I started my blog a couple of weeks ago now and have absolutely loved doing it. It does help that my weekends haven’t been overly busy recently so I’ve had some spare time to work on it and I’ve been working on it pretty much every weekday where I’m free also. However, this is simply because I want to get off to a good start.
I wanted to share with you how I organise my blog posts currently. I have a feeling this may very well change as I optimise the process.
How I plan what I’m going to write
So, honestly, I plan what I’m going to write based on what I think people will want to read. I started off my blog with How I read over 50 books last year because I thought that would draw people in. I read and reviewed The Midnight Library because a lot of people were talking about it and it was doing well in the best-sellers list and I wrote a review of Shadow and Bone because I knew people were watching the TV series on Netflix.
Is this a bad way to do it? No, I don’t think so. I love writing and I love books – as I’ve said before – so angling my content to appeal to the audience has no effect on my enjoyment of what I’m writing at all.
In addition, if I receive questions from people (which since starting the blog I’ve had a few from friends and colleagues) on how I do certain things on my blog, I’ll write those up too. For example, I wrote 50 Things to know when starting (and running) a blog
Notion all the things
Notion is an app I found recently that I’ve absolutely fallen in love with. It’s essentially a very minimal but powerful note-taking app. However, it has a lot of features that make it so much more than this.
With Notion, you can create a note and you can use this note to simply link to other notes and then this is represented in the side-menu almost like categories. This means I can create a note for my blog post ideas and then have pages of notes within that note of the blog ideas. And all of this sits under one single note called Blog. I also have one for Work and one for Personal. If you’re looking to get your note-taking life into action, I’d recommend Notion.
Jot down article ideas
If you come across an article idea that you enjoy from one of your own favourite blogs you’d follow, steal it! Unless the idea is incredibly original, there’s no problem in nicking the idea and repurposing it for your own content.
Sometimes you’ll be doing something else entirely or to do with another subject and you’ll think how that could be a great article. Open your notes all or grab a pen and some paper and jot it down. This way you shouldn’t be short for ideas to write for the first few months. I’ve got around 20 ideas on Notion that every now and then I flesh out and add to.
Browse Pinterest
I imagine every page on the internet has taken the pandemic well as more people found themselves at home and on the web. Pinterest was one of these online forums that flourished as the place for people to go to get craft ideas, DIY ideas, interior design inspo, fashion inspo and much more at-home hobby-related content.
Pinterest has also seen a huge uptake in new members as people utilise it for their side-hustles – most of the hobbies I mentioned above could be monetised and so some people did. However, blogging has likely taken off too as many people turn to write about their passions online in their spare time (oddly, I chose to start this blog as the pandemic was disappearing and the social interaction limitations were easing). Pinterest is a great way to find inspiration for blog posts and something I’d definitely recommend signing up to it or revisiting it to keep your blogging ideas alive.
Keep a checklist of blogging To-dos
One of the easiest parts of organising a blog is writing the articles. This doesn’t require much technical know-how and can be easily done in one tab on your PC. However, it’s once the blog is up and you need to optimise your SEO or share to Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter and Instagram.
Without sounding like the world’s biggest fan, I also use Notion to keep a simple to-do list where I essentially write what I’m writing that day and then what I need to do once it’s up – where to post it and what else I need to do for it.
Keep a log of your blogging highlights
This is something I started when I first created my blog and am keen to keep going. I write down the small wins – the first time someone tweets my blog, the first time someone who isn’t a friend subscribes to my newsletter etc. I’ve also noted days where I put in bigger plugins and if I change themes or designs of my graphics.
This comes in use in many ways: it’ll help me remember how I did certain things if I go to write about them in an article later, it helps me remember what I’ve done to get where I am today and also it allows me to remember the small wins.
