Best Blogging Practices | Set A Realistic Blogging Schedule | Plus: I've Included a Great Sample Blog Schedule for Wedding Pros!
I have lots of 'best blogging practices' tips I have collected over the years ... 8 years of blogging definitely showed me what works and what doesn't ... and you can learn from my mistakes and take a shortcut to what I think will create an amazing tool for your business: Your Blog. The first blogging practice I am going to take about is:
>> Set a Realistic Blogging Schedule <<
You don’t need to blog every day. I like to blog twice a day on The Editor's Touch, but only if I have something I am writing that matches my voice on this site. You need to ask yourself: How often is realistic? How long will it take me to produce a blog post? How can I keep the content fresh? Come up with a schedule for blogging, but don’t tell people the schedule. Just hold yourself to it. Otherwise you will surely be making apologies ... there were so many times in my first years running Style Unveiled that I would get super pumped about a blog series idea and I'd be like EVERY TUESDAY I WILL POST ABOUT SHOES ... 3 Tuesdays in, I'd be dreading a shoe post and eventually it just got forgotten.
Never force a blog post << you will regret it BIG TIME. I find that if the words aren't pouring out of me I just end up deleting a bunch of stuff and never end up with a product I truly love and am proud of. Your blog is an extension of you! It's an extension of your brand! Only publish posts that you want people to read and see ;)
Here is an example of a doable blog schedule for a wedding pro that keeps a few posts easy but still keeps fresh content on your site:
MONDAY: Words of wisdom to start the week ... if you are a wedding pro you may have just worked a wedding ... what did you learn from that wedding that you want to pass along? What tidbits from your experiences can you share that will tell clients: this vendor knows their sh*t!!!
TUESDAY: Are you on Pinterest? An easy peasy blog post idea is to share your favorite 5 Pins from the week before. This does 2 things: one it shows off your wedding detail loves and two it gives people a reason to follow you ... because I **KNOW** you will send them a link to your Pinterest boards ;) Here is an example of a post I did for Style Unveiled that is more involved, but you get the idea. You could take this idea and break it into 5 posts and then you have 5 weeks of Tuesday posts done!
WEDNESDAY: As in Wedding Wednesday??? Give a shoutout to a wedding pro you admire and love working with or spotlight on a local venue! This will give you brownie points with the vendor or venue and Google will eat it up! Bonus if you have gorgeous photos of a wedding you did with that particular vendor or at that wedding venue ;)
THURSDAY: Feature one of your styled shoots or real weddings! The good thing about only doing this once per week is that you will *hopefully* never run out ... rather than posting them as they come in and then having a week or so when you are still waiting for photographs. Using Thursday to post your work is a great way to have something big to look forward to and it gives you plenty of time between posts to make sure every Thursday post is exactly how you want your work portrayed on your blog. It also gives you plenty of time to get the credits right and create a great inspiration write-up! Here is an example of what I would post on Style Unveiled.
FRIDAY: Round up day!! Were you featured this last week? Do you have new badges to show off? Discuss on your blog and be PROUD of what you've done!
SATURDAY and SUNDAY: Hopefully if you've done your homework and have been working hard you are busy at an event or wedding ... and if not, use this time to get your blog prepped for the next week ... OR: even better ... enjoy your weekend!
XO~ Heather