Wednesday, 26 July 2017

I have a friend who once asked me how I am able to blog, have a part-time job, go to college full-time and have a social life. I simply laughed and said "it's not that hard" but I thought I'd do a post on how I manage it. 

First things first, it's okay to have a day/week/month off. If I am having writers block and I don't know what to write about, then I'll take time off as I would rather publish one post that I'm proud of that may have took me a few weeks to come up with than loads of small posts I am not proud of. 

I think a thing many bloggers forget is that their readers understand what it's like to be busy. Whenever I see a blogger on Twitter talking about how busy they are, but they NEED to post this week, I always remind them that they come first. I know our readers are important to us, but at the end of the day they know how busy and stressful life can get.

Now that I've said that, I'm going to start on my tips. 

1. Write posts and schedule them in your free time.

If I have a day where I don't have anything planned or I'm not seeing friends until later that day, I write as many posts as I can, and schedule them for Monday, Wednesday and Friday (the days I upload) and I keep writing and scheduling posts. I've once had two weeks worth of posts to share! This means that when life gets too busy, you still have posts to make. 

2. Schedule tweets 

I use Buffer to schedule my tweets. This is my least favourite part of blogging but it's really important to do, as it means your followers can get your content at various times of the day without you having to manually tweet! A controversial thing I use is Crowdfire, so if you don't like it then I suggest you look away now! Crowdfire essentially tweets for you by creating tweets using your posts which you can then choose to tweet now, at a specific time or at the best time. It also can be used for other things but I've never looked into that myself. Both of these methods save you so much time! - I write my Buffer tweets usually before I go to bed and you literally have to open the Crowdfire app and choose what tweets you want to post and when. 

3. Be organised! 

In my early days of blogging, I wasn't very organised at all. I would leave essays to the last minute and not have time to blog. However, after that initial bump, I started using a diary and to-do list and writing down when I would want the first paragraph finished etc. This meant that I had a way to plan what I was going to do every night and then start a blog post. I also have a post on how I organise things

4. Understand that at times you'll have to decide.

I do try to be as organised as possible, but with going to full-time education during the week and working at weekends, I found it a lot more difficult to go on nights out as I wasn't free when the rest of my friends were free. This means that I missed a few nights out, and now that I blog I miss even more. However, my true friends will come round and sit in my house while I write a post and just chat to me, so technically I still get to see them as much. 

5. You'll realise you have a bigger support network than you once thought 

This one is related more to feeling de-motivated but is also good for when life is getting on top of you. When I'm feeling stressed due to how busy I am, I log onto Twitter and see how amazing people are. I have made great friends in the blogging community and bloggers that I've never spoken to RT my tweets and comment on my posts. It really is the nicest feeling ever and helps me so much! I also have a post on how I motivate myself which may be useful!

I hope these tips help someone out there and if you find any useful, please let me know in the comments! Sending love and hugs, 

Ashleigh ♡ xoxo 

Join the conversation!

  1. Great tips! I've started scheduling more posts in my free time now too, I used to stress myself out so much before!
    Steph x

  2. Great tips Ashleigh ☺

    I think I need to schedule Tweets, and get some of my content out through at various times. May give Buffer a look ☺


