So new year, new you, best blog content ever yaddah yaddah yaddah. Am I right? Well, for a lot of us “influencers” there’s talk about upping our blogging game and such like. All very motivational and aspirational I’m sure you can agree. But how about putting something tangible behind your quote of the day?
How do you really up your game on the ‘tinterweb?
Planning out consistent content is definitely a tangible way of upping your blogging game and I’m going to share with you exactly how I will be doing just that this year. You never know, you might just find it useful after all.
Oh look…here comes the list….
Decide on a posting schedule
Google loves consistency. Brands love consistency. Hell, even I love consistency. It’s like tuning into your fave TV show only to find you have no idea when it will be airing next if there’s no consistency. Not conducive to finding an audience or readership in this case, I’m sure you’ll agree. So be consistent, even if that is just one post a week – aim to make it happen at the same date and time.
I’ve decided on three posts a week, Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays – perhaps with bonus content if I get a lot of work in. But for the most part, I know that I need to pick up my laptop and tappity tap until a blog post is produced on those days of the week.
Choose your content theme/s
“Good” blog content (whatever that might be) is widely expected to have a niche. Blah blah blah. I don’t like rules but if you could stick to maybe three or four types of subjects / themes and schedule your posts out equally amongst these themes then you will impress the gods of blogging. And make people wel jel when all kinds of people want to read your ramblings.
My themes for example are…drum roll please:
- Work / career stuff
- Beauty / fashion and making the most of yourself
- Home stuff – organisational, motivational etc
All very succinct as per..
Map out the hero content
Hero content is the big ticket stuff and unless you are having a big life event like a new bambino or something, then it will probably be just the usual things like Easter, school hols, back to school season, Christmas etc. You can get some of your best topical work planned in months ahead and scheduled onto Pinterest if you get organised this month. Pinterest needs planning in advance if you use it to drive traffic – about three months in advance works best I find.
Create a library of media for use all year round
This is really simple. You are a blogger and that means you need to master high quality imagery all year round. Practice, take pictures of everything all of the time and save them into folders on your laptop / computer / IT method of choice for use in your blog posts. I like to categorise mine depending on what style of posts they may work with and then add them to my draft posts for the three months ahead. However, I am definitely still very much an enthusiastic amateur with this and so it’s good to have back up options from websites such as Unsplash.
Equally, you can pop onto Canva way in advance and set up pinnable templates that will work for your posts. Once you know the wording of your pins, the templates will already be there and it will be a case of quickly editing and downloading them for use.
This kind of thing makes blogging so much less faffy.
Use the WordPress calendar plugin
Obvs only if you are blogging on WordPress. It’s really good as it allows you to drag, drop, edit, draft and schedule posts and then view them in a one month view. I love seeing all of my posts just laid out in front of me for the month (it appeals to the list maker in me) and I highly recommend getting this plugin if you haven’t already so you can revel in smug bloggers satisfaction too.
Hope that helps my loves. Feel free to pin any images you find on here – sharing is caring after all.
Muchos luvos my dears.
TTFN
xxx
Thankyou Fi thats a very helpful post and really helped and made me think about what I’m planning for this year. Thanks for sharing xx
Author
You’re so welcome 🙂
Really useful post. I struggle to plan my content in advance so I’ll using some of your tips to try & up my game 🙂 x
Author
Happy it helped hun 🙂 It’s always hard to keep it consistent but def worth the effort if you can x
I keep trying to plot my content out and stick to a plan but it’s sooo hard! I’m very much an ad hoc poster and so easily distracted by something shiny and new to write about, lol. I really do need to implement some of this advice this year!
Author
I feel your pain here! I think the answer is have a posting schedule with planned content and then add to it when the mood takes. Can’t completely remove the creativity from our lives after all 🙂 Good luck! x
Loved this post! Really useful as I am rubbish at planning ahead. Gonna get the plug in for wordpress, fingers crossed it helps me get organised.
Thanks,
Anna
http://www.madeupstyle.com
Author
Ooh yes def get it – I love it! So glad you found the post useful x
Thank you for these amazing tips! Which is the exact name of calendar you use? I found too many options there. Thank you so much!
Debora
https://DeboraTentis.ro
Author
It’s WordPress Editorial Calendar xx
Great tips! I use WP Calendar Plugin and it helps me to map and plan my blog posts easier as I can see my posts in a month calendar view.
x Rasya
rasya recently posted…November & December In Retrospect
I’ve been wanting to start a blog for some time now. This post really sets me up! Thank you for waking up the inner blogger in me 🙂
Author
Oh good luck hun – it’s a fabulous thing to start, you will love it! x