Tuesday, May 24, 2016

Long term blog planning

In an effort to make keeping up with my blog relatively easy while I'm traveling this summer, I've been working on some long-term blog planning recently. I actually started doing this in April, and I have to say it's working quite well thus far.

I'm simply keeping a monthly calendar about what my topic will be each day as well as a task list in order to complete those postings in advance. My goal is to have my blog planned through August 1st by the time the calendar says June 1st. That'd be a two month out schedule, which would be fabulous! This is probably not something I can constantly maintain, but I think it's a really good start. There's not much that I hate worse than having to scramble to finish a blog post just a few minutes before midnight. Since I've made keeping my blog updated daily a goal I want to continue, then I have to work on new ways to make the process more streamlined and efficient.

Take a look at my calendar for April. You can see that I started with a printed form and then made changes by hand as needed. I also put a check mark on each day as I finish it and officially schedule it in my blog app. That way, I can see at a quick glance how many days I have to finish up something for my blog that's upcoming.



Here's a look at the May calendar in progress.



And here's June.


And here's July.


As you can see, I have a good handle on what I'll post each day, and that's primarily because I offer recurring topics each week. Ideally, I want to schedule three crafty posts each week - Mojo Monday, Throwback Thursday, and Friday. Since the Thursday posting is for old layouts that I'm sharing, that's not much work beyond typing out a description and taking photographs.  This is an easy, recurrent theme that doesn't require a lot of creative time/effort on my part; mainly it's just locating an old layout and analyzing it in terms of my scrapbook style today.  That means that I need to make at least two creative projects each week for the posts on Mondays and Fridays. Honestly, that's a stretch some weeks, but overall it seems to be manageable with my schedule. Tuesdays are usually allocated to some sort of list that has to do with a trip I'm planning or a topic I'm interested in scrapbooking about at some future point.  On Wednesdays, I usually share a photo heavy post that doesn't require a lot of writing or preparation.  The rest of the week is fair game for whatever topics seem to strike my fancy at the time. I'll share recommendations, recipes, etc.

I think one of the keys to maintaining a regularly updated blog is to plan what you want to share in a format and schedule that actually works with your life. I don't make five projects a week, so trying to incorporate something like that into my blog would be setting myself up for failure. As it is, I feel pretty good about the mix of posts that I share and hope that those of you who read it feel the same way.  :)

4 comments:

  1. I am in awe of your planning skills - I guess that is part and parcel of being a teacher. I like having assignments so that I can keep my blog calendar going, and working ahead - I guess that makes me a good student, huh?

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  2. Just wanted to say how much I appreciate the time you put into your blog. I check it every day (even though I don't comment much), and I love the variety! I also think your throwback Thursday posts are great; I love how you examine what you still like and what you would change today. I enjoy it all--thank you for the inspiration!!

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  3. I printed a planner from off-line to help with blog planning. It helps so much to be prepared. Although sometimes life still gets in the way.

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  4. you are so organized - i love it!

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