That’s the last post from the series The First 6 Months Of Blogging and it will be about tools I use when I blog. Every activity is enhanced by tools and blogging is no exception to this. Today’s post will be rather technical or at least strictly focused on the technical part of the whole blogging process. If you came here directly, you may want to have a look at the previous posts of this series:
The First 6 Months Of Blogging – Writing
The First 6 Months Of Blogging – Promotion
The First 6 Months Of Blogging – Money
Without further ado, let’s start.
iBlueSky
iBlueSky is a mind mapping application for iPhone. I already wrote a review for iBlueSky, so if you’re curious you can go directly to that page. I’m often stroke by some idea or thought in the middle of something: while I walk, while I exercise or while I’m reading something. Most of the time I have my phone with me and I use it to quickly capture that idea. Mind mapping is sometimes faster than linear writing and it let me empty my mind pretty quick. I guess around 30-40% of my blog posts are ideas sketched using iBlueSky.
Evernote
Another fantastic application I use for capturing ideas is Evernote. Evernote lets you capture text, audio or photos using your iPhone (or anything else if you’re using the desktop client). One neat thing about photos is that Evernote process them for writing recognition and made them searchable, which is extremely useful. Evernote is well deserving a post on itself, but until then, I will just emphasize on its versatility as a capture tool. The notes are stored remotely on Evernote dedicated servers and can be accessed with the Evernote desktop client for further tweaking. Most of the time I record voice notes using Evernote client for iPhone which I process every 2-3 days on my laptop.
MacJournal
I do all my writing using MacJournal. I already extensively wrote about MacJournal here, and if you’re interested in more details you can always check the post about power blogging with macjournal, GTS style. I use MacJournal not only for blogging but also for writing ebooks. There is a post which details my ebook writing setup, if you’re curious. MacJournal is also offered with a significant discount to DragosRoua.com users, so feel free to check the monthly MacJournal promotion.
Woopra
When it comes to analytics software, Woopra is one of my favorites. I’m a veteran of Google Analytics and although I highly appreciate the reports in Analytics, Woopra has several things that make it stand out. One of the most important would be real time alerts: you can set up as many visitor alerts as you can, based on a countless choice of parameters, and Woopra will alert you in real time whenever the criteria are met. I can see in real time my visitors from StumbleUpon, Twitter or Digg, for instance. There’s a 50.000 monthly impressions limits to any Woopra account right now, but even with 50.000 impressions is enough to get an idea about your blog traffic.
Thesis
I use thesis, a commercial framework for WordPress, or, in plain English, a commercial WordPress theme. The main reason for using thesis is its flexibility. Thesis features a hooks system by which you can greatly enhance your blog theme without compromising future upgrades. I already wrote about how you can customize thesis with some simple hooks for Twitter, Digg or StumbleUpon. Thesis also features an affiliate program for those of you who are interested in promoting it, you can sign up here.
Blog Audit
This is a wordpress plugin I wrote several months ago in order to assess my blogging progress. This plugin lets you create blogging goals like the number of posts you intend to write per day, per week or per month, the expected number of comments per post or per day and the expected number of pingbacks per post. After setting up your goals, you can asssess your pogress by checking up Blog Audit main screen and see if you met or not your goals. Blog Audit is in a very early stage, at the version 0.1 beta, this is the reason why I haven’t yet officially launched, but it can be downloaded if you want to play with it from a separate page dedicated to blog audit.
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Those are my main 6 tools I used in my first 6 months of blogging. There were of course some other plugins or experiments in using other tools but none of them lasted more than several weeks.
Interesting enough, when I intended to write this post, I wanted a short list of applications, nothing complicated. Call it synchronicity, but today’s assignment at the “31 days to build a better blog challenge” is exactly that: write a list post.
I guess I just did 🙂
Thank you for sharing your knowledge and the tools!
Very good list of must have tools for a blogger. But I use Windows and I think I can’t use the MAC Journal 🙁
Thanks for sharing this knowledge.
@Angela thanks for being here and I’m glad you found something useful 🙂
Awesome tips Dragos, thank you! I will continue to update and follow many of these.
