How to plan your blog posts

Blogging is great for business as it raises your profile, helps your search engine ranking and positions you as an expert in your field. It does take time to do though – and when you’re busy running a business it can be difficult to find that time. However, when you plan your blog posts and schedule them into your calendar, it’s a lot easier to keep it regularly updated.

The first thing you need to decide when planning your blog posts is how often you want to blog. Some people blog once a month, some blog once a week – one person I know blogs five times a day! However often you choose to blog you need to be consistent, so think about what feels comfortable for you. For most people, blogging once a week is sufficient to achieve their blogging objectives. Once you’ve decided how often you want to blog, open up a spreadsheet and write the dates down the first column. So if you decide to blog once a week on a Tuesday, add the dates of the next 12 Tuesdays to the spreadsheet.

The next stage is to generate some titles for your blog posts. Think of three or four topics you can blog on – just general areas at this point. For example, if you’re a personal trainer you might blog about exercise, nutrition and healthy living. From those base topics you should be able to come up with lots of sub topics – for example, recipes for healthy meals, specific exercises to strengthen the legs, the importance of vitamins in your diet etc. You might find mind mapping a useful tool here. Try to come up with 12 different sub topics – each of these will form the basis for a blog post.

Variety is important when it comes to blogging, so once you’ve come up with the titles think about the best way to “present” each post. There are lots of different methods you can use in your blog – videos, case studies, step by step guides, photo posts, reviews, etc. Try to come up with at least three or four different styles of post that you feel comfortable creating.

So now you have 3 or 4 core topics, a list of 12 titles and several different blog styles. Add these to your spreadsheet, mixing up the core topics and styles to give your blog plenty of variety. This will give you a blogging schedule for the next three months. Now you need to schedule time into your calendar to create each post. You should need no more than an hour each week, or you may prefer to block out an afternoon each month and create 4 posts at once. Alternatively, if you really don’t have the time you could employ a professional blogger to write them for you.

To find out more about the professional blogging service we offer give us a call on 01793 608777!