Advice from the trenches: best productivity Blogger tools

OK, if you are on a Mac, you must use MarsEdit and other items in this list. But if you have Windows, then the image is much brighter.

The free Windows Live Writer is certainly the best blog editor available. I use for my blog and it is difficult to compare with MarsEdit, even if it is a commercial software. I recommend you search YouTube Live Writer reviews and tutorials, to see it in action. I consider the software to be among the best created by Microsoft and especially created for blogging.

Once again, if you are a Windows user, and SnagIt is perhaps the best screen capture (either photo or video) in software, even if I do not see this well-related blogs. In addition, it is not free.

I refuse to fully understand how the Gmail or Google Calendar fell into this list, because they are not linked to blogs at all.

Personally for me, the list of things that I use for blogging also includes HTML Editor (the blog is not only consists of positions, but pages also), service comments Disqus, some modules for the Chrome browser that analyse the performance of the site, the software development environment (as I'm changing the blog engine according to my needs)utility synchronization of files, software for the production of screencasts and a whole lot more, but they are not directly related to the blogs, so the list would be meaningless.

The list of tools depends on what you do. Basically, that the list should contain only the platform (WordPress, BlogEngine.NET or other) and the editor offline, everything else is irrelevant.

In my view, by using the right equipment is no less important - for example, I have a separate laptop for blogs, and I am extremely pleased that I have taken this decision, although for some people it would look like to an overcapacity.

Just my 5 c.

Better Buttons Part 2: Buttons as Brand Engagement Tools

Earlier today, the Ninja made an important point about buttons on your blog: he said that users have an expectation about the kind of response they get when they interact with a button.

In a world where engagement is the blogger’s ultimate goal, we can take this one step further. We can see buttons as the mechanisms by which users effect their engagement—whether they’re clicking Subscribe or Comment or Share or Download or Buy, users enact engagement on your blog using buttons.

This is, primarily, why it’s important to use the correct—honest—words on your button: as the Ninja says, verbage sets an expectation that your conversion process must fulfil.

Another consideration is usability. The poor average reading levels of many web users, coupled with the distractions and limitations we all face as we use the web, suggests that we should keep button text as straightforward as possible. There are also standard web conventions for many interactions, and it makes good practice to consider those, too.

But there’s another element of engagement that we should consider when we look at button text, and that’s your brand.

If buttons are the ultimate point of engagement with your blog, they may well be the ultimate point of engagement with your brand, too. So your button text needs to be honest, clear and brand-appropriate.

For most bloggers, honesty and clarity are brand values, so a button that invites users to sign up for an email newsletter with the words “Subscribe now” is probably pretty brand-appropriate.

But, depending on your brand and your audience, there may be other options, including:

Sign up nowSign me up!Subscribe meLet’s do itBombs away!

That last example is a real-world example: it’s from the subscription form on Ashley Ambirge’s The Middle Finger Project.

As the Ninja alluded in his post, the button text you choose will always be seen in context, so you can shape it according to the surrounding calls to action. That said, it’s true that readers’ eyes may be drawn to buttons before they’ve read any surrounding text, so there’s a very strong argument that your button text should make sense independently of that text as well as within it.

Of course, “making sense” is relative to your audience: what makes sense to you may baffle me. So while some may argue that a text input box followed by a button that reads “Bombs away!” is not prescriptive enough—not a strong enough call to action—Ashley may reply that her readers get it, well and truly.

Moreover, we can imagine that those who do get it also get a kick out of clicking a button that reads “Bombs away!” rather than boring old “Subscribe.” Maybe “bombs away” is within their own personal vocabulary; maybe it simply resonates with them—tickles their fancy, or gives them a chuckle.

I wonder how many people are smiling as they’re clicking Subscribe buttons on websites right now? If your blog’s users are having a positive physical response to your brand as they’re interacting with your blog, that may well dictate something about the emotional depth of that engagement, and its potential to evolve into lasting loyalty.

This isn’t to say that your button text should always make people smile. Obviously that’s not appropriate for all brands or contexts. But words do solicit feeling, so a consideration of users’ feelings—which will, after all, affect their eagerness to undertake the interaction your button is inviting—is important.

Would you rather:

Get started, orProceed?Buy now, orPurchase?Become a member, orJoin us, orCreate an account?

Your answer probably depends on the site’s purpose and brand. And what about your blog? Is the text on your buttons consistent with your blog’s brand? I’d love to hear in the comments whether you’ve considered buttons as a branding element.

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Blog Wise Tip 7: Use the Right Tools

You might think that, with blogging being a digital pursuit, the bloggers we interviewed for Blog Wise would be right up with the latest and greatest productivity gadgets, philosophies, and software.

They’re not.

Interestingly, almost every one of the bloggers we spoke with relies on physical productivity tools to some degree—pen and paper, wall calendars, and whiteboards.

“I actually have to have something visual to look at deadlines on a calendar,” says Amy Porterfield. “So what I have is on my wall in my office I actually have a yearly calendar, but it’s month by month, and I’ll put my deadlines in there.”

It seems that for many of us, there’s a sort of psychological benefit in having our to do list, for example, at our elbows, and separate from the computer in front of us.

In terms of digital tools, these bloggers stuck with the mainstream software options: Google Apps like Calendars and Docs, Basecamp, and Evernote.

“I write whenever ideas come to mind,” Jeff Goins comments. “I use Evernote a lot, whether it’s on my phone or on my laptop, and I’ll just write some ideas down or a quote or whatever, and a lot of that turns into articles later.”

Many bloggers simply used the apps that came with their computers—iCal, Notepad, or Word, for example.

“I use a lot of text documents,” Darren problogger.net reveals. “I have about ten open on my computer at the moment. They’re just plain text documents, and that’s where I put my to-do lists and half-written posts and that kind of thing.”

Email, clearly, plays a massive role in productive communications between bloggers and their teams; Skype does too, but to a lesser degree.

Though it wasn’t talked about in detail, the interviews conveyed the impression that smartphones have been a boon for most pro bloggers’ productivity.

As a storeplace for diary and appointment information, email access tool, alarm, and cache of contact details, the smartphone’s invaluable. It also makes working on the go achievable even in locations that don’t have wifi—and at times when you’re nowhere near your computer (or, for that matter, a notepad).

In particular, bloggers with families relied heavily on their phones. Heather Armstrong uses Google calendars on her phone. “I can make a change, my husband can make a change, and it immediately updates on my phone so that I know what to be prepared for the rest of the day.”

In his interview, Darren revealed, “My wife, she’s out for a walk at the moment—I texted her and said, “Please don’t let the boys in my room. I’m doing an interview now.’” Communication, he says, is critical to his productivity.

The other piece of hardware that got the thumbs-up? The tablet PC. “If anything pops into my head I have a tablet next to me [where] I just write it down so that I can forget about it in that moment and stay focused,” Amy explained.

What’s your favorite productivity tool? Let us know in the comments. And if you’ve downloaded your copy of Blog Wise and you’d like to share your thoughts on it, we’d love to hear them, too!

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