Last week I reviewed what I believe to be a great example of a Snippet that tells a story. Pat Flynn, speaker and blogger, shared his personal story through a series of short chapters and videos. Snippet is a fantastic platform for this sort of thing.

So this week I’d like to share a bit about the Snippet I’m creating, and the tools I’m using to create it.

Backstory: I’ve been blogging for a while (I created the blog in May 2006 – that’s a little over 8 years!) but have really only intensively worked on the blog for the past year. Needless to say, I’ve put in a lot of time researching blogs – providing quality content, tracking stats, layout.

Over the summer I was asked to consult on someone’s personal site. And then I was asked twice more – to help create personal sites from scratch. It’s something I really enjoy, and until I began working with these people I wasn’t even aware of how much I’d learned about blogging.

Present day: I’m creating a How-To guide to assist teen writers in building a blog from scratch. I’ve chosen Snippet as my platform for this project.

I list/describe my tools below.

Pixelmator – a tool for image editing
Cost – $30 (free 30 day trial)

Basically, Pixelmator is Photoshop for Mac. I’ll use this program to edit the images I plan to use in my Snippet (cover image, header image, etc.)

Scrivener – a tool for writing/editing
Cost – $45 (free 30 day trial)

Scrivener is a word processing program for writers and has so many great features. The reason I’ve chosen to use this program for my project is that it’s easier to keep things organized. Rather than having a folder with multiple word docs, I can keep it all in Scrivener.

Camtasia – a tool for screen recording and video editing
Cost – $99 (free trial)

I’ll be creating video tutorials for my Snippet. This program allows me to do that. (It will definitely take some experimentation!)

So I realize these programs can be expensive. I truly believe they’re worth it in the long run. However, these programs are not necessary for the successful creation of a Snippet.

Next week I’ll write about content and layout. Thanks for reading!

Questions, comments? Have you worked with these programs? Any recommendations for me? Share your thoughts!