If only running a blog was easy. If only it was just taking photos of coffee shops, liking things on Instagram, and talking to your stories. BAM. Instant followers, right? Well, today I am sharing the 11 100% free tools that I use EVERY STINKIN’ DAY. These are my holy grail gifts and will make your blogging life a smidge easier. More time to take coffee shop pictures now, right?

SEE MORE : 11 Texas Bloggers You Should Be Following

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1. Unum

This gets to be first because this gem is my LIFESAVER. There are some amazing feed-planning tools out there, such as Planoly (Austin-based woo hoo!) and Later, but UNUM is my personal favorite.

Why I Love It: UNUM allows you to move photos are to plan your feed, pre-caption them, directly upload to Instagram, schedule your posts so it will send you alerts for when, gives you amazing analytics into best posting times and hashtags, and (my personal favorite) allows you to edit within the app itself. 

UNUM is 100% free, however, for advanced features, you do have to pay. I used the free version for an entire year and just last month decided to purchase the upgrade. I personally feel it’s been worth it, but I totally think the free version is amazing too!!!

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2. Sortd for Gmail

If your email happens to be a total disaster pit like mine, this is about to be your godsend. This is a tool I recommend for bloggers AND for business owners. It allows you to sort out your inbox and emails into sections to better keep track of ongoing projects

Why I Love It: I am the WORST about answering emails in a timely manner, and then they get lost and I get angry people emailing me a week later (hi sorry yall). Sortd allows you to see your emails in a project-board format and move them along. I set it up with my to-do emails I have to reply to, then another bucket for ongoing collaborations, and the final bucket is for completed projects (like if I am waiting for a payment for a collab and don’t want to forget about it). 

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3. Canva

If you are ever designing marketing materials, business cards, infographics, pins on Pinterest, or literally ANYTHING you can think of, this is a tool for you. Canva is the ultimate design machine for people that need some design help.

Why I Love It: Templates GALORE. I use Canva mostly for creating Pinterest graphics that look appealing and generate clicks. It is incredibly user-friendly and the free features you get out of it are amazing. I’ve also used to create my media kit, business cards, infographics, and specific layouts for blog posts!

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4. Google Sheets

Y’all, I know this seems obvious, but you better be using those Google Sheets. Or really any/all the Google Suite products. No matter what device you are on or where you are at, it’s amazing to have this at your fingertips. 

Why I Love It: I use this specifically for tracking my blog and instagram analytics! I also LIVE on Google Sheets for my full time job. I actually designed the above Analytics & Organization Tracker that I am sending y’all FOR FREE. I just wanna spread that Google love. Click here so I can snag your email and send it right on over to ya!

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5. UnSplash

Let’s face it. As much as we all want to be amazing pro photographers, sometimes we just do not have the photos we need. For a FREE database full of insanely beautiful high-quality images, check out UnSplash.

Why I Love It: No weird watermarks. No bad quality images. Just gorgeous photos that you can use entirely for free. Such a lifesaver when I can’t find any of my own photos for what I need! No need to steal someone’s copyrighted images, y’all!

While this is entirely free, I highly recommend you credit the amazing photographers of these photos. They’re helping you grow, so you gotta spread some love right back!

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6. Google Keyword Planner

Okay, as someone who literally works full time in SEM, I pretty much am required to tell you how IMPORTANT having AdWords set up for your blog/business is. Even if you aren’t ready to spend money on search ads, you can pause the campaigns for now and just use the Keyword Planner that Google has.

Why I Love It: You could spend all this time with your Yoast SEO plugin adding in focus keywords, but if you are adding in keywords that don’t actually have search traffic then what’s the point?

Use this planner to figure out exactly WHAT people are searching for to better write & target. For example, I recently changed my Austin Guide focus keyword to “What To Do in Austin” instead of “Austin Weekend Guide” because the former was receiving thousands of traffic a month vs just a few hundred for the latter.

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7. FaceTune 2

We live in a world where our feeds & photos must be perfectly curated with absolutely NO flaws. While I do my best to ignore that and do minimal editing to my photos (in the UNUM app!) I still cave sometimes. FaceTune is my go-to for detail-oriented editing!

Why I Love It: Easy as pie to use. When I am trying to whiten an image (which is what I use this app for most) it is a lifesaver. It is the best at vamping up some colors, for quick retouches, and for whitening!

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8. Google: My Maps

This one is a little more specific to my brand and content, but I would be absolutely lost without it regardless. Google has the ability to create your own maps with segments + saved locations! A lifesaver when I am looking for a cute instagrammable happy hour spot or trying to find a mural.

Why I Love It: A lifesaver when I am looking for a cute instagrammable happy hour spot or trying to find a mural. I save multiple cities with their own maps segmented by Coffee Shops, Murals, Lunch Spots, Dinners, Happy Hours, etc! For bloggers that are always looking for a good photo-opp, this is a must! 

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9. iPhone Notes

Okay, I realize it sounds silly to include this but LET ME EXPLAIN. If someone told me I could only recover one app on my iphone I would 100% say my notes. Which is honestly kinda sad? But it houses EVERYTHING for me.

Why I Love It: I have all my saved instagram caption templates (specifically with line breaks), all my categorical hashtags, and spur-of-the-most post ideas. It also is home to my list of TV shows & when they come back on, all my travel recommendations from people, my random ideas, my gift ideas for friends, and SO MUCH.

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10. Google Analytics

Another gem like Google Keyword Planner that I will knock you on the side if you have not set up yet. No matter what you do or what business you run, this is vital. Use it to track how people are getting to your website, what your audience looks like, where people are going and how long they spend there, etc.

Why I Love It: This tells me where to move forward, from what posts get the highest traffic to where most of my audience lives. I know what pages have horrible bounce rates and what pages people love so much they continue to browse the rest of the site. How do you grow if you don’t know what you are doing well and what you can improve on? 

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11. Coffee.

Seriously. SERIOUSLY. Life changing. If you are a blogger or small business or human that needs to get more organized, I recommend you grab a nice cup of coffee right now because you are in for an adventure.

Check out my Austin Coffee Shop favorites.

Also, my Dallas Coffee Shops.

And my Fort Worth Coffee Shops.

Andddd lastly, Houston Coffee Shops!