Content creation tools keep you on top of your game. They help you create content quickly, easily, and consistently.
If you’re a blogger or journalist, content creation tools can help you to write more articles and blog posts than ever before.
Content creators, whether they’re journalists or bloggers, need quality content in order to keep their audiences engaged and coming back for more. They also need to create that content quickly so they can meet the demands of their clients or bosses. Content creation tools allow them to do both of these things easily and quickly so that they can focus on what’s most important: creating quality content for their audience. The best content creation tools also come with features that allow users to connect with other users around the world for collaboration purposes like co-authoring an article together using Google Docs or sharing images via Dropbox so that both parties can access them from anywhere on any device!
360 Content Creation Tools
Using the right tools can make content creation so much easier and more successful.
And while you can’t replace a solid content marketing strategy with tools, using the right ones can help speed up parts of the process, gain insights that you otherwise wouldn’t have, and help you create better-performing content.
But where do you start?
What are the best content creation tools and resources you should use to help you create better content? Or, at least, which should you be checking out that you have not already used?
We have rounded up what we believe to be the most useful and valuable tools and resources to help you choose the right one to take your content to the next level.
Specifically, in this guide, we will share the best tools and resources, including:
Content Research and Planning Tools
Written Content Creation Tools
Visual Content Creation Tools
Podcasting Tools
Video Content and Webinar Tools
Content Creation Resources
Use this list to find a new tool to try or a resource to check out the next time you create content and improve your marketing efforts.
Content Research and Planning Tools
Coming up with ideas and inspiration for your content is one of the most difficult parts of the process, yet one of the most important.
Creating content without a solid plan makes it harder to focus your efforts and drive success, but there are a whole host of tools that are perfectly suited to helping plan and research your content.
SEMrush Topic Research Tool
Content ideas example
Topic research is one of the most effective ways to quickly come up with ideas to explore further and to inspire your content plan. The SEMrush topic research tool makes it a quick and easy process to come up with a whole host of potential ideas around your core topic in just minutes.
Just enter a subtopic and see related articles and questions being asked in real-time.
Cost: From $99.95 per month (but this includes an entire sweet of content, SEO, PPC, and social media tools)
SEMrush Marketing Calendar
Marketing Calendar screenshot
Once you have identified the content that you want to create, you need to map out a solid editorial calendar and stick to it.
Planning a content strategy around a calendar will help you be accountable and take the steps needed to regularly drive growth. It is a great way to motivate you to keep on top of a regular publishing schedule, and the SEMrush Marketing Calendar is the perfect tool to help you to do this.
Cost: From $99.95 per month
SparkToro
Sparktoro
SparkToro positions itself as a way to “Instantly discover what your audience reads, watches, listens to, and follows.” When it comes to planning your content strategy, it is absolutely imperative that you know who you are targeting and what their interests are.
The more you can create your content around your target market’s needs and wants, the better success you will enjoy, and this tool crawls tens of millions of social and web profiles to share the insights you need on your audience.
Cost: From FREE for 10 searches per month to $225 per month for 500 searches
Google Trends
Google Trends example
Google Trends can help you to understand the popularity of a search term or topic amongst Google searchers (which, let’s face it, is the majority of web users).
Enter a query and see how interest has trended over time and use this insight to create content around topics that are quickly gaining traction (gaining a competitive advantage by being the first to jump on a trend) or, similarly, identify those that are likely losing interest.
Cost: FREE
AlsoAsked.com
Also Asked example
Google is regularly referred to as an answer engine, and this means that we need to be considering the questions that are being asked by searchers.
And one of the most effective tools that you can use to help you to find the questions that you need to be optimizing your website for is AlsoAsked.com, a free tool that returns the “People Also Asked” data, giving you an insight into longtail searches and, importantly, defines the relationship between topics and questions.
Cost: FREE
Answer the Public
Answer The Public
As we have already discussed, you should be optimizing for questions as part of your SEO strategy, and the more insight you have access to, the better responses you can give to the different questions that are being asked.
