How To Blog When You Are Busy or How to organize your blogging time when you are super crazy busy and don’t have a minute to spare. Lately I’ve been seeing so many blog posts that start with something like this, “I know I’ve been neglecting this space lately, but I’ve been so busy with everything…. I promise to be a better blogger”, and then their post actually begins. I totally know what it’s like when life starts happening around you and you don’t have a second to breathe let alone to write, take photos and promote a blog post. I used to stress about getting posts out all the time and then suddenly I changed my way of thinking and planning and now it’s never a problem (aka, I never have that feeling in the pit of my stomach) to put together 5 posts a week.

HOW TO BLOG WHEN YOU ARE BUSY

Actively look for inspiration. Looking for inspiration needs to become a habit, so that it’s something you do without even realizing it. I do this by being present whenever I’m reading emails or magazines. Post inspiration can come from a headline or a photograph in a magazine. I actually have an email folder marked Post Inspiration where I save the hundreds of emails I get on a daily basis. I’ll guesstimate that 95% of them never get opened because it’s the headings that give me my ideas. Sure, there are times when you might sit down and brainstorm and that’s another very valuable tool. I set aside 1 hour a week, usually it’s on Saturday mornings but the specific time is irrelevant, where all I do is browse around for post ideas which I immediately enter into my online calendar. I try to plan about 2 weeks ahead, sometimes if I’m on a roll then I’ll get to 3 weeks.

Plan the post. Once I have post ideas, it’s time to do some research and outlining. I approach this just as I would have writing an essay when I was in school (note, I was never great at writing structured essays and it wasn’t until I realized that I could write creatively and in my own voice that I started applying the tools and techniques to actual writing).
Research. If I’m writing a more technical post then I’ll always do some research to make sure that my facts are correct.
Outline.This is the time when I open each post and put together an outline. I decide on my position, what I want to say, what I want my readers to get out of the post and which points are the most important to highlight. Unless I feel particularly inspired, I leave the post at about 3/4 complete, move on to the next one and repeat the process. Total time is about 2-3 hours.

Polish and post. Now that I have my posts planned out and partially written, it’s time to go over all of them and finish up the writing and decide which photographs I want to include. Some images I purchase and others I’ll take myself. This is actually the longest part of my process and can take a few hours, especially if I’m taking my own photos. I simply break it down to manageable chunks so that each post is done several days before it needs to go live. This way I can pre-plan my time to make sure that I’m not rushing to meet a deadline.

There are some posts that take longer to write and are much more involved and of course, I have to make special time for them. The same goes for any articles that I write outside of this blog. The key is that I rarely churn out an entire post at once and instead I break it down and create my very own assembly line. This way, even if something comes up at the last minute and I can’t spend the day at my computer, I’m never without a post on hand.

How do you organize your blogging time?

For more tips don’t forget to follow me on INSTAGRAM and PINTEREST

IF YOU ENJOYED THIS POST PLEASE SHARE IT AND SIGN UP FOR REGULAR UPDATES

images courtesy of DollarPhotoClub

• Author
• Recent Posts

caroline

Caroline has worked with international designers in fashion retail and completed professional makeup courses when working in the beauty industry. Her love of writing, photography and film inspired her to work at the Canadian Film Center and then to earn a BFA in Screenwriting. In addition to her blog, Style On The Side, you can see her work in Huffington Post Canada and other international websites.

Latest posts by caroline (see all)

• Behind The Scenes With A Book Editor - June 3, 2022
• Books That Read Like Poetry - September 2, 2021
• When You Want A Peek Into Someone’s Life - July 19, 2021