5 Ways to Stay Organized While Blogging

Hey friends! Welcome to Blog Organization 101! I’m a bit extra excited to share with you today’s blog post about how I stay organized while running a blog. I am about to approach my one year anniversary with blogging! Whoohoo! Every Tuesday for the next couple of weeks I’m going to share everything I’ve learned about blogging over the past year. Even though I’ve been blogging for almost a year now, I still have a lot to learn.

Staying Organized While Blogging

Being organized is soooo important to keeping up a great blog! I had a lot of trouble with this when I first started blogging. I had no idea what to write, so I just didn’t write, sometimes for weeks too! It was very hectic and overwhelming at first.

Starting at the beginning of this year, when I really cracked down on implementing the below tips, I was able to see an increase in traffic and better engagement with my readers!

*Some of the below links are affiliate links and are at no additional cost to you. I have only included links to products that I have used myself and would recommend to others.*

Ready for my top 5 tips for staying organized while running a blog? Keep on reading!

Create a Content Calendar

This is my favorite thing to do! At the beginning of each month, I’ll crack open my bullet journal and create an entire spread of what I need to do for the whole month. This keeps me very organized and I’m able to see an overview of what I can start working on. This of course changes and I don’t always stick to it-but I certainly try to! If you prefer to use a planner, I love this one!

On this calendar, I only write down things related to my social media/blogging. I have a different one for school/work. At the beginning of each week I’m able to clearly see what I need to get done and start working on anything that may be more time consuming. I do also add major holidays to this calendar. This helps me remember that “oh this holiday is coming up ” so let’s get out a related blog post.

Having a monthly spread is also so important when it comes to the weather! I will actually include the days that the weather isn’t so great so I know that I most likely won’t be able to do any photoshoots. On days that it is raining or too gloomy out to take pictures, I try to start working on the post itself. There is nothing worse than finding out last minute that it will rain all day and you need to get a summer bathing suit blog post out!

Write Ideas Down

In my bullet journal I also have a ton of pages that I write down any ideas that I get for a blog post. My three main categories that I write about are lifestyle, health and fashion. I have separate pages for each category and write down all posts related to each one. This really helps me if I’m in a rut and have no idea what to write about for that day. This also ties in well with my content calendar. I will pick ideas that I want to write about and add it to my calendar at the start of each month.

I also write down anything that I may need for that specific idea. Such as my 10 Instagram Worthy Spots in San Diego, I wrote down the 10 spots and what I wanted to wear to each one. This has made it very easy to transition into writing an entire post from my ideas. When I wrote down my 4 Ways to Incorporate Pink Into Your Life blog idea, I also wrote that I wanted some fun pink drinks. I was able to plan ahead and grab it next time I went grocery shopping instead of running out at the last minute to grab it.

Be Consistent

Being organized also means being consistent. Having set days to work on certain things keeps my sanity and I am able to post more frequently.

My blogging days are Tuesdays and Thursdays. I try to write a more lifestyle post on Tuesday and a fashion one on Thursday. Anything else that pops up, I write on Wednesdays. The rest of the week, I can start working on a post or taking photos for one.

Again, with my content calendar, I write down all the lifestyle posts on the Tuesdays of that month. I am able to expect to upload a post on Tuesdays and my readers (you guys!) can also expect it as well. This helps me get into the mindset of writing a specific post early on so I am not panicking Tuesday morning that I have nothing to write about.

Keep Blogging Separate

As many of you know, I am a full time student in school. This means that I have a ton of papers, assignments and what-not that can clutter my desktop (and life!).

I have completely separate folders on my desktop specific to blogging. Any photos I have go in the photo folder under blogging. I never have to worry about lost photos or blog posts.

I also have a separate Gmail account for blogging as well. This allows me access to a separate Google Drive too. Writing up all my blog posts in my blogging Google drive helps prevent me from searching through essays about Public Health and Biology for classes while trying to find it.

I also invested in another bullet journal specifically to all things blogging/social media. I am able look through and not be reminded that I need to do laundry as I’m looking for what I’m writing about for the week. Also, it was a great excuse to get another bullet journal, I love them so much!

Scheduling Ahead

Scheduling! What an awesome invention. Running a blog can take up a lot of time and sometimes you finish writing at 1 am! That being said, I don’t always finish a blog post and publish it write away. I want to stay consistent and post on specific days.

With almost all of my blog posts, I write them early and schedule them to be posted with WordPress’s scheduler. This helped a lot if I wanted the blog post to go up while I was in class or traveling. I always double check that it got uploaded correctly when I have a minute later in the day.

With my blog, I also utilize Pinterest and Instagram to help grow my traffic. After I finish writing a blog post, I schedule every photo I used with Tailwind to post to Pinterest over the next couple days/weeks. This has taken a HUGE stress off my shoulders and I don’t have to worry about manually doing it. This has also been a huge help in helping me stay organized with Pinterest. I don’t have to remember if I pinned my blog post or not. Tailwind is a great resource for many bloggers. It allows you to schedule pins (at the optimal time!), view analytics, and find other content creators!

They recently came out with the same features for Instagram. I work in the evening once a week, so I am not able to post on Instagram during the best time to do so. Using Tailwind for those days has helped me posting consistently, even if I’m not there to do it manually. I religiously use this website and highly recommend it to you guys! I do have a referral link for a free month of Tailwind! Click here to learn more!

That’s all for my top 5 tips for staying organized while running a blog! Did you find any of these helpful? Which one do you think you need to work on? Let me know!

Want to read more of my blog? Check out my last blog post here. 

-Camille Grey-