If you run a blog or website, one of the biggest challenges is going to be writing. Not that it’s hard for most of us to write something intelligent and interesting, but it’s that we fail to start at all – there are many reasons for this.
But what can be done? Well, short of writing a book on procrastination, I’ll tell you what I do on a daily basis that makes a difference. If you have a serious procrastination problem, it’s likely affecting other areas of your life. Several excellent books have been written on the subject, so I won’t pretend to be an expert.
For me, procrastination has been a drag on my productivity from day one. I have read a fair number of books on the subject, with minimal success. I find that what works for one person, doesn’t necessarily work for another – we are all different, after all.
This article is similar to the one I wrote on how to get more content. The difference is that I’ll get into how to get started writing in the first place.
Here are my tips:
Make sure you set aside a time to work – nothing will get done if you don’t. I set aside 9am to 2pm with a lunch break. It’s important to structure something, otherwise, you’ll be watching Youtube all day. Treat it like a job – if you want to make money as a blogger, then you better put in a minimum amount of time. Once I get started, there’s a good chance I’ll do more, but at least I can count on doing approximately 5 hours a day and that allows me to live with myself and not feel like a loser – lol.
Learn to separate work from your personal life. You need to write and churn out content or you don’t make money – simple as that. While it may be tempting to hang out with your friends or simply idle the day away, you have a job to do if you want to make this work.
Don’t lose ideas
If you’re in the shower, hiking your favourite trail, driving… whatever, make sure that you record ideas as they come to you. Yes, it feels like the easiest thing in the world to just “remember,” but you probably won’t – at least not fully. And that is a huge loss. All these ideas add up and may even represent your best work. I know myself, that I have my greatest ideas while out walking. If you don’t have ideas, the thought of sitting down to write can be daunting – as a result, you’ll procrastinate and get nothing done.
Once you have those ideas, start writing. Open a new page for each idea and write as much as you can. You likely won’t complete an article right away, but that doesn’t matter – open a dozen pages if you have to. Even if all you do is write a sentence for each idea, at least you have a start – something on paper.
You will be tempted to procrastinate if you write yourself into a corner. If that happens, go to another article you started. Don’t worry if you have many articles open at once, or that you leave them for a good length of time, you’ll get back to each and every one. Make sure to choose a good descriptive title for each piece or you’ll get mixed up in no time.
Pick topics that interest you. Yes, you might make a lot of money if you break into the health and wellness niche (there’s a small chance), but unless you are an expert already, you’ll hate researching every last thing you write about. The prospect of a great income might initially give you a boost of energy, but it will fade if it becomes a chore. Procrastination is certain to follow.
You need to be consistent. Ideally, you should try and post something every day. Your readers will appreciate it and remain loyal. There is nothing worse than following a blog or vlog, only to have the creator disappear without explanation for a period of time. Maybe a few days is ok, but not more than that. You will start a slow slide backwards that can be tough to recover from. Sure, your readers get your content for free, but they still expect consistency. If you are not consistent, they will go elsewhere and forget about you. There is little loyalty on the internet these days.
Another reason to remain consistent? Well, search engines, of course. Google and company love lots of fresh content, delivered on a consistent basis. It’s one of the makings of a good, solid and reliable website. It separates you from those who are only willing to put in a minimal effort.
Lastly, if you remain consistent, you build work habits and that is important. The more consistent you are, the better your work ethic will become (for most people anyway).
Number of words
I find that most of my articles are at least a 1000 words. A proper article should be 1000-5000 words. Too little, and the reader feels like they are missing out – too much, and it becomes a chore to read and people will start skimming down your well written masterpiece.
A personal blog usually has shorter articles; sometimes less than a thousand words, even. A well researched information article will be longer. Don’t get too caught up on words: The article will take as many words as is necessary to flow and convey your message.
Now, there is a point at which your efforts no longer have the desired effect. If you write a 10,000 word article, it better be engaging or you are going to lose your readers. The search engines probably don’t care that it’s a 10,000 word post either. The bottom line is that the extra effort is not worth it and is inefficient (the law of diminishing returns). If you feel you have a topic that simply cannot be written with less words, split it up into part 1, part 2, etc and meter it out over a few days; or simply make another separate article or two.
If you know that you are going to take a few days off, most blogging platforms have a schedule feature that will allow you to upload your articles and drip feed them on a schedule of your choosing. Want to take a week, go camping and go offline? Well, write some articles ahead of time and put them on a scheduled release. It will look as though you are posting regularly and no one will know you’re actually away for a bit.
While you are away, you’re sure to come up with ideas for new posts. Write them down! I always come back with many more things to write about.
If you are away, make sure to have a comment protocol in place. If you don’t, you could easily come back to thousands of comments, each with dozens of links to all kinds of depravity. Spam bots can easily drop hundreds of comments over a very short period. The good news is that it only takes a few tweaks to prevent the assault.
Failure to do this will mean having to delete these comments, and that takes time. We don’t want to make our lives any more difficult and/or contribute to any more procrastination than is normal.
The bottom line is that running a website takes work. Not only are you required to push out consistent content, but there is the maintenance side of things too. Sounds like a lot of work for someone who procrastinates, but with a strong enough end-game in sight and by implementing a few of the tactics I mentioned, there is no reason you can’t be a success amongst the millions of blogs out there.
