publish” or “ship.” Each free instruments verify for grammatical errors — and Grammarly even checks for plagiarism.

19) Hemingway App

Ernest Hemingway, admired for his succinct writing model, is the namesake for this helpful modifying app. Wish to make your written content material simpler to learn? Paste your content material into this free internet app, and it will assess your writing and establish alternatives to make it easier.

My favourite options embrace figuring out passive voice and hard-to-read sentences. Try the right-hand facet of the screenshot beneath, the place the instrument has summed up how readable my writing is with a grade. (Some room for enchancment right here.) Their suggestion to enhance readability general? Shoot for decrease than a tenth grade studying stage.

20) Headline Analyzer

This is a scary stat for you: Only 60% of people that click on into an article find yourself studying previous the headline. That makes your headline each the primary and probably the one likelihood so that you can compel readers to maintain studying — so it’s very value it to spend the additional couple of minutes arising with a extremely good one.

What does a extremely good headline appear to be? The free instrument Headline Analyzer by CoSchedule can inform you. It scores your headline high quality and charges its potential to drive social shares, site visitors, and web optimization worth. In my expertise, its power helps you strengthen particular parts of your title. For instance, it experiences on perceived sentiment and commonality of phrase varieties. It’s going to even present you the way it will seem in search outcomes.

So though it’s best to take these scores and grades with a grain of salt, you need to use this to offer your headlines a “once-over.” (And read this blog post to learn more about writing awesome headlines.)

For Designers

21) Nimbus Screenshot

That is one other instrument I exploit day by day. Positive, you’ll be able to seize a screenshot of your whole display screen or a part of your display screen utilizing the outdated keyboard shortcut method. However what if you’d like your screenshot to incorporate stuff that is not seen in your display screen?

Nimbus Screenshot enables you to seize the seen a part of an internet web page, a specific space, a specific scroll (my private favourite), your complete web page, or your complete browser window — together with every little thing beneath the fold.

As soon as you’ve got taken the screenshot, you’ll be able to crop, edit (like including notes and callouts), and select to print or save to your desktop or Google Drive.

22) Canva

In the event you like creating stunning visual content in a extremely brief period of time, you may love Canva. The time and assets it takes to study design, pay for design belongings, and/or get impressed to create magnificence from scratch will be actually tough once you’re observing a protracted checklist of to-dos — however Canva provides an enormous library of pre-made templates and belongings which you can manipulate whereas additionally including your individual imagery.

Better of all, they’ve so many belongings and graphics obtainable at no cost that you simply will not need to pay a cent if you happen to do not wish to. If you wish to use extra “premium” belongings and graphics discovered via their picture search, they will cost you $1 for every. However there’s loads of worth at no cost.

This is an instance of one thing you possibly can make:

23) ThingLink

Ever wished to make a picture (or infographic) clickable? ThingLink enables you to add a picture and add little icons to it that seem when an individual hovers their cursor over the picture. These icons permit customers to go to hyperlinks, watch movies, or learn messages you’ve got written. Plus, it is easy to share: Customers can simply embed ThingLink photos. (Click here for step-by-step instructions.)

Beneath is a part of a a clickable infographic from Thinglink my colleague Ginny Mineo created for another post:

 

24) Skitch

Skitch is a free app by Evernote that helps you talk extra visually. It enables you to mark up photos, digital belongings, PDFs, and different information with arrows, callout bins, textual content, and extra multi function place.

Within the instance beneath, I opened this system on my desktop and used the “Display screen Snap” button to take a screenshot of an internet web page — which then opened proper in Skitch for modifying and exporting.

Though it is free, it does require you to open an Evernote account — however that is additionally free (see above).

25) Infogram

Whereas much like Canva, Infogram is a visible content material instrument that focuses on serving to you create infographics, charts, and information visualization. In the event you wish to create charts utilizing Microsoft Excel, you are in luck — it additionally provides compatibility with Excel via Infogram Charts. Additionally, their infographics are responsive with cellular units.

26) Infographic Templates

As a content material marketer, you would possibly really feel extra comfy creating written content material than visible content material, however that is no excuse to exclude infographics out of your technique. Visual content is rising in demand out of your viewers, and infographics are notably shareable. We have created the backbones of 15 completely different templates which you can simply mess around with to customise to your content material and viewers — this is a sneak peek of 1 template, and you’ll grab the rest here. 

