In the beginning was the word. Sadly, as any content-marketeer knows, the word is not enough. Not only should they be commissioned, shared, promoted and measured, stories invariably need a picture, sound file or video to spruce it up.

Here are some handy tools that add media to your digital text.

Flickr.com – Don’t waste your time panning for photographic nuggets in the Flickr silt, but do use the site to host images you have created or commissioned. Flickr’s free suite of tools includes a widget that allows you to embed hosted single images or galleries into your own digital pages, meaning you don’t have to worry about storage on a local server.

Slideshare – Loathe them or simply hate them, PDFs are an occasional, evil necessity. If you have to accept a dance with the document devil, Slideshare allows you to upload PDFs to the site and embed the links locally. So the next time you want to post an article on rising costs – and refer to the Bank of England’s Inflation Report half way through – you know where to go.

Vimeo – What Flickr is to the still image, Vimeo is to movies. Used primarily by serious videographers, the site is a more respected alternative to Youtube and its attendant stream of all things family, feline and futile. Vimeo allows you to embed files, runs on most up-to-date browsers and lets viewers switch between standard and Hi-Def modes as their bandwidths allow.

SoundCloud – Spot a pattern? What Vimeo is to movies and Flickr is to photos, Sound Cloud is to… you get the story. There are plenty of sound embedding services out there, but SoundCloud is set apart by the ease with which users can upload and share long files – plus, the embedded links are easy for readers to understand and look neat. Ideal for long-form interviews.

Podcasts – If you want iTunes to be the main place to promote your sound files, then keep in mind Podbean, a useful plug-in service. It will allow you to create, upload, publish and promote podcasts under one roof – while you still get the most out of appearing in the iTunes line-up.

Visit Content Cloud to sign up as a creator, or commission the content your business needs