Content marketing platforms have shaped the way I work—for the better.

Over the past five years as a content marketer, I’ve built SEO strategies, managed editorial calendars, and juggled freelance gigs.

At first, it felt manageable.

But soon, I was buried under overlapping deadlines, messy briefs, and endless Google Doc versions.

That’s when I realized I needed the right tools to organize my workflow and reduce bottlenecks slowing me down.

To find the right mix, I tested dozens of content marketing platforms—both as a freelancer and on in-house teams.

In this guide, I unpack my learnings, show what’s in my current stack, and share how each tool works in harmony.

Why trust me?

I’ve spent the past five years creating content for SaaS brands like Buffer, Mailmodo, Videowise, and Supademo—both in-house and as a freelancer. Content creation tools are the backbone of my workflow. I have written this guide based on my years of hands-on trial and error.

Before I had a proper marketing stack, my workflow felt like wading through molasses.

I was switching between Slack threads, email chains, and scattered folders to track down the latest version of a blog post.

Client guidelines changed mid-project, briefs were unclear, and I was spending more time organizing content than writing it.

As a freelancer, the chaos slowed me down. As an in-house writer, it slowed the entire team.

I needed tools that mirrored my workflows, helped me stay consistent, and improved my productivity.

Through trial and error (and tons of canceled subscriptions), I created a simple checklist for evaluating tools:

✅ Ease of use: If I can’t figure out the basics quickly, I move on.

✅ Built-in collaboration: The tool should help me communicate and collaborate smoothly with cross-functional teams and clients.

✅ Customizable: I prefer tools that let me tailor views, templates, and workflows to how I operate.

✅ Integrations: It must connect with the other tools in my stack.

If I could marry a platform, it would be Notion.

I use it to plan campaigns, create marketing calendars, organize content assets, and track projects.

As a freelancer, it houses my client projects, key documents, and invoices.

✅ Highly customizable for both solo and team workflows

✅ Minimalist interface that’s easy to navigate

❌ Can become overwhelming if over-engineered

Free for personal use. Paid plans start at $10/user/month (billed annually)

Ahrefs is my go-to tool for building content strategies grounded in data.

I use it to identify keyword gaps, reverse-engineer competitor rankings, and prioritize content opportunities based on traffic potential and keyword difficulty (KD).

It’s especially handy for pitching new ideas based on specific SEO strategies.

✅ Powerful keyword, backlink, and content analysis tools

✅ Reliable traffic estimates to guide prioritization

✅ Helps with on-page and technical insights in a single tool

❌ Expensive, especially for individual users

❌ Learning curve for newer marketers

Starts at $108/month for individuals (billed annually)

Frase is my favorite for creating content briefs and on-page SEO.

I enter a target keyword, and Frase generates a detailed breakdown of top-ranking pages. I use this analysis to build structured outlines, identify keyword gaps, and later optimize my draft using its content scoring tool.

✅ Time-saving content research and optimization in one tool

✅ Easy to organize briefs and final drafts

❌ The content score feature might be an overkill for creative content pieces 

Start at $45/month for 1 user and offers 30 SEO reports and document creation (billed monthly)

If you've ever spent 45 minutes reformatting a Google Doc into WordPress, you’ll love Wordable. I do.

Wordable saves me hours of reformatting.

It lets me export Google Docs straight to WordPress. I use it when managing blogs for multiple clients or publishing high-volume content.

✅ Reduces content formatting and upload time

✅ Easy to use and comes with a simple setup process

❌ Easy to use with a simple setup process

Free for 1 site and 2 users. Paid plans start at $29/year for up to 5 sites.

BuzzSumo helps me see what’s working across a niche.

I use it to validate content ideas, analyze top-performing articles, and explore which formats (listicles, how-tos, opinion pieces) are trending. It’s also great for spotting influencer collaborations and backlink opportunities.

It’s particularly helpful when I want to reverse-engineer a high-performing topic or analyze the target audience’s content preferences.

✅ Offers solid data on engagement metrics, content trends, and influencers.

✅ Helps pinpoint formats and angles that resonate

❌ Reports can feel overwhelming without guidance

Starts at $159/month, 7-day free trial available (billed annually)

Every content marketer has a list of tools they want to love—the ones that work in theory but don’t seem to translate in the real world.

Here are a few that didn’t hit the mark for me:

None of these were bad tools—they just didn’t align with how I plan, create, and ship content.

The best part of my current stack is how well everything connects.

Here’s one example of how my process flows from start to finish:

Ahrefs keyword explorer is where it all starts. I use it to find a long list of relevant keywords, run gap analysis to spot ranking opportunities and estimate traffic potential. It helps me prioritize topics that align with client goals and search demand.

I use Notion to manage campaign planning, editorial calendars, and individual project trackers. Each task links to briefs, deadlines, and status updates, so I always know what’s in progress.

Next, I switch to Frase to build the content brief. It pulls insights from top-ranking pages so I can create outlines, spot content gaps, and generate SEO checklists.

I draft every article in Google Docs, which I link to the Notion database. The database also contains status, due dates, checklists, and client feedback.

Wordable comes into the picture during the publishing stage. I export the Google Doc directly into WordPress, keeping the formatting intact.

Notion also acts as the collaboration hub. I invite editors, clients, and managers to leave comments, tag updates, or access shared documents in a central space.

BuzzSumo helps me keep an eye on what’s trending. I use it to find seasonal topics and also to validate keywords collected through Ahrefs.

You don’t need 50 tools. A handful of the right ones that match your content lifecycle will do the trick.

Start by identifying gaps in your existing workflow and recurring concerns your team mentioned. Then, sign up for a free trial or plan to evaluate the platform’s solution to those specific bottlenecks.

Make sure your tools integrate well with each other, as it’ll help you reduce duplicate or repetitive work.

If your workflow includes newsletters, consider using beehiiv, a creator-focused platform for scaling and earning from email content without the headaches.