“Create content that teaches. You can’t give up. You need to be consistently awesome.” — Neil Patel
image by KevinKing
Here’s a model that has kept me:
- Constant in publishing blogs
- Consistent outside and inside my content
- Concise in wording my content
- Clear in my content
- Creative in brainstorming blog ideas and selecting photos and quotes
1. Decide and no longer flounder
- Consider carefully how often you can blog and which days you’ll post. When I first started blogging, I decided I could blog once a week. I chose Thursdays to post. I haven’t missed posting. (Constant)
- Decide what type of blog you’ll write: Journal, Review/Interview, or How-to. I write how-to blogs. (Consistent)
- List what topics you’ll stick to. My topics are:
- writing craft,
- book marketing,
- blogging, and
- speaking. (Consistent)
- Decide if you’ll host guests. I host guests who have how-to posts in my topic areas. (Consistent)
image by PIX1861
2. Schedule and no longer struggle
- Brainstorm and Draft. On Fridays, I seek God, brainstorm post ideas, research, and draft posts. I often use tasks I’m working on in my topic areas. That way, I can share my research. (Creative, Clear, Constant)
- Polish and Setup. On Mondays, after my content sits for a weekend, I edit the main content down to 500 words, put it through my checklist, obtain photos and a quote, and add my post to WordPress. (Concise, Clear, Consistent)
image by gounder
- Publish and Announce. On Thursdays, I review the post again, publish, and announce to social media and writing groups. (Clear, Consistent, Constant)
- Respond to Comments. I have email notification of comments sent to me. I respond to all comments as soon as I can. (Constant, Consistent)
3. Create aids and no longer forget
- Checklist. Mine makes my editing tasks go quickly without worry. Most important reminders in my checklist are:
◊ Check for:
• Uniform bullet structures (Consistent, Clear)
• Words I tend to misspell (Clear)
• Words that may work as contractions (Concise)
• Words ending with –ing (Concise)
◊ Add links and make sure they open in a new tab. (Clear)
◊ Construct Click to Tweet. (Clear)
◊ Test that links and Click to Tweet work. (Clear)
◊ Add tags and category. (Clear)
◊ Select featured photo. (Consistent, Clear)
◊ Capture post’s unique link to announce posts. (Clear)
◊ Announce post to list of social media venues and groups. (Constant, Consistent)
- Photo and quote sites. I add an opening quote and 3 to 5 photos. I use the sites below. They have free photos and allow modifications. Required or not, I always give attributions. (Clear, Consistent, Creative)
- Photos:
- http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/agree-terms.php?id=10081079 Needs attribution, which you can choose to have them email you.
- http://www.morguefile.com
- https://pixabay.com/en/photos/
- Quotes:
- http://creatingminds.org/quotes/quotes.htm
- http://www.brainyquote.com
- Quotes from my research sources.
- Photos:
- Reserve blog post. I always have at least one post ready on WordPress for emergencies. (Constant, Consistent)
Use this model to be a constant, consistent, concise, clear, & creative blogger. Click to tweet.
What do you do to make blogging efficient and your content reader-friendly?
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Great post with practical ideas. I use an Editorial Calendar to post each week’s titles so that I can go back and check with myself – Scheduled? Published? Draft? My Ed Calendar is the 1st thing I open when I sit down to write.
RJ, thanks so much for your alerting us to the Editorial Calendar. I was unaware of this. I watched the video and am going to give it a try.
Wonderful info Zoe! I blog 3 days… Tuesday Treasure, Thursday Thoughts and Saturday Spotlight and host guests on all three…although I try to schedule at least 2 Tues/Thur posts for myself each month too. Doesn’t always work out that way but by having guests, I don’t often run out of content.
Good luck and God’s Blessings
PamT
Pam, it sounds like the Editorial Calendar Rj mentioned would work great for you. I know what you mean about not worrying about content. I don’t worry so much as I pray hard each Friday on draft day. I love it when God gives me an idea earlier in the week.
Your post was timely for me as I plan to do some teaching on this subject.
I’m glad, David, that it will be helpful to those you teach. I should have added that I use Hootsuite for easy scheduling of all the Tweets (and Facebook).
Zoe, this is a real keeper. I appreciate that you are so well organized in presentation as well as content. I think I’ve got things well in hand for my website, then I read this and realize I’ve got work to do. Thanks so much. Cheers
Thanks, Marilyn. I think we all have work to do. I read a lot of experts in blogging to get to this point, such as Michael Hyatt and Copyblogger. I’m always looking for ways I can improve my blog and the process, especially efficiency. I liked reading RJ’s comment about Editorial Calendar. Best wishes, Marilyn, to you as you try a thing or two.
This is not only a great blog post, it is an outstanding blueprint for blog discipline. I plan to use this regularly!
Thanks, Keisha. The process helps keep me going.
Thank you for the clear, concise guidelines. My health has made regular posting more challenging, so I need exactly this kind is help.
Jane, I can’t imagine working on a blog when I don’t feel well. I was thinking more of having blogs in reserve for vacations. Maybe I’d better get a few more posts in reserve. I hope you are in good health soon.