Melissa in her dining room. Plants in background. She's looking at her notebook as she works.

Bookmarks

My favourite tools, apps and products for business, productivity and web development

Useful Articles: Social Media & More

  1. The Absolute Beginners Guide to Google Analytics
    • Lovely write-up by Moz on using Google Analytics – written for total beginners.
    • If you already have Google Analytics set up on your website, skip to the section on Goals and continue reading from there.
  2. How to optimize blog images to maximize impact on social media and search
    • Great, well-researched Next Web article on the best ways to optimize images for your website.
  3. Why Instagram Doesn’t Convert
    • Article by Lauren Hooker on why Instagram doesn’t appear in your Google Analytics and alternative methods for tracking Instagram clicks.
  4. Write the Perfect Blog Post
    • Struggling to write a blog post? This article from Zapier breaks down the best way to write your blog posts.
  5. WordPress quick tip: Customize your feed footer
    • Great notes by Elembee on how to customize the info shown at the end of your posts in an RSS feed.

Business & Freelancing Tools

  1. Wave
    • Free accounting and invoicing software. It automatically imports transactions from bank accounts and credit cards.
    • You can create professional-looking invoices and clients can pay right on the invoice. (Credit card processing is done via Stripe).
  2. Toggl
    • Simple app for time tracking. I don’t usually bill clients by time, but I’m fascinated with knowing how I spend my time. Tracking my time helps me understand where my time goes and helps me evaluate if I’m using my time effectively.
  3. Zapier
    • I love Zapier! You can create “triggers” from one app / service to another.
    • Example: I set up a Zapier “zap” so that whenever someone fills out my contact form, all of the information goes straight to a Google spreadsheet.

Useful Apps & Tools

  1. Alfred
    • Alfred super-charges your Mac’s searching capabilities. The basic version is free (that’s what I use). It’s how I open programs, search for files, and google things.
    • Check out my blog post Why I love Alfred to learn more about it.
  2. Bartender
    • Mac application for organizing all the icons and cleaning up your menubar.

      bartender example - mac menu icons hidden behind bartender icon

      My menubar – icons hidden away via Bartender

  3. Buffer
    • Lovely tool for managing and scheduling social media posts. Offers great analytics on engagement and clicks.
    • I especially love the iPhone app. You can add content and drag and drop items to re-order them in your queue.
  4. ImageOptim
    • Free Mac application for optimizing images for the web. I usually run ImageOptim after resizing images. It reduces the file size while maintaining the quality of the image.
  5. Mobee Magic Charger
    • So useful if you use an Apple Magic Mouse. It’s a charging dock and battery replacement for the mouse. You’ll never run out of batteries again.
  6. Paparazzi – free (Mac-only) app for capturing screenshots of websites.
    • Amazingly useful app for taking full-screen screenshots of websites. You can even enter custom sizes to snap screenshots of a website at desktop, mobile, or tablet dimensions.
    • Learn more about Paparazzi in Zoe Rooney’s blog post: Q&A: Full Site Screenshots (I discovered Paparazzi via her post!)

Web Development

  1. Emmet Re:View (also: Emmet Re:View Chrome Extension)
    • Powerful Chrome extension for viewing all of the responsive breakpoints on a website. It displays all breakpoints on a particular website side-by-side.
  2. Wave – Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool (also: Wave Chrome Extension, Wave Firefox Extension)
    • Fantastic tool for evaluating the accessibility of websites.
    • I use the Chrome extension. It offers in-browser notes on errors, a colour contrast checker, and provides links to resources to learn more about any accessibility issues found during testing.

Web Development: jQuery Plugins

  1. Anchorific
    • jQuery plugin that automatically adds IDs to headings and sets up in-page navigation that toggles as you scroll down the page.
  2. Instagram Lite
    • jQuery plugin for creating a simple list of an Instagram user’s photos. You can customize the number of images displayed, whether captions are displayed, and more.
  3. jQuery Collapse
    • Lovely jQuery plugin for creating a collapsible accordion of information. You can customize the mark-up and it’s fully accessible (compliant with WAI-ARIA).
  4. Responsive Lightbox Plugin
    • Lightweight jQuery plugin for adding lightbox pop-ups to websites.

WordPress Plugins

  1. Crop Thumbnails
    • WordPress creates different-sized copies of every image you upload. This plugin gives you control over how those images are cropped.
  2. GM Block Bots
    • This plugin blocks annoying spam bots from appearing in your Google Analytics stats. (ie. websites like  4webmasters.org, best-seo-offer.com, buttons-for-website.com)
  3. WCAG 2.0 form fields for Gravity Forms
    • The WCAG Gravity Forms plugin improves the accessibility of Gravity Form fields by adding proper “for” attributes on labels and more.