While AlsoAsked.com shows results from PAA, Answer the Public returns results from Suggest data, showing combinations of auto-complete searches.
Use the two tools together to supercharge your insights and research.
Cost: FREE
Written Content Creation Tools
When we think about content creation, we almost always jump straight to thinking and talking about written content. And while other formats are, of course, an impactful way to use content to drive marketing results, written content remains the default format for many businesses.
And, with that in mind, we have compiled a round-up of the tools you need to know.
SEMrush SEO Content Template
SEO Content Template data screenshot
If you are creating content to help you rank on the SERPs, you shouldn’t be writing blind. You need to know what is helping the top results to rank and take this into consideration when creating your own content.
The SEMrush content template can help you analyze the content that is ranking top for your target keywords and help you understand what you need to include in your own pages to compete.
Cost: From $99.95 per month
Grammarly
Screenshot of Grammarly results
It might sound simple but creating mistake-free content is harder than it sounds.
Grammarly can help you check for spelling and grammatical errors in your content while writing, as well as helping you to focus the tone of your content and check for plagiarism. The browser add on also makes sure you avoid typos in social shares.
Think of it as your helping hand to make sure your content reads well and is free from errors.
Cost: Free version and Premium $139.95 a year
Hemingway App
Hemingway app example
In their own words, “Hemingway App makes your writing bold and clear” and helps you make your content more readable and also shorten sentences.
Run your written copy through the web app, and in seconds you will see the opportunities to make it better for your readers.
Cost: FREE
Izitext.io
izitext.io screenshot
Izitext is a transcription service that’s used by transcribers, podcasters, journalists, and more. You can sign up for a demo today and learn more about their services!
Cost: FREE DEMO and further pricing may apply
Visual Content Creation Tools
Including visuals in your content can help to make it easier to read and, ultimately, more engaging for your readers.
But creating visual content is also one of the biggest challenges that many marketers face, especially if they don’t have access to a professional designer.
Canva
Canva
Canva is, without a doubt, one of the most popular design platforms out there and a tool that even the world’s least creative people could use to create stunning visuals across a range of formats.
From social graphics and blog images to infographics and more, if you need to create simple and effective visuals without a designer, you’ll love Canva.
Cost: FREE and Paid Plans
Remove.bg
remove.bg screenshot
Ask a graphic designer to remove a background from an image using Photoshop, and it will likely take hours using the lasso tool.
Use Remove.bg and you will be able to remove backgrounds using AI in a matter of seconds.
It’s as simple as that and can save you hours when cutting out images to use in your visuals.
Cost: FREE and Paid Plans
Piktochart
Piktochart
Infographics remain a popular way to visualize data and to use as part of your link building strategy (assuming, of course, that the data that you are visualizing tells a great story), but without access to a graphic designer, it is not always easy to design a visually appealing graphic.
And that’s where Piktochart comes in.
The tool is perfect for people with no design skills to create beautiful infographics that look professional and help elevate your business’s content.
Cost: FREE and Paid Versions
Giphy
Giphy screenshot
Over the last few years, GIFs have found their way into pretty much every brand’s marketing in one way or another, but the reality is that you don’t always need to be creating your own for them to be effective.
Whether you are looking for one to sit alongside your latest social post or to use in a blog, GIPHY’s collections of thousands and thousands of GIFS is certain to have something suitable.
Cost: FREE and Paid Plans
Nimbus Screenshot and Screen Video Recording Chrome Extension
Youtube video thumbnail
Screenshots and screen recordings are the perfect way to help your audience understand what you are trying to show them in “how-to guides” and the like.
But capturing these, especially if you don’t want to have to edit them before using in your content, isn’t always the easiest thing to do.
We love the Nimbus Chrome extension to capture both screenshots and recordings without hassle, and we are pretty sure you will grow to love it, too!
Cost: FREE
Unsplash
unsplash example
Images and photos can really help to make your blog content more engaging, and the reality is that not every marketer has access to a team who can take custom photos. While some have the luxury of a stock photo library at their disposal, not everyone does.
