Tools I Need To Be Able To Blog

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Blogging requires a lot of work and is a job whether you see it as one or not because you can make a full-time income off of a blog and you have to put in a lot of hours before you start to see results. Blogging like any job requires certain tools that if you did not have you would not be able to blog. The tools that you need as a blogger will vary from person to person and it depends on what they blog about and where you are in their blogging journey because new bloggers typically won’t need to invest in the same types of tools that veteran bloggers would because you don’t have the readership to need the best tools out there. The tools you would need for a YouTube channel and aa blog are going to be different because not every blogger makes video content and will need a expensive camera to do their job. I have invested in some tools to improve the quality of my posts as my blog has gotten more popular but I haven’t always needed the tools I use now and there was a time when I had hardly any equipment. . In this post, I am going to talk about tools that if I didn’t have I would not be able to blog.

An Internet connection to publish posts– An Internet connection is needed to waste your time browsing Facebook all day but the Internet isn’t just a tool for wasting time but it’s also necessary to be able to blog because with no Internet access blogs don’t get published. If your Internet is down you can write posts on things like Microsoft Word which I would recommend doing first because the WordPress block editor can be glitchy and it’s never a good idea to start your first draft in WordPress and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve done that and had to rewrite posts. I don’t usually have a real problem with not having the Internet for long periods of time and I am glad I don’t have this issue because it’s hard for me to go places when there is no Internet so I basically am stuck when it’s down. If the Internet is down you can’t publish new posts but certainly can write them which I recommend you do because then you aren’t scrambling when it’s back and all you have to do is share it. The internet is necessary for bloggers to be able to do their jobs because just like you can’t post on Instagram with no Internet you can’t publish a blog post. Bloggers rely on an Internet connection to be able to do their jobs but sometimes life happens and there is not a whole lot you can do but wait. When the Internet goes out it’s frustrating for bloggers which is why it is helpful to write posts in advance and schedule them because when posts are scheduled they will still be shared even if you Internet happens to be down at the time they are being published. Scheduling tools can be glitchy and sometimes scheduled posts still won’t share due to technical errors that cannot be fixed without the Internet but in my experience most of the time there are no issues.  

A good hosting service – There are tons of different hosting companies you can blog on and some are better than others but we all need it because you don’t blog with no host. My blog is hosted by WordPress because that is the platform I started using when I launched my blog and have had nothing but good experiences so there has never been a reason for me to switch hosts. There are tons of different blogging platforms and not every blogger will have the same preferences because some blogger will tell you a certain host is great while others will say it’s trash but we all blog on some kind of hosting platform because you can’t blog without it. You don’t need to be self-hosted like I am and some people prefer to do it the free way but every blogger needs a reliable host to get their blogging done on. 

A reliable device to blog on – There is no device that I would say is the best thing to blog on because everyone is familiar with different types of devices and it all depends on what you are most comfortable with. I prefer to blog on a computer because the text is larger and it’s easier to create images with a mouse but I can blog on my cellphone or iPad if I had to. Recently I have had to switch from my blogging on my computer to an iPad because the hardware on my computer crashed and that is the only way I will be able to blog which is fine because I can still get my work done and it just may take an hour or two longer than normal. My iPad is not my preferred device to blog on but it’s an option and I am grateful that I can still blog even if the device I am blogging on is not my preferred choice. A reliable device to get your blogging done is necessary for all bloggers whatever that device may be because without our devices being in tip-top we can’t blog and not blogging I think is worse than blogging on a different device.  It is frustrating for anyone when computers die but it’s even more stressful for people who need it to do their jobs.

Grammarly to check mistakes– I will not even try to deny the fact that my blog posts are filled with kinds of spelling and grammatical errors. I struggle with finding grammar or spelling mistakes and some of that may be my dyslexia but it’s mostly because in school I was told that grammar was not important and it wasn’t taught. I rely on Grammarly to help me find mistakes because I am not the best at recognizing bad grammar and if it wasn’t for grammar checkers my blogs would have double the amount of mistakes they do now. Grammarly is not perfect by any means and sometimes it does miss mistakes but I am not striving for perfection because it usually does catch the major ones and that is all I need to improve my writing to make my points more clear. I think I am getting better at catching mistakes than I was when I first started blogging but I still use grammar checkers because you get tired when you stare at a computer all day and may miss things your grammar checker won’t.  You don’t have to be a great writer to be a blogger but you should try to have decent grammar so people aren’t confused with what you are trying to say and Grammarly can help improve your spelling if it’s not your strong suit. I think all bloggers should use some kind of grammar checker because it can makes your blog post stand out from the rest when it’s easy to understand.

Canva to create images-  The hardest part of blogging sometimes isn’t writing the post itself but it’s creating the images because you can’t just go on Google and download a photo and you could be stealing a photo that is not righfully yours which violates copyright laws and you don’t want to do that. Some bloggers are great photograhers and that their own pictures or draw them themselves and I wish I could do that but that’s not me. I have zero artistic ability and it would hurt my blog more than help it if I tried to draw my own images and I don’t even try. I can take decent photos but I don’t go enough places to where I would have a bunch of different types of photos and it would likely just be the same ones so I don’t take a lot of photos either. I use Canva to create images for my blog which is a free online graphic design tool that anyone who doesn’t have the time or talent to create images can use. There is a free and paid version of Canva but I use the free version because it works for the things I need it for but if you were a business and need more options the paid version might be better for you. Blogs are not required to have images but I like to have at least one photo in every blog post because blogs with at least one or two images get more more views than those who have zero. 

A quiet place to write- When I started blogging I was very bad at zoning out distractions and I could not write unless it was so quiet that I could quite literally hear myself breathe. I still get distracted if I am in a noisy environment but I have worked very hard on being able to write blog posts with small levels of noise because distractions are inevitable and if you can’t work with any noise you have a problem that could interfere with your ability to create. A quiet environment is necessary for bloggers because blogs don’t get created if you are too distracted and can’t focus. I usually will create posts on Tuesday and Friday evenings because those are days my mom is not typically watching my niece and I can usually create better posts when there are less distractions. 

Blogging does not require as many tools to do your job but like most jobs, there are tools you need to do it successfully even if it’s not a career. Bloggers and YouTubers will need some type of equipment to do their jobs but it’s typically not the same things because blogging can typically be done solo whereas being a YouTuber sometimes needs a small team. I have invested in some things for my blog because I am trying to make my blog a career and in order to make money you have to spend it, but I did not invest in anything for the first year of blogging. Some bloggers require more tools than others and it depends on what type of blogger you are because if you are only blogging for fun, I don’t think you need to be using the premium version of Canva like a professional blogger would. These are some of the tools that I use to run my blog but not all bloggers will invest in the same things as me and some people may need more or less tools than I do. What tools do you need to be able to run your blog?

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