I celebrated six years of blogging at Stephany Writes in September. That feels absolutely crazy to me, mainly because I used to have Blogging ADD where I would constantly start and stop blogs I created. Before committing to this blog, I don’t think I kept a blog running for more than a year before dropping it for a different one.
And yet… here I am. More than six years into this blog, and with no plans to stop anytime soon. I love this space because it’s where I feel most fully myself. When I started blogging here, I was nearly 22 and just beginning my journey through journalism school. There was a lot of complaining (oh, the complaining!) and a lot of sadness. Eventually, as I grew up and graduated college and found more solid footing on who I am and what I want, I found my blogging voice.
So, with six years of blogging under my belt (and really, more than that if you add in my other blogs), I thought it might be fun to talk about my blogging process – how do I come up my blog topics, maintain a consistent schedule, etc?
Let’s dive in!
How do I come up with content ideas?
As you’ll begin to see, my entire blogging process is pretty straightforward and no-frills. I don’t keep a detailed list in Evernote. Instead, I just use my Notes app, where I jot down post ideas as they come to me. Post ideas come to me at the most random times, too. Sometimes, I’ll have a thought as I listen to a podcast or read an article or commute to work or fall asleep at night.
The minute I have the idea, I immediately pull out my phone and jot the thought down. The last content idea that I jotted down was simply the quote: “What you think about me is none of my business.” Someday, I’d like to explore what that quote means to me, especially as someone who deals with self-esteem issues on a daily basis.
Sometimes, the idea is bigger than that, like this:
That one came to me last week as I was reading right before bed. It was just one of those out-of-the-blue moments and I wanted to make sure I wrote down this thought in its entirety, exactly how I feel about it so that I can come back to it at another point in time and dive into my thoughts on the subject in a personal essay.
So, that’s how I come up with post ideas! I like having a long list of random thoughts I’d like to blog about because I can pull from this list as I make my editorial calendar. Speaking of that…
Do I keep an editorial calendar?
Absolutely! I find keeping an editorial calendar is key to maintaining a consistent blogging schedule. Mainly, I try to be a month ahead in my blogging schedule. I use Google Calendar for this, which makes it easy to switch out blog ideas if something comes up and I need to change the post topic I had planned. Here’s what February looks like:
Now that I have and use a paper planner regularly, I only use Google Calendar for my post ideas. You may notice that I’ve only planned for two posts a week and that’s because I have made the decision to move from three posts a week to two, to create space for more novel-writing time. My goal is to write one personal essay, to be published on Tuesday, and then a low-key post for Fridays, like Five for Fridays or a Currently post.
Honestly, without this editorial calendar, I’m not sure if I would be able to maintain a consistent blogging schedule. This is what keeps me in line, motivated to write, and my topics fresh and interesting.
Being able to see what I have planned for the month means I always know what I am writing about the following week, and gives me the time to ruminate on what I want to say before writing the post. So, how do I write my posts? Well…
What does my content writing process look like?
This is the one area that can be all over the place, as I don’t have a set schedule for when I write. It’s just whenever I can make the time for it. But, how do I go from an idea in my Notes app to a published post on my blog? It’s not quite as streamlined as you may think!
For example, let’s discuss my post last week, For the Love of Writing. I wrote a long draft of the post on the Friday before I published it. I spent probably about an hour to an hour and a half free-writing. I didn’t stop to edit it for clarity or grammar or anything like that. I just wrote from the heart. Then, I stepped away from the post for a few days. I came back to it on Sunday night, read through what I wrote and added to it. I stepped away again. On Monday night, I came back to the post for my final round of revisions. I read through it, this time via a blog preview so I could read how it would look on my blog (sometimes, I can catch mistakes more easily that way than just by viewing it through WordPress), fixing mistakes and clarifying statements and deleting sentences that didn’t belong. I found a picture to accompany the post. And, after about an hour of editing, I scheduled it to publish the following day.
Sounds pretty crazy, right? I basically spent more than three hours perfecting just one post. Now, I don’t do that for every post (for example, my Currently in January post took me less than an hour to write), but for personal essays and more in-depth posts, they take me a long time because I want them to say exactly what I meant for them to say. And that takes a lot of writing and revising and editing and revising and writing and editing. Over and over and over again, until the post reads perfect (or nearly perfect) to my eyes.
This is also why I’ve decided to drop down to two posts a week. One, so I can focus on writing more personal essays and more meaningful posts. I want to focus more on quality and less on quantity this year. And two, because I need to create more space in my life for novel writing. With three posts a week, the majority of my weeknights were taken up with blogging. I had to change my schedule because writing my novel is my main priority goal for 2016, so I need to make sure I am really making it my number-one focus.
But that’s basically my blogging process! I do like to include a graphic with my posts, and that can add 10-15 minutes to my process between finding the right photo, uploading it to PicMonkey and adding text, and adding it to the post. I don’t spend time promoting my posts on social media (I’ll usually just tweet about the post once in the morning, and sometimes I don’t even do that), so basically, once the post is published, I’ve moved on to what’s next for me.