When you need a license-free image to use in your content, Unsplash’s library contains, as they claim, photos for everyone, something that we can confirm to be true!
Cost: FREE
Podcasting Tools
Podcasting has absolutely surged in popularity over the last few years, especially amongst B2B marketers, and it’s never been easier to create a DIY podcast and generate traction.
But having the right tools can really help you to maximize this channel.
Audacity
audacity screenshot
Ready to record your first podcast but not sure what tools you need to capture and edit your audio?
Audacity is an easy-to-use multitrack audio recording and editing platform that’s far easier than it looks to get to grips with.
In no time at all, you’ll be ready to hit record on your first podcast episode, and with the right software at your disposal, you’ll be able to edit out and little blips and background noises before exporting straight in your required format.
Cost: FREE
Alitu
aitu
You will undoubtedly want to spend your time creating podcast content and promoting it, not on editing.
But there as a clear need for your podcast to be the very best quality and edited in a professional way. At the end of the day, your audience will be used to pristine quality ‘casts and quite rightly so.
You can use Alitu to make better sounding podcasts without needing audio editing skills and experience. Simply load in your raw recordings, and the tool will help you to do the rest.
Cost: $28/month
Buzzsprout
buuzzsprout example
Once you have recorded your podcast, you need to host it somewhere. And Buzzsprout is a solid option to help you to manage and share your show with your listeners.
You will also gain insights into each episode’s performance, as well as the devices that they are using and where about in the world they are located — data that can help you to tailor your show’s content (and promotion strategy) to continue to grow.
Cost: FREE and Paid Versions
Scribie
scribie screenshot
While podcasts are booming in popularity, they are not for everyone, and only creating an audio version of your content could mean that you are missing out on engagement from your audience.
And for that reason alone, it is recommended that you transcribe your podcast episodes and offer a text-alternative. But doing this yourself is time-consuming.
Use Scribie as a cost-effective way to transcribe your podcasts quickly and efficiently, and spend your time creating content, leaving transcription to the pros.
Cost: From $0.10/min
Video Content and Webinar Tools
Webinars are more popular than ever, especially in a time when in-person events are off-limits. They are an effective way to engage your audience, invite participation, and reach new prospects.
And while a decent streaming session can’t go amiss, you are going to need to find simple and cost-effective software that you can use to host your webinar on.
But let’s not ignore other uses for video; understanding that it is still one of the more engaging formats of content that you can share on social platforms. The problem for many, however, is the investment needed to produce professional-quality video assets.
Again, there are tools that can help, and here are our favorites:
Webinar Ninja
Touted as “The Best All-In-One Webinar Software,” the reason why Webinar Ninja has become so popular is due to it’s simplicity.
Want to launch your own webinar? You can literally be ready to go live in minutes, and the platform now powers millions of webinars from companies like Podio, Baremetrics, and AppSumo, so you are in good company.
But one of the main reasons why it comes recommended is the extensive template library that it comes with, helping you to launch professional-looking sign-up pages without needing a designer and developer’s resources.
Cost: From $39 per month
Zoom Webinars
Youtube video thumbnail
Find us someone who isn’t familiar with Zoom by now. And while many of us have spent much of the last few months speaking with friends, family, and colleagues over the platform, there is no denying that it is one of the most popular options for hosting a webinar.
This is partly due to its sudden familiarity amongst pretty much everyone’s audience, but also the fact that it has a solid offering that comes with a cost-effective price tag.
Cost: From $40 per month, per license
Streamyard
streamyard screenshot example
While we have all recently come to love webinars, there has also been a huge surge in interest in live streams, and Streamyard is perhaps the top tool that is out there to help you to go live across Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, and other platforms.
Keep your audience engaged across any of the platforms that they follow you on, and benefit from a simple and straightforward solution that doesn’t need a complex tech set up for you to stream.
Cost: FREE and Paid Plans
content creation tools for digital marketing
17 Content Creation Tools For Digital Marketers
A year ago by Darya Jandossova Troncoso • 11 min read
As a digital marketer, knowing how to diversify your content format will help you step up your game in generating higher conversions and user engagement while creating great content at the same time.
