Welcome to our Resource section, a curated list of all the best blogging tools and websites that I strongly recommend.
These are the most significant tools for establishing and optimizing an online business successfully.
I have personally tested every recommendation on this post.
Many of these listed resources are incredibly a must-have resouce in running my business.
Before moving forward with this amazing list, an important disclosure:
Some of the links mentioned below are affiliate links, which means that if you choose to make a purchase, I will earn a small commission. This commission comes at no additional cost to you, rather even if you decide to make the purchase by directly going to these product websites you will pay the same amount. Please understand, that I have experience with all of these companies, and I strongly recommend these websites dues to great assistance provided by them in flourishing my business, not because of the small commission I make in case you decide to buy something. Kindly do not spend your money on these products, unless you feel you need them or that they will help you achieve your goal.
The Essential Tools
These are the absolute must-have tools. I son't know where my business would have been without these fantastic tools. Just with these tools, you will be able to create an extremely fast and money making site.
SiteGround: #1 for Hosting Websites and Blogs
I have tried and tested almost all hosting companies over the period of 7 years, be it Godaddy, Bluehost, etc., but shifting my website to SiteGround was the most satisfactory decision, I have made.
My website's loading speed had almost doubled and the traffic increased by 176% just by shifting to SiteGround. That's the power of this amazing hosting.
Today majority of my websites are hosted on SiteGround.
You can host multiple websites on their Grow big plan (which, is quite affordable as, the prices are best in the industry) and thus, you don't need to pay more for hosting when you are ready to start another website. Almost all major and popular bloggers use SiteGround and recommend this company to all.
Check my comprehensive review of this site here
Thrive Themes Membership
You will be surprised by the quality delivered by Thrive Themes.
They provide me with themes, lead generation plugins (popups, in post call to action etc), landing page creation etc. Investing in Thrive membership is one of the best decisions in my online money making journey.
I will highly recommend you to become a member and get the benefits of all these fantastic plugins at 1/20th the cost
This blog uses Rise Thrive Theme and you can see the results yourself. Packed with amazing features (makes so many extra plugins redundant), lightweight, ultra-fast, and many more features.
Domain name with hosting
The first thing before starting a website is the correct Domain name, right.
The best place to register your domain name is along with the hosting. but if you only need the domain name then you should definitely buy the domain name from Godaddy.
Although if you are starting your first website then don't register the domain name separately, rather buy a below mentioned hosting like SiteGround (recommended) or Hostgator, This way you don't have to learn the technicalities of connecting a domain name with the hosting (this can be complicated for beginners).
Adobe Creative Cloud
Well no video editing is complete without Adobe CC. You can pay monthly or yearly and you get access to all adobe products.
It works seamlessly. My entire video editing team use Adobe CC to edit videos for all our channels
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WordPress Themes and Plugins
Once you have your site ready, you will need many tools for purposes like: collect of emails, making your content look great & beautiful as well as to make your site look like a pro site. Here are my best recommendations:
Although, if you have purchased the Thrive membership (recommended) then you dont need to buy individual plugins from Thrive as you get all the plugins for monthly subscription.
Thrive Leads
Thrive Leads: Best e-mail Capture plugin
My Email Capture statistics has increased by 95% once I moved on to Thrive Leads. Earlier I was paying more than $200/annum for Leadpages. Once I started using Thrive Leads which cost only $67/site (yes, no annual fees, just one-time small payment for amazing returns later) I have never been happier
Packed with so many features that even you will be amazed by the quality of this plugin. The price is so small for the features and deliverables provided by this specific site that you will love it.
An email list is the most important asset for any blog or online business. Even an email list of 1,000 people can help you make more than $10,000 /annum (yes, I have done it ). For me, this investment of $67 is nothing compared to the returns I make from my email list
Thirsty Affiliate
As I have mentioned multiple times before, that affiliate marketing makes a big portion of my monthly income.
One plugin that is a lifesaver when we deal with affiliate marketing is Thirsty Affiliate Almost all pro affiliate marketers use this link cloaking and affiliate link for management plugin.
It has both a free and a paid version. If you are willing to start a blog, you need to use this plugin.
Other SEO Tools I Use
Apart from Ahrefs and SEMRush, here is a list of all the other tools that will help you scale-up your online business.
I use them daily and they have helped me a lot.
- Google Webmaster - Free - Must use
- Google Analytics - Free - Must use
- Yoast SEO - WordPress Plugin - Free - Must use
- W3 total cache - Must use -WordPress Plugin
- Cloudflare - Free CDN
E-mail Marketing Tools that Help Me
Reach over 100,000 people everyday
Aweber
I have tested many companies, and honestly, almost all email marketing companies are good. So I won't state any favorites here.
I prefer AWeber here due to its simplicity and easy navigation management.
Aweber gives a free trial till 500 email subscribers.
For a beginner, Aweber is fine. If you are looking for a more advanced level of e-mail marketing with advanced segmenting, tagging, etc., then check out Drip.
Drip
If you are looking for more advanced features like behavior-based emails and advanced email workflows, then you must try Drip.
