As the digital world speeds up, it can feel as though you’re trying to stay afloat on a never-ending wave of content creation. So how do you keep focused when deadlines stack up? How do you ensure you're creating excellent copy that positions your business well? And how do you come up with the topics that will make even the slightest ripple in the vast online ocean we call the Internet?
Business owners, copywriters and content marketers, we hear your distress, but it’s OK! In today’s blog post, we’re going to share the top free content writing tools you’ll ever need, whether you're creating copy for your business or your clients.
Table of contents
- 18 free content writing tools for marketers
i. 4 tools for brainstorming ideas
ii. 4 tools for editing content
iii. 3 tools for focusing
iv. 7 tools for SEO research and analysis
- Content tools can lighten the load
18 free content writing tools for marketers
The market for free content writing tools is about as vast as the range of topics there is to write about. So we’ve broken down our recommendations by function. Read on to change the way you write and save time, money and energy:
4 tools for brainstorming ideas
If you've been creating content for a while, then pretty soon you’ll feel like you’ve written on every topic under the sun and have nothing more to say. Or maybe you’re new to corporate blogging (or a specific subject area) and need some help? Try these tools:
1. Answer the Public: Enter your topic into this content idea generator and you will be rewarded with not just blog topic suggestions but those based on the most popular search queries, meaning you can produce content that you know there is already an audience for.
2. Google Trends: Google Trends is a helpful tool for content writers to come up with new, trending topics. Enter a keyword, phrase or topic into the search bar to see search trends over time. Look for topics with an increase in interest and explore related topics in the search results for ideas.
3. BuzzSumo: BuzzSumo is a content writing tool that helps you discover topics related to your niche, uncover trending content and find influential authors in your industry. It enables you to create engaging content that resonates with your audience. Finally, you can use BuzzSumo to identify influential people in your industry who are creating content and follow their work for additional inspiration. Although this is a paid tool, there is a 30-day free trial available.
4. Google Alerts: If you’re active in a certain field or you want to know when the brand you write for gets a mention or the latest research/news on a subject, sign up for Google Alerts. You'll get an email rounding up the latest articles about this topic that have been published online. Just make sure you have a dedicated folder for each alert so you can keep track of them and delete as necessary.
For more suggestions, check out the SEO section further down for tools to help you generate an SEO-backed content strategy.
Read More: 9 content idea generator tools
4 tools for editing content
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There’s no bigger barrier to content success than having poorly written posts. These editing tools can help:
5. Grammarly: Whether you use it as an add-on in your browser, via the web app or install it on your desktop, this free grammar checker is a lifeline for bloggers, content marketers, editors, authors and more. It isn’t infallible, but it will pick up those rogue typos, inconsistencies and stray punctuation marks. If you write (and proof) a lot of material, then team Grammarly with another decent spellchecker, such as that available via Google Docs, and you’re onto a winner.
6. Hemingway App: This handy app delves beyond the surface-level errors in your work to flag up passive phrasing, complex sentences and reading age. This is what will take your content up a notch.
7. Cliché Finder tool: When you write so much content it’s not always easy being original. Reveal and banish those clichés with this simple tool.
8. Repetition Detector: It's easy to repeat yourself when you're creating content all day, so an easy way to reduce unnecessary similarities is running your content through this tool before you press 'publish'. It'll highlight where the same word falls closely together and can help you check you're optimising your content for keywords too.
If you need more help in this area, The Write Life examined six different automatic editing tools to discover the best.
Read More: Essential grammar checklist for writing great content
3 tools for focusing
Content writers are often up against strict deadlines, and as content production ramps up, it’s more important than ever that you use your time effectively. See if one of these productivity tools can help you stave off procrastination:
9. The Most Dangerous Writing App: If getting your head into gear isn’t top of your abilities, try this tool. It starts to fade and then delete anything you’ve written if you pause for longer than three seconds!
10. Stay Focused: Maybe you’re a sucker for becoming interested in the latest news stories or what’s trending on social media as soon as you should be putting finger to keyboard? Limit how much time you spend on those websites with this tool.
11. Calmly: If the formality of an open Word document fills you with dread, then Calmly aims to banish that. A distraction-free jotter pad, all you’ll see is a big white screen ready for your text. No tabs, no formatting choices. Just words. Bliss…
7 tools for SEO research and analysis
Where would our words be without the SEO tools and content analysis that help us to drive their visibility? Probably languishing on page 3 of the SERPs. These tools are great starting places for all things keyword research and performance analysis:
12. Google Search Console: Google Search Console is an essential tool for SEO analysis. Link it to your website and it provides data on search engine rankings, indexed pages and CTRs, as well as tracking keyword performance, submitting sitemaps and generating and reviewing HTML improvements. It also helps you to identify and fix website errors and analyse search query data.
13. Google Analytics: In tandem with Search Console, Google Analytics is an incredibly useful tool for monitoring content performance. It provides detailed insights into how people are interacting with the content, such as how many people are viewing it, how long they are spending on it and what devices they are using to view it. This data can then be used to inform content strategies and improve the overall performance of the content.
14. LowFruits: LowFruits is an online tool to generate ideas and topics to write about. It uses a vast database of search terms to generate related topics and keywords, automatically filtering search queries so you can identify the best chances for ranking success. It also offers trending and popular topics for users to stay up to date. You can do 7 keyword searches a week for free.
15. Ubersuggest: Ubersuggest is an easy-to-use keyword research and analytics tool from content marketer Neil Patel. It's designed to help beginners gain insights into search demographics, click-through rates, browsing devices, long-tail keywords and top content ideas. It is free to use and requires only a Google account login.
16. Read-o-Meter: As you know, content is all about engagement, and engagement often comes down to concentration. Give your readers and Google a taste of how long you need their attention with this tool that calculates reading time.
17. Content Row: Of course, the key to getting readers to click on your content from the start is optimising one of the most important parts of your content: the headline. It’s often hard to know where to start or whether the headline you’ve come up with is catchy enough. But offers some simple tools to do just that, from a headline generator to a headline analyser.
18. BuzzSumo: Again, if you want to keep tabs on how well your content is performing, BuzzSumo allows you to measure the success of content on a specific domain so you can calculate your ROI.
Content tools can lighten the load
“It’s best to have your tools with you. If you don’t, you’re apt to find something you didn’t expect and get discouraged.”
– Stephen King
Writing tools aren’t there to do all the hard work for you. But they are there to help make things smoother, freeing you up to focus on exactly what you need to say rather than adding to your workload.
By using these top free content writing tools, you will find you start to write better, faster.
Main image credit: Kenny Eliason
Internal image credits: Startaê Team, Kelly Sikkema, Carlos Muza
