Must have Browser Extensions.
Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox are two most popular web browsers across the world.
It is their ability to have extensions or web tools embedded in them that has made them unique.
Today, we are going to look at 20 useful and powerful browser extensions for bloggers that would make blogging super easy and effortless.
Learning Points
- What Are Browser Extensions and Where To Find Them?
- How Are They Useful For Bloggers?
- B-E for Content Planning
- B-E for Content Optimization
- B-E for Social Media Marketing
- Browser Extensions for SEO
What Are Browser Extensions and Where To Find Them?
Browser extensions are add-ons or web tools that are embedded in the browser toolbar for instant usage.
They are NOT browser plugins that remain hidden in the background and do their work automatically like Adobe Flash.
They have user interfaces for tweaking their settings or using them explicitly according to your requirements.
Browser extensions are designed to help users get their jobs done effortlessly.
For example, Checker Plus for Chrome helps you to get notifications every time you get an email in your email inbox. You can open and read them as well as reply to them from its interface.
Therefore, you do not have to check your inbox from time to time or open your email account to reply.
For Google Chrome Extensions, they have Chrome Web Store.
For Firefox Extensions, they have Add-ons Store.
Search any extension, install them, reopen your browser and the extensions will be present at the right corner of the address bar.
How Are Browser Extensions Useful For Bloggers?
Blogging is nothing like working in an office where you have only one role.
Being a blogger means you have to write your content, optimize them, promote them and get the analytics to analyze your performance and improve upon it.
You have to be the jack of all trades and hence, you need the help of web tools to lower your burden of manual works in blogging.
There are extensions for optimizing your content like checking grammar and spellings, pointing out on-page mistakes to rectify.
Some extensions are for social media marketing and email marketing.
Others are for SEO works, performance metrics, taking quick screenshots and much more.
Ultimate List of Powerful Browser Extensions for Bloggers
Browser Extensions for Content Planning
#1 Evernote (Chrome | Firefox)
This is an amazing extension for bloggers because bloggers have to go through a lot of webpages to find and curate quality articles and topics to write on.
With Evernote, you can bookmark the pages to read them later.
You can also share them on your social media pages to offer your followers variety by posting external links other than your own site.
You can also save screenshots after highlighting any particular line or paragraph.
#2 Feedly Mini (Chrome | Firefox)
Feedly Mini is a popular blog reader tool.
You can save websites or blogs under different categories, and every time, a new post gets published on those websites, you will get to know about it.
Thus, you will be able to keep a close watch on your competitors.
You can also save any webpage and read and share it later. One can also search with keywords to find the best-curated articles on them.
You can also check RSS Aggregator which performs similar work but it is lighter than Feedly.
#3 Pocket (Chrome | Firefox)
Pocket is more like Evernote but it has a unique feature that makes it so popular.
You can bookmark anything, and it automatically syncs your bookmarks or saved links to your phone or tablet, and you can view them without an internet connection.
This is extremely important for bloggers as they can review and curate topics for writing when they are traveling or does not have internet connection for some reason.
You should also have a look at Google Keep to store your random ideas, photos, lists, and memos.
Browser Extensions for Content Optimization
#4 Headlinr (Chrome)
Headlinr is an extension that will generate 30 headlines with high conversion and better ranking possibilities.
Just supply your keyword and get the best-brainstormed headlines.
You can use it not only for your blog posts but also for email newsletters and social media updates.
#5 Grammarly (Chrome | Firefox)
Grammarly is an indispensable tool for bloggers to optimize their articles. It reduces the burden of proofreading your article for grammar and spelling mistakes.
It is ten times more powerful than MS Word in detecting grammatical errors and spelling mistakes.
It also points your repetitive words, passive voice and suggests the correct words or sentences or alternative words.
Just install the extension and paste your article directly in your blog’s text pad and Grammarly will point out mistakes with different colors.
#6 Word Count Tool (Chrome | Firefox)
It is an important extension for bloggers because time and again, they need to count words in a paragraph or sentence, characters for meta descriptions and likewise for on-site SEO works.
All you have to do is to select the text and right-click to invoke the extension for your purpose.
#7 Writer (Chrome)
If you just hate to write in MS Word because it distracts you with mistakes and errors in your text all the time, Writer is the perfect extension for you.
It offers a distraction-free editor, and it will increase your writing output far more than usual.
It does not even have fonts or any formatting style. It saves your work automatically and exports it in PDF format.
It is a premium extension and you need to spend some bucks to buy it.