Use this if you are already familiar with email marketing and have been doing it for some time. It is an advanced software with high operability and maintainability.
You can use either of Aweber or Drip, I have used both, and both of them have given me good results.
If I have to choose, my recommendation will be AWeber.
This is the ultimate tool that has made me thousands of dollars. HOW?
Well, I use this tool for building backlinks, sending thousands of emails each month, managing the replies and so much more.
All my SEO efforts are dependent on this single mind-blowing tool. A must have if you want to focus on SEO of your site.
If you are doing email marketing then you need a domain level email address for better deliverability and amazing branding.
Just like I have an e-mail address contact@ankuraggarwal.in , you can also have a domain level email along with 100s of amazing features when you use Gsuite. Use my promotional code FDELMRFYDREYGUC or W33YQEW76F7PVHE and get 20% off on your first year.
Social Media Management tools
This is the tool of choice for millions of newbie online bloggers or basic online website owners.
When I used Buffer before shifting to MeetEdgar., they have a premium plan as well, but the free version is more than sufficient and offers all the necessary features
Another alternative is using Hootsuite, which also a nice interface. But among Buffer and Hootsuite, I would recommend Buffer.
Graphics are extremely important.
Even if you have an amazing content but crappy graphics, then also the impact will be inadequate. Do not worry, you don't need to hire any graphic deisgner.
You can make professional images in just a few clicks using Canva, that too free of cost.
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Take our free Affiliate marketing course and become a master at creating and building an amazon affiliate website from scratch.
It has a comprehensive step by step videos , checklist, and an engaged Facebook community and much more.
Other Amazing Online Softwares I Use
If you want to sell an online course or share with the world your knowledge with the world, then you need a tool that can help you deliver your online course with ease.
Teachable is the easiest and most popular website for creators to share their online course. There are so many options you can explore over here.
Students get to buy and access the course in their dashboard.
I have all my online courses hosted on Teachable.
You trust your friends the most when they recommend you any service or product right?
This is where Upviral excels. It has helped me to create viral referral campaigns for my online courses so that followers and audience who loved the experience can refer their friends and in turn get a promising bonus.
This is a growth hacking tool and one of the best online investments in my business. It is highly recommended tool for anyone who wishes to make their business viral. Use it with Gleam and you will get thousands of leads in a month.
Automation is one of the keys to success in any business. The more work you outsource or automate the more time you will have for yourself.
Zapier helps a lot in doing repetitive tasks in automation. Like adding new email leads to a google sheet. This tool helps me save so many hours each month.
This is the best time tracking software on the internet.
I have 15-20 freelancers working for me (both full time and part-time). Tracking time is extremely important to calculate the money you owe to each freelancer.
Hubstaff has this amazing technology where your freelancers are being paid only for the useful work they do, it removed the ideal time, and hence you save a lot of money. I am in love with this software
Books that have made me Smart and a better Human Being
These books have been of immense help to me and you should read them too if you are planning to start an online business or learn about these topics in general
- The 4-hour workweek by Timothy Ferriss
- How to win friends and influence people - Although the title might repel you , but trust me this classic is filled with goldmine of information
- Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill - Another must read classic
- Rework - change the way you work forever
- Zero to one - by peter thiel
- The one thing by Gary Keller
Books that are currently on my Kindle
- Elon musk : Tesla, Spacex ....
- Unshakeable by tony Robbins - Your financial freedom playbook
Tools that i use to make high quality videos (courses and youtube)
I never compromise on quality. Yes you can shoot a video on your phone as well, but i like the professional quality in my videos be it for my courses or youtube. Here is a list of all my hardware:
- Camera: Nikon D-5300 and Canon 200d (Recommended)
- Lens: 50mm prime lens and Sigma 18-23 F1.8 lens (expensive but recommended)
- Tripod: Everycom professional tripod or manfroto
- Microphone: Boya omnidirectional and Zoom h1
- Voice Recorder for ScreenRecording: Blue yeti (highly recommended)
- Lighting: I bought umbrellas, LED lights, stands and more from amazon and Softboxes
- Video Editing Software: Adobe Premiere pro and Camtasia for screen recording
Other Productivity Tools that makes my life simpler
- Evernote: All my data is stored in Evernote
- Wunderlist for my Todo Management
- A Google Analytics app for tracking and managing traffic to all my websites
- Quora: I don't know what would I do without Quora. I have spent countless hours on Quora
- Asana : My preferred project management tool
- Slack: This is my favorite. Its like Whatsapp on steroids for your team.
Automation for time saving
On freelancer.in you will find Indian Freelancers. But over the years I have found the Indian freelancers to be not as effective (no offense to them, it's my personal opinion) as the other Philippines freelancers I hire from onlinejobs.ph.
And now I have shifted almost 90% of my online workforce (45-50 freelancers as of January 2020) to this site. You get quality applications, and also the prices are highly competitive.
Sometimes I use this site for work that i can outsource (I don't use it anymore unless i need Indian freelancers)
Be it Video Editing, Content Writing, Social media management or anything else. Its vital for my business.