Tools and resources

Tools + Resources

A collection of useful resources and tools for content creators and small business owners

This post contains affiliate links, which will be clearly marked. If you click on these links and choose to purchase something, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you. I only recommend products and services that I trust to be useful and of high quality, whether an affiliate relationship is in place or not.

Please note – this page is being actively updated

Domains + Hosting

Please read my Hosting 101 and Domains 101 posts for more information on these topics.

Siteground
Great for domains + hosting with excellent support. For bloggers who are ready to invest a bit more I recommend the Startup package or GrowBig package. Both have awesome features and built specifically for WordPress.

Blacknight
Hosting + domains. An Irish company that I was with them for 5 years and never had a problem, great customer service and quick to respond to downtime. The Minimus Plan is great for small bloggers starting out.

Lyrical Host
Lyrical Host specialise in web hosting for bloggers. They pride themselves on transparent pricing, offering premium managed hosting without price tag. Hosting plans include SSL certificates, email addresses, automatic daily backups and one-to-one support and are designed for WordPress. I’ve heard a lot of great reviews! Use discount code XOMISSE for 10% off your first hosting plan payment.

Clook Internet
UK managed web hosting. They offer free migrations, 24/7 support and boast that their servers have 99.99% uptime with excellent reviews.

BlueHost
Hosting that is very popular with many bloggers due to low prices and ease of use, but it does experience occasional downtime and support can be hit and miss. It also has mixed reviews as discussed in my Hosting 101 post. If you do choose to go with them, check out the Blogger/WP Standard WordPress package which is specifically put together for WordPress users or the Plus Shared package if you’re looking for a cheaper alternative.

GoDaddy
Domain registration that is rather popular with many bloggers starting out due to cheap prices, but they do experience downtime and I wouldn’t advice them for hosting. In my experience though, they do have good customer service/support.

NameCheap
Domain registration that is fairly popular with bloggers, with low prices and a helpful support team.

Flywheel
Managed WordPress Hosting that has become really popular recently with great support and customer service. Select a plan that best suits your site and they take care of everything like backups, updates and migrations. (Update, June 25th 2019, Flywheel has been acquired by WP Engine)

DreamHost
Another popular and affordable domain and hosting provider.

Stock Images

Death to the Stock Photo
Free stock photos each month or pay a monthly fee for full library and bonus photos.

Unsplash
10 new stock photos every 10 days for free.

Frame Product Shots
Add your screenshot to a product scene.

SC Stock Shop
Gorgeous styled product scenes/styled stock photos, sends some free win newsletter. Some of my product images were purchased here.

Pexels
5 new photos daily for free.

Burst
Free stock photos in all categories.

Styled Stock Society
Styled stock images for female entrepreneurs with free images each month.

Shop Lemonfresh
Product scenes / styled stock photos.

Gratisography
Free stock images added weekly.

Jaymantri
7 new stock photos every thursday for free.

Startup Stock Photos
Free stock photos – mostly desk / tech themed.

Splitshire
Free stock photos with premium option.

Kate Max Stock
Gorgeous styled photography/product scenes, sends some free in newsletter. Some of my images were purchased here.

Rekita Nicole Styled Stock
Colourful stock photos for bloggers and creatives, sends some free in newsletter.

Little Visuals
7 free stock images every week.

Creative Convex
Free stock photos for bloggers and custom style brand photography services.

Exposure
Search stock images across various sites, which are free for personal and commercial use.

Get Refe
Stock images.

Super Famous
Stock images.

TWNSND
Vintage photos from public archive.

Public Domain Archive
Free stock images weekend.

The Pattern Library
Free patterns by designers.

Pic Jumbo
Free stock images.

Pixabay
Find stock images, vectors and illustrations.

Pickup Image
Find stock images.

Getty Images
Find stock images.

PDPics
Find stock images.

Photopin
Find stock images.

VEER
Stock photos, illustration and fonts.

123RF
Stock images, vectors, footage and audio.

Graphics, Icons + Fonts

Creative Market
Amazing marketplace to purchase fonts, graphics, templates, photos and more. Current favourites include Manhattan Darling Font, Isabella Font and Watercolour Effects.

Etsy
Fonts, graphics, templates, jewellery, craft, wedding, art, etc

DesignCuts
Discounted collection of designs including fonts, graphics, patterns, etc from top designers. Also have an amazing team that are so helpful!

You Work For Them
Vectors, graphics, fonts, images, PSD brushes and actions, etc

Ink Nest, Haystack Dept
Illustrations, graphics, textures, patterns, type, vectors, photoshop brushed, clip art, etc

Google Webfonts
Widely supported collection of non-standard fonts for use on the web. Installation tutorial here.

DaFont, Font Squirrel, MyFonts, Fontspring, Lost Type Co-Op
Collection of fonts.

The Noun Project, Entypo, Font Awesome, Mono Social Icons, Fontello, Icons DB
Collection of icons and social media icons.

Learning to Code (HTML + CSS, Design, etc)

TreeHouse
Learn web design, coding, business, java, etc. from professionals. Get 3 Months Off the Basic Annual Plan ($75 Value) for a limited time.

Skillshare
Learn web / graphic design, Photoshop, lettering, illustrator, photography, gaming, culinary, DIY, business, how to create your own logo or font and lots more. Get a free month here.

Code School
Learn HTML / CSS, Javascript, iOS, etc. Great place to start is Fundamentals of Design. Get first month for $9 / £6 / €8 here.

