31 Days to Building a Better Blog—Day 7
Day 7 of my Building a Better Blog series just happens to fall at the perfect time: I’m getting married on Sunday and today’s tip is to Plan Ahead. Since I have family coming in this week and I’ll be gone from Thursday to Thursday of next week, I have to plan ahead if I want there to be new stuff coming out on the Coin. This isn’t something totally new to me, I’ve been doing it since I realized it was possible to write and then have WordPress publish stories whenever you want it to.
This allows you stock up for the upcoming week (or next few days) and work ahead. If anything happens or you just can’t think of anything worthwhile to say on a given day, it’s ok. Maybe you’re tired or hung over — either way, you’re not getting any blogging done today. No problem. Your schedule is set and you can forget about it. The first time I heard about this was from Trent over at The Simple Dollar. I emailed him about something and he responded by saying he’s usually a week ahead of his schedule. So he could go a full week without touching his computer and content would still flow. That’s pretty cool when you think about it.
Another reason I like it is because it doesn’t tie me to the computer every day. I spend enough time as it is on it, so I like to just leave it off for a day and not feel like, “OK I gots to blog now.” I know M doesn’t like it and I understand because it feels kind of lame to be that attached to a computer.
The main reason I use it for now isn’t to be a “more responsible” blogger, but to make the time to write fiction. I get all my writing done in the mornings before going to work, so if I can get a couple of days ahead in my blogging, it opens up a full morning of writing fiction, which I’ve been meaning to pick up more and more. Right now my time is probably divided 80/20 with blogging taking up the most time and I want to get it to around 60/40 at the least. I won’t get any closer to publication if I’m not writing.
Anyway, this is a really good tip for anyone committed to blogging. It will help you become more efficient and it won’t tie you to a routine. You can even go ahead and get married, out of town if you want to, and your readers won’t have a clue. Unless you tell them, of course. Today, for example, I’m on my honeymoon and you can bet your ass I’m not on a computer.
May 26th, 2008 at 11:41 am
Sounds good. Of course, I’m always at my computer lately anyway so I don’t notice a difference. And I’ve only just begun a blog so I don’t yet feel that sense of “gotta post something today.” Maybe I’ll get it soon enough.
But I’ve already started to plan future posts, etc.
Congrats on your wedding! And your site looks great.