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Home » The Famous Blog » Software Can Make Blogging A Lot Easier

Software Can Make Blogging A Lot Easier

December 2, 2010 - Last Modified: December 2, 2010 by Drew Rafferty

When I first started out blogging I barely even knew what a blog was yet I stepped up to the podium and successfully installed my first WordPress blog and started creating a blog. Of course in the beginning I had no idea what I was doing and that blog is long gone into the blog graveyard.

That was around late 2008 and since then I’ve spent a lot of time improving my blogging skills and knowledge which has now eventually given me the knowledge to help others have successful blogs too. With being a geek and a techie it has meant that along the way I’ve searched high and low for tech and gadgets to help make blogging easier and now I’m here to share some tools and resources that are extremely powerful for each and every blogger.

1. An RSS Reader

Any advanced bloggers will already know that an RSS reader is a must for your every day needs to ensure you can stay on top of the latest trends in your niche so you can then easily blog about them. There are online versions such as Google reader and desktop versions such Snarfer. Personally I prefer a desktop reader however you may find a different taste.

2. Scribefire for Firefox, Safari and Google Chrome

Scribefire is what I’m currently using to create this post for Famous Bloggers. It’s a browser addon that’s available for either Firefox or Chrome that enables you to create a post wihtout logging into your blog. What this means for bloggers is that realying information from another source is made extremely easy as you don’t have to switch between tabs from your writing pane to your browser Window. Though I do believe the Chrome & Safari version still haven’t got split pane writing mode so you’re probably best off using Firefox and its version.

3. Zemanta

This is a really handy addon for Firefox and other browsers or can be found as a plugin for your blog depending on what blogging software you use. What you can do with this is easily add relevant links, images or tags to your post at the click of a button. I don’t think any blogger should be without Zemanta or a similar featured product.

4. Clippings or similar browser addon

When blogging you’ll probably have snippets of text or code that you regularly add to certain blog posts and instead of having to remember them all you can use a browser addon such as Clippings which enables you to save your snippets of text for easy insertion when you need them.

5. Screen Capture / Image Grabber / Video Downloader

There’s nothing more tedious than having to take a standard screenshot then use some software to cut the screenshot to to the desired size.  it’s the same for when you need to download a web video for use later so having some browser addons for these tasks are important. There are many of these to choose from and in my case I use Screen Capture Elite and Video DownloadHelper.

6 Password Manager

As a blogger or even just a user of the Internet you’re going to need a lot of login deatils. To save time with managing and logging into your accounts you can use a password manager such as Roboform or a variety of free alternatives.

Out of all the software I use to improve my blogging experience these are the most worth mentioning and if you also have some nifty tools that are useful to bloggers you can always pop down to the comment section and discuss.

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Filed Under: Blogging, How To Blog

About Drew Rafferty

Follow @techiezine

I'm Drew from the Techiezine blog. I'm a geek as you can probably guess and also highly interested in business, economics and especially Internet business which includes blogging. I've decided I want to spread my wings and I'm now here to write some content for all you Famous Bloggers fans. Follow my blog on Facebook.

