Writing Articles for a Blog – A Recipe for Success

Pic via http://www.flickr.com/photos/kitsa_sakurako/

Understanding that I am a bit new to this blogging game, I thought I would share my procedure for putting together blog content anyways, in the hopes that it may help out some other would-be bloggers.  Full disclosure, I failed to follow the good advice that most new bloggers should abide by, and that is first, find a niche, then second, write a bunch of articles for a few months before you launch your blog and start publishing content.

Since this blog started in earnest (meaning I actually posted more than thrice quarterly…yeah I said “thrice”) at the beginning of June 2009, I initially was using it as a means to update friends and family on the status of our newborn triplets.  I’ve now branched out into other interests including spirituality, parenting, productivity and exercise. 

It took me a few weeks to put a plan together and since I don’t really have a backlog of posts waiting to be published, I am forced to write them every week.  The process is not nearly as bad as it seems.  In fact, it’s quite like a Master Chef planning out the weekly menu for the guests at a restaurant.

I keep my eyes and ears open.  I ALWAYS carry my little red softback Moleskine and a pen or pencil.  On the off occasion where the Moleskine is not available, like when it’s packed as I am riding my bike, I use the Notes function on my IPOD Touch and then copy it later into my Moleskine.  I make no bones about writing ideas down when they come to me, even if it’s in the middle of work.  I would rather take ten seconds to get the idea out of my head then let it nag at me and affect my productivity during my day job.  Therefore I always have a bunch of recipe ideas (blog posts) waiting in my little red book.

Menu Planning – On Sundays, I pour through the Moleskine and pick out blog ideas just like I would recipes to plan the weekly menu.  I always pick six, even though I post only five times a week (Monday – Friday).  I like having a spare in case I find myself out of steak or lobster (uninspired on one of the other topics).  I write them down on an index card, divided by day, as my weekly menu. 

Creating the Shopping List - Then I have an index card for each and start jotting an outline for each idea.  This brainstorming is so important and it makes it so much easier to fill in the rest of the article later.  I consider this the ingredients and directions of each recipe.  As such, once I get down to cooking (sorry, writing), each note of the outline becomes the start of a paragraph in and of itself. 

Prepping the Food, Making the Meal - The recipe cards then go into my 43 Folders system so that when I grab a folder by date, each day, my outline is ready to go.  I keep the master menu index card next to my computer.  It typically takes me less than thirty minutes to finish the article after that.  In fact, it takes me longer to format the post and create the links in Wordpress than it does to write it. 

Pat Yourself on the Back, Then Do it Again! – It can be hard to come up with new content.  Basically, rinse and repeat, is easier said than done.  Every Sunday I make a new menu.  In many ways, it’s more exciting than being Master Chef at a restaurant in that I am trying out new recipes every single week. 

Ideally, I should be slowly building up a canon of extra posts, for those lean times when the Muse is a fickle witch.  When I have time on Saturdays, I will provide that as a to-do.  Otherwise, this process is working great.  Hope it helps you.