By far one of the most useful tools I use to speed up my SEO workflow is Dragon Naturally Speaking Professional Version. Despite the fact that it types what I say with blistering speeds, for example, this entire paragraph took about 12 seconds to type, it also has so many other benefits that you can use for SEO.
Navigating directly to websites without the use of bookmarks: This is a great feature that allows you to create voice commands so you can navigate to any URL you want. I have hundreds of bookmarks that I can’t find when I need them. But if I just say “go to Seo Worx login” it goes straight to my hidden login address for my site.
As soon as you set up your commands for all of your favorite sites you’ll never have to fumble around looking for a bookmark or trying to navigate to a site via Google or the address bar. You can just say the command in the middle of what you’re doing, and it just opens a new tab and navigates to the site in the background, genius!
Dragon makes searching in Google, Yahoo, or Youtube super easy. I constantly search Google using long search queries like “CSS to make a top border shadow”. I would usually have to open a new tab, and then type in the search phrase and press enter. Now I just say my search query. Every time I conduct a search I save at least 4 seconds.
It’s also great for quickly checking a couple of keywords rankings too. I just say ‘search Google for ‘bathroom renovation companies in Parramatta’ and I see the results much faster than manually opening new tabs and typing in the keywords to check their positions. Although I use Serpbook for bulk keyword monitoring, using Dragon is unbeatable for quickly checking the positions for a few keywords without having to fire up your Serpbook account.
Never Type Your Clients Address Details Again: The first thing I do when I get a new client is I create short, concise commands in Dragon for all of the client’s details. These commands work no matter what program I’m using or what website I’m on. Let’s say the new client is called Acme Widgets. Now when I say the following commands, it immediately enters these details.
“Acme site” – https://www.acmewidgets.com/
“Acme site short” – www.acmewidgets.com
“Acme Address” – 123 Smithson Street
“Acme Address Full” – 123 Smithson Street, Parramatta NSW 2150
“Acme Phone” – (02) 98987 87865
“Acme Email” – info@acmewidgets.com
“Acme Facebook” – https://www.facebook.com/acmewidgets
“Acme Twitter” – https://www.twiter/acmewidgets
Stop Wasting Time Searching for Bookmarks & Typing URLS
Having these details readily available with a simple utterance is a huge time saver. I don’t know any of my clients addresses or phone numbers off the top of my head, nor do I have the spare space or inclination to commit them to memory. But the amount of times I get caught out during Seo campaigns having to enter business details about my clients business isn’t funny. I’d have to open a new tab, go to their website, copy the business details from their site, and then go back and enter them in.
Sometimes the clients business details I need aren’t even on their site. That used to mean that I’d have to search through old emails from the client to find the information I need, what a terrible waste of time! Now I just say, “Acme Address Full” and instantly I have my clients full address entered or typed into wherever I need it. Commands also let you enter large amounts of information too. If I say “Acme tagline” it will automatically type in or enter the two lines of text that their tagline is comprised of.
Making Your Task of Faster SEO a lot Easier!
There are countless other ways to utilise the time-saving power this program offers. For instance, who has the time or inclination to commit complex .htacess syntax to memory. No matter what program I’m using to edit my .htacess file, I can just say ‘301’ and it automatically enters the following:
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^yoursite.com [NC,OR] RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www.yoursite.com [NC] RewriteRule ^(.*)$ https://yournewsite.com/$1 [L,R=301,NC]
If I just say ‘bot block’ it inserts the following lines of code, and I can edit this any time I wish, or even just create a different version and call it ‘bot block 2’:
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} ^.*(Baiduspider|HTTrack|Yandex).*$ [NC] RewriteRule .* - [F,L]
The program also has the functionality to create macros as well, either via step by step programming or via mouse and screen record. Of course, the macros aren’t nowhere near as powerful as uBot Studio or Windows xxx, but they can still be quite helpful, especially when you need to enter certain keystrokes.
For an example, I use a program called Copy Paste Software (there’s a link in the right sidebar). It allows you to copy multiple items at once and paste them in one after another without having to copy everything individually all the time.
To paste in the 2nd last thing I copied, I can just press CTRL+2. But when using Dragon I can now just say ‘C2’ to paste in the 2nd last thing I copied, or say ‘C3’ to paste in the 3rd last thing I copied, etc. To achieve this, I just programmed dragon to enter the keystrokes CTRL+2 when I say ‘C2’, and it was easy, but remember you need the professional version.
Open Folders Without Hunting Around
Another brilliant feature is the voice command folder and program opening functionality. No matter where I am in my computer I just say ‘Open Photoshop’ and it will open Photoshop for me. It’s also great for opening client project folders too. I can just say ‘Open Acme Widgets’ and it will open that folder. Otherwise, I would have to navigate to pictures > clients > Acme Widgets. And that would be another 10 seconds wasted.
Further to that, I can navigate to folders deep inside other folders with one simple voice command. For instance, say ‘Open Acme citations’ and it navigates to pictures > clients > Acme Widgets > local > citations. Initially, it takes a while to set these commands up, but from that point on you never have to search through multiple folders to get to the destination folder you want. And that can dramatically speed up your workflow.