Blog Post Ideas That Will Make Your Blog popular

You want your blog to succeed, right? Of course you do! Unfortunately, it takes a lot of determination and persistence to write blog posts on daily basis that make your blog sizzle, viral, or “hot”. I know many bloggers who produce excellent content. Their approach is different, out of the box and it makes them extraordinary. Therefore I have made a list of 101 blog post ideas that most likely make your blog more interesting.

This list is more than enough to keep you busy for the whole year.

#1 Run a contest – I’ve run blog contests (currently not available) on this site before, and all I can say is that it gives great attention and new traffic to your blog.

#2 Review books/products/films – Reviews deliver a lot of value to your followers, and people are constantly looking for honest opinions, not the fake ones that the web is full of.

#3 Make comprehensive guide/tutorial – If you’re a professional in a field or know some topics extra well, feel free to help the ones who have less skills and experience than you do. Tutorials and guides provide a lot of value, which can help drive traffic and convert followers. As an experienced blogger, I teach others how to start and maintain a blog.

#4 Interview someone – Know any celebrities or people who have great stories behind their work/life/career? Interviews are extremely popular in two cases: a) you deliver an interview with a famous person who rarely speaks in public or b) your shares rally insanely useful and practical tips and content.

#5 Post a cool infographic – Infographics help to visualize complicated data, and they’re hugely popular these days. As always, when something becomes mainstream, the overall quality is poor. So, if you’re not a designer, hire one to get a viral infographic that stands out from the crowd.

#6 Criticize a website/blog or a person – The web and blogs are great for discussion, opinions and criticizing. Nevertheless, if you are brave enough to say some crispy words about someone, make sure your text has strong arguments and is based on real facts. Random ranting is pointless.

#7 Make a post full of GIFs – GIFs are the symbol of online entertainment and humor. There are thousands of GIFs and generators that help to produce new ones. See example:  Linkbuilding in GIFs

#8 Create a photo post – Share your favorite photos from your niche or personal photos from your latest traveling adventure. Keep in mind that if you’re not the author, you should always give credit to the original photographer by providing a link.

#9 Tell a personal secret – We all have our dreams as well as secrets. Sharing them publicly gives very engaging content to the followers. As much as people love rumors, they love to know the dirty little secrets of other people.

#10 Write inspirational/motivational post with famous quotes – People need little kicks to get going and get things done. Big things start from small ones, and motivational posts can do miracles. Here’s one of the best quotes from Steve Jobs: “Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else´s life.” Here are some tips for using quotes in your posts.

#11 Share recent travel experiences – Travel blogs and posts are popular, and there are people who earn a living solely from writing about their adventures. Sharing inspiration and tips from your adventures is very useful to your audience, whether you’re in the travel industry or not. In case you haven’t traveled for a while, publish the best or worst experiences you’ve had in certain countries/airline companies/etc.

#12 Host a giveaway – Have you ever thought why products like GoPro become more and more popular with each day? They do giveaway campaigns regularly. People love free stuff, and taking advantage of that helps you reach new audiences.

#13 Write down a conspiracy theory – Have you heard about all the number theories behind important events and people? Now it’s time to start a new one; let your imagination free, or simply share you opinions about the known ones.

#14 Show log files of intense conversations – Who doesn’t like to read log-files that are somewhat offensive?

#15 Write a short story – No previous experience with writing fiction? Publish your short story (about 200 – 500 words), and ask your followers for feedback.

#16 Sing a song – Great artists and singers are not born overnight. First, they’ll have to discover their talent. Find your new hobby or passion in music.

#17 Create a list of something – People are lazy. They don’t want to waste time on searching and gathering information. That’s the reason why lists are popular. Create a TOP10, or better yet, a TOP100 list. Lists of movies, books, influential people, or any other topic can easily generate buzz.

#18 Write down all the thoughts you had in mind today – This is pretty mindf*#?, but if you are bored, then you can try this method as well.

#19 Share your goals/dreams publicly – Write down all your goals for the current year or dreams where you want to be in 5 years time. It gives nice pressure and motivation to achieve the goals, and it will excite your loyal followers.

#20 Make a link carnival and ask others to join – All sorts of link carnivals and linky parties are becoming very popular.

#21 Announce that you’ve turned the comments into “do-follow” so you can get more comments – You will probably get 50% more comments in that way. However, the downside of this technique is that you might receive a lot of “spam” blog comments as well. CommentLuv is a great plugin to start with.

#22 Build your to-do list – There are many to-do list apps and services, but try to publish your tasks on your blog. Other people will have the opportunity to learn from you. How you build your tasks, how broad or narrow they are, etc. can all be helpful to your audience.

