Proven Methods To Increase Your Blogging Productivity
Most bloggers launch their blogs with a great deal of
enthusiasm. A month or two later, there’s a distinct slump in ideas, interest
and enthusiasm. All of this tells on the blogger’s productivity. The result?
The blog suffers from lack of regular content, regular followup, promotions and
networking.
Here are proven methods to increase your blogging productivity and
keep it burning steady.
1. Create A Schedule
Based on your annual blogging goals, make a list of your
blogging activities for a month. List
the activities you want to accomplish each week. Then create a weekly schedule,
with a breakup of tasks for each day. Factor an off day or two into your
month’s schedule as you need.
2. Refer To Your Day’s Activity List First Thing In The
Morning
When you do this, you’ll know exactly how your day is going
to pan out. You’ll be able to factor in the breaks you need and get your
personal work done when your day’s schedule is well planned.
3. Prioritize Tasks
Go over the day’s list of tasks and prioritize them based on
level of importance. Then focus on doing one thing at a time, till that task
gets done. This will help steady your focus and the tasks will get done one by
one.
4. Do The Easy Stuff When You’re Feeling Dull
Mid-afternoon after lunch is the time most people feel a
little sluggish. Assign easy-to-do and enjoyable tasks such as reading RSS
feeds and tweets to the sluggish time of your day.
5. Clean Up Your Desk And Desktop
Clean up your desk, keeping only the things you absolutely
need close to hand. Do the same with your computer – clean up your files and
folders, organize information neatly, organize your bookmarks in folders and so
on.
6. Time Scheduled Activities
If you are on a tight schedule, use a timer to time your
work. For example, let’s say you need to upload three posts a day on your blog,
at specific times. Using a timer will keep you on your toes and maintain your
schedule.
7. Remove Distractions
When you need to focus, you need to focus. Shut off all distractions
– such as notification pings from emails, tweets and other updates. Keep your
phone off, and turn your immediate environment into a quiet zone.
8. Take Breaks Often
The human brain is not built to sustain continuous focus
without breaks for an entire day. Schedule breaks every hour. Walk about, call
a friend, make some coffee – just don’t sit in front of your computer.
9. Drink Plenty Of Water
Water not only hydrates you, but keeps your brain and body
working in top gear. Some people forget to drink water when they work and
complain of sluggishness and of pain in their arms and legs. Avoid all that.
10. Cut Back On Your Subscriptions
How many RSS feeds or email newsletters can you read in a
day? Plus, how much of all that reading is actually going to benefit you? Cut
back on your subscriptions and keep only what you want. Set a time during the
day for reading them.
11. Use The Right Productivity Tools
Use Buffer to automate your tweets, Netvibes as your feed
reader, InstaPaper to save interesting pages, easyComment to automatically fill
comment forms and so on. These tools can really save you a lot of time.
12. Discourage Sensory Overload
Our brains have to operate at different frequencies to make
sense of street noise, music, lights and the many noises that surround us. Keep
the music off when you work, and shut the window to drown out street noise.
13. Don’t Check Stats Too Often
Some bloggers upload a post, wait an hour and then run to
check their traffic statistics. This can swiftly turn into a real OCD, eating
into valuable time. Check stats once a day, or at the most, twice.
This article is contributed by GO-Gulf.com, a website development company from Dubai that
offers professional web designing and SEO services to online
businesses in Middle East.
