Whether you’re a beginner or a veteran, we all need apps to help us keep our lives together as content creators. I wanted to craft a list to help people on this path. Here are 6 FREE apps that every blogger needs that I use on a day-to-day basis to get things done! These are my bread and butter apps and I couldn’t be nearly as successful as I am without them! This is an update to a post I wrote in 2017 about other apps all Instagrammers should use. I updated it as I’ve grown a lot in 4 years and found some great tools!
Planoly
I wouldn’t be nearly half as far as I am today without Planoly. It’s the top app on my list because it basically runs my day-to-day Instagram life. Not only do I schedule all of my captions, hashtags, and make prep for my Reels there as well. While a screenshot of my Planoly might look…insane to the normal person, there’s a methodology to my madness with color coding and notes.
Inshot/Splice
Video content is king these days. It’s nearly impossible to truly edit in either Instagram or Tik Tok’s in-house editing software. I prefer Inshot, but I’ve also heard that Splice works really well! In Inshot, I can edit the video locally and save it, giving me flexibility and functionality. Extra bonus, by using third party apps, I avoid those pesky watermarks and can reuse the video on different platforms.
Captions
Being more accessible isn’t that hard and Instagram made it easier. While they have rolled out captions in Stories and IGTV, they haven’t for other video content. I use the captions app to caption my Tik Toks/Reels mostly. Adding captions is so easy with all of the automation these days. Plus, when I want to upload directly to my stories, I can do it directly from the app.
Maché
As I said earlier, video content is king. That being said, it’s super important to have custom cover images. If you saw my Listen to Black Women series or truly any of my Reels recently, this is how I make my covers! I use it for everything these days and it’s a super simple app to use!
Quickbooks Self-Employed
As a creative, I’m also a freelancer. While this QuickBooks software also helps with my work in politics when I work as a consultant, its primary function is for my creative services! I can manage taxes, submit payments for quarterly taxes, and manage business vs personal expenses for write-offs! Plus, I can manage my gas mileage through the app for all my trips. This function hasn’t gotten much use during the pandemic, but it will afterward! Until I move, that is!
Snapseed/Lightroom Mobile
Editing my Instagram photos to keep them consistent is tough. I use Lightroom in order to use my presets (which you can find in my Store and Resource Library) on all of my images. Then I make fine detail touches for individual images in Snapseed and remove the occasional leaf. I don’t use apps like Facetune because I don’t want to change how I look. These apps are tried and true and I love them.
I hope you enjoy these apps and if you use any of them, let me know! If you have any additions to my list of 6 free apps every blogger needs, drop them in the comments. I’m also sharing my favorite non-blogger apps in my newsletter this week, so if you’re interested in seeing them, be sure to sign up below!