Browser Extensions for Social Media
#8 Buffer (Chrome | Firefox)
Buffer is the most popular browser extensions for sharing your published post to your social profiles and pages.
You can add any text or message to publish along with the post link. It lists all the images you have used in the article and hence, you can select the images you want to publish with the link.
It also lets you share any image in any articles directly on your social media account.
You can also add posts in a queue and set the time period for publishing them automatically. If you do not set any time manually, Buffer will publish them at optimal times to reach out to maximum followers.
The Buffer button will appear on all the social media pages beside the Post button.
#9 Hootlet (Chrome | Firefox)
Hootlet is the browser extension of Hootsuite.
Unlike Buffer, it requires only one click to publish your post or any external link to all your connected social media pages.
You can either set a time or auto-schedule for publishing the saved links.
Hootlet supports more platforms than Buffer.
Hootlet lets you reply to the comments received in your published links on social media accounts without opening them.
In this connection, also have a look at Shareaholic (Chrome | Firefox) for sharing anything instantly.
Browser Extensions for SEO
#10 SEO Quake (Chrome | Firefox)
SEO Quake is a useful extension through which you can get vital SEO metrics of any website. Just go to that website and click on it to get the information.
You can export the detailed SEO report in Excel file. You can get information for internal and external links, social media vibes, keyword density, and web traffic analytics.
#11 Mozbar (Chrome | Firefox)
Mozbar is one of the most popular SEO extensions which is in the form of a toolbar.
It is designed for bloggers to research on the go. You can get vital SEO metrics of any website.
On search engine result pages, it reveals a lot of hidden information such as keyword used for ranking, SEO details of the site and you can use them to rank your post better.
You can get PageRank and domain authority score, differentiate between do follow and no follow links.
You can also compare two sites’ SEO metrics for better understanding. One can easily spot the keywords in any article.
You can also check out Ahrefs SEO Toolbar and Open SEO Stats which are similar to Mozbar.
#12 Meta SEO Inspector (Chrome)
It is a web page crawling extension that will help you to crawl any competitor’s webpage and get to know about the keywords, meta tags and meta description they have used.
You can use the same creatively to edge past them easily on SERPs. You can directly open many other popular SEO tools from it for analyzing a website’s SEO properties.
Miscellaneous Browser Extensions
#13 Google URL Shortener (Chrome | Firefox)
Every time you post a link on your social media pages or anywhere on the web, a long URL is unattractive and takes up a lot of space.
Therefore, most of the bloggers use URL shortener to reduce the link to a very short and unique URL.
Google URL Shortener is the most popular extension and will save you the time to open shortener website all the time.
Just paste your original link in the extension interface and get the shortened URL instantly.
#14 StayFocusd (Chrome)
This is an extension that will increase your work productivity.
As a blogger, there is no restriction on your activities, with freedom comes distraction.
There would be a lot of occasions in between your blog writing when you will be distracted by social media, email or website notifications.
Once you start checking those notifications out and dive deep into them, you know you are wasting a lot of your productive time.
With StayFocusd extension, you can block any website, webpage, even specific part of a website for an allotted time period while you work.
#15 Nimbus Screenshot (Chrome | Firefox)
Taking screenshot is a regular activity of a blogger.
With Nimbus screenshot, you can capture photos as well as videos.
It lets you resize and crop the captured shot. You can also blur sensitive info, add arrows and diagrams.
One can save the screenshot directly in Google drive or Nimbus platform or to the hard drive.
#16 Giphy (Chrome | Firefox)
It is a popular extension through which you can get all the different types of animated GIFs.
If you are wondering how Giphy could be useful for a blogger, well, these days funny animated GIFs are taking over the social media.
You can get the shortened URL of any GIF from the extension and post it on your social media pages to get attention, more likes, and shares.
They are perfect to express your feelings about a subject visually. You can also use it to reply in the comment section.
Have a look at Eye Dropper which is used to get information about any color you see on your computer screen.
Tips – To uninstall or disable any extensions in Chrome, go to Settings and then to Extensions.
For Firefox, you have to go to Add-ons and select the extensions to uninstall or disable.
Wrapping It Up
Among all the browser extensions we have discussed above, it is obvious that you cannot install all of them and try to be the fastest blogger on the planet.
These extensions consume memory, and hence, you must install only the essential ones that will enhance your blogging experience.
If you do not have enough RAM to support the number of extensions you have installed, your browser may often crash.
Use these powerful extensions and make your blogging life as swift and effortless as you can.