#23 Write a post in response to some recent post/news – In other words, become an opinion blogger or analyst. When you manage to write high-level content on hot topics, your blog can be featured on major newspapers and websites.

#24 Make a full case study about something – We covered tutorials already, but case studies reveal what you’ve done, how you’ve done it, and what the results are. This is extremely interesting for many folks, especially for me.

#25 Share your favorite blogs/bloggers in one post – It’s a bit similar to “Make a list” idea, but sharing the blogs and bloggers you follow is never a bad idea. Give the resources to your readers; believe me, they are grateful and won’t stop following you.

#26 Invite your readers to submit guest posts – Are you struggling with new posts or have to leave for some time? Ask people to write guest posts. It’s a win-win situation; you get the content, and they can build up their name or brand.

#27 Publish the best comments that your blog has received throughout the history – Are you using a vote system on your comments or just know the posts where some comments have raised very fruitful discussions? Share them in a separate post.

#28 Share your blogs income + traffic numbers – Prove that a blog in your niche can have reasonable traffic numbers and maybe even be profitable. Bring Google Analytics data to daylight and it’s very nice if you provided some analysis in important points, for example a major change in traffic numbers etc. Pat Flynn has done that, why don’t you?

#29 Tell a joke – That’s pretty straight forward. Humor never gets old, and great jokes are really entertaining.

#30 Bust a myth – There are thousands of well-known things that actually are not true. In other words, they’re called myths. Take some time and do some research to disprove some of them. If your follower love it, feel free to become a MythBuster.

#31 Produce or publish your art – Online galleries and portfolios look cool and can be the first step to the world for artists. So publish your paintings, comics, graphical design masterpieces, and other creations as well.

#32 Publish a post about your success and epic failures – Being successful means making mistakes (or in other words: failing). But failing is not all bad. It’s a learning experience that allows you to be better the next time. So, that’s the reason why you should talk publicly about your success and failures, to let others learn from it.

#33 Ask your readers to tweet, like, and share the posts they like – Spreading the word about your blog or posts is important, but sometimes people need a little extra kick to do that, so write a post for that.

#34 Start a poll – That’s simple. Want to know what other people prefer or think about a certain topic? Start a poll to get quick overview.

#35 Write a post about things you regret doing/not doing – When you surf around Quora or Yahoo Answers, you’ll find many very popular topics and posts about the things people regret doing and not doing. Try to write down your own list.

#36 Pose a rhetorical question in your blog post – This blog post idea is similar to posting random quotes just to produce some content, but it can really spark a discussion, even if the question is rhetorical.

#37 Post a picture that speaks more than thousand words – Sometimes you can and SHOULD post images that tell us a story. It does not only grab attention and increase your visitors average time spent on the blog, but it’s also extremely interesting. Check this.

#38 Publish some little or unknown facts – The Internet and different encyclopedias are full of facts, some of them really random. For example “Did you know that the pink/red/white color of flamingos comes from the food they eat?” You can gather those facts in your own post to generate buzz.

#39 Publish an In Memorian post – It’s polite to commemorate the people who pass away.

#40 Bring out the most important dates in history – Pick a country/war/invention/company, and write down the important dates of it. People love to get general but detailed overviews.

#41 Tell about your latest event experiences – Visited a concert or a festival lately? Write a review about it.

#42 Publish your CV online – Show your previous experience and the things you are good at. You might get a job offer for doing that.

#43 Post an obvious lie – You can turn things upside down when you tell an obvious lie inside your blog post. People might get mad at you, but that doesn’t matter.

#44 Write where you’d like to travel – … and encourage others to do the same in your comments. This kind of conversations usually turns out pretty big.

#45 Blog about marketing secrets – Tell your readers about your top secret strategies, techniques, and tactics you use to get more followers and traffic.

#46 Write about the most important lessons you’ve learned in your life – What is more kind than helping others and analyzing yourself at the same time?

#47 Tell your readers what they should do to succeed – Create a blog post that explains your readers what they should do in order to become successful as you are.

#48 Do a video post about your day – Let your readers see about your daily life. For me, it’s extremely interesting, but you also need to have some courage to do that. In either way, it’s up to you.

#49 Show off your personal stuff; car(s), house, accessories – This is something that creates many different opinions among your readers. Don’t be scared to show your stuff. It can also turn out as a motivational blog post from someone who doesn’t own those kind of things. People love those kind of things.

#50 Build a list – Build a list of your readers. You can use Aweber or Mailchimp for that; in that way you can inform your readers about the new posts you’ve made.

#51 Create a blog post about your bad habits – Smoking, alcohol, drugs. Tell them something shocking!