Codecademy
Learn to HTML / CSS, Javascript, jQuery, PHP and more.

A to Z CSS, CSS Tricks
Learn CSS

Refills, HTML + CSS Vocab, Learn to Code and HTML For Beginners
Learn HTML / CSS.

Learn Layout
Learn HTML / CSS and layouts.

PHP the right way
Learn PHP

JQ Fundamentals
Learn jQuery

Practical Typography
Learn typography

WordPress

Genesis Framework
Great framework for WordPress with lots of benefits, features + plugins.

Akismet + FV Antispam
My favourite team for tackling spam comments.

Essential Security Tips
Tips for preventing your site being hacked.

Gravity Forms Contact Form
Advanced contact form allowing conditional logic (fields appearing on specific selection) and third party integration (like PayPal and Mailchimp). Check out my contact form for an example!

WordPress Support
Need help running your WordPress site? WPCurve and AccessWP offer a number of support and maintenance plans as well as one off service if you need something fixed or changed on your site.

5 basic plugins
Some simple but must have plugins.

Development Resources

CSS3 Generator
Choose from 13 CSS3 effects and generate code.

Character Codea>
HTML code + entity for characters.

Check Responsiveness, Am I Responsive?
Mobile responsive design testing

Listify
Turn lines into a HTML list

px to em
See pixels, ems, percent and points conversions

Support Details
Details of OS, Browser, Resolution, etc

Built With
Information on what providers websites are built with (server, host, domain, CMS, etc)

xiconeditor for favicon
Create a favicon

Usability Checklist
Checklist for user experience and usability.

Web Development Checklist
Checklist for development stage.

Lipsum, Cupcake Ipsum
Lorem Ipsum generators

Placehold It, Video Placeholder
Placeholder images and videos for web projects.

WordPress Test
Test WordPress theme or plugin.

Usability Tools
Track user activity

Design Resources

Subtle Patterns
Clean and subtle background patterns.

Kuler, Color Hailpixel, Design Seeds
Finding colours to use in projects

Fontface Ninja
Tells you details of any font online

Photoshop Etiquette
How to create Photoshop Design Files that will make your developer happy to open.

Online Alternatives to Photoshop, Downloadable Alternatives to Photoshop, Image Editing Tools for Blog Graphics, FotoJet.
Tools for Image Editing, Blog Graphics and Photoshop Alternatives

Canva Logo Creator
I’m a big fan of Canva, as mentioned in my alternatives to Photoshop post, and now you can create logos and blog headers using their template creator too. It’s quick and easy!

Snapito
Full webpage screenshots to save on your computer or send to Pinterest

Designspiration, Agile Designers, The Influence Network, Media Queries, Logo Lounge, Logo Pond
For Design Inspiration

Monetising

SkimLinks
Automatic affiliate/referral links for blog posts

Stress Less & Impress
Amazing course teaching you how how to set up a system in your freelance business that makes everything run much smoother and helps you communicate with clients. There’s also a free Freelance Process Cheat Sheet available here that you can check out. I’ve implemented these tips and have noticed a huge difference in workflow and client feedback.

Blog Beautiful
An eBook with 50 tips to make your blog beautiful.

Organisation + Management

Any.do, Weave, 30 30, Clear and Getodo
Really simple to-do apps or organising and managing tasks.

WordPress Editorial Calendar
Schedule posts and see what’s planned to be published in a calendar view. Really great for getting an overview of upoming posts so you can schedule social media updates.

Feedcamp, Timecamp, Paymo, Slack
Client + Project Management

Bonsai
Great tool for freelancers to send and manage invoices, clients and projects (get one month free when you use my link!)

Pancake, Freshbooks, Harvest, Solo
Book keeping and invoicing apps

Legal Resources

Small Business Bodyguard
A worthwhile investment for every blogger, designer and anyone doing any kind of business online. Must read! It explains so many areas about how to protect yourself and your content online, working with brands and clients, starting a business and selling online, contracts, etc. I refer back to it weekly. They’re also expanding the Legal Nunchucks range which is directed at specific expertise (for Photograpers, for Coaches, for Designers, etc.)

Legal Sifter
Check contract fairness

EchoSign, Dropbox Sign, SignNow, Contractually, Krit Ink, Docusign.
Sign documents online

Docracy
Research contracts + sign documents online

TLDR Legal
Licensing inforamtion

Miscellaneous Tools

DropBox, Cloudup, Box
Media Cloud Storage – save PDFs, files, photos, etc online.

Adblocker
Blocks ads in your browser

TypeForm
Modern contact form / questionnaire

CleanMyMac 3
Is your Mac slow? This app will keep your Mac clean and running as it’s supposed to. See how I use it in my 10 steps to a faster Mac post and how I keep my MacBook Pro organised post.

Gemini
Have loads of files on your Mac? This tool locates duplicate files to eliminate them quickly and easily. See how I use it in my 10 steps to a faster Mac post.

A/B Testing
Split testing tool, test two possibilities to see which one produces best results.

LastPass
Great password manager for securely saving passwords online.

Gaug.es
Readable Analytics and Stats for your blog.

Positionly
Measure your SEO, competition and stats, with a simple and usable interface.

Every Timezone
Easy to use site showing world times

Day One App
Micro-journaling app

What Is My Screen Resolution

Down For Everyone or Just For Me
Check if your blog or any site is down completely or just not working for you.