Serious bloggers understand that digital marketing is exceptionally diverse and can get pretty complex.

More importantly, the amount of time needed for marketing a website can have you wringing your hands in sheer frustration and panic.

That’s why keeping abreast of the latest – and best – online tools is crucial.

This list of 8 crucial online tools for serious blog marketers will make your life easier, and give you a better return on your time.

Set up email marketing and landing pages: GetResponse

All your content is for nothing if you don’t have a Call to Action on your post. There must be one action your readers should take for each of your webpages.

As a marketer, you need to keep growing your email lists, because this is where the money is. Your Call to Action can be anything, but most times it should be linked to an email marketing vendor where you manage your lists.

Now, GetResponse is not only an email marketing software but rather a complete marketing automation solution that also offers a landing page service. I recommend them for virtually any marketing automation task, including email automation.

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And on the topic of email marketing, this post by Sujan Patel offers relatively unheard-of email marketing tools to give your efforts a boost.

Get more traffic and viewability: SEO Analyzer

If you’re struggling with SEO, competitor analysis and content marketing, then SEO Analyzer is a godsend for you. SEO Analyzer is a free tool that scans websites and then suggests tweaks to optimize your website for search engines.

What’s more, you can also use SEO Analyzer to determine what are the top performing articles in your website so that you can repurpose them as guest posts or add CTA’s in the content. You can also get ideas for best performing content in your website.

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Lastly, SEO Analyzer also has an automated checklist that prioritizes various marketing tasks for you. Whether they are SEO, traffic, content or sales related, the tool will analyze them and suggest a plan of action with a breakdown of priorities.

Do keyword research: Serpstat

In terms of keyword research, Serpstat is similar in many ways to Google Keyword Planner, with a few exceptions like being able to filter keyword suggestions by “only questions” so that you know for sure what your target persona wants to know.

Unlike most keyword tools, with Serpstat you can also perform keyword searches for elements like images, videos, news, etc., and a whole lot more.

It also specializes in competitor keyword research. The best thing about Serpstat is that it’s free for up to 30 queries a day.

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If you’re new to keyword research, find out how the experts do it.

Get blog content ideas: Quora

Serious blog marketers understand that content marketing is not about simply throwing content on a website in order to rank higher with search engines.

Instead, they understand that while each post needs to be optimized for SEO, it should also – and perhaps foremost – be a carefully constructed piece of information that adds value to the lives of their target persona.

Using Quora is a novel way to find out what your target persona cares about, and about what they are looking to find out. Quora is a question and answer forum that is visited by thousands of people each month.

To use Quora as an online content tool, simply do a search with the keyword of your choice, and see the related questions that result.

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Take screenshots: Nimbus

Peep Laja, website conversion guru and founder of ConversionXL, says “if you’re using (stock images of) shiny people and suits shaking hands, you’re stupid and you think your customers are too.”

If you’re a serious blogger, you’ll know that adding stock images to blog posts for the sake of an image, can actually damage your reputation. Images need to be relevant and support the content.

For example, if I didn’t use Nimbus to add screenshots to this blog post, I would not have been able to provide better value by explaining and showing how all these online tools work.

Take a screenshot, add shapes, text etc. to illustrate a point, and then save it as an image.

Nimbus can be used with all browsers as an extension.

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Customize images/create CTA’s: Canva

I don’t write any blog post without using Canva. It’s a super easy way of creating images, or customizing them. Use a template (anything from email headers to blog post titles) or design an image from scratch.

You can also use Canva to create a Call to Action for your blog post.

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Compress images to reduce blog speed: Optimizilla

Did you know that almost half of your visitors will abandon your website if it takes less than 2 seconds to load?

So although your blog content is important for SEO, your website’s speed is just as important.

I’ve found that the majority of small businesses that blog, do not compress images, and as a result, their website loads slower.

If you use WordPress, you can add a plugin like Smushit, or simply use Optimizilla to compress them before uploading to your website.

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See what works by measuring results: Truconversion

One of the most neglected areas of blogging is measuring what’s working and what’s not. With Truconversion, you simply stick a code on your website to start tracking your visitor’s behavior.

They offer other online tools like heatmaps and mouse move maps and step by step guides to help improve your website. They also integrate with many 3rd parties.

Truconversion offers a free 30 day trial.

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The bottom line

There are a lot of great online tools available. The trick is to be sure to put them to use. Click through and take a look at some of the tools outlined above. But don’t forget the most important part — be sure to put them into action.