#52 Offer free help in your industry to get new contacts – Free help gives you great reputation and people will start sharing your blog more often as well as suggesting to their friends. It helps to grow into a branded expert.

#53 Research and analyze a topic in your industry – Well written and analyzed posts get great attention. Invest time and grow your followers by that. Many professional bloggers write one post for more than 12 working hours, they invest a lot of time to produce perfect posts.

#54 Answer to every single comment personally – Make your readers feel special and honored. It takes only a couple of minutes to answer them personally but you can get new friends, co-authors or even business partners.

#55 Write a longer “About Me” post – Classical About Me posts are a couple of lines but introduce yourself more and write a longer one. People like to know what’s the background of the content they’re reading but they usually don’t have time to check LinkedIn accounts or just Google the name.

#56 Create a post that utilizes a bar chart or pie chart – Infographics is one of the hottest keywords in the web industry. Visualizing data makes it easier to read, gather interesting data and build charts!

#57 Write down your monthly personal budget and expenses – You can document what ever costs you like. Take your website and show how many dollars you’ve spent on it and also show the income/revenue side of it. Additionally, you can use the same model on your family budget.

#58 Participate in reciprocal guest blogging – Talk to your followers and look for people who’d like to write you a guest post and you’ll write one by yourself.

#59 Post linkbait – Don’t know what linkbait is? Have a look at here: 10 extraordinary linkbait examples

#60 Make a post about your most popular posts – Gather the data behind the most popular posts (traffic, shares and comments) and write them down in a single post.

#61 Publish a “What If” post – Use your imagination and write a post about what if you’re going to move to another country or travel the world or win billion dollars. People love to dream and believe that these things will happen to them.

#62 Publish online courses/e-books – If you’re an expert in your field, invest time in writing and publishing courses and e-books. Create quality content, and people will be ready to buy it for nice amount of money. When money is not an important aspect, publish the content for free.

#64 Turn on Gravatar images on your blog comment – Make it as a real conversation by turning on Gravatar images (just like my blog has).

#65 Build your portfolio – A portfolio is a great way to showcase experience. It’s a wide-spread myth that only artists and photographers can use it. Build a portfolio of projects you’ve run, the applications you’ve coded, and so on.

#66 Write in your own everyday language/writing style – Forget the well-known rules, and use the expressions you use every day. It’s a great way to make your posts more enjoyable and stand out.

#61 Share food recipes – Don’t know what to write about? Share the recipes of your favorite meals and desserts.

#68 Publish a post about cons and pros about something – Things are never black & white, and there is nothing perfect in this world. There’s always some cons about something.

#69 Show others how to secure their blogs – This is something that is useful and interesting at the same time. I recently posted an infographic about “What if Your WordPress Gets Hacked.”

#70 Hold a conference or a webinar through blog post – Have a “group” meeting at next Saturday 9 PM. I’m more than sure that if you hold a live event through your blog then there will be people watching it.

#71 Ask for general feedback on your blog – Sometimes you can improve your blog by the way your readers want. Minor tweaks here and there can add value that can bring you more traffic and returning visitors.

#72 Curate or summarize someone else’s work – Write short summaries to bring out the most important aspects or points in other published writings. This helps save a lot of time for the readers who are only looking for the most important information.

#73 Publish a list of your most successful Tweets/social media posts (based on re-tweets & likes) – Have you had any success with massive re-tweeting, liking, or sharing? Share the tweets and posts with others.

#74 Compile a list of common mistakes in your niche – Many people don’t know the basics and make common mistakes. Write tutorials to help them prevent these misunderstandings.

#75 Publish a manifesto – See a sample here.

#76 Make a post about future plans – Dreaming of being a world-class analyst or an entrepreneur in five years time? Looking to start studies at a university? Write the plans down; it’s interesting to read them later on, and it gives new ideas to other people as well.

#77 Write down an extremely long blog comments – In that way you can show your readers that you actually care about their comments & opinions.

#78 Thank your audience for following you – Show that you respect them.

#79 Write about why you actually started blogging – Simply tell your followers how it all started…

#80 Abandon your blog for a week and make others think “what happened to you” – It’s pretty risky, but if you are famous blogger – this will get you a lot of buzz.

#81 Write the list of things and activities you want to do before death – Ever seen the books in the bookstore called “1001 places to visit/foods to eat/artists to listen before you die?” Build your own list, and inspire others to do that as well.

#82 Show others how to do something extremely FAST – Everybody likes to do something quickly. As you know, time is the most valuable thing in our lives. For example, David Risley teach you how to blog fast.

