Here are my recommended tools & services for writing and editing, project management, content creation, publishing, and marketing.

[ Please note: Some of the links are affiliate links which means I make a small percentage of the sale if you buy through my link. I use all these services myself and only recommend those I trust, so I hope they are useful and you can always google them if you don't want to use my link. Thanks!]

Audio and video editing

• Adobe Premiere Pro
  • Adobe Premiere Pro is a video editing software developed by Adobe Systems and used in the post-production process of filmmaking and television production. It is widely regarded as one of the most powerful and versatile pieces of software on the market for professional video editing. With its intuitive user interface, advanced tools, and comprehensive range of features, Premiere Pro provides users with everything they need to create stunning videos. From basic editing functions such as trimming clips and adding transitions to more complex tasks like color correction and audio mixing, Premiere Pro has all the tools necessary for creating high-quality videos.
  • I use it to edit footage I capture and with its more advanced features I can’t accomplish with Descript.
• Artlist
  • Artlist is a subscription-based royalty free music library that provides high-quality music for filmmakers, video editors, and other creatives. It offers an extensive selection of original songs from a variety of genres, as well as sound effects and vocal tracks. With the subscription, users can access unlimited downloads with no additional costs. Artlist also provides access to its own online community where members can discuss their projects and share tips on how to use the library.
  • I use it to add music and sound effects for my podcast and videos.
• Descript
  • Descript is a powerful audio and video editing platform. It allows users to edit their audio and video recordings with an intuitive, natural language interface. With Descript, you can easily create professional-quality recordings without needing to learn complicated editing software.
  • I use it to edit and storyboard videos, edit audio, transcribe voice over, and highlights to repurpose as social media content such as audiograms.

Author website and email list

• Bluehost
  • Bluehost is a web hosting company owned by Endurance International Group. They provide web hosting services to individuals and businesses of all sizes. Their services include shared hosting, WordPress hosting, VPS hosting, dedicated servers, and more. They are known for their reliability and affordability, making them a great option for those looking to set up their own website or blog.
  • I use it to host my WordPress author website where I showcase my books, blogs, podcasts, and videos; plus, one way for people to get in contact with me.
• MailerLite
  • MailerLite is an email marketing platform that helps businesses manage and automate their email campaigns. It provides a range of features, such as customizable templates, drag-and-drop editing tools, and advanced segmentation options. With MailerLite, businesses can create targeted campaigns that reach the right customers at the right time. Additionally, they can track results in real-time to measure the success of their campaigns. MailerLite also offers automation capabilities that allow businesses to send automated emails based on triggers like customer actions or events. This makes it easier for businesses to stay connected with customers without having to manually send out emails every time. Overall, MailerLite is a powerful tool for businesses looking to streamline their email marketing efforts and engage with customers more effectively.
  • I use it to collect email subscribers, more specifically fans of my work who I entice with a reader magnet (free ebooks), book updates, promotional offers, and more.

Book cover design

• Reedsy
  • Reedsy is an online platform that connects authors and publishers with professionals in the publishing industry. It offers a variety of services, such as editing, cover design, marketing, and ghostwriting. Reedsy also provides educational content for authors to help them understand the publishing process and make informed decisions about their work.
  • Not so much as a tool but as a service where I work with a professional with book edits, book cover designs, and book formatting—more so with fiction than poetry books.

Book formatting and layout

• Atticus
  • Write and Format Stunning Books. Create professional print books and eBooks easily with the all-in-one book writing software. Atticus is a book formatting app designed to make it easier for authors to format their books for publication. It's a web-based application that takes the hassle out of formatting, allowing authors to focus on their writing. With Atticus, you can easily create professional-looking ebooks and print books that are ready to be sold or distributed. The app allows users to customize their book’s layout and design with features such as font selection, page setup, and cover design.
  • I use it to format my poetry chapbooks and any ebooks I create outside of what my book designer does.

