It’s now been well established that content marketing is an aspect of marketing that you need to direct your efforts towards, no matter how big or small. You do your research, find your content but how do you make it interesting and easy for your readers to digest? You have to make it exciting.
The content production phase is when you’ll find content creation tools the most useful. Employing a strategy to content creation ensures you’re creating interesting and easy-to read content. This is the difference between retaining readers and losing them. If you can gain trust with your readers and take them on a step by step journey through the consumer funnel, then you might even convert these into a sale. And that’s the whole point of this content marketing business in the first place, isn’t it? In this article, we explore the best content creation tools for creating articles, infographics and videos.
Content Creation Tools: Planning & Readability
Divvy HQ
Sometimes two heads are better than one. Better yet, a whole team of heads working on your content creation can do the world of good for your content creation efforts. Differing areas of expertise mean the more eyes that look at your articles the better. But back and forth emails and duplicate copies can make the simple idea of sharing and altering content between team members a rather confusing and time consuming task.
That’s where the content creation tool Divvy HQ comes in handy. The easy-to-use interface features a wide range of functionality including a dashboard with what’s due, what’s done, what the teaming is working on right now, shared calendars, content and social publishing and a parking lot for great ideas you can reference later.
The best part of Divvy HQ is that its workflows tools ensure efficiency and structure no matter what size your team is. Your team can use the content creation tool to mimic the production process
- Copywriting
- Review/edit
- Design/photo sourcing
- The final review and approval
You can create a custom workflow template if you find a more efficient method as well. Plus there are some small, handy features such as creating multiple tasks for each content item and logging hours. It’s a great content production platform if you’re producing a lot of content and working with multiple team members.
Cost: $25 per user
Hemingway Editor
It is unrealistic that every business will be able to afford a copy editor for their blog posts but we still want our content to be readable. At the end of the day, you’re the expert in your field but you aren’t a professional writer and editor as well. Your role is to give the best advice that you can. You might not have the skills of a trained writer or editor but Hemingway app is like your own computerised copy editor. As you write, the app grades your grammar to highlight complex sentences, hard to read phrases and heaps more. If you know your stuff but can’t always find your way with words this is the app for you.
Hemmingway Editor is different to any other spellcheck and grammar app you’ve used before. It isn’t about being 100% grammatically accurate. Rather, Hemmingway App measures the readability of your writing using the Automated Readability Index. Sounds complex but Hemmingway just looks at features of the text such as the length of sentences, phrases with simpler alternatives, unnecessary adverbs and the use of the passive voice to give your work an overall readability grade. Your aim is to score below a 10th grade level, which is achieved by reading through the constructive comments the app provides.
Maybe in the future you’ll have the super team of writers and editors for your blog, but until then, Hemmingway App is a good place to start.
Cost: Free
Content Creation Tools: Graphics
Piktochart
A picture can speak a thousand words – combine elements of text and some good looking imagery and you’ll be able to capture the attention of your audience. Including infographics in your articles is a fantastic way to break up text and summarise your point. Everyone is time poor these days and the internet only amplifies this need for speed and efficiency. Providing your audience with a quick visual summary of the kind of information they’ll gain from reading your article is not only convenient but will also keep them engaged and on the page for longer.
Piktochart is on off must have content creation tools because it offers fantastic visual templates that are fully customisable. Drag-and-drop functionality means that you don’t have to fiddle with high-tech software. The hardest task you’ll have is choosing the colours for your infographic. But that doesn’t mean that you aren’t spoilt for choice when it comes to the design itself. There are over 400 professionally-designed templates to choose from. You also have icons, images, graphics, charts and maps at your disposal. So get creative.
Cost: Free or starting from $15 per month for premium packages
Meme Generator
Your audience want you to keep them informed but it couldn’t hurt to make them laugh at the same time. Memes are the perfect addition to an article to break up chunks of text and re-enforce an important message from the text.
The Meme Generator takes the simple idea of captioning images and makes this more accessible and useable for everyone. You can choose their image templates or you can upload your own images. It’s completely customisable. Other customisation features include moving and resizing text boxes, changing colours and fonts or even drawing on your meme. They don’t take long to make but they can be very effective in delivering your message. You never know, maybe one of your memes will go viral.
Cost: Free
Giphy
Go one better with animated GIFs. Giphy is a fantastic tool that allows you to search thousands of animated gifs. One picture tells a thousand words, well how about an animated one? What’s more most social media networks will accept animated gifs. A great way to inject the fun factor as well as the viral aspects into your social media channels.
Cost: Free
Content Creation Tools: Video
Magisto
Movies and videos are a great way to keep your audience engaged from the get-go. Too often valuable content is getting lost in visually saturated social media platforms. Not only will video be a great addition to your social media pages but also a great supplement to your blog posts. Your audience is time-poor so they don’t always have the ten minutes it takes to read your article. They might have one minute for a visual summary. Then if the video appeals to them, they can bookmark your articles for further reading.
In the past, quality video production has been an expensive venture that not all businesses have the money or resources for. There are currently loads of great video creation tools out there now to combat this problem. Magisto is one of these. The tool allows you to turn your photos and videos into one professional video. You can choose from an array of themes, music and other customisations. With the Smart Movie Maker you can add your own custom branding, styles, captions and music. You really don’t have to be a computer or video editing whiz.
Cost: $9.99 per month for Business Edition
Shakr Plus
The list of video creation tools is endless. It’s hard to know which are the good ones and which are just the timewasters. Shakr is definitely a content creation tool you should have up your sleeve. There’s no need to download complicated software because the Shakr Video Editor can be accessed through your web browser. The process is simple – choose which video design you like, drag your own photos and videos into the editor and add your text. Once you’re happy with your video, you’ll be sent an email with the completed video so you can always find it again later. Simple.
There is a huge selection of video designs to choose from all created by professional designers that have worked for some of the bigger name brands such as Nike, Samsung and BMW. They’re always adding more as well so you’re sure to find new designs for a fresh new addition to your website, blog posts or social media!
Cost: Free with watermark over video, $65 per video, $99 per month for 5 videos or $299 per month for 20.
Conclusion
Content marketing and content creation isn’t just about doing your research and writing a long-winded article. Mix it up, get people excited and break up your text with something visual. Making your content easy to read – whether that’s with shorter sentences, simple vocabulary or visual aids – will make the world of difference to audience retention. You want them to stay on your page, read your information and direct themselves around to other pages on your website.
The journey doesn’t just stop here either. If you’re interested in how to get the best out of your content, have a look at other useful content marketing tools in our up-to-date Content Marketing Explorer.
