May
27
An editorial calendar is a schedule made in advance of what you’re going to publish. Magazines and newspapers have been using editorial calendars for many years, and with good reason–they work. You too can benefit from creating and following one. Here’s what you’ll get from having one:
- Your post quality will increase. Since you know what you’ll be writing in advance, you’ll have a longer period of time to edit your post drafts until all uneccessary words have been cut and your metaphors sparkle. For posts that involve research, you have more lead-up time to conduct that research.
- Your blogging consistency will improve. Before I created an editorial calendar, my post topics jumped all over the place. I would find myself writing a post that was too big and which needed to be divided. Or I would create a post that required follow-through in a later post, but would never follow through. If your readers think a particular post is coming, but it never appears, they will be disappointed. With an editorial calendar, you may plan series posts in advance so that they build momentum and nobody is disappointed because your posts are publishing at regular intervals in order.
- Your RSS subscribers will increase. When you know what’s coming up, you can build anticipation in your readers for what’s to come at the end of existing posts or in comments. You can use this as a way to entice subscriptions. A small amount of extra effort at the end of some posts is worth the payoff in extra readers.
Any calendaring program can be used to create an editorial calendar for you blog. It doesn’t matter which one you use, so long as you use something. Sitting down and brainstorming all those posts for an entire month or more in advance is quite an eye-opening exercise! The more in advance you can create topics, the less likely it is you will ever suffer from writer’s block.
Try creating and using an editorial calendar for a couple months and see if you don’t notice a marked improvement in your post quality and consistency.
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[...] wrote a post for PureBlogging, called 3 Ways an Editorial Calendar Improves Your Blog. It came out pretty good, I think. Go read it, because only then will you get the full impact of [...]
The best way an editorial calendar helps a blogger is by bringing in a level of consistency.
After I started blogging and freelance writing , initially I was also finding it difficult to manage the work. But then I decided to follow a schedule and now things have streamlined for me. And that has also brought posting consistency in my own blog.
Anybody have a favorite editorial calendar program I should try?
Editorial calender is a very useful tool used to improve one’s blog. It gives lots advantages, like your blog will be updated regularly. I’m also interested to try this, I’m sure this could help improve my blog.
Creating the calendar is a great idea and one I should certainly do; however, sticking to the calendar is another topic altogether! In that quest, I have gotten another staffer involved in helping me “stay on track”, but she calls it a bit like herd cats!
Michael – I have been using a blog calendar for about six months now for keeping track of my marketing stat posts. The nice thing is when I get a seller lead from say the UNM area I can let them know that on the 14th +/- a day the newest report will be up. That really helps to bring them back each month. Now to use it for other topics and I will be in good shape.
Your statement is true for blogging and i think it is true for many other aspects in business. The whole marketing of a business is quite useless if it does not follow a strategic plan with targets and dates.
I’m never used Editorial calendar tool in my blog. Now I shall try to use it. Thanks for this article. I hope what it help me to increase popularity of my project.
I decided to follow your advice and to create Editorial Calendar. I suppose that there will be everything in order in my blog and my head. What is left is just to wait the results of this small experiment.
This is a fantastic suggestion. I would add a few things:
1) Keep the number of posts per week low, no more than 2 or 3. If you’re really serious about building your brand start at 1 per week. At the beginning you’re going to be really excited about your blog and want to write every day. That enthusiasm is hard to keep up. That’s why most blogs disappear after 2 months.
2) Add a minimum target for networking and social media participation to the list (each week: 5 comments on 5 new blogs, 10 comments on blogs you like, submit one thing to Digg, spend 10 minutes networking on stumbleupon). In your early weeks, channel your additional energy into additional comments and making additional friends on stumbleupon. Join Entrecard and stop using it after two weeks – the initial returns are great but they taper off.
3) Make the calendar for at least 3 months, 6 is better. Most blogs die after 2 months or less. Make a commitment to yourself to outlive the average at the onset.
4) Print the calendar and put it somewhere that you’ll see it. It will be a constant reminder of the commitment you’ve made to yourself and will keep you going.