It’s every blogger’s worst nightmare: writer’s block. But it doesn’t have to be painful and it doesn’t have to cause you stress. The simplest way to overcome writer’s block is to always have something to write about. In order to always have something to write about, you need to create a plan.
Create a Plan
Every 6 months, set aside a few hours to develop your blogging calendar. Decide what you want to write. If you’ve decided that your blog is to educate and help, pull together every Facebook question, every email enquiry, and look at what you can answer in the form of a blog post.
In our industry, the questions we are asked often require an in-depth answer and sometimes also images. The benefit of answering these questions in a blog post is that you have a blog answer to which you can direct people next time you’re asked. If someone has asked a question in Facebook or email, chances are someone else will as well. The second time though, we don’t have to reinvent the wheel.
Include blog posts about time-sensitive information. For example, in our industry that would include a blog featured around International Babywearing Week or Cloth Nappy Week. You can write about anything that your audience will find interesting or educational.
Remember, not all blog posts have to be written by you. They don’t even have to be written! Blog posts can feature video, images, audio or a combination of all three. Whether as a written article, a video, a series of images or a Q&A doesn’t really matter. The format, at this stage, isn’t important. It’s about getting topics down on paper.
Once you have your list of topics, you’ll then need to slot them into a calendar. Put your time-sensitive topics in first.
Regular Writing (Stay On Track)
Once you have your blog calendar created, you’ll need to set aside a time each day or each week in which to create that content.
Hold to it as though it were an appointment that you can’t change. This is key. If you keep putting it off, you’re never going to develop that resource library that your customers need and that you will use constantly.
You’ll be surprised how a good blog can help to streamline your customer service and response times. Don’t disrupt the flow of writing by stopping to schedule a finished post. So if you finish writing a post and still have 10 minutes left of your writing time, just start another post.
Scheduling is the most distracting part of blogging, so reserve all scheduling for a new time slot. Scheduling can also be the most time-consuming as you have to bring a number of different elements together. Scheduling needs to be a different time slot.
I try to write enough blogs in one sitting for at least 4 week’s worth of posts. This means I’m always at least one month ahead.
Need Help Coming Up With More Ideas?
Reach out to your retailers:
- Send them an email and ask what the most difficult question is that they are asked about your brands -answer it in a blog post
- Provide them with useful information about the products, that they can use to improve customer service and boost sales
- List the benefits of your products and encourage them to share these with their customers
- Provide short demonstration videos on your blog that your retailers can use to train their staff
Reach out to consumers:
- Go back through your emails and pull their questions and concerns into blog ideas
- Read their social media posts and comments and turn these into post concepts
- Survey them -ask them directly what it is they want to know
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