Blogging consistently is tough, right? There are so many moving parts it can feel like you’re spinning the whole kitchen cupboard of plates at the same time. But if you over complicate things, at some point those plates are going to come crashing down.
You need to consider what kind of content you’ll publish, which keywords you’ll target, as well as where and how you’ll promote it. This is all time-consuming stuff!
But I’m all about simplicity and finding the easiest and quickest way to get your content out into the world. Because showing up every week doesn’t have to be difficult. Not when you adopt these 4 tips…
Use a content calendar
Making blogging easier all starts with a plan. If you don’t plan ahead, you’ll end up like a squirrel before winter scrambling for nuts. And the content you do write may not be your best. You could easily end up in desperation mode pushing out nonsense.
But if you map out your topics at the beginning of every month, and set the dates for publishing and promoting in stone, everything becomes a lot more focused and doable.
It’s why I always suggest businesses use a content calendar. It’s how I drive all my client’s blogging strategies to bring focus and clarity to every piece of content we create.
It’s also a nice way to hold yourself accountable. Because if it’s in the diary, we’re more likely to do it, right?
You could go down the simple route, adding your topic ideas to your regular calendar on the dates you’ll publish. Or if you’d rather a more effective and comprehensive solution, go here to grab your free content calendar so you can start planning like a pro!
Share your knowledge and passions
Writing can be excruciating if we’re sharing topics that don’t light us up. Every word can feel like trying to draw blood from stone because you don’t believe or love what you’re saying.
When you write about the things you love, the words flow easier. Everything falls into place. And the best part is readers can really sense that. They’ll resonate with what you’re saying. They feel your passion and expertise come across, and they’ll connect with it.
Great relationships are born when two people share a common thought.
So always aim to talk about topics you know well and are passionate about. It’ll make a world of difference to how easy those words come, and the response you receive from your readers will be far better received.
Repurpose and reuse your content
Repurposing and reusing content is a marketer’s best friend. It saves you a shit ton of time and allows you to be present everywhere with little work. Who doesn’t want that!
To reuse your content, go back into old posts and see how you can improve them. What can you add (or remove) to make that post even better? This method works particularly well if you have lots of themed content, perhaps for a holiday like Christmas or Halloween.
Revisit those old posts, make them the best they can possibly be and reshare them to all your social platforms. Doing this from time to time ensures you’re getting the most out of every piece of content you create.
To repurpose you content, simply take your blog post and turn it into different content formats. Or vice versa. If you’ve created a Facebook Live, a podcast or a longer social media post, write these up and you have a perfectly good blog post to share.
So don’t be afraid to reuse ideas you’ve published in other formats. Not everyone will see you everywhere.
Batch create content for the entire month
Batching is my epic set it and forget it approach to content creation. So for example, if you’re writing one blog post a week, set aside time to brainstorm four topic ideas at the beginning of the month. Then get down to writing those four posts in just a day or so.
They don’t need to be long posts, between 500-1000 words is plenty. I know this is the hard part, but when they’re done, you don’t have to think about creating for the next 28 days. And when you’re batching, you may find you get into the swing of it and you end up writing much quicker than you normally would.
It can also feel a lot easier when you break things down into manageable chunks. When you have your four topic ideas, brainstorm four or five subheads for each article. These will be the main points you’ll discuss in each post.
Then next to each subhead, bullet point or list a few of the main ideas you’ll talk about within that subhead. This gives you a decent skeleton to add the meat to the bones, so to speak. Can you see how much easier and less traumatic that makes the whole content creation process?
Each post is broken down into manageable tasks. It gives logical structure to all the thoughts spinning around your head.
What do you like to do to make blogging easier and less time consuming? Let me know in the comments below…
Here’s that content calendar again if you want to go grab that.