Your main goal as a blogger probably comes down to marketing your blog and your content, building a community, converting visitors into readers and clients and making money as an end result.

Aside from that however, as a blogger you should also strive to save time!

Time is an important factor. The less of it you have to spend on your work, the more of it you will have at your disposal to do whatever you want.

But if we assume you are making thousands of dollars from your blog every month, what’s the point if you don’t actually have the time to spend them, right?

When it comes to making a living by spending the least amount of time possible actually working, internet-related monetization models are a good idea.

And that most definitely also goes for blogging! 

But even so, there are always things you could do to further minimize the time you spent on your day-to-day tasks.

That is exactly what I will focus on in today’s post!

Let’s get started:

 

1. Have a Table with Your Stats and Plan Ahead

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We’ve all heard that failing to plan is planning to fail. And there’s definitely some truth to this.

Well not in our case exactly, but still having a proper plan and knowing exactly what’s going on with your blog is an important part of the improving productivity process.

Here are some of the steps you should follow in order to stay on top of things:

• Take a minute to figure how many articles you need to complete PER month for your blog – that way you can track your progress at any time and compare it to that final number.
• Include another table with the guest posts you want to write per month – guest blogging as you probably know is one of the best ways to not only improve your SEO, but to also expand your community and draw new readers in. That is why you should include it in your plans.
• Create a checklist with all the tasks you need to perform daily – the list might include things like engaging on Twitter, replying to comments, scheduling social media updates, etc.
• Make a list of your earnings based on their type (if you have any that is) – for me the list includes affiliate sales, sponsored reviews and custom content that I’ve written. That way at the end of the month you will have an idea of which monetization strategies are working and which require improving.

NOTE: You can use Excel or more sophisticated software to structure all that data, but if you prefer simplicity, I’d recommend you to go for Sticky Notes.

 

2. Don’t Procrastinate Your Tasks Even a Minute

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That sounds like a really basic tip, I know…

The reality however is that procrastination is more often than not the reason why things aren’t working out and why you end up spending way to much time on things that could take only a few minutes.

There are no tools that can help you with that (except for your phone’s alarm maybe). It’s all up to you.

Just get up in the morning, drink your coffee, finish breakfast and don’t waste another second. Look at the list (from the previous paragraph) that you (should’ve) created and start striking through your tasks (using CTRL+T if you decide to try Sticky Notes).

By doing so you can better “feel” the progress you are making, which will keep you more motivated to keep going.

And don’t stop until you’ve crossed the last on the list. Otherwise you might just end up in that postpone-circle, which is almost impossible to get off of.

You may want to read: 5 Very Good Reasons to Get Off of Social Media for a Few Days

 

3. Complete Everything and Leave Writing Last

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A lot of folks will probably start be telling you, you should do your writing first and then move on to the other less-important tasks. And there’s some logic to it when you think about it.

You work on what matters most until you reach the task that aren’t that crucial.

But… by leaving those not-that-significant tasks last, you risk not finishing them at all (remember what I said about the tasks that take just a couple of minutes to complete?).

That is why I always start work from the smallest things that need to get done and make my way up to the more important ones with writing holding the last spot.

An additional benefit of doing so is that once you reach the writing part, you know there is nothing else to do and that as long as you complete the whole post, you are free to go.

Wait… did I just say “complete the whole post”?!

Yep, moving on to the next tip on the list: 

 

4. Don’t Write Half an Article, Get it All Done

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That has definitely got to be the most time-saving advice from this whole article!

How I achieved this?

• Firstly I installed the WordPress Editorial Calendar – a great plugin that changes the whole layout of your WordPress blog posts archive by turning it into what is essentially a calendar, where you can easily manage your finished and unfinished content and get a better idea of what you have to publish next and what you have to write next.
• Secondly rather than simply writing an article idea when something came to my mind, I also took the time to write a short bullet-pointed plan for the post that consists of all the paragraphs I am going to cover.
• Thirdly I created a sticky note with all the to-be-written articles along with their subheadings. That way I always know what other articles there are in the queue, which gives me additional time to think of what to write in the subheadings.

 

Final Words

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Those four strategies have given me a huge helping hand in the battle to find more free time and make my day a little more productive. I really hope you liked the advice!

 

Now I’d like to hear your thoughts! 

What are your ways to improve blogging and marketing productivity?

Are you a Sticky Notes fan?

How many articles do you finish per week? 

Please take a minute to share!