Angela’s last blog post..Notes from the Surf XXXV
@Stephen Woopra is definitely a great tool for analytics, the same goes for Evernote as a capturing tool and for thesis as a blogging wordpress framework. Thanks for the comment 🙂
Dragos, the series was great! I use Thesis and Evernote. I have never heard of Woopra but since you and some of my other pals here are using it, I will definitely check it out.
Stephen – Rat Race Trap’s last blog post..To Think or Not to Think – Your Fundamental Life Decision
@nutuba well, if it’s only pen and paper that you use, you surely use them in a very clever way, based on what you write 🙂
@Kernunas thanks for the nice words. And for that ebook mention, now that you’ve said I will actually have to do it 🙂
This is a wonderful list of tools! It sure beats the pad of paper and pen that I often carry around. 🙂 I will look into each further — thanks for sharing!
nutuba’s last blog post..DC in a Day
A good, candid series, excellent reading for those who are looking to either start or improve their blog. You’ve hit the areas most people forget about, and I look forward to seeing the series as an ebook.
@Jay thanks for the nice words. Yeap, I look forward for my 1 years series too 🙂
@Jonathan thanks for the nice words and look forward for some feed-back from the blog audit plugin.
@scott look at the comment above, you can use them both. As for nozbe, I tested it a while ago. There are quite a few reviews of GTD software in this blog, you can have a look at the GTD category and see for yourself. The GTD software of my choice is OmniFocus.
@BunnygotBlog you can use Woopra and Analytics at the same time, there’s no problem with that.
@Rebecca thanks for the nice words and good luck with your blog 🙂
@Kendall thanks for stopping by! Me love the 31 days challenge, by the way 🙂
@Kikolani Woopra is great, I agree, as for the plugin, I really look forward for your feedback, is still in its early stages
Just a wonderful series! I wish it could keep going! Am looking forward to your 1 year series!
Jay’s last blog post..The Inner Noodle’s Guide to Dream Analysis- Step 8
Thanks for the information. Blog audit seems like a great app that I will have to check out. Thanks
Jonathan | EnlightenYourDay.com’s last blog post..Yes, I love all things Social Media.
Can one use google analytics and woopra or is it one or the other?
I am going to check it out.
You’ve touched on a few reasons why I want an iphone. Evernotes has always appealed to me. Have you ever had experience with nozbe? http://www.nozbe.com? It allows your to write out notes and create actions to do. it’s helped me out a bit but I feel there is probably something better.
I am going to check out macjournal just to see because I never know when something might be right for me.
I have heard good things about thesis…and a good theme can really help out a blog for sure. It makes the process nicer when the theme works well.
scott webb’s last blog post..8 Attributes of HDR Photographers
Well I use Google analytics but this is Thumper’s department. I will check them out though.
Great article.
BunnygotBlog’s last blog post..TV Fanatics, Shopping & The Anti-Aging Miracle
As a new blogger, these tips have really been helpful to me. I only started in January and I am looking already to expand into my own domain and make some money, so those tips were extremely interesting. Thank you for this series!
Rebecca’s last blog post..The Quote Game- Loyalty
Just popping over from the 31 day challenge! I love this post and its especially helpful since I’m in my first six months! I am excited about this mind mapping thing! How am I ever going to get anything done today?!
Thanks again!
Kendall
I just started using Woopra this weekend… so far, I enjoy seeing how many people are online now and where. And I’ll check out the blog audit plugin… sounds like a good tool for me, as I need to have some more even distribution between some of my categories.
~ Kristi
Kikolani’s last blog post..A New Concept for Kikolani
@Jonathan well that was fast 🙂 And I don’t mean just the comment but also the other moves 😉 I’m glad you found value here 🙂
Thanks for this Dragos,
I already use Thesis and Woopra. I will take a careful look at the rest as I trust your assessment and welcome anything that makes the process quicker or simpler. I have already benefited in several ways from this series and have been implementing some of suggestions. I appreciate your insight.
Jonathan – Advanced Life Skills’s last blog post..When Your Inner Voice Speaks Do You Listen?