Do you use Chrome extensions? If you’re unfamiliar, they’re software programs that allow you to customize (and maximize) your experience with Google Chrome—and they can make your life and work way easier.
In fact, there are more than 137,000 Chrome extensions out there to serve virtually every purpose imaginable, including helping you create better content.
Here are seven Chrome extensions I’d recommend you try.
How it helps: Checks your writing for typos, grammar, tone, and sentence structure to make your content more readable.
I’m sure you’ve probably used Grammarly at some point, but if you haven’t, I’d strongly recommend it. This extension automatically detects spelling mistakes, grammatical errors, and typos. It can even detect your tone and tell you when your sentences are too long or don’t make sense.
Ultimately, Grammarly can help you write more clearly and concisely, which, in turn, makes your content much more enjoyable to read.
Even as someone who writes every day (or maybe even more so as someone who writes every day), I couldn’t live without Grammarly. In fact, I’ve used it a few times while writing this.
How it helps: Provides you with ideas for what to write about
If you’re looking for blog topics to write about, BuzzSumo is really helpful. It helps you find content opportunities across social media platforms and Google search results and shows you new keywords, trending stories, and customer questions—and the Chrome extension makes it all easily accessible.
How it helps: Makes it easy to find high-level SEO keywords to incorporate into your articles
Another handy Chrome one is Keyword Surfer. This extension adds right onto your Google search bar and shows you search volume, cost per click, and estimated traffic in any country for anything you’re searching for in Google. It will even show you suggested keyword ideas relating to your search. This is really helpful if you’re thinking of tapping into specific keywords for your blog articles, but don’t want to go into a full SEO analysis.
In the example below, you can see that there are 1,600 monthly searches for “coworking spaces Vancouver” on Google, and the ad value of that keyword is $18.00.
Pro tip: Another easy way to find search terms to use in your content is with Google’s related searches, which can be found as a dropdown in the search bar as well as at the bottom (as shown below).
How it helps: Analyzes your headlines and identifies words and sentences that can make them more clickworthy.
If you’re unsure how to write great headlines, Headline Studio can help you find “power words” and phrases that help you get more clicks. While I wouldn’t advise that you use this to come up with your headlines—I strongly recommend doing this on your own—this tool can be really useful for helping you fortify the headlines you’ve come up with.
How it helps: Makes it easier for you to overcome writer’s block by stashing away your favorite sites and blogs and giving you suggestions for similar content.
Inspiration isn’t always on tap, and that’s why reading and consuming content can help keep the creative juices flowing. Content Discovery Feed lets you store your most-read blogs, news sites, and forums and provides recommendations for other things to check out.
How it helps: Provides you with reliable sites and articles to cite in your own content.
When you’re writing blog articles, you’ll frequently find yourself searching for reliable sources to reinforce your points. This Chrome extension helps you easily find solid websites and articles to reference within your own content.
How it helps: Reads your articles, emails, and documents back to you so you can make sure they sound as good in real life as they do on paper.
One of the most vital things I was taught early on in my career was that reading things out loud is the best way to ensure your articles, emails, or any other content read well and sound right. Read Aloud converts text to speech from Google Docs, web pages, PDFs, and more, and can help you spot awkward sentences and other issues in your content.
There are a ton of Chrome extensions to choose from, so it’s worth doing some research to find the ones that can help make your life easier. But when it comes to creating content, you can’t go wrong with these seven.