Online Writing Tools
As a creator of elearning content, you might feel like you have to be a million things at once. You have to produce high-quality content, find an audience, amaze them with your graphics and storytelling abilities, and get them to share your content to grow your audience over time. None of these things are easy. But these online writing tools will help you with the day-to-day writing and design.
Like Zen Writer, Scrivener is an alternative to Word, but it’s an alternative on steroids. Scrivener lets you physically arrange your paragraphs however you want. You can have your story open in one window with marketing claims, taglines, or ideas for more content in an adjacent window. It lets you piece together your content without the barriers of a tradition word processor.
If you work with a team to create your elearning content, even a small team, you know how difficult it can be to get everyone on the same page. But you can say goodbye to those long, complicated email threads and say hello to Trello. Trello is a project management website that lets you easily organize every aspect of your project. You can see your marketing strategy, schedule, action steps, and to do lists all in one place. Best of all? The website is free.
There’s no denying that you have to do a lot of writing for your job. You have to write blogs, marketing content, dialogue for video courses, and website content. But you also have a lot of marketing and creative content to produce. Instead of spending all of your time writing, you can hire custom writing service (like AssignmentMasters) to produce some or all of your content. They will get to know your content and your voice, and produce high-quality content.
One of the biggest offenses you can make when creating the content for your ecourse or subsequent marketing material is plagiarism. Even if you mistakenly use the same wording as another course, it can cost you your reputation: your most valuable asset. To avoid this, you can visit PlagTracker. The website can scan your content and compare it to thousands of websites. If any of the content comes back as a match, it will notify you. If you prefer, they can even rewrite the content for you to make it original.
One of the hardest parts of producing elearning content is the massive amount of multi-tasking you have to do every day. With so many tasks on your plate, it’s helpful to have a tool that can keep you on track. Pomodoro helps divide your day into small, manageable chunks of 5, 10, and 25 minutes. It sounds simple, but it’s highly effective.
Zen Writer is an alternative to Word. While you’ll sacrifice a bit of functionality, you’ll make up for it with a clean, distraction free place to organize your thoughts. Zen Writer lets you focus on the writing process without worrying about the layout or formatting. It’s a great option for when you need to really focus on the writing.
- Ninja Essays (Ninja Essays Review)
NinjaEssays was specifically designed for academic writers, but it works well for ecourse content as well. Service will find things that you have a hard time spotting in your own writing: things like passive voice, excessive adverb use, and repetition. When you submit work, you can specify what you want Ninja Essays to analyze, whether it’s the readability or the plot and level of interest.
Studies show that people are most creative and focused when their brains are slightly distracted. This might be the reason so many people credit the shower for their best ideas. Coffitivity uses this information to your advantage. The site provides ambient noise from a coffee shop to help you focus while you create, market, or write.
- Hemingway Editor (Hemingway Editor Review)
The greatest writers can take complex ideas and explain them in simple, short sentences. Nobody did this better than Ernest Hemingway. The Hemingway Editor will take your content, whether it’s the copy for your videos or the marketing for your ecourse, and make the sentences shorter and simpler.
Creativity Cards is a great website to get your imagination stirring. You just click on the card and get new creative ideas each time. Some examples are “Draw skeletons at a tea party,” or “Draw your street after the Apocalypse.” The point isn’t necessarily to be literal, but to open your mind about potential ideas and get your creativity flowing.
All of these online writing tools can help increase your productivity, organization, and creativity. Have you found a site that you’re excited to try for your ecourse? Do you know of any other great online tools that can help with creating elearning content? Leave a message in the comments.