I’ve been guilty of a crime. The crime of sugar-coating the truth. When you ask me how often you should be blogging, I fudge the answer. I tell you that as long as you’re consistent, it doesn’t really matter. Well it does. Because if you want your blog to bring you business, if you want it to be a fully functioning marketing asset, you need to be posting something at least once a week. Sorry.
When you post something weekly (and tell people about it!), it does three important things for your business. It keeps you uppermost in people’s minds, it helps people start to automatically associate you with what you do, and it quickly builds you a valuable set of resources you can use to show people how you can help them.
If you’re not blogging weekly, or if you can’t imagine how you’ll ever manage to, please stay calm. With a little help you can and you will. Here are three methods you can use to get blogging every week.
1. Keep a store of blogging ideas on your computer, in a notebook, or on your phone. That way you will always have something to write about. Add to your list every time you have an idea; or a customer tells you what’s annoying them, or how you’ve helped them; or you hear something relevant while watching a film; or you read something your customers will love in a magazine. I ran an experiment one evening and found three blog post ideas from The Mentalist, CSI and NCIS:LA. Yes, busted, I love American crime drama.
2. Write your blog post early in the week or early in the day. If you’re the kind of person who doesn’t hit the ground running on a Monday morning, schedule in your blog post for then. It’s a good way to ease into the week, and you’ll have something major ticked off your To-Do List before you’ve even written it!
3. Block out time at the beginning or end of the month and write several blog posts at once. This is how I write for my clients. I spend a day entirely in their head and write their four posts in one go. If you’re someone who finds it harder to get in the zone for writing, this is a great way to do it. It means you don’t have to get in the zone each week, just once a month.
When you’re just starting to blog, or if you’re getting back into it after a break, it can feel a little overwhelming to commit to blogging once a week. And it’s okay to start off with one a month, or one a fortnight, but weekly is what you should aspire to, and what you should be working towards if you want your blog to work for your business, rather than be ‘just one more thing to do’.
If you want help to get there, check out Blog Club. Its sole aim is to get you blogging, and keep you blogging: with a cocktail of resources each month, along with plenty of support, encouragement and help in our VIP area. In the meantime, let me know what keeps you from blogging weekly in the comments below. 🙂