There’s no doubt that the digital space is getting more crowded while countless amount of digital content is competing for readers’ attention every day.
However, not all digital marketers are also designers.
via GIPHY
The status quo of the marketing world cannot stress the importance of content marketing enough.
A solid content strategy with creative content ideas and long-term content curation is what you’ll need to keep your users engaged and eventually converted them into paying customers.
HubSpot, for example, offers immense content in different formats and topics, which is great for growing your customer base.
This rule applies across businesses, large and small. Furthermore, many retail businesses like supermarkets or restaurants use enticing visuals and alluring advertising lines to boost online sales.
To make your content stand out and improve your SEO efforts, knowing the right content creation tool to use for your content marketing strategy can enhance your business’s competitive advantage over other competitors tremendously.
Therefore, finding the right content creation tools with built-in templates or easy-to-use features are two of the deciding factors when it comes to creating unique visual content and marketing designs.
Below are 17 easy content creation tools for digital marketers to generate images, graphs, videos, GIFs, and more.
What’s best? No prior design knowledge is required!
Canva
VistaCreate
AdobeSpark
Jasper
Pablo
PiktoChart
Adobe Spark
Vectr
BeFunky
Pic Collage
Pixlr
Fotor
iMovie
Boomerang
Google Charts
Infogram
Meme Generator
Giphy
Important disclosure: we’re proud affiliates of some tools mentioned in this guide. If you click an affiliate link and subsequently make a purchase, we will earn a small commission at no additional cost to you (you pay nothing extra).
- Canva
Image Source: Canva
Canva is perhaps the most well-known content creation tool among digital marketers, content creators, and bloggers alike.
It offers plenty of content templates for various social media channels such as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and LinkedIn. If you’re looking to diversify your blog content, it even offers blog cover templates and flipbook templates for you to use.
What’s more, it allows users to create slideshows, PowerPoint presentations, videos, posters, and cards for all sorts of occasions. Alternatively, you can customize your dimensions if necessary.
One reason why marketers love Canva is because of its intuitive interface, which leads to an amazing user experience even for first-time users.
Most importantly, Canva offers free stock photos targeting varied industries. Simply type in the search term and grids of related images will show up.
Digital marketers can easily create well-designed images or videos with the help of Canva.
👉🏼 Check out our list of Canva alternatives.
- VistaCreate
Image Source: VistaCreate
VistaCreate is world-recognized design software used by 8+ million people who want to simplify their visual content building tasks.
It’s perfect for creating posts and stories of pre-optimized formats for all social networks, flyers, logos, thumbnails, infographics, banners, brochures, and the like.
Delivering around 50K+ ready-to-go design templates and 1M+ creative assets, VistaCreate makes it a matter of minutes to build stunning and professional visuals, which means digital marketers can save so much of their time and energy on the next content creation task.
Unlike some other similar tools, VistaCreate puts a huge emphasis on the productivity tools, for example, allowing you to erase an image background in a click.
You can also automatically align objects, simply apply typography styles, add animations, to name a few features.
Namely, you get started in seconds and customize your design in minutes thanks to the human-friendly, clean editor interface and tons of categorized and pre-designed patterns.
- Adobe Spark
Image Source: Adobe Spark
Adobe Spark, designed by Adobe Systems, is an all-in-one graphic design suite that allows digital marketers to design social posts, web pages, and videos.
One of the highly praised features is its video creation tool which helps turn your images into enticing videos within a few clicks.
Many marketers use Adobe Spark alongside Photoshop to create videos on Instagram or Facebook. Besides, Adobe Spark offers exhaustive articles for beginner-level users whenever they run into difficulties.
- Jasper
Image Source: Jasper
Having perfect visuals and bad wording around them can decrease the overall impression of your content. With Jasper, you’re able to support all your graphics with great-sounding copy and create your written content faster.
Automation of the content creation process allows for more time for other creative endeavors.
