When it comes to writing, the pen is mightier than the sword. However, it can be hard to find quality writing tools online. There are free online content writing tools that help you with everything from grammar to voice tone or even how to structure your content. You can even use writing software to improve your skills for work or school, and there are hundreds of free content writing tools available.
Here, I have listed out free online tools that could enhance your writing career.
Buzzsumo
Ever wondered which articles or contents are getting the most shares for a specific topic? That’s what Buzzsumo can help you with. Just input a keyword or phrase then it will show you a list of top content. You get to decide if the content that they will show you are from the past year, month, week, or in the recent 24 hours. You can also exclude specific types of content like videos or giveaways. What does the list mean? If these topics got a ton of shares, then you should create a better version of them.
Hubspot’s Blog Topic Generator
Hubspot’s tool is one of the easiest topic generators that you can use. Just input a couple of nouns that you want to write about and voila, it will give you a list of topics that you can work with. It’s not perfect though and you still need to tweak the titles that it gives you, nevertheless, it’s a fast and easy way to create topics out of a single or two word ideas.
Google Ads Keyword Planner
Now don’t get intimidated by this one. Though it has the word “AdWords” in it, you don’t need to have knowledge on it to be able to use this one. This tool is used mainly by our Paid Ads and SEO teams but it’s a great tool for us in the content team as well because it shows us a list of keyword groups that are getting a high volume of search. Neat huh? Here’s how you can use Google AdWords Keyword Planner for your topic generation.
- Click on “Search for new keyword and ad group ideas”.
- Type in a word or keyword that you want to write about. If for example you want to only view the keyword searches in a specific country, you can select it under Country in targeting. Then click on Get Ideas.
- It will show you a list of keyword ideas. Sort it by Avg. monthly searches to find out which keywords have the highest searches. In this example, “wedding invitation” get the most number of searches in the Philippines so work on article variations about wedding invitations.
Research
While Google search is the more obvious free tool for research, I find these two tools convenient for keeping myself updated with topics that interest me, as well as bookmarking and taking down notes especially when I’m not in front of my laptop. And if you’re a writer, you know that our best ideas usually come to us at the most inconvenient time, like when we’re on a bus and we only have our smartphone with us.
Feedly
If you’re following a lot of blogs and subscribed to a ton of email newsletters that are piling up in your email, I suggest you sign up for a Feedly account and download the app in your phone. Feedly is a better version of the now discontinued Google Reader and I’m a BIG fan of it. All of the work (and non-work) blogs that I follow are in my Feedly account and are organized into their own categories. Because it has an app, I can also read my feed while on the go. If you’re researching for an article you’re working on, just add them to your Feedly in its own category and read them whenever, wherever.
Evernote
Evernote allows you to take down ideas, write a blog when inspiration strikes, and even take snapshots for your notes whenever you need to, even if you’re on the road or stuck in traffic. Unlike paper notes that will get lost, your notes taken with Evernote will be synchronized in all of your devices like your phone and laptop.
Writing (and focusing on it)
Though the Internet offers us a lot of information to help us with our research, it’s also full of distractions. While writing is already tough for us, Facebook and other websites eat up a lot of our time that we should have been using instead to write.
FocusWriter
Those who write for a living have deadlines to meet so we can’t afford to be distracted every now and then. Some writers need peace and quiet to do their work. While plugging in your earphones to listen to soft tunes can do that trick, writers will also need a clutterless screen to avoid the temptation of doing other things aside from writing. FocusWriter is a great tool that lets you do just that with its clean interface to get you immersed on your writing.
Milanote
This little organizational tool acts like a board to keep all your writing ideas, resources, and references in check. Whether you’re writing a book, shooting a video, or running an ad campaign, you’ll be sure to appreciate how it lets you structure your creatives in an organized manner. As a bonus, if you’re collaborating with others on any sort of project, Milanote offers a convenient platform for all contributing members to share their input, no matter where they are.
Dayboard
I recently discovered Dayboard with the help of our resident designer Jevie. In the Spiralytics team, we use Asana to keep track of our daily tasks, but when you’re swamped with tons of tasks, it can get confusing as to which tasks you need to prioritize for the day. Dayboard is a to-do list that shows up everytime you open a new tab, so you will always be reminded of your tasks. I love that Dayboard only lets you list down 5 tasks a day. Because of that feature, you’ll be able to quickly reorganize your long list and decide which ones are the most important. It lessens the stress too compared to looking at a long to-do list.
Design
I know, I know, this is a list for writers so why include design? Adding visuals to your content is a great way to increase the page views, engagement and shares of your work. Investing in good quality images help to make your article more readable, easier to scan, and make it stand out from the tons of content produced on a daily basis.
Canva (For Writers Graphic)
I love Canva! It’s an easy to use browser-based graphic designing tool that is also user-friendly to non-designers or those that don’t have or don’t know how to use Adobe Photoshop. With Canva, you can produce social media images, infographics, blog headers/banners, and more by dragging and dropping design elements that are built-in in Canva. You can also upload your own design elements if you want to use a photo that you have for example. They also have a blog called Design School where they teach tips and tricks on graphic design to non-professional designers.
Editing
Last but not the least is editing your work. Though you might have an editor, you should still check your own work for spelling and grammar mistakes, including plagiarism.
Grammarly
Okay, so maybe it’s tempting to immediately submit your work after you’ve spent hours (or even days!) on it, it doesn’t hurt to check for mistakes. After all, your work has your name in it. I understand that you might just depend on Microsoft Word’s spelling checker, but it’s not as accurate and doesn’t have a plagiarism checker, unlike Grammarly. Editing is as simple as clicking on the underlined and highlighted words, a suggested correction will appear in the sidebar and clicking on it will automatically make the corrections. It will also explain why it thinks there’s a mistake. For plagiarism checking, it will show the link to the original source of the said plagiarized sentences or paragraph. Grammarly also has a browser extension so I use it when I directly write in WordPress or in my social media accounts.
MindMeister (Web, iOS, Android)
Best free writing software for expanding your ideas
Mind mapping is a great brainstorming exercise for all kinds of writing projects. Whether you’re capturing thoughts for a term paper or thesis, putting together an outline for a long blog post or ebook, or coming up with ideas for a new novel or book series, mind mapping can help you capture your ideas and brainstorm new ones by triggering associations.
And while you could create a mind map on paper or a whiteboard, MindMeister offers more flexibility. MindMeister is a tool designed specifically to make mind mapping easier, giving writers a simple way to capture their ideas, organize them, and share them with others.
It doesn’t matter how large your mind map gets, MindMeister expands to give you as much room as you need. Capture all of your ideas in a single file, rearrange and organize your ideas by dragging and dropping them, and connect ideas no matter how far apart they are on your mind map. With a premium plan, you can even attach related files and images to reference later.
MindMeister Pricing: Free for up to three mind maps; from $4.99/month for the Personal plan that includes unlimited mind maps and file attachments.
Want to learn more about mind mapping? Check out our mind mapping tutorial, or discover nine ways to use mind maps to jumpstart your projects.
Conclusion
Why use plain text for writing when you can add some character and add more meaning to your words? It’s not like it takes too much time to add a little formatting. We want something engaging and fun to read instead of something that looks like an essay on the page. Writing tools online free make this possible for us.