Tools For You
People always think I get so much done. And I do, but I wouldn’t be so productive if I didn’t use these tools and informative sites to help me in my business. I’ll keep adding to this so bookmark the page and keep coming back to help you work smarter! Oh, and by the way, some of these links are affiliated, others, not. You don’t have to click through, but I’d definitely appreciate it if you did!
Writing Tools
- Children’s Book Insider – This newsletter will teach you everything you need to know about getting published! And for less than the cost of a fancy cuppa joe, you can get five years worth of CBI’s stellar newsletter. It’s really quite phenomenal the sheer mountains of content they put out all the time.
- And not only that, but this eBook, 11 Steps to Writing Your First Children’s Book is also offered by CBI. You can get it by clicking here.
- Creating a storybook app? Julie Hedlund, created this Storybook App Proposals Template.
Plus, as a BONUS, (FREE!) you will receive a document listing e-publishers that accept submissions and companies that provide app creation tools. So go ahead and buy your copy now!
- Emma Walton Hamilton has hit the New York Times bestseller list with her The Very Fairy Princess series but did you know she also runs the Children’s Book Hub? Join the Hub and you’ll have access to Emma’s experience as an editor and writer through her monthly teleseminars, interviews and more!
- Did I mention that Emma also offers an online 8 week picture book writing course called Just Write for Kids, dealing with everything from finding ideas, creating compelling characters, writing excellent narrative and dialogue and finally, editing your work.
Video Making Tools
- Screenflow – for all my video editing, screen recording, and exporting.
- iStockphoto – for stock images, some video clips, audio (for videos and my podcast
- Keynote – for video slideshows and/or regular slideshows
- GoAnimate – to create my Fairy Vid-Mother animations for my Video Idiot Boot Camp course
Productivity Tools
- mSecure – to keep all my passwords and logins straight and synched!
- TextExpander You have no idea how much I use this! With TextExpander, you create an easily remembered code, and when you type it, in pops whatever you’ve set it to. For example, it’s great for my home address, phone numbers, and long, often repeated responses I need to give, like for frequent requests, or podcast guest info. Here is a screen shot of my stats – and this doesn’t even count what I’ve saved on my desktop computer, which I use way more!
- Pages – to create great flyers and posters for school visits, PDFs for teachers, and brochures
Email List Tools
- Aweber – I love this service for managing my newsletter, e-courses. If you get email from me, it comes through this safe list managing service.
- Leadplayer – this is a plugin that allows you to take a URL of a YouTube video and enter a form to opt in to your email list.
Site Tools
- Go Daddy – This is where I register any domain names I buy. I buy a lot of them for projects, potential projects, and all my book titles. There are always coupons available so click the image if you want to use GoDaddy, too!
- Host Gator – This is the company I use for hosting my site. They’re very reliable and easy to use.