#83 Write a satirical blog post – Satire never gets old, but don’t be too harsh. These posts can easily go viral, but be sure you’re prepared for backlash.

 #84 Write a series of blog posts – To make your readers constantly engaged with your blog, then I suggest you to start a blog post series. Here’s a good example of blog post series: How to Make a WordPress Plugin #1.

#85 Publish a questions and answers blog post – Make a “Questions Monday.” Promise to answer all the questions your audience has.

#86 Post a quote – People adore quotes that make them think and spread motivation, so use them wisely.

#87 Launch a free e-book about your best blog posts – Gather the most viewed and commented posts together and convert them into an e-book that can be published on Amazon or other online bookstores.

#88 Run PPC campaign through Facebook to your blog posts – It costs a little, but this option means a lot of new traffic and followers.

#89 Update/invest in customized blog post design – Great blogs and posts need great design to keep the readers coming back. Hire professionals; never try to do “something” in PhotoShop unless you’re not a designer.

#90 Make 404 page that is a game – That’s a fun way to get people staying on your page. See the tutorial HERE.

#91 Make a handwritten post and publish it by taking a photo – Hand-written texts look amazing and shows your creativity as well as character.

#92 Make an ultimate resource post – Operating in fishing niche? Publish a list of most useful resources for that.

#93 Invite experts to comment your posts – Busy people work the most, but they’re quite often ready to help if you offer them value from your side. If you ask them, do it kindly, and state clearly why they should do it and what they get for doing it.

#94 Publish a post as an audio file (mp3) – Write your post and record it as an audio file. It allows the readers to follow the blog on the go; all they need is an mp3 player or a smartphone.

#95 Make list of useful & interesting people to follow in your niche – This is another “TOP” category post idea. List the useful people who provide great insights; these posts become viral quickly.

#96 List nostalgic post about different blogs in your niche, and show readers how they’ve changed from 2000 by using web.archive – Web design and trends have changed a lot. It creates great WOW effect for people to see how ugly the websites used to be back in the dot.com bubble times.

#97 Link to new or interesting patents in your niche that amazes people – Ever heard that Apple patented the two-finger movements on smartphones and tablets? Here’s your chance to shine.

#98 Ask some billionaire to write a post for you – As these people are often too busy to respond, they enjoy fame and publicity. This is definitely worth a try, even when you fail.

#99 Rant about something that REALLY disturbs you – Ranting on the Internet is sometimes pointless, but well-argumented posts may get a lot of attention.

#100 Create a list of online tools you find useful – There are literally dozens of tools that can make life a lot easier, create a list of the ones you use or would like to use.

#101 Dare your readers to do something – And then ask them to report back on how it went. Or, have them dare you to do something, and then post a video of you doing it.

#102 Host a voting contest – Ask your readers to nominate the best blogs in your niche. This can turn into several posts since you can take those nominations and write a “Top 100 Blogs in the Industry” post. Notify the winning blogs so that they’ll send some of their followers your way.

#103 Curate content in your niche – Did you read some interesting articles this week? Link to the best ones in your blog post as a resource for your readers.

#104 Wish yourself happy birthday – Are you entering the second year of your blog? Wish it a happy birthday, and then show readers how far you’ve come.

#105 Make a list of interesting stats in your niche – Want to blow your reader’s minds? Create a useful resource of stats in your niche.

#106 Repost a long email response to a reader’s question – Do you often get personal readers’ questions only to respond in a long email? Share that response with your other followers. (Just be sure you’re keeping any emails, names, etc. confidential.)

#107 Write a FAQs post – What questions do you get asked constantly, either about yourself or your industry? Create a FAQs post answering all these questions. Repost this as a page on your website so that it’s easy to find for newcomers.

#108 Write an ultimate list – Choose a topic and write an ultimate list of ideas so that it’s the first go-to resource for your readers.

#109 Create an A-Z post – For example, write an A to Z post on travel tips or an A to Z post on the best WordPress plugins.

#110 Develop a profile on an influential figure – Is there someone in your niche you admire? Write a profile on them detailing who they are, what they do, why you love them, and where your readers can learn more.

#111 Shoutout to your mentors and fans – Write a post naming specific people who have influenced your blogging journey. Be sure to let them know when the post is public to help drive their followers to your site.

#112 Showcase a reader – Do you have a strong relationship with some of your loyal readers? Ask one of them if you can interview him or her and post his or her responses on your blog.

#113 List the best apps in your niche – Are you in the finance industry? List and review the top 50 mobile accounting apps. The more apps you list, the better.

#114 Write a makeover post – Did you just get a haircut? Maybe you remodeled your kitchen. Show your readers the before and after photos.

