On Day 1 of the Prepared Blogger series, I talked about designating a Blog Pizza Night. Today I will talk about blogging checklists.
I’m a checklist kind of woman. Checklists, to-do lists, grocery lists-I like and use them all.
Checklists are energizing. Momentum builds as you mark off completed tasks. Point by point they can show you what it takes to get from here to there. When you feel like you haven’t accomplished anything on a given day, they are friendly reminders to whip out as proof you have done “something” that day.
Creating step-by-step lists for your repetitive blogging tasks will free up the energy needed to stay consistent and creative-characteristics of all profitable bloggers.
Some of you commented you liked the video about using Google Calendar as a blog editorial calendar.
Blogger beware. A simple entry to “write blog post” on your Google calendar is deceptive. Hidden behind that three word phrase are many tasks.
As you go through your daily blogging activities, write down each action you take to get to what you consider done for an activity.
Develop a routine and capture it in a checklist.
An organization style that will help you get checklists down to a science is the “Getting Things Done” method by David Allen. The core of his teaching is to get everything out of your head, identify projects, make a list of actions to complete the project and create systems.
Use these nifty online apps built around the GTD method to get started with your blogging checklists.
- Offers a free level.
- Great for users new to the GTD system.
- Offers free 7 day trial.
- Clean, intuitive, drag and drop interface.
- Use straight from browser
For ideas on documenting internet marketing tasks, I highly recommend Melissa Ingold’s Sweetie Saturday Report Club. Every month she creates a report, checklist and action plan detailing a marketing strategy.
photo credit: alancleaver_2000