Book summaries & study guides

• Blinkist
  • Blinkist is an app that helps people learn and stay up-to-date on the most popular non-fiction books. It provides users with quick, 15-minute summaries of the key insights from each book. Each summary includes a breakdown of the main points, key takeaways, and actionable advice. The app also offers audio versions of each summary for those who prefer listening to reading. Blinkist is an excellent tool for busy professionals who want to stay informed but don’t have time to read entire books. It’s also great for students who need to quickly get up to speed on a topic or subject. With its easy-to-digest summaries and audio options, Blinkist makes it easy to learn something new in just 15 minutes!
  • I use it to supplement topics I write and publish about human nature into my greater brand message.
• LitCharts
  • Litcharts is an online literary resource that provides comprehensive information about literature. It provides detailed summaries and analysis of books, poems, and plays, as well as literary terms and themes. The site also includes interactive features such as quizzes, timelines, and character maps to help readers better understand the works they are studying. In addition to providing a wealth of information on literature, Litcharts also offers educational resources for teachers and students. These include lesson plans, discussion questions, and writing prompts to help students engage with the material in meaningful ways. With its comprehensive library of literary resources and teaching materials, Litcharts is a valuable tool for anyone interested in exploring the world of literature.
  • It serves a similar purpose as Blinkist but with a focus towards study guides of fiction and poetry literature I supplement into my research when writing a book about a particular theme.
• SuperSummary
  • Supersummary is an online platform that provides summaries of books and other texts. It helps readers quickly get the gist of a book without having to read the entire thing. The summaries are written by professionals and cover the main plot points, characters, themes, and other important elements. They also include quotes from the text to help readers understand the material better. Supersummary is a great tool for busy readers who want to get a sense of what a book is about before they make the commitment to read it in its entirety. It can also be used as an educational resource for students looking for quick overviews of texts for class assignments or research papers.
  • It serves a similar purpose as Blinkist but also provides study guides of fiction and poetry literature I supplement into my research when writing a book about a particular theme.

Graphic Design

• BookBrush
  • Bookbrush is an online tool designed to help authors create professional-looking marketing materials. It provides a range of templates and tools that allow authors to quickly and easily create book covers, promotional graphics, book trailers, author websites, and more. The platform also allows authors to customize their designs with their own images or text, making it easy to create unique materials that represent their brand. With Bookbrush, authors can save time and money when creating the perfect marketing materials for their books.
  • I use it to create 3D book cover mock-ups for social media and paid ads images.
• Canva
  • Canva is an online platform that makes graphic design and visual content creation accessible to anyone. It offers a wide range of templates, layouts, and elements that can be used to create stunning visuals for websites, social media posts, presentations, and more. With Canva’s intuitive drag-and-drop editor, it’s easy to customize these templates to fit any brand or aesthetic. Additionally, users have access to millions of photos and illustrations from Canva’s library as well as the ability to upload their own images. By combining all of these features together, Canva makes it easy for anyone to create beautiful visuals without needing any prior design experience.
  • I use it to design graphics for social media marketing and other graphics related to my business plus hire a graphic designer to create graphic templates for me in Canva to reuse and repurpose it.
• Fiverr
  • Fiverr is an online marketplace that connects freelancers with businesses and individuals who need services. It's a great platform for freelancers to find work and make money, as well as for those looking to outsource tasks or projects. On Fiverr, you can find a wide range of services such as writing, graphic design, web development, video editing and more. The cost of each service is typically around $5 (hence the name “Fiverr”), though some services may be more expensive depending on the complexity of the job. Fiverr also offers a variety of tools and resources to help freelancers market their services and manage their business.
  • I use it to hire freelance professionals whether it's graphic design templates or developing a marketing strategy for my business. It’s a great place to delegate work I’m not highly skilled in and frees up my time to focus on other areas I’m good in, which is writing!
• Midjourney
  • MidJourney A.I. art is created by training AI algorithms on data sets of images or videos and then allowing them to generate new pieces of artwork based on the data they have learned from. These algorithms can be taught to recognize patterns, colors, shapes, and textures in order to create unique visuals that could not be produced manually. The end result is often abstract yet visually appealing artwork that combines elements from different sources into one cohesive piece.
  • I use it to create digital art based on phrase descriptions from my books to visualize the scenes in them.

Marketing

• BookFunnel
  • Bookfunnel is a digital platform that helps authors and publishers deliver ebooks to readers. It provides a range of features, such as automated delivery of ebooks to readers, customizable landing pages, and the ability to track reader engagement. With Bookfunnel, authors and publishers can easily manage their ebook distribution and ensure that their books reach the right audience.
  • I use it to host and deliver reader magnets such as my poetry ebooks and others.
• Publisher Rocket
  • Publisher Rocket is a powerful keyword research tool that helps authors and publishers optimize their book titles, subtitles, and descriptions for Amazon Kindle. It uses advanced algorithms to analyze the competition and suggest the most effective keywords for your book. With Publisher Rocket, you can easily identify the best keywords to target in order to maximize your book’s visibility on Amazon.
  • I use it to research which book categories and keywords my books can rank for and make it easier for readers to find plus Amazon ads.

