The New Year is finally here, and many of us are considering new and inspirational ways to help us build a better, more popular blog. As I’m sure Blog Bloke will agree, the strongest pillar of a successful blog is the regular production of great, original content. In theory, this is a wonderful principle, but in practise many of us suffer from writer’s block, the lack of inspiration, or simply cannot find enough time in the day to write!
Over the past few months, I’ve developed a technique which can help you overcome all of these problems in your blogging practise: I call it “The ten minute blogging workout“. I know the name may sound a bit silly, but in practise this really works!
Ten Minute Blogging Workout
Here’s what I do: for ten minutes or so at the end of each day, I open my blogging dashboard think of everything I found interesting that day which is related to my niche. This may be:
- Interesting posts I read on other blogs
- Thought provoking emails
- Reader comments and my reaction to them
- Magazine articles
- The latest news in my niche subject
With these in mind, I then open up the post editor and write two or three snappy titles on separate posts which are linked to my thoughts for the day. These titles can later provoke an interesting and complete post in their own right, though if I have the time I will also add notes to the body of these draft posts: thoughts, ideas, related URLs and even images to help spice up the content a little.
At the end of each day when I do my “blogging workouts”, I add a little more to these drafts, and also create new ones when something inspires me.
Although I do keep a notebook where I jot down my blogging ideas, I find it’s much better to have my notes where I need them: right in the body of a draft post. Then I can easily rearrange things, build complete paragraphs from simple phrases and use the URLs in links where they are needed, rather than having to copy and paste from my browser bookmarks.
These draft posts serve a multitude of purposes which can help you become a more regular, productive blogger:
- They keep all your notes in one easily accessible place
- They provide inspiration for future posts for those times when you can’t think of an interesting post to write
- You can work on a lengthy, article style post over a number of days (or even weeks) by building upon these notes you have already written, while adding even more relative content as time goes on.
- For those occasions when your blogging time is sparse, you already have some content saved away which could easily become a full blown post with just a few tweaks here and there.
At any one time, I may have a dozen drafts saved in my dashboard to build upon, which ensures I’m never short of content or resources for my posts. You’d be surprised at what can be accomplished in just ten minutes of your day, so why not make your blogging resolution for 2008 to do your own daily workout? It could help you become a more productive blogger!
