If you want to post new content more frequently (I recommend 2-5 times per month), I’m going to suggest that you develop a daily blogging habit.
Stop. Breathe. Don’t worry. It’s not what you think.
I do NOT want you to post every day. For most people, that’s an unrealistic goal, and not necessary for reaping all the benefits of blogging.
It’s like I suggested in a previous post, Five Writing Resolutions that are Worth Keeping: To increase your writing frequency, look at how often you’re aiming to publish right now. Get solidly consistent with that goal, and then gradually increase your number of posts.
Otherwise, you’ll be trying to change too much, too fast, without having these foundational supports in place:
Five Foundational Supports for Your Daily Blogging Habit
- Blog post calendar – Have at least a rough plan for how you will keep your blog fresh throughout the month. I recommend Charlie Gilkey’s planners, available in two versions – free and premium. I just sprung for my second year of premium planners (combined with his Freelancer Workweek planners) and have found it well worth the small investment.
- Blog post planner – Make use of the feature on Charlie’s planner that allows you to group your posts by categories. That way, you can see at a glance that your blog is balanced.
- Article time - If you’re sitting down to start, finish and publish a blog post all at the same time, you’re setting yourself up for failure. Instead, devote time to take each post through four stages – brainstorming, drafting, writing and editing – with at least a short breather in between.
- Idea catcher – Have a place (or many) to capture your new brainstorms wherever you may be, and a set time to transfer those into a draft post where you can proceed through the rest of the stages.
- Draft posts – Set your blog to save your new posts in “draft” mode by default, and use that space to develop your ideas and polish them for publishing.
A daily blogging habit is a commitment to devote time to your blog. But blogging every day doesn’t mean posting every day. It means that no matter what day it is, you have at least one blog post that you’re working through the stages of the writing process.