#115 Run a month of giveaways – Each day, post a new blog post (or have a guest author), and then include a quick gift for one winner at the end of each post. Be sure they have to earn it, such as by leaving a blog comment to be eligible. Add in a few “surprise” gifts so they don’t always know what’s coming.

#116 Hold a guest post pitching contest – Do you accept guest authors on your blog? Hold a pitching contest where readers can pitch their idea in the comment section and give each other feedback before you decide which pitch will turn into a published blog post on your site.

#117 Develop a quiz – Use a quiz-building application like Online Quiz Creator, and make your next post into a game for your readers.

#118 Create a glossary – Do people get confused about terminology in your industry? Write a post detailing the definition to commonly confused words in your niche.

#119 Write an open letter – Do you have someone you’ve always wanted to say something to, whether it’s your child or a celebrity? Finally say those things, and then post it on your blog for the world to see.

#120 Share a worksheet – What’s the number one thing your readers want to know about themselves and your niche? Create a worksheet that will help them answer that question. For instance, if you’re in the finance industry, you might develop a “Get out of Debt” worksheet that will help readers better plan their finances.

#121 Share coupon codes – Do a bit of research and find out which online stores in your niche are offering discounts or coupon codes right now, and then share that information with your readers.

#122 Create a list of free eBooks – People love free stuff, so help generate some buzz by creating a long list of helpful and free eBooks in your niche.

#123 Predict the future – Tell you readers where you industry is going in the next five years, or talk about where you think a celeb will be in a year or two.

#124 Compile a list of jokes – People love to be entertained. Make them laugh with a list of jokes related to your industry.

#125 Draw a comic – Show your personality by drawing and uploading your own comic. Try to make it clever and funny to drive more traffic.

#126 Write a poem – This is a great option for lifestyle bloggers, but if you can provide enough entertainment value, your poem can become wildly effective in any niche.

#127 Tell your readers who to follow on Twitter – This type of posts provides a lot of value to readers, and you just might get the attention of some influential people in your industry.

#128 Make a list detailing influential people’s response to a single question – Connect with a dozen or so popular individuals in your niche, and ask them all the same question, such as, “What’s your go-to marketing tactic that you believe is the most successful?” Compile their answers in a blog post, but be sure to ask their permission and to give them credit for the answer.

#129 Highlight the key takeaways from a recent conference – Are you planning to attend a conference in your niche? Be sure you’re taking notes so that you can report back to your followers the most important points covered.

#130 Make a list of hacks – People love it when they discover something that will make life easier. Write a list of hacks that will make your readers say, “Why didn’t I ever think of that?”

#131 Write about your plans for the holidays – No matter what holiday is approaching, share with your readers what you’ll be doing. This gives them a heads-up if you’ll be gone, but it also sparks conversation. Be sure you ask them to share their plans as well.

#132 Record a Skype call – Get in touch with a well-known person in your niche and talk with them via Skype. Record the conversation and post it for your viewers to see later. You can also host live calls via Google Hangouts.

#133 Put on a skit – People absolutely love short entertaining videos. Video tape a quick skit, whether you want to send a political message, educate your viewers, or just produce a spoof that will make them laugh.

#134 Host a free live workshop – Who would pass up something free, especially if you have something valuable to offer? Share some of your training and consulting material with your readers via a live online workshop.

#135 Write a blog post about 135 blog post ideas (or more) in your niche – List down 135 blog topics in your niche; a lot of people find it useful :).

Have you started yet?

If you haven’t started a blog yet, head over to my homepage and learn how to set up your own blog.

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Happy Independence Day 2015

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10 Innovative Ways of Using a Smart phone

Cellphones are quickly becoming a thing of the past, as smartphones are becoming cheaper and more accessible to millions of people around the world. It’s no longer enough for a phone to be able to call someone or send them a text—consumers expect them to do just about anything you can think of and more. The explosive popularity of apps in the past few years have helped the smartphone become the must-have tech device of our generation. The smartphone is a cellphone, but it’s also so much more than that.

So what exactly can you do with a smartphone other than call and text your friends? Let’s take a look.

1 Conversation starter

This is probably my personal favorite use of the smartphone. Whenever I’m having a conversation with someone, we’ll invariably come upon a topic or a question that neither of us knows much about. Instead of arguing about what the answers could be, I turn to my iPhone for some help. Wikipedia and Google can work wonders, especially when you’re looking for something to talk about in a crowd.

2 Banking

Smartphones are also amazing financial planning tools, with countless apps available to help you manage your money and maximize your savings. Apps like Mint and various bank-sponsored mobile services can make banking and money management so easy that you’ll rarely have to set foot in an actual bank to handle your finances. The best part is that these apps are secure and trustworthy, so you can manage money on the go with confidence.

