11 ways to increase your blogging output.
If you’re like me, sometimes you can find it hard to come up with content for your blog (you might have noticed that, huh?). Life gets in the way, you feel uninspired, nothing comes to mind that inspires you to post.
There are ways to get around or over that – here’s my pick of the top 10.
1. Make it routine. Pick a time (and a place) every day to do nothing but blog. I used to have this, but my routine changed, and this sorta.. fell off. Every morning I’d get up, make breakfast, read a few selected RSS feeds while eating, then spend the next 45-60 minutes blogging. It’s also important for me to put a limit on how much time I spend blogging. Not a hard limit, but a soft one, just something to prevent me spending too much time on a single post.
2. Take notes. One of the tricks for me, is to have an easy way to make notes on blog ideas when they come up – which always seems to be at the least convenient time – when driving (or worse, on the motorbike), or in the shower, or at 3 in the morning. I’m yet to find the perfect solution for this, but the voice recorder on my phone (and previously, my palm pilot) gets a lot of use for this. I’m damned sure I’ve had a bunch of great ideas that have escaped my memory at other times, however. As part of your routine, clear your notes from wherever you file them, pick something and write about that. If you take enough notes, you’ll never be stuck for something to write about.
3. Use the right tools. I’m not going to tell you what the right tools for you to use are – you’ll have to figure that out for yourself. For me, it’s a combination of the right OS, a good reliable browser, a fast acting RSS aggregator, and a good blog editor[1]. The right tools are those you’re comfortable in, that get in the way of the work as little as possible, and let you do everything you need and want to do.
4. Be proud of your blog. I find it hard to put the effort is on a weblog I’m not proud of (this was one of the reasons for my dissatisfaction with my former blogging employer). You have to be proud of what you’ve said in the past, happy with the way it looks. You have to actively want people to go there, so you can show off what you’ve made.
5. Motivate yourself. I use the Updated Today plugin for wordpress, and have my weblog set as my browser homepage. Every time I see it, with the little yellow banner in the corner, I know I’ve achieved something already – helps keep me motivated for the rest of my life as well.
6. Fix your environment. I’m messy, kinda slobby in my office. But I know I work a lot better if my work environment is clear and clean. It’s worth a few minutes of my time every day to clean it up to make myself that bit more productive. Worst case, I can spend 5 minutes clearing what I can see in front of me – mess I can’t see doesn’t distract me as much.
7. Fix your ergonomics. You’ve got to be comfortable. A good chair, set to the right height for your desk and your body. A good pointing device and keyboard.
8. Be less picky. Sometimes, nothing’s quite right, your posts aren’t flowing as you’d like, you’re not happy with your work. Get over it, and hit publish – you can always revisit the subject later on.
9. Use your imagination. Imagine talking to someone about your blog, someone who’s not a current reader. What would they ask? Answer them already!
10. Use your archives. If you’ve been blogging for a while, odds are you’ve got ideas in your archives that could do with some refreshing. Have abrowse through what you’ve said before – is it still what you mean? What have you learned since then? Could you say it better now?
11. Take the day off. Go for a walk instead, play with a puppy, have your morning coffee outside in the sunshine rather than at your desk. Sure, your output for today will be down, but sometimes a break from that routine is exactly what you need. Just remember to take something to make notes with…
[1] My toolkit: OSX, running Camino, NetNewsWire and Ecto
Uncategorized
Nice post. You should email it to Darren Rowse :> Re: number 6, I always tidy up my office (cough, the living room, cough) before I go to bed. That way, when I wake up, everything is neat & ready for action. Makes life MUCH less stressful.
Excellent post. I actually wrote an entire blog post about #2, taking notes. I usually come up with the best ideas while driving as well. I actually keep a pad of paper next to me while I’m driving so that I can jot down notes at red lights or in traffic.
The Updated Today plugin looks fantastic! I’m certain that that will work just as well for me. Thank you for the link. :D
Thanks for some great tips and reminders that can help make us more productive bloggers!
Regards,
Jeanne
Good article. Good ideas.
My system does not necessarily increase my blogging output, but instead it keeps me organised and on task which has the net result in keeping me consistent.
I keep in a word file a table with four columns. In the first one I type in the dates for the next month or so. The second, third and fourth columns are one for each of my three blogs. As I think of ideas for blog posts I write a draft title alongside a date. It acts as a prompt for ideas when I struggle to think up a new idea.
It also acts as a planning chart for future posts, especially a series of posts. It is also a repository of ideas for future posts in case I forget them. Not all ideas on this chart get used, but it is a system that works for me.