Keeping up with my blog can seem like a lot of work to some, but honestly, I only do it because I love it. It’s a hobby that earns me no money (it actually costs me money once I pay my yearly domain and hosting fees, ha), but I have gained so much from this space – new best friends, new outlooks on life, the push to go after my dreams, and mostly, a space to be myself, to be accepted, to be heard.
What does your blogging process look like?
I love this glimpse into your blogging process and i have to say, it looks pretty similar to mine (except for the fact that I do have an editorial calendar but I am NEVER a month ahead with my scheduling… a) because I usually don’t have that much content in advance and b) I am often a spur of the moment – blogger. The only posts that are scheduled in are the ones that regularly occur on my blog like “Link Love”, “Monthly Favorites”, “Currently”, etc.)
I definitely agree that blogging can take up a lot of time (I’ve been blogging for almost 15 years *gasp*), but I keep going because I love it, because I love to write and share and because I’ve made wonderful connections and friendships. I am so glad I found your blog along the way <3
My blogging process is non-existent, as evidenced by my random, rare and sporadic posts. I have and continue to struggle with how and what to share with my readers. What I do share is authentic but I’m also not able OR comfortable to discuss a lot goings on in my life (by choice) on the ole blog. I really want to be better about blogging but things like reading a book or coloring in my coloring book seem to win out over writing these days. I have lots of thoughts and ideas, just need to actually WRITE them. Maybe soon….!
This is awesome! Love it. 🙂
I’ve been blogging for sometime, and I’ve recently decided to try and get a little more “serious” about it, so I know I have to start having a schedule/process. This was helpful to see thanks for sharing.
Wow, this is impressive! I have absolutely no calendar, schedule, or process. I do keep notes as they come to me in the Notes app on my phone, as you do, but beyond that, I just write when I feel like it, when I think of something, when I have time, etc. I also have about 100 posts still in draft from the past eight (!) years, in part because my only really process seems to be starting, stopping, trying again, deciding I don’t like it yet, vowing to come back to it later, & never doing that. 😛
I do not have much of a process or I should say much structure to my writing process! I will occasionally write post ideas on a post-it and put that in my planner or sometimes I’ll write out post topics on the calendar, but for the most part I just kind of write about things as they come to me. I try to post 2-3 times a week but sometimes it’s less and sometimes it’s more depending on what is going on in my life. This month Tuesdays have been recipe posts so that has given me some structure, which I like, but I won’t continue that throughout the year as it’s kind of a lot of work to come up with a recipe that’s worth sharing (although it was motivating in January!).
Your process is great and much more organized than mine! I wish I could get my blogging as organized and planned out as you! I’m more of a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants kind of girl when it comes to blogging, although I do the exact same thing on my phone with the notes for post ideas. I would love to eventually get to a calendar like you with my posts planned out, but my struggle is coming up with new ideas for my personal essay pieces which makes it harder to plan ahead. Ah, well. Maybe one day I’ll get my blog more organized. And hey, my blog turned six in September too! 😀
This is soooo interesting to read, seriously. I have no real method to blogging, which is probably why I continue to fall off the face of the earth after 3-4 posts (oops). I mean, I keep a list of ideas on my phone and then when I have free time, I write blog posts in text documents on my computer. Sometimes I don’t write ahead of time, though, so I’m writing whatever’s floating around in my head Wednesday night (I’m trying out once-a-week blogging on Thursdays for now so I don’t overwhelm myself).
Back when I was blogging regularly, I had a LOT of day-specific topics and month-specific topics that kept me on track. Like, I used to participate in some kind of question-and-answer community post on Tuesdays, then Fridays I tried to come up with easy list-type posts. I think when I stopped, it was because I felt like I wasn’t posting anything of substance, just a series of broad life updates (usually monthly) and lists.
Luckily, because I’ve been away from blogging for a while, I have a lot of ideas and most weeks I can just sit down and pop one out into a blog post. But perhaps I should try an editorial calendar once I get back into my groove.
Thanks for sharing this, Stephany! I’ve always admired how you are so consistent with blogging 3x a week. My goal for my blog this year is to post more consistently (3x a week). I’ve just started using an editorial calendar so hopefully that helps me.
I like the idea of writing blog post ideas in the notes app. Mine end up on my google calendar or in my drafts folder. I need to be better about keeping them all in one place!
Your method for blogging is so clear and organized – definitely makes the process easier no doubt :).
I’ve blogged on and off for years, usually starting a blog and then forgetting it existed, becoming bored with it, and/or I would just stop writing for it. I maintained a blog when I was 19 for a solid number of months, but even that fell by the wayside. I’m not sure why I didn’t keep up with them, for I love sharing my thoughts and connecting with others. Perhaps real life and other pursuits oh-so-easily detoured me lol. But with my new blog I’d like to develop an organized method so that I will stay on track with it. I have a notebook where I write thoughts down and Word documents that become drafts for posts; my goal is to blog 2-3 times a month. This way, my ideas remain fresh!
Wow so awesome! I think if I had more of a process like you I would be better at posting more regularly. I do keep track of post ideas in the notes app on my phone but I usually don’t do too much writing ahead of time, at the most I will draft 1 – 2 posts for the week on the weekend and then perfect them the night before. I think if I was better at that I would have way more posts up than I currently do. This was a fun post and it was interesting to see inside of your process!