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{ 85 Responses }

  1. om didien says:
    this tips are really extraordinary, I am very grateful for the info
  2. SK says:
    Thanks for the list. Scribfire seems like a nifty little addition to have to make blog posting a little easier. Not sure if it comes with all the features that a regular posting platform would provide, but it'll be worth exploring.
  3. Raj says:
    I found Zemanta to be very useful. Thanks for the tips Drew!
  4. Jenn says:
    Oooh, this is the first I've heard about ScribeFire. Is it secure, do you think? Also good tips on the screen capture and crop tools. I usually have to paste my images into Photoshop, crop them, save them for web, etc. It's a long and tedious process. Anything that makes it easier is much welcome.
  5. Claire says:
    Nice post. I am now downloading Clippings as a Firefox addon. This will definitely come in handy. Thanks for the recommendation.
  6. Isha Singh says:
    awesome tools and the most liked and important tool for me is screen capture... thanks for share...
  7. Rajan Balana says:
    I don't know, how I am practicing blogging without these tools, I must use them, Thanks for sharing :)
  8. Daniel Sharkov says:
    Hey Drew, Having the right tools when blogging can definitely make a huge difference on your overall effectiveness. There are literally dozens of tools I'm currently using to help myself with all the daily blogging tasks. Strangely or not, I haven't heard about the ones you mentioned. Shame on me, since they all seem great! I especially like the idea behind Scribefire and will definitely give it a shot. It seems like a great time saver. The other thing I found interesting were the screen capturing tools. The traditional process we all know is quite frustrating and time consuming, so this is the next tool I'll give a look at. Thanks for sharing man! Keep it up! :)
  9. Kimi says:
    From the lists above, i only ever tried Zemanta. I have tried it, and it is horrible, though it helps looking for some relevant links.. Be careful though, Zemanta gives automatic "links" after the post if you don't check, it is a turn of for me to use it. Thanks for the awesome lists, will check the rest!
    • Drew says:
      I guess by that you mean the Zemanta WP plugin? If so I don't really recommend using the plugin and a browser extension/addon instead.
      • Kimi says:
        No, not the plugin, firefox Zemata addon..
        • Drew says:
          Oh but if one is an eternal blogger then one won't be uninstalling Zemanta :D I regularly create new Firefox profiles anyway cos I'm always adding more addons and it eventually breaks it.
  10. Dennis Edell says:
    I did not read through all the comments, my apologies if someone already said... The problem with Zemanta (I've heard) is, it does not uninstall clean by any means. It leaves a real mess of crap code behind...
  11. Lucian says:
    Zemanta is very cool, a good article should have resources and links attached
  12. Isabel Rodrigues - Pro Blogger Journey says:
    Wow, some interesting points there. I was aware of a few things bu yes some points were new to me.
  13. Rachel says:
    I've been blogging for quite some time now too, but I am not really that of a "PRO". Is the password manager really recommended to use?
  14. Karan says:
    Thanks for the compilation friend, it really seems that these applications can simplify my job of getting everything in order and will help me concentrate on my blog rather than getting distracted by fuzzy jobs.
    • Drew says:
      Some are a mus, while others are personal preference but when you put them all together as your inventory then you'll be impressed with what they and do for ones blogging.
      • Drew says:
        Oh dear, the typos. I blame the snow and cold fingers.
      • Karan says:
        I guess you are right!
  15. Paul Tech says:
    Didn't realize that there are so many tools to make blogging more fun and convenient. I am gonna try out Zemanta and Scribefire...
    • Karan says:
      Well,I never gave any of em a try!
  16. Drew says:
    I think my next blog post is going to be about "when blogging gets on your nerves", as my blog has went and published a post I specifically scheduled to be published on the 7th, not today!! grrr.
  17. TJ McDowell says:
    Interesting products there. As far as automatically creating affiliate links, how does that work? On a blog post I wrote today, I had to go through all the different products I was referencing and find the link on my amazon affliate account. Are you telling me there's an easier way? I'm all ears if it saves time.
    • Drew says:
      I used to try getting affiliate links for Amazon through using plugins but now I hardly ever place an affiliate link, and when I do need to, I will go to Amazon and get the affiliate link from there. Then I will use TweetDeck to shorten the url to a shortened Amazon url. However if you really want to use a plugin, there are many to choose from on the plugin directory or some paid ones, such as reviewazon or phpzon.
  18. Edwin says:
    Thanks for telling us about ScribeFire. I used Zemanta before but it got annoying.
    • Drew says:
      It got annoying for me too, but then I missed the ease of creating tags and placing links, then had to have it back. :D
  19. Ondrej Dyrka says:
    Nice touch with the multiple pieces of software and add-ons, I'll get Scribefire right away. What I do have to point out though are a few mistakes in your post, such as: "It’s a browser addon that’s available for either Firefox or Chrome" - with this being said you would imply that it's available only for Firefox or for Chrome, but not for both. The right way to say it would be "... that's available for both FF and Chrome". I'd also recommend you using Respelt.com to remove the few spelling mistakes you have (such as "login deatils"). Not a big deal, but it hurts the eyes.
    • Drew says:
      I can't understand the spelling errors, because when I edited the post there were no spelling errors highlighted by my editor, nor in my Firefox browser (I have spell checker on my FX browser). "Either Firefox or Chrome" implies that you can choose to install it on either Firefox or Chrome, and is not incorrectly worded at all. It does exactly what it says on the tin by notifying you that either Firefox or Chrome have the addon available. Yes it could be worded the way you want it to be, but not everything is always to ones particular tastes, but as long as it's correct then one has to accept it without judgment. Cheers for trying though, but you said incorrect, when it's not at all incorrect. Plus I didn't ask for feedback on my article's writing, so I'm at free will to reject what you say and defend myself.
  20. Lauren Ashley Miller says:
    Thanks for all the great blogging resources. I'm taking on a lot of ghostblogging for social media marketing and I need some new management techniques - my organization is not sufficient anymore. Getting Scribefire, Clippings, and Screen Capture Elite asap!
    • Drew says:
      You'll wonder why you haven't been using Scribefire all this time :D
  21. Bishwajeet says:
    I use Windows Live writer and its kind of cool software
  22. Ardorm says:
    These are great recommendations, Drew! The desktop software surely seems cool and useful. Thanks! :)
    • Drew says:
      Snarfer is awesome. It took me a very long time to find Snarfer, and during that time I spent a lot of time using other RSS readers that were either badly coded and used too much system resources, or were featureless/ugly interfaced :D.
  23. Dennis Edell says:
    I haven't opened it yet, but I just installed clippings. If it is what I think it is, it's something I've needed forever. Thanks in advance for that. Up to now, it's been copy/paste off multiple word-pad docs.
    • Drew says:
      Yes it's for saving text snippets in your browser in a neatly compact way for easy access :D
  24. Andreas says:
    There is a log of software for bloggers that can be very helpful. I am using the SEO plugin that gives me information about link stats and helps when building links with other niche related sites.
    • Drew says:
      Ah I don't be fussed about all these links when its blogging, the aim is to get links naturally, as that's when your blog is performing as a blog should. Having to build the links yourself is distracting from what blogging is really about.
  25. Alex says:
    Great recommendations Drew, I didn't even knew that a software like Scribefire exist, it's really nifty if you find yourself having a moment of inspiration while browsing other blogs. And the screen capture soft is great, I too find myself print screening my screen then going to pain so I can paste the image there and then save to to pass it on. That is a really time saver!
    • Drew says:
      The image grabber is definitely a huge time saver, before I discovered something like that I would have spent ages taking a screenshot then editing in Photoshop. Scribefire rocks this world, it can't be matched for its awesomeness when it comes to creating particular types of blog posts.
  26. Kerry says:
    Drew - Don't know if this is your first guest post or not but you did a good job here. I loved all of your recommendations, but especially the scribefire addon and the password manager Roboform. I have used clippings before and it is definitely handy. Good article.
    • Drew says:
      Thanks, glad you enjoyed them. They're all very handy and do make blogging easier! :D
