Think back to the day you decided to become a freelance writer. If you were like most freelance writers starting out, you probably thought that all you’d need was a solid writing program and a secure internet connection.
Typically, it doesn’t take new freelance writers long to realize that writing great articles is as much about resources as it is about spelling, grammar and punctuation skills.
Unless you were one of the lucky few, your early days as a writer didn’t rake in a lot of dough, so those writer resources had to be cheap… or better yet, free.
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If you are a successful writer who understands the importance of short and longtail keywords, high page rank linking, and SEO optimized content, you likely have some of your favorite tools installed on your browser or bookmarked for easy access.
Here’s mine.
1. SEOQuake
The SEOQuake toolbar and plug-in is an excellent free resource for a number of SEO practices.
From finding high-quality links to include in your optimized content to analyzing the keyword density of the competition, the SEOQuake toolbar delivers instant access to a wealth of information as you browse the web.
Once it is installed, you will immediately be rewarded with new information regarding your keywords and whom you should be linking to, such as page rank and the age of the website.
For the more advanced SEO user, you can also explore Google SERPs, perform a website SEO analysis, obtain a website’s whois information and much more.
You can also filter your results each and every time you search for information, thanks to the SEOQuake toolbar that will remain in the upper left corner to eliminate the links you have no intention to use.
2. Small SEO Tools Plagiarism Checker
With so much information available on the Internet about your topic, there’s a good chance that some of your word choices may have already been used by other writers. With the plagiarism checker at SmallSeoTools.com, you can paste your article into the blank field and allow this free tool to score your article for originality.
The image below shows an excerpt scoring 100 percent in originality. However, if there had been any commonly used phrases or duplicate content found by the free plagiarism checker, the line would have been highlighted with red rather than green. By clicking on the plagiarized content, you will be taken to the original source.
3. CoSchedule Headline Analyzer
If you aren’t familiar with some of the great things happening over at CoSchedule, then you may not have heard of their free Headline Analyzer tool. As you probably already know, your article or blog post title is one of the most important aspects of the entire post. This is because your headline may be the only impression that you get to make on your perspective audience.
“On average, 8 out of 10 people will read headline copy, but only 2 out of 10 will read the rest. This is the secret to the power of the headline, and why it so highly determines the effectiveness of the entire piece.”
Brian Clark, CopyBlogger
The CoSchedule Headline Analyzer scores your title based on a number of factors, such as unique and emotional word usage, length, search engine optimization and sentiment.
With its unique scoring system, you can ensure that your title stands out from the crowd and is designed to generate interest and promote clicks.
#4 – Hubspot Topic Generator
Hubspot’s Topic Generator is another great free tool when you have keywords but lack a clear topic and title. This topic generator allows you to enter up to 3 keywords (nouns) from which it generates numerous blog post titles.
This is a great tool for writers because you can use a title exactly as suggested or use it for inspiration in creating your own topic and title.
The three keywords chosen for the results below were: freelance writers, content creation and free writing tools. With the right results, you will have enough titles for an entire week.
#5 – Google Keyword Planner
Determining the best keywords for a website or even just a blog post can be a serious undertaking. In order to help things along, the Google Adwords Keyword Planner is a great free tool that cal tell you the search volume for a particular keyword, related keywords and the CPC (cost-per-click) of the keywork in question.
It is a great way to determine what the most competitive keywords are, find long-tail keywords that are easy to rank for and hone your keyword strategy.
These are five go-to writing tools used by professional writers who not only appreciate ongoing collaboration, but also want their clients to see positive results with the content provided.
There are still many other free writer resources that deserve to be mentioned, providing aid to freelance writers on every facet of content creation from idea planning to sharing.
Which free tools can you add to this list? Please share in the comments section below.
