Although we use our laptops and iPhones to get most things organised for our blog, there’s some things that are just easier on paper. You may have seen in our “where I blog from” blog post that besides a laptop, I also use a small folder to keep track of blog ideas, etc.
Besides having a notepad, and various pages printed out, I also have two different pages that I made in Word and scaled down to fit my folder and one that I keep handwritten (which I probably should turn into a template!).
The first is a monthly planner – I’m not very good at updating this, but it’s colour coded so I can see if I can try to get specific topics on certain days.
The next is a weekly planner – on this, there are sections that show which category relates to which day, space to note the blog post title / theme and then checkboxes so I can check that I am doing specific things for each post (e.g. whether the images have been edited for the post, whether the SEO details have been completed for each post, and whether it’s been promoted (the description for the automatic tweet has been written, etc)
Finally, I have (for my personal blog) a list of items that have been sent to me, so I can keep track of what I have posted a review, which helps me make sure I post reviews in a reasonable time.
If anyone requests them, I will put these files up for download, but you may have different requirements, so you should design these notepages yourself! Here are a few things you might want to keep on your lists:
Monthly Page
- Post Title
- Post Category
- Number of comments after a certain period (perhaps 2 weeks?)
Weekly Page
- Post title
- Have all the photos been taken and edited for the post?
- Has the post been written?
- Have you posted it on your social media accounts?
- Have you edited your SEO plugin details for the post?
- Have you put the post into Buffer for future promotion?
C/O Items and Sponsored Posts Page
- What the item was / How much you charged
- Where the item came from / Who is paying you for the post?
- Contact Email address
- Any specific links / text required (if you don’t have a no follow review policy)
- Has the item/payment been received?
- Has the post been published?
- Have you informed your contact that the post is up? (They’ll usually be checking on the agreed day, but it’s a nice touch to inform your contact that it’s up!)
What would you include on these sort of pages?
Thank you for this excellent resource, I especially like the last bit now that I am taking on sponsored posts :)
I figured I couldn’t be the only one who needs to write everything down!
This is awesome, I would LOVE to be able to download the templates!
Maria xxx
Here’s the link to the monthly planner, and here’s the one to the weekly one!
Thank you! :)
I need to get more organised. Thanks for the post, and I would love to be as organised as you! Maybe I could learn….. H x