3 Blogging

Tumblr, WordPress, and Blogspot all have mobile apps meant to help a blogger get things done on the go on their smartphones. You can draft blog posts on any major blogging platform from the palm of your hand, so you don’t have to let your work suffer when you’re away from the computer. Some of the best microblogging services out there are literally designed with the smartphone in mind, so you know smartphone blogging is a smart option.

4. Photo sharing on the go

One of the standard features of a smartphone is the camera (now typically found on the front and back of the device). There are all sorts of apps that allow you to manipulate and edit your photos as you take them, so you can put a funny backdrop on a group photo or give a landscape picture a nice sepia finish. More importantly there are apps like Instagram that help you reach other photographs with whom you can share and exchange photos, regardless of where you are in the world. Welcome to the 21st century!

5. Restaurant critiquing

Anyone with a smartphone is a critic, whether they’re reviewing products on electronics sites or tweeting about how much they like or don’t like some new social media tool. I’ve found that many people use their smartphones to comment on restaurants, either in their city or while visiting another on vacation. Apps like Yelp and Urbanspoon make it easier than ever for someone to write up a quick review about a restaurant, turning them into a causal food critic.

6. Gaming

I couldn’t even begin to estimate how many games are available for smartphones. There are addicting word games like Words With Friends, puzzle games like Bejewled, action games, fighting games, strategy games, learning games, and much more. Even classic arcade games like Pac Man and Space Invaders are available for smartphones. There’s a game for every taste and every generation, and I’ll bet you that every smartphone user has at least one that they play from time to time.

7. Filming

Smartphones have created as many amateur film directors as they have photographers. Apps like Clash Video Editor have completely changed the way that people can edit and polish video taken from a mere phone. It used to be the case that cellphone videos were a grainy mess that didn’t look like much of anything, but now they’re approaching professional-grade quality. I think it’s only a matter of time before some enterprising college film student or amateur director makes a great film solely with their phone. Here’s hoping!

8. Finding new music

You can also use your smartphone as a net with which to catch new tunes. There are apps that identify songs for you as you hear them playing on the radio or in a club (Shazam and SoundHound come to mind), as well as apps that help you find new music based on your tastes (Pandora, Spotify, and Grooveshark). If you really invest some time in these apps, you’ll find yourself discovering new bands, artists, and sounds like you never have before. Go on, expand your musical horizons with your smartphone.

9. Shopping

Of course there’s online shopping to consider, too. Just about any online retailer has a mobile app to help you find easy access to their products while you’re on the phone. Amazon, eBay, and Newegg are just a few of the bigger retailers that offer intuitive mobile shopping apps, but there are so many more that specifically cater to just about any niche. Clothing, books, tech, kitchenware, movies and videogames are among the many general categories available to the ambitious online shopper. If you do shop from your smartphone, be sure to check your banking app to make sure you have the money for your purchases!

10. Learning new things

If anything, smartphones are designed to help you learn new things and become a more informed person. There are a ton of apps out there to help facilitate your mobile learning experience, from instructional apps that read like a college textbook (with just as many diagrams and loaded with educational videos) to those that offer stimulating daily facts in an easily digestible format. It doesn’t matter if you’re in college or if you haven’t cracked open a textbook in thirty years; there’s something for everybody in the vast body of educational smartphone apps, and that’s something worth celebrating.

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20 Best Graphic Design and Image Editing Softwares

Graphic design and image editing softwares are the most essential tools for a graphic designer. These softwares let them keep innovative and organized in their graphic designing.Adobe photoshop is one such software that makes the task of designers extremely easy and advanced. Beside Adobe Photoshop, there are numerous other graphic design and image editing softwares available in the market. Some softwares cost a bit and some are available with no cost. Among all, we have compiled 20 best graphic design and image editing softwares, that are showcased in this post.

20 Best Graphic Design and Image Editing Softwares:

1. FatPaint

Fatpaint is a free, online graphic design software, image editor and custom printed products webshop that assists you in painting & editing bitmap images/photos, writing rich text, making page layout and displaying graphics on products from Zazzle. Furthermore, images can directly be added to the project by searching on Wikimedia, Picasa, Flickr, Google, Yahoo and Bing. The completed project can be saved on Fatpaint’s server or your own computer.

2. Gimp

It is a free software used for  photo retouching, image composition and image authoring. It can also be used as a simple paint program, an online batch processing system,  an image format converter and so on.

