In this post, we will list of best tools one can use to become more efficient in writing tutorials.
SnagIt
Snagit is an all time favorite tool of bloggers, it is available for both Windows and Mac for $49.95
But the price you will pay for the piece of software is worth every penny as it will save you a lot of time in creating screenshots. It almost automates the process of creating images for tutorials.
From taking screenshots to adding text and arrows to it, it all takes just a few seconds as it has in inbuilt editor which is quite powerful that can be used for editing other images as well.
Snagit Editor is also very useful in converting bulk to different formats and resizing images.
Few other notable feature of Snagit is that it can send images to other programs such as Adobe Photoshop if they are installed on your Computer. It makes life simpler if and saves a few seconds of your life every time you have to use an advanced tool for creating the screenshots.
Snagit is also available as a Chrome extension, get it here.
Camtasia Studio.
Camtasia comes from the makers of SnagIt, it is a very popular program for creating screencasts. SnagIt also has a feature of recording screencasts but offers pretty basic tools to edit them. Camtasia is the big brother of SnagIt which handles the videos pretty efficiently.
Plus the Camtasia Studio, which comes along with the Camtasia, is powerful enough to edit other videos as well.
So, if you are doing video tutorials, Camtasia becomes the must have software to own
Read our post on getting started with YouTube, if you want to start doing video tutorials.
Nimbus Screenshots
Nimbus is a lightweight chrome extension which is much like a basic Snagit which works inside the browser. If you would be taking screenshots of web pages, then it is the best free tool available.
I actually started using it when I switched to Chromebook from a Windows based laptop. It initially took some efforts to get used to it but Nimbus has become a must have chrome extension for me now.
You can read this post Must have Chromebook Apps, the apps would work on any Computer as long as you use Google Chrome.
If you have to take screenshots elsewhere you can use the print screen button to capture the entire area of your screen and then open default programs on your Computer like Paint, to paste and crop the area you want for your screenshot.
Even though, there are dozens of free image editing tools available online, our objective is to be more efficient in getting our job done.
Windows Live Writer
Now, writing Tutorials requires a lot of images and step by step instructions, using the WordPress Editor will be a lot of effort, as you have to uploads images before it appears in the editor.
Windows Live Writer works pretty well for creating this type of content as you have to simply copy paste images and add instructions to your posts and hit publish once you are done. Even though, WLW is only available for Windows and has not been updated in a while, it is still the best program out there. You can read the review of Windows Live Writer.
Few alternatives for WLW are Zoundry Raven, BlogDesk and ScribeFire
Bonus Tips
➤ If you are working with a lot of images, then it is a good idea to use .jpg images over .png so that your pages do not become heavy in size. This will affect the overall loading time of your blog pages.
➤ Writing tutorials is just like writing any type of content, you need planning beforehand so that you can create more tutorials without getting stuck for ideas
You can use tool as simple as Google Keep or full-fledged planning and collaboration tools like Wunderlist or Trello, but the aim is to keep a list of tutorials you will be creating in a week or a month.
➤ Use a specific category or tag for the tutorials so that it is easy to refer users to the tutorials section of your blog.
➤ Use the actual problem as the headline of your post. It is quite basic thing to do and you might be already following it, but it is useful from the SEO point of view, as people would be searching for the exact problem.
Using ‘(Solved)’ at the end of the headline, where you are solving a problem, can increase the CTR in the search results.
