Five Content Creation Tools To Boost Your Productivity Right Now

The first one will change your life as a content creator.

Content creation is the job of the century.

For the first time, a few people escaped employment and started working by themselves. And since they were the first to come, they defined the rules of content creation and exploited them as much as possible.

Then, more people and companies joined the creator’s economy too. The quality rose. And today, we are experiencing an abundance of content like never before. So it became even harder for new writers and video makers to shine.

When I started writing online, I didn’t know anything about online businesses and how to build one. I opened a Word document (not even Google Docs) and started rambling about my passions.

With time, I discovered the more you produce, the faster your audience grows. And productivity is essential for building a fanbase. And I started improving my workflow, searching for the best software that could help me produce more content.

So here are five content creation tools I use to boost my productivity.

1 — Write Your Article With Effie

Conciseness and clarity are two of the most precious achievements you must reach as a beginner content creator. And they all require strict organization.

If you are confusing, your audience will drop your content and search for somebody who can explain things better. And if you are not concise, you will bore your readers with useless ideas and examples. So, again, they will drop your content.

Effie is the latest of five tools I used to boost my productivity. But it helped me improve my articles more than I expected.

With Effie, I can build an outline that helps me organize before each article. So I can have a clear idea of what to say, and I don’t add useless information that might bore the reader.

Also, I can transform the listed outline into a mind map that I can export or review while writing the article. So besides being more precise, I am also more productive. And the transformation process is automated.

You don’t need to create the map piece by piece. You can write a list of concepts, click a button, and the magic happens.

The editor works with markdown language, a universal and easy-to-learn standard that allows you to structure your text for exports or further editing.

You can test it for free. And it also synchronizes your pieces between all your devices — basically, it is an improved Google Docs.

2 — Build An Editorial Calendar With Notion

Planning content is another problem that might slow you down if you are a content creator. Even if quantity is the key to success, you can’t publish your posts when nobody listens, or you will lose most of your potential. So build a content calendar to keep track of everything: status of the article, publication date, article URL, target audience, etc.

The first time I built a content strategy, I used a task management software called Ora. But I soon discovered that too much color distracts you from being productive. So I opted for a lighter but more powerful software: Notion.

In Notion, I build my personalized editorial calendar for my blogs, newsletter, and other minor side projects. And thanks to its versatility, I can structure my content database however I want and create many views based on what information I need.

For example, I have an overview to see general information on all my articles. But I can also use the management or timeline views to check the state of my articles or their publication schedule. And this helps me keep track of everything I need and enhances my productivity.

3 — Schedule Social Media Posts With Buffer

One of the five content creation tools that can boost your productivity even better is Buffer.

Before using it, I had an infinite list of social promotion posts I needed to publish, but I couldn’t be consistent. Managing a social media account requires a lot of time. And if you are focused on productivity, you may not have that much.

But with Buffer, I can manage my promotional posts easier:

• Consistency is not a problem anymore because I can set a time slot to schedule content for the entire week.
• It allows me to publish posts for audiences with different time zones (currently, 70% of my followers live in America while I live in Italy).
• And I can check all my social media posts in one place.

4 — Create Graphics with Adobe Illustrator

Personalized infographics are an efficient tool to catch the attention of your readers. And if you create something they have never seen, you will gain their following or even convince them to subscribe to premium content.

Adobe Illustrator is one of the best content creation tools to make graphics and boost your productivity. And even if you are a newbie, YouTube has many tutorials that teach you how to do anything. So it has a mild learning curve.

The only downside of this software is that you need to pay for it. So you can start with free solutions like Inkscape, if you want, and then make an upgrade. But if you are serious about creating graphics for your audience, Adobe Illustrator is the best.

5 — Edit Your Article With Grammarly

Writing in English is challenging for a foreign author. I studied the language at school, but I never practiced it too much before starting my blog. So even if I knew most of the grammar rules, sometimes I still make mistakes with complex sentences, verbs, or words.

But even if you are not a foreign writer, you don’t want your article to contain stupid grammar errors you could have prevented. So Grammarly is the perfect tool to avoid these mistakes, reduce your editing time, and boost your productivity.

Extra Tools

Since I started my writing business, I haven’t only discovered five content creation tools to boost productivity but many more.

For example, you can write your content with Google Docs. Trello is another option for creating an editorial calendar. And you can schedule some of your social media content with Facebook Creator Studio.

For infographics, you can use Affinity Designer, Autodesk Graphic, or even Canva. And Pro Writing Aid is one of the best alternatives to Grammarly.

The software you decide to use does not matter. But beware of the distractions every tool offers. Minimalist designs help control procrastination and boost productivity, while numerous features will distract you.

Photo by Mateus Campos Felipe on Unsplash