This AI tool creates 100% unique text for your website content, including video scripts, Google and Facebook Ads, and headlines. It has 50+ writing features and the possibility to write copy in 25 different languages.
- Pablo
Image Source: Pablo
Pablo is a content design tool by Buffer, a social media scheduling platform. That being said, Pablo is a great tool for creating attractive social media images.
It offers 25 different fonts and over 600 beautiful stock images to choose from while allowing for plenty of customization.
One of the greatest features of Pablo is its minimalistic design principle.
Users can simply follow an easy workflow and share the content directly on social media platforms or schedule it on Buffer once they finish the design.
Also, unlike other content creation tools that sometimes require users to log in, Pablo allows you to create an on-screen project directly.
- PiktoChart
Image Source: PiktoChart
If you’re looking to create eye-catching, high-quality infographics or presentations, give PiktoChart a try. PiktoChart is a web-based content creation tool that doesn’t require users to have extensive design experience.
Like most content creation tools, PiktoChart also offers more than 600 themed templates for users to choose from.
As digital marketing requires some data analysis work, PiktoChart can conveniently help convert your numeric data into visual charts that provide a more engaging story of your marketing efforts.
According to Google’s Search report in 2015, there’s already been an 800% growth in infographic searches. And the numbers are continuing to grow. Infographics will undoubtedly become another way for people to consume information in our fast-paced society.
- Vectr
Image Source: Vectr
If you’re looking to design logos or icons for your business or clients, Vectr could be the tool you’re looking for.
It’s a web and desktop cross-platform tool that helps marketers create zero-frustration and amazing designs for all social media platforms.
Most importantly, Vectr allows its users to save photos in SVG format (Scalable Vector Graphics), indicating that resolution won’t change when you zoom in or out of the design.
And since it’s a professional SVG creating tool, many users also use it when making web mockups.
- BeFunky
Image Source: BeFunky
BeFunky is another easy-to-use content creation tool praised by many digital marketers.
It offers features such as batch photo editing, collage creation, background removal, and more. It also offers templates for various purposes such as events, blogs, and social media marketing.
If you’d like to double-check for minor details on your image, BeFunky provides a scroll bar that you can drag and adjust the size of your design for more meticulous examination before publishing it officially.
It also lets you edit screenshots directly while using the tool.
BeFunky also offers a Chrome extension, allowing you to see a list of dropdown images on the upper left toolbar.
Once you click on the extension icon, it takes you straight to BeFunky photo editor.
In terms of pricing, it’s also very affordable if you’re running your own business and striving for visually attractive images for your content marketing.
- Pic Collage
Image Source: PicCollage
For content marketers, Pic Collage is one of the must-have content creation apps on their mobile phones.
Why?
It offers more than 60 templates suitable for all marketing platforms, including Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Email, and more.
Additionally, both Android and iOS apps are packed with over 500 stickers, templates, backgrounds, and fonts for users to choose from.
Digital marketers can easily create unique visual content within minutes and then publish them directly on social media.
Many also use Pic Collage as a tool to send images to their friends and family. Whether it is for personal or business use, Pic Collage has made the content design more interesting and accessible than before.
- Pixlr
Image Source: Pixlr
When it comes to online photo editing tools, Pixlr would probably be one of the top three content creation tools that springs to most marketers’ minds.
Pixlr helps you quickly crop an image, apply filters and add elements to your image to make it more visually inviting for your audience.
Its basic image editing features make it convenient when you have limited time for your content creation.
What’s even better?
This content creation tool comes in three types of formats: mobile app, web-based, and desktop tool version that aims to let you edit images seamlessly wherever you go.
- Fotor
Image Source: Fotor
Another photo editing tool that’s also easy-to-use is Fotor. Fotor focuses on three things: photo editing, design creation, and collage presentation.
Like Pixlr, it also offers an app version that lets you edit images on the go.
Many marketers tend to use both Pixlr and Fotor to compensate for missing features or filters to make their digital content stand out among other competitors.