3. Adobe Photoshop

Adobe Photoshop is the most popular and widely used software for graphic design. The primary functions of Photoshop are photo editing, graphic designing and creating elements for any type of web project.

4. Paint.NET

It is free image and photo editing software that has an spontaneous and advanced user interface.

5. MyPaint

It is a fast, easy and open-source graphics design software for digital painters. It allows you to work on your canvas with less distractions.

6. Blender

This is a 3D animation software for graphic designers which is available free of cost.  This software enables graphic designers to create 3D applications.

7. 5DFLY

This is a robust and brilliant Photo editing software.

8. Pixelmator

It is a fast and powerful image editing software for the Mac operating system , which has spontaneous and stunning graphical user interface.

9. Inkscape

It is an open source vector graphics editor just like Adobe Illustrator.

10. Skitch

It enables users to capture screen shots rapidly  and drag them into email for sharing.  You can even compose images with text and sketches, and share them with your friends.

11. Iconfinder

It provides high quality icons for web designers and developers in an effortless and efficient way.

12. Picnik

This is a free software that enables you to change colors of any image, do editing, add text to an image. Moreover, if you have creative ideas, you can make buttons, banners, and headers for your blog.

13. Artweaver

It enables you to paint creatively by utilizing various painting tools.

14. GraphicConverter

It is an apple photo software for image editing and  graphics conversion.

15. DrawPlus

It is a robust and versatile graphics studio perfectly developed for digital art, illustration, and painting.

16. ArtRage

It is an easy to use, stylish painting package for Windows, Mac OS X, and iPad.

17. Paintshop

It is a powerful Photo-Editing Software for graphic designing.

18. Photoscape

It is a fun and easy photo editing software that enables you to fix and enhance photos.

19. Image Tuner

It is a free software for batch resizing, converting, watermarking and renaming your digital photos and images from and to JPEG, BMP, PNG, TIFF and GIF formats.

20. PhotoFiltre

It allows you to do simple or advanced adjustments to an image.

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How to Restore Deleted Photos & Videos From a Digital Camera

A big advantage of digital cameras is the delete button which erases photos with a simply tap, letting you to choose which pictures you retain. This feature has its dangerous part too, because only one mistake is needed to lose all pictures stored on that memory card. On traditional cameras this would be possible only if you would expose the film to sun, but the simplicity that came with newer technology may have its downsides too.

For instance, what happens when you accidently remove a picture? It is lost forever or there are ways of recovering the file? Luckily, the short answer favors those careless and in the following lines we are going to explain why deleted photos can be recovered from a digital camera and most important, how.

How a digital camera actually works?

These days everybody owns a digital camera and uses it for different reasons, from capturing important family moments to just taking photos of a beautiful landscape. All in all, they represent a better solution than old cameras in many ways, such as the capability of organizing photos much better or the possibility to share pictures via social networking sites.

Practically, a digital camera stores all photos on a flash memory card which can be a SD, CF, Memory Stick, MMC card or other types. They are made by different manufacturers, have different sizes and appearances, but they have the same essence – one very similar to a floppy disk or a hard drive.

When you choose to delete a picture or a video, your digital camera will locate the space allocated and mark that space as available for future usage. The picture is not actually deleted until another image takes its place. So basically, the photo is still there and it is very important to stop taking other pictures or the chances of recovering pictures that have been accidentally deleted will be reduced.

So plug-in your camera or connect the memory card to your laptop’s card reader and use one of the tools presented below:

Asoftech Photo Recovery Software

Asoftech Photo Recovery Software is a specialized program in recovering deleted, formatted or corrupted photos and videos from your digital camera. It supports all memory card types including MMC, Memory Stick, CF Card, SDHC and several file types.

The interface is bright purple, easy to use and even allows a personalized search, limiting file types for better and quicker processes. Users reported that the software showed some problems in recovering movies in .mov format, but for pictures everything functioned smoothly and quick and they were all recovered.

To undelete files, simply launch the program and choose the mounted memory card. After that, specify the save path, click “Start” and all recovered data will show up. From the results page you can also choose only certain photos or videos which you want to save on the personal computer.

A big disadvantage of Asoftech is the price, because even if it’s so good at recovering pictures you will have to pay $29.95 to really use it. The demo version will only find lost pictures and videos on a memory card, but it will not offer the possibility to save them. Also, the compatibility in the demo version is limited to four major file types: JPEG, BMP, GIF and PNG.

PhotoRec

PhotoRec is a powerful application which can recover photos and videos from almost any device. Developers are saying that it recognizes over 390 different file types and it works with every memory disk, hard disk or USB stick that exists on the market.

