Thanks to TextExpander for sponsoring BrettTerpstra.com this week!

These posts usually follow copy provided by the advertiser, but TextExpander is one of my all time favorite sponsors, and this week I wanted to offer a more personal story.

First, if you’ve followed me for any length of time, you already know that TextExpander is a utility that runs on all of your devices that expands “snippets” (text shortcuts) into longer text. Or images. Or even script output. I use it everywhere: signing off emails, doing customer support, including links in Tweets, and yes, writing blog posts. Anywhere I’m typing. If I was given a Mac and told I could only choose one third-party utility to run, I would choose TextExpander.

I use it so much, in fact, that if it stops working, I’m lost. I have snippets I’m so used to using that I barely remember what they say. Not only do they save me typing time, they save me brain power — I never have to think about the right thing to say or how I usually phrase it. And some of my snippets run scripts that perform automation tasks that I’ve used for so long that I don’t even remember all the steps to perform them manually.

A couple of weeks ago a glitch on my system did, in fact, cause TextExpander to stop working. I’ll admit to a bit of panic as I contacted customer support. I got a rapid response, a diagnosis of the issue and immediate fix, and was back to happily typing in no time. That’s the thing about software you come to depend on: it’s only as good as the developer’s ability to support it. And TextExpander comes with support you can rely on.

If you’re not using TextExpander, I strongly recommend checking it out. It’s available for Mac, iOS, Windows, and Chrome. And my readers can get 20% off on a subscription: check out TextExpander today. You won’t regret it.