Fotor also offers free downloads for Windows, Mac, and Webapps. In terms of pricing, Fotor costs less than Canva, which for most small businesses or individuals is a fairly reasonable investment to have if the paid version is considered.
- iMovie
Image Source: iMovie
iMovie is a built-in video editing software for Mac and it’s perhaps one of the most commonly known video editing tools for marketers worldwide.
The editing process in iMovie is a linear format, meaning you can insert music, image, or subtitles at any point of the timeline. You simply add another element on top of the other.
For videos that don’t require too many animation effects, iMovie is an accessible and simple software to use if you want to create video content for your online content marketing campaigns.
One thing to note is that iMovie allows only up to three layers of content accumulation.
That means if you want to add another element layer without changing any video editing software, you will need to export your current content into a video, open another project, and then add that fourth layer on top of the video you just exported – this could be a hassle for some.
Alternatively, you may consider the paid version: Final Cut Pro or other video editing software if you are looking to achieve more advanced effects in your videos.
👉🏼 Check out our list of iMovie alternatives.
- Boomerang
Image Source: Boomerang
On the other hand, Boomerang by Instagram is another rising video creation tool among digital marketers. It lets users record a series of images and play them in a loop.
The new form of digital content has helped many brands generate more engagement.
Some even use these boomerang real-time videos as their social media content with fantastic results.
- Google Charts
Image Source: Google Charts
Google Charts is a powerful tool for data visualization among digital marketers, especially when it comes to connecting with your real data using Google’s connection tools.
It offers interactive charts and highly customizable items, including lines, fonts, background colors, and many other features.
It’s a very user-friendly content creation tool that requires very little Javascript knowledge. And it’s completely free!
- Infogram
Image Source: Infogram
Infogram is another great tool that digital marketers use to turn overwhelming marketing data into understandable and visually attractive charts. There is a wide range of charts to choose from, such as pie charts, line charts, bar charts, and more.
You can even take your design to the next level by creating a story with animated objects.
You can easily add these beautifully organized graphs to your articles to add a more authoritative tone to your writing. Infogram is user-friendly and doesn’t require much of a learning curve.
So if you can’t be bothered with Excel sheets, simply create visualized data with Infogram. Make your marketing reports easy to read while sharing knowledge with your audiences at the same time.
- Meme Generator
Image Source: Meme Generator
Meme Generator, as its name suggested, lets you create your own memes in just a few minutes.
The tool offers over 500 images for you to choose from. Alternatively, you can also upload your own pictures.
There’s also a section called “Top Kek”, where users can check for top trending memes and get more inspiration for their next unique content.
Unlike other mobile apps for creating memes, Meme Generator is the most easy-to-use tool when trying to create memes using a mobile phone.
- Giphy
Image Source: Giphy
According to DigitalTrends, Giphy is known to be the default search engine for GIFs (Graphics Interchange Format).
Its library offers endless GIF ideas to inspire users. What’s best is that Giphy lets you create and share your own GIF creation online simultaneously.
You can create your GIFs via mobile or desktop applications, use them in your social media, or even email marketing.
Many marketers nowadays use Giphy to boost user engagement and higher conversion.
How To Use These Tools In Your Content Strategy 🧐
All the above-mentioned 16 content creation tools all come in FREE versions. Some even offer chrome extensions, web apps, and plugins.
While these free content creation tools already offer plenty of resources and editing options, if you’d like to access more quality stock photos or other advanced features, paid versions are also available.
The best suggestion would be to try the free version of these tools first, evaluate each tool’s functionality, and then based on your content marketing strategy select one or a few of the tools that best suit your requirements.
Here are two extra tips to keep in mind when creating your content.
First, always make sure the font on your images or videos are visible and distinctive, while Grammarly and Hemingway App are tools that can help you with spelling.
Secondly, always aim to generate unique content. Plagiarism is highly undesirable and could cause a PR disaster or worse revenue loss if your business is accused of violation of copyrights.
What is your favorite content creation tool? Are you using other free image websites other than Unsplash? We’d love to hear your thoughts!
Conclusion
Let us know your thoughts in the comment section below.
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