Supply: 15 Free Infographic Templates in PowerPoint

27) Google Fonts

Wish to spruce up your web site pages, displays, ebooks, and different content material with cool and completely different new fonts? Little-known reality: Google has a listing of 600 free fonts prepared so that you can obtain and use.

Merely discover and choose the fonts you want from their directory, then click on “Use” to get the HTML code you’ll be able to copy and paste onto your web site. Alternatively, you’ll be able to obtain the fonts to your desktop and use them when making new advertising and marketing content material by clicking “Add to Assortment.” (Click here for step-by-step instructions for doing this in the HubSpot software.)

28) Image Color Picker

Do not forget that time you wished to match your call-to-action design to that shade you have been utilizing on all of your occasion swag … however the one one that would know what that shade was did not work at your organization anymore? Subsequent time that occurs, snag an image of that swag and add it to ImageColorPicker.com, or use any picture URL to do the identical factor. Choose any level of the image, and instantly see its corresponding HEX, RGB, and HSV values.

29) PowerPoint Templates

Is there something extra boring than a PowerPoint presentation that includes black textual content on a white background? With the assistance of those templates, you’ll put collectively compelling, visually interesting displays. Whether or not you are driving lead technology or reporting in your weblog’s development to your workforce, hold your viewers’s consideration with these eye-catching displays.

30) SlideShare Templates

SlideShare does not should be daunting. You possibly can simply create shareable, embeddable SlideShare presentations in PowerPoint with the assistance of those templates — no want to start out from scratch or rent a freelancer. As soon as you’ve got created your first presentation, take a look at our information to marketing SlideShares successfully.

31) Haiku Deck

In the event you’ve ever needed to create a PowerPoint or SlideShare presentation in a pinch, you may want you knew about Haiku Deck. This instrument helps you shortly discover easy layouts, stunning photos, and nice fonts. It is obtainable for the online and for iPad.

Wish to see what one appears to be like like? Beneath’s an instance I pulled from their list of featured decks. Observe the simplicity of the design — if you wish to create tremendous detailed slides, this will not be the best instrument for you.

Snowed In? – Created with Haiku Deck, presentation software program that evokes

32) HubSpot’s Free Stock Photos

Trying to find and shopping for inventory imagery is usually a ache within the you-know-what — particularly in the case of deciphering legalese for various use circumstances. I’ve a liberal arts diploma, and Nietzsche was simpler to learn than no matter legalese inventory imagery corporations tended to offer me. All I wished to know is whether or not to quote or not cite a inventory picture of a laptop computer. Why was it so arduous?

That is why our workforce determined to create a library of 550+ free and royalty-free stock photos. Whether or not it is a distinctive picture wanted for an book or that good picture you wish to add to a weblog put up, that assortment ought to have you ever coated. This is considered one of our “across the kitchen” inventory pictures — yum.

Supply: The Free Stock Photos You’ve Been Searching For

33) PlaceIt

PlaceIt serves a really particular function: It means that you can add photos of your web site or product into real-world environments of individuals holding telephones, tablets, and laptops. PlaceIt will robotically alter the picture to make it seem pure with the angle of the cellphone’s display screen — which is able to prevent time studying and/or modifying in additional superior software program to get the angle proper.

You will need to pay per picture to get actually massive or high-resolution variations, although I’ve discovered free photos work simply nice for weblog posts and product web page content material. The paid downloads additionally take away that PlaceIt watermark from the underside proper.

34) LICEcap

Searching for the proper GIF to incorporate in your weblog put up? If it does not exist already on Giphy, you can also make one your self utilizing LICEcap. Movie a screenshot and switch it right into a GIF utilizing this helpful, free instrument — we use LICEcap for our blog posts, too. 

35) & 36) The Noun Project & HubSpot’s Resizable Icons Collection

Like with inventory pictures, one other problem content material creators face is discovering elegant icons that resize with out getting all fuzzy. There are just a few assets on the market for nice, resizable icons.

The Noun Project is an in depth library of 1000’s of icons uploaded by contributors. With a free account, you need to use icons so long as you both give credit score to the creator or buy them royalty-free for $1.99 apiece.

HubSpot has a library of resizeable icons, too, which you’ll obtain at no cost and with none licensing or attribution. The equipment comes with a free information for the way to change the colour of the icons utilizing PowerPoint, Photoshop, and Illustrator.

To that, we are saying …

(From HubSpot’s Free Icon Collection.)