  27. Rick LaPoint says:
    Hi Drew, I don't use any of these. You make me feel really, really old. Rick
    • Drew says:
      Ha you definitely should if you're a blogger. They are great for speeding up the process of creating and publishing a new post! :D
  28. Barbara Ling, Virtual Coach says:
    I've never investigated clipping - thanks for the idea! My favorite blog tools are very simple. VI for editing, ftp for uploading, SSHing for direct hacking. I'm a very basic gal indeed....
    • Drew says:
      Add Scribefire to your list and you're advanced instead of basic :D
  29. Harsh Agrawal says:
    Software does help a lot in bringing down your Blogging time.. Here are few of my weapons :) Windows live writer feed demin FileZilla Evernote Dropbox
    • Drew says:
      You should try Backupify, it's really good.
      • Michael Brandvold says:
        I have been using Backupify for backing up gmail, Facebook and Twitter, but I didn't realize it also does backups of WordPress. Thanks for the tip, just installed it on my blog.
      • Harsh Agrawal says:
        Thanks Drew for recommendation..I will look into it now :)
  30. Tinh says:
    Yes, agree that plugins and extensions made our blogging much easier :-)
    • Drew says:
      Which of them do you use?
  31. Shiva says:
    Wow Drew those are some excellent software that can help in blogging. I am right now Downloading Snarfer, I think a Desktop RSS reader can be pretty handy for me since I hardly login to Google Reader
    • Drew says:
      I used to use Feeddemon but it uses too much system resources, Snarfer is like it and uses way less resources.
  32. Mani Viswanathan says:
    I will give ScribeFire a try. Heard lot about it, but never tried it. Lastpass works like charm for storing passwords. Could u find an alternative for Snippets for chrome ?
    • Drew says:
      I never checked, I rarely use Chrome because it doesn't have same addons as what I'm used to on Firefox. If you try the extension directory for Chrome you may find one - hopefully.
  33. Lennart Heleander says:
    Hi Drew, Thanks for the good list, special RSS, totally forgot that. I always have problem to look over all interesting blogs and find the latest and interesting things.
    • Drew says:
      RSS is especially good for finding new things, like new videos, websites, tools, software.. basically anything new to blog about. :D
  34. Patricia says:
    Hi Drew Utmost respect to you geeks. Techie stuff a mystery to me lol Thanks for a clearly explained article that even this technophobe could grasp. Much appreciated Drew. Patricia Perth Australia
    • Drew says:
      Oo I'm techie through and through. Always got a keen eye for good useful tech. :D
  35. Gaurav Agrawal says:
    I have been using Zemanta along with my wordpress blog for a while now and am thoroughly impressed. However, I would love to see a way to include 'related posts' from your own blog into the functionality this addon offers. Another tool that I have found pretty useful is the Windows Live Writer, which is a desktop app I use to jot down quick ideas and save drafts for later. Can check it out and decide for yourself if it works for you. I am definitely intrigued by the concept of scribefire and would give it a shot soon. Cheers, Gaurav
    • Drew says:
      There are some plugins out there for quickly grabbing related posts to add within your post content, however I can't remember any of their names and have recently not used this method, which I really should be adding some related links to the bottom of posts that have other similar posts and useful resources.
  36. Chuck says:
    Excellent article Drew. I love using software to blog. I have a specific set of software I use when I blog. Everything from several add-ons for my Firefox browser, screen grabbing image software, video capturing and even audio capture and editing for my podcast which I will start doing pretty soon on my new blog. But my favorite piece of software is Windows Live Writer. It's an excellent blog editor which also comes with many useful plugins that help greatly in creating and publishing my articles to my multiple blogs. Although Scribefire is cool, I prefer a separate blog editor, especially since I was also able to make it portable which allows me to work on my articles during my free time at work or at someone else's computer. I wouldn't mind making an article pointing to all the tools I use to post to my blog. Would be interesting.
    • Drew says:
      Always good to share your experience, I'd like to see that article. Somehow, keep me posted on that one. :D
  37. Jayant from TheAdMatrix says:
    These are the list of tools which can save a lot of time and headache to do some of the necessary tasks. There are many other tools which I use for my blog and are on good shape but the list you have provided are some of the crucial one everyone must use.
  38. Natalie says:
    Thanks for the tips re RSS readers, I was looking for a good reader so I will check them out. On the odd occasion, I also like to use Windows Live Writer. It is accurate, reliable and does the job.
  39. Tej Kohli says:
    Sorry , But I have little doubt, Using the too much automatic tools is good for our Blogs , I had read on many avenues that we have to avoid Automatic tools while blogging and try to maintain generic and genuine blogging
  40. Extreme John says:
    No doubt an excellent list of tools, I haven't really thought of using clippings before maybe I'll check that one out.
  41. Michael Aulia says:
    I wish there's an auto marketing software so we don't need to do the tedious work of marketing :) But I guess some are just have to be done manually like blog commenting or the forums
    • Drew says:
      Yes it's hard work, though eventually marketing should be an autopilot thing when you get an awesome audience. It's about growing a community as well as getting traffic, something which is very hard to do, but with the right marketing strategies and enough traffic it can work.
  42. illana says:
    Seriously nice post. Thanks for such a useful and concise approach!
  43. Devesh - Blokube.com says:
    Hey Drew, Awesome post dude. These are great softwares. Scribefire is new for me. Will Going to check it out. Thanks for sharing this great post. Keep up the good work.
  44. John says:
    Whoa. Awesome list of tools here. I think Clippings all by itself may shave 25% off of my workflow! Time to retweet...peace!
  45. Ingrid Abboud says:
    Hey Drew, I just love reading something that teaches me new things. You've got some solid tips here. I'm not familiar with Scribefire and Zemanta but once I'm done leaving you this comment, I will be :). I also hadn't heard of Screen Capture Elite but I use about 3 similar others that pretty much do the trick. Thanks for introducing me to these tools. I'll be looking forward to trying them out. Cheers
  46. Alex Wise says:
    Awesome. I'd never heard of scribefire or Zemanta before :)
  47. Ryan Biddulph says:
    Hi Drew, Super tips here. 2-5 are new ideas for me. As for 6 I've heard of password managers....time to get crackin' on purchasing one. I am not big on blogging software but understand how they can save time and energy. Some techie resistance here ;) I am huge on Google Reader. There isn't a better way to assimilate loads of blogging data in a quick and easy to access format. It's like a newspaper for blog readers. Thanks for sharing and have a powerful day! RB
  48. Drew says:
    BTW everyone if any of you interested in a free Pagemodo PRO membership we shall be giving one away any time now, to keep updated you can catch me and my blog on Twitter or Facebook. Should be giving this away in a contest hopefully at the weekend.
  49. Mike says:
    I don't know about ScribeFire and Zemanta addon before, so the first thing that I do after I read your blog post is to install them. Here's my thinking. ScibeFire is really cool for affiliates where you can paraphrase a text from an outside source into your blog. However, I'm so worried about exposing password in this add-on. This add-on hasn't been published on Mozilla so that's why I'm so concern about its security. If I just type in to the textbox and later, paste it into my blog, that should be more ok. Zemanta is awesome! It's the fastest way to insert images into blog post. Thank you for introducing, Drew!
    • Drew says:
      Sribfire is perfectly safe. And I just realized that I left one vital software out. Backupify: http://www.techiezine.com/backupify-review/ Which is a service for automating daily backups of your blog to an external server. :D
  50. Rahul says:
    great tools , how to tell you about this ? amazing tricks loved Scribefire so much , very good ideas !! thank You
  51. Michael Brandvold says:
    I would add Evernote and it's clipping extension is awesome. I can quickly clip a entire web page and save it in a blog ideas notebook for future reference.
    • Drew says:
      Yes good choice, I've personally never tried it, but I do use a range of addons for Firefox that give me all the clipping abilities I need.
      • Michael Brandvold says:
        Give it a try, with it being free and running on all platforms... Mac, Windows, iphone, iPad, Android and Blackberry, you won't find a better solution for having access to all your notes and ideas.
        • Drew says:
          I will have a look and see, thanks.

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