I have been blogging for 6 years now, and each year I have invested more into my blog. 2020 has been a great blogging year – I have managed to double my stats on the previous year, as well as grow my social media following by 2,000. Here are some of the resources I use, hopefully they can help you too.
*Disclaimer – this post contains affiliate links*
Photos
Editing
While editing photos for Instagram, I use VSCO. I have been using this for years, and it has helped to add some consistency to my feed.
Preset: +8
Exposure: +0.5
Contrast: -1.0
Sharpen: +3
Clarity: +1
Saturation: +1
Temperature: -0.5
Tint: +1
When editing for Pinterest, I use Canva. Using the free account, I have created 5 pre-made designs, which I can edit, using stock photos to create “Pinterest worthy” content.
I use an app called Preview to rearrange my Instagram grid posts before I post them. This way I can produce the best feed possible!
My favourite Pinterest e-book is Pinterest With Ell – within 2 months she was seeing 1,000 views a day from Pinterest. I am not as good but using her strategies I have gained 1,000 impressions in 2 weeks from a starting point of zero. No doubt will this increase as I get more experienced, and I have Ell to thank for that!
Scheduling
To schedule my Pins, I manually pin. Having used Tailwind, the act of using the in-built scheduler helps to boost Pinterest engagement. The Pinterest scheduler is also free, so great for saving money.
For scheduling Tweets, I like to use Hootsuite and Twitter in built scheduler. Hootsuite allows up to 30 tweets a month, whereas Twitter scheduling is unlimited. I tend to schedule daily comment thread, my advertiser tweets, new posts and affiliate links. This allows a steady stream of content throughout the month.
Writing Content
When writing content, I always want to ensure it is SEO friendly. To do this, I use the Yoast Plugin to ensure my content ranks, and Keysearch to find the perfect keyword. Keysearch (aff) allows for an in-depth analysis of what is trending and how to get your posts on Google. This is a paid-for service, but it has got me an additional 5 ranking keywords per month.
E-books
E-books are a tool I have ventured into using during 2020, and something that I have found incredibly useful.
I have purchased two e-books from the lovely kayleighzaraa and I have to say they are such good reads. “A Beginner’s Guide To Affiliate Sales” (aff) really helped me to decode the whole process and truly understand what I need to do. Her new e-book, “The Ultimate Guide To Blog Monetisation” (aff) is becoming a godsend in terms of climbing the next step on the blogging ladder. What I love is that it has been written in such a friendly way that it all seems manageable.
The first ever e-book I bought was from Nele at The Navagatio, who wrote SEO For Bloggers. This has been my blogging Bible over the past few months, as I am just starting out with SEO and had no idea where to start. 3 months on and I have a much better idea as to what I am doing, and have 5 more ranking keywords. May not seem like a lot, but for me it proves that something is working!
Emails
I have switched over from Mailchimp to Flodesk – I found that Mailchimp was just a bit too business-friendly and less user friendly. Flodesk has been absolutely perfect in terms of engaging with my followers and perfecting my communication with them.
You can get 50% off your Flodesk subscription by clicking this link – I would never offer anything I did not believe in, and trust me – I am never going back to Mailchimp.
Plugins I use
Clean Talk Anti-Spam
Broken Link Checker
Contact Form 7
Inline Related Posts
Insert Headers and Footers
Insert Script
Post Slider and Carousel
Redirection
Revive Old Posts
Shared Counts
Smash Balloon Instagram Feed
WP Last Modified Info
WP To Twitter
Yoast SEO
