Blogging 101: Free, User-Friendly Tools to Make Your Blog More Awesome

Recently I’ve been making little improvements to my blog because I’ve had a wee bit more time.  Things like updating my header, adding social media buttons, creating a new blog button, rearranging the layout, adding advertising, changing the font and background.  So just a couple of things….that probably took longer than they needed to because of this little thing called perfectionism.

THEN when I changed the font and background, the original share buttons I had on each post disappeared, so I had to figure out how to add new ones in.  There went a whole day of productivity.

Even after all of that…I still have more things I want to update and organize!  It truly is a never-ending project.  Once you get through a round of updates, you read a friends blog and see something you MUST HAVE on your own blog because as in everything, the grass is ALWAYS greener over there.

Thus starting the whole process over again.

Of course with more time, the phrase less money usually follows.  Unless you are truly fortunate, there is always an opposing balance in life between money and time.

Since I am on a limited blogging budget (like zero aside from conferences or blogger get-togethers), I’ve learned to do most things myself for free, especially after I naively got a quote from someone who would update my blog….yeah I don’t have hundreds of dollars at my disposal so I will piece it together myself, thanks.

Fun side-note: you might look like a tech whiz after all of your improvements to those friends who haven’t seen this post.

After going through and creating a blog graphic, all you have to do is save this to an internet picture folder such as google or picasa, right click with your mouse to copy the “photo source,” then paste it into this handy-dandy blog button creator.  I forgot over and over (and spent hours trying to re-figure out) how to find the photo source part, so just remember: right click on the photo (if it’s in google/picasa).

href="http://www.semihealthyblog.com/" title="Diary of a Semi-Health 
Nut" target="_blank">src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-ntfi1be0r3c/UVDV6_wgE9I/AAAAAAAALDQ/5GxBFAMSaPI/s200/blog+button+i+was+featured+on+shn+favorites+2.jpg"
 alt="Diary of a Semi-Health Nut" style="border:none;" 
/>

If you want, I can do a post on how to create a button.  I’m no graphic designer, though so was a lot of trial and error, but at least I figured it out!

This is something I have been putting off…um…two years?  For some reason I thought I would have to design my own buttons then figure out how to put a link to the image or something super techy like that.  Then I decided on day to just google it and I found this amazing site! 

These handy buttons should be placed by a picture of your face so that all of your die hard fans can stalk you in every single way possible.  (Right…?) 

The only thing with this site was that not all social media buttons are available for each style (I wanted smaller buttons, but Pinterest wasn’t available).  I also wasn’t able to find one with an Instagram share button.  Alas, free is free!
(UPDATE: This site now requires a “donation” but $1 is enough to get your own set of buttons…much better than custom buttons I’ve seen at $5 a button.)

After my whole debacle with changing my background which then killed my previous share buttons (the buttons found at the bottom of each post to share on social media), I stumbled upon this site and was so relieved to have share buttons again.

A huge part of blogging is social media sharing and awkwardly self-promoting your blog.  You can share the post yourself or use the Pinterest button to self-promote the pretty pictures.  Like I do.  Every day.  (Just kidding.  Kind of.)  The best though is when a reader loves your post so much they frantically look around for these little icons so they can share it with all of their friends.  Make sure to do this on other blogs to make their day. 😉

If I could write songs, or sonnets, or poems, I would write one to PicMonkey.  Instead I will write a paragraph about it in a blog post.

I use this life-saving site for all of my photo editing, graphics, collages, blog headers, buttons–everything.  It is incredibly user-friendly and has so many options it will blow your mind.  I use the free version, but for a small fee each month, you can have access to even more cool fonts and cutesy pictures.  When I get a job, upgrading PicMonkey is on my wish-list.  (If you’d like me to write a whole post on how I use this site, I will gladly do it.  If you couldn’t tell.)

This site is also in my leechblock sites (I instituted a time-limit) since I could spend hours playing around with all of the features.

If you only have a short block of time that you can promote yourself and/or other blogs, get this tool so that you can spread out your promotions throughout the day.

This is much better than tweeting a dozen times in a row.  You might get on someone’s nerves and they will unfollow you OR you just won’t be reaching all of your followers since not everyone is (allowed to be) on social media all day long.  There is also a phone app, which is the same basic principal–spreading the love throughout the day and not all at once.

Would you benefit from further explanations or tutorials with anything listed above?  Let me know and I can create a post! 

Also get SUPER excited for more Blogging 101 posts from some bloggers I idolize (okay a strong word but you get my point) and love!  I have at least ten gals who will be writing up posts about all areas of the blogging arena and I cannot wait to learn more from them!

I am also thinking about hosting a link-up of blogging tutorials at some point….stay tuned for that!  And get your blogging skills to work blogging about blogging to link-up to my blog! 😉

Do you have any tips or tricks to share?  
Any sites or tools you SWEAR by?