Project management and notes

• Evernote
  • Evernote is a note-taking and organizational app that helps people stay organized. It allows users to create notes, store documents, and manage tasks. With the app, users can easily access their notes and documents from anywhere, as long as they have an internet connection. The app also provides features such as reminders, tagging, and sharing of documents with other users.
  • I use it to store and organize research, notes, highlights from articles and books that best fits in the format of notebooks.
• Google Drive
  • Google Drive is a cloud storage service provided by Google. It allows users to store and access files from any device with an internet connection. It also provides powerful collaboration tools, such as the ability to share documents and collaborate in real-time with other users. With Google Drive, you can store photos, videos, documents, and other files securely in the cloud and access them from anywhere. You can also store and back up your important files on the cloud so they won't be lost if something happens to your computer or device.
  • I use it to store larger files and use specific features like table of content in Google Docs and Sheets not well done in note-taking apps.
• Notion
  • Notion is an all-in-one workspace for note-taking, task management, and project collaboration. It is a tool that helps people to organize their thoughts and tasks in one place. Notion combines the features of a traditional note-taking app with the power of a productivity suite. Its intuitive, user-friendly interface allows users to easily create notes, documents, databases, wikis, and more. With its drag-and-drop capabilities and customizable templates, Notion makes it easy to create an organized workspace that fits your individual needs.
  • I use it for my weekly reviews, database features like kanban boards, relational links, create templates I can reuse for certain projects or tasks; also, where Evernote doesn’t have the same features as Notion.
• Todoist
  • Todoist is a task management and productivity app that helps people organize their lives. It allows users to create tasks, set due dates and reminders, and keep track of progress on projects. With the app, users can also collaborate with others, share tasks, and sync across multiple devices.
  • I use it to track tasks and the rewarding feeling of completing each task and not to remember what needs to be done tomorrow or in a few months. This is where I offload and structure my tasks.

Transcription

• Descript
  • Descript is a powerful audio and video editing platform. It allows users to edit their audio and video recordings with an intuitive, natural language interface. With Descript, you can easily create professional-quality recordings without needing to learn complicated editing software.
  • I use it to edit and storyboard videos, edit audio, transcribe voice over, and highlights to repurpose as social media content such as audiograms.

Writing and editing

• Google Docs
  • Google Docs is a free web-based word processing program developed by Google. It allows users to create and edit documents online while collaborating with other users in real-time. With Google Docs, users can create text documents as well as spreadsheets, presentations, drawings, and more. All of these documents can be shared with others for collaboration or just for viewing.
  • This is where most of the magic happens with creative writing, where I pour sweat and blood the bulk of my drafts and revisions inside Google Docs, a simple yet powerful text editor to write stories, blogs, scripts, etc.
• Grammarly
  • Grammarly is an online grammar checking and proofreading tool. It helps users identify and correct grammatical errors in their writing, as well as improve their overall writing style. The tool uses artificial intelligence to detect potential errors, such as incorrect spelling, punctuation, verb tense, and subject-verb agreement. It also provides suggestions for better word choice and sentence structure. With Grammarly, users can quickly and easily improve the quality of their writing.
  • I bounce between Grammarly and ProWritingAid for spelling and grammar check, Grammarly more so with nonfiction works like blogs; while, ProWritingAid with fiction works.
• Prowriting
  • ProWritingAid is a powerful online editing and proofreading tool. It uses advanced algorithms to check for grammar, spelling, readability, and style issues in any text. It can be used to improve the quality of your writing before submitting it for publication or other purposes.
  • I use it primarily for spelling and grammar checks of fiction works.
• QuillBot
  • Quillbot is an AI-powered writing assistant that helps people write better. It uses natural language processing and machine learning to suggest edits, provide grammar and spelling corrections, and suggest synonyms to improve the readability of text. Quillbot can be used for a variety of writing tasks, from academic essays to blog posts. It also has a range of features to help users find the right words for their message, such as a thesaurus and a dictionary. With its intuitive interface and helpful feedback, Quillbot makes it easy for anyone to create high-quality written content quickly and efficiently.
  • Rather than summarize or paraphrase long-text this is my go-to to handle all that dirty work for all of my writing.
• WordHero
  • With WordHero's AI technology, you can create original blog posts, social media content, emails, and more - in just seconds with over 70+ writing tools.
  • This is my writing companion when I’m struck with writer's block or generating story ideas, or even adding more details to my writing. This tool saves me a lot of time and offers new insights into my writing.