However, the interface may represent a big disadvantage for some users because the program runs in a DOS box or from a command line, which may not appear so user-friendly. Another problem is that PhotoRec is actually a surrogate program to TestDisk and if you want to get it, you will also have to install TestDisk.

Once you have it, simply open the program and a menu will pop-up with a list of all storage devices that are connected to your computer, including hard-drives, removable drives and mounted cards. Choose the problematic memory stick and select search parameters, which can be for example “Bruteforce” that recovers more fragmented JPEG files or “Low memory” if your computer has crashed during past recoveries.

Next, select the place where you want to save all recovered pictures and wait, because everything else is automated. In case the process takes too much, the program allows you to stop the operations and to resume later.

Besides the Windows version, PhotoRec is available also for Linux and Mac OSX and can be downloaded for free from their official page.

Recuva

In case you deleted photos or videos from a digital camera, Recuva may represent a viable solution. This program is developed by Piriform, the same company which made the famous CCleaner optimization tool. Recuva has a nice interface, user-friendly and a wizard that will guide you through the process of recovering pictures. It can make personalized searches for different file types, specific drives or enable a deep scan that will find pictures even on a damaged memory stick. To do this, just follow this simple guide:

1. Start the application and click “Next” on the “Welcome to the Recuva Wizard” page.
2. Now choose the type of files you want to recover.
3. Choose the location of the memory card from the “File Location” page and click “Next”.
4. The next page allows you to select a deep search option, which is preferred in the case of a corrupted memory stick.
5. Click “Next” and wait until the search finishes. Select the desired pictures and press “Recover” to save them on the computer.

After searching finishes, a list with the found pictures is shown along with their health and other detailed information. Health refers to the fact that the picture was partly overwritten or not. Results can be also shown in a thumbnail view which will might help navigating between various results.

Besides major file types (JPEG, PNG, GIF) the program is able to recover also Nikon RAW and Canon RAW (.CRW) formats, representing a good choice even for pro consumers. The interesting thing about Recuva is that it comes also in a free portable version so that in case you don’t have internet you can move it between the laptop and computer. The free version is fully-featured, while Pro and Business Editions cost $19.95 and $24.95 and they will only add support from developers.

CardRecovery

CardRecovery is an application specially designed to recover files from memory cards used by digital cameras. It supports all main file formats and memory cards, from compact digital cameras (JPEG, PNG) used by common users to DSLR cameras (raw format) used by professionals.

The interface speaks for itself because everything is placed where it should be and the three step wizard will guide you through a very simple process. All you have to do is to enter the location of the memory card, choose the camera brand (optional) and the destination folder where to put recovered pictures.

Everything else is automated and to browse through pictures you will have to wait until the whole process is finished. Developers are saying that for an 8 GB SDHC card you will have to wait approximately 14 minutes to complete a full search. The program also offers a thumbnail preview, only for JPEG pictures and unfortunately, it will show only six pictures on a page which can be a little bit discouraging when you are searching for a particular photo between hundreds of photos.

Besides the Windows version, CardRecovery is also available for Mac OSX and can be tried before purchase. Developers offer a free version which will scan memory sticks and find lost pictures, but for the ability to save them, you will have to pay $39.

SoftAmbulance Photo Undelete

SoftAmbulance Photo Undelete is a powerful tool specialized in recovering and repairing deleted or corrupted photos / videos. It can restore images directly from a wide range of digital cameras, so that you will not need to pull out the memory card and use it through a card reader.This application is also able to recover pictures and videos from hard disk drives, DVD’s, CD’s and Blue Ray disks. Formats like JPEG, TIFF, PNG, BMP and RAW are all supported along with other dozens of different file types.

The interface of the program is very simple and light because this program has implemented an intuitive, easy-to-use wizard which will guide you through all processes. Just select the desired device, press scan and it will locate all deleted or corrupted photos and show previews of them, so that you can choose which one should be saved.

If the memory stick is corrupted or damaged, SA Photo Undelete has the option of deep scanning, sector by sector, which will find any available pictures in no-time.The program also comes with a free evaluation copy which allows only previewing search results, while recovering will cost $44.9.

EaseUS Card Recovery Wizard

Another interesting option is EaseUS Card Recovery Wizard which is a card recovery program that retrieves deleted photos, videos and audio files from any flash memory cards, USB or SD cards used by cameras and phones.

Connect the memory card to your computer and open the software which has two modes: Deleted File Recovery and Deep Scan. While the first is for recovering all deleted photos or videos from a memory card, the second is used to recover from damaged or inaccessible storage devices. When the scanning is over, you can choose which pictures or videos should be saved. Easy and reliable, EaseUS Card Recovery Wizard can be purchased for $39.95.

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