10 Ways To Save Major Time When Blogging

Becoming a productive blogger is easier than ever, but takes some work in the beginning. 

We have access to hundreds of online tools and services to make working online easier and more efficient.

I recently wrote a post on the many things I do as a blogger, but I’ve saved hundreds of hours from using these tools below.

I created this blog and made over $80,000 in my senior year of college (that’s me in my first major feature by Forbes!). I’ve grown this thing by myself, so saving time and maximizing productivity is a must. 

Below is a list of 10 ways to save time when blogging that will help you save time to work on other important things! 🙂

Before we get started, make sure to sign up for my free resource library and get access to exclusive printables all about saving money and building wealth, meal planning, and more.

Start a blog today for just $2.95/month with my step-by-step tutorial here. It’s easy, painless, and takes less than 20 minutes to start a blog of your own. With my Bluehost discount, you get a discount from $7.99/month to $2.95/month.

Schedulers

Roughly twice a month I will schedule everything for my blog.

I set a goal of getting this completed in under an hour.

You can schedule:

• Facebook posts
• Twitter posts
• Pinterest pins + Tailwind Tribe posts
• Instagram photos
• many other platforms as well

For scheduling, I like to use:

• Tailwind (which is an approved Pinterest publisher, VERY important)
• Hootsuite (for Twitter)
• Facebook Scheduler (Facebook’s scheduling service)

I have been using Tailwind Smart Loop to schedule my Pinterest pins and I’ve been an active member of Tailwind Tribes for years.

Work when you’re most productive

If I told you I get the most work done at night, would you think I’m lying?

I recently read a book called “When” by Daniel Pink and it talked about the different personalities and productivity times of people.

I was surprised to read that there were other people like me.

There are studies that recommend working in the morning because your brain is more readily available to tackle on the difficult tasks.

This doesn’t come as a surprise to me, but then it made me realize I’m the exact opposite.

I love working at night.

I say work when you are truly the most productive.

That may be in the morning, mid-afternoon, or late evening.

Editing

When editing your blog posts, use Grammarly.

It’s not perfect (I use it and I bet there are a few grammar mistakes in this post somewhere), but it’s better than nothing.

I personally use the free version of Grammarly, and it’s been tremendously helpful and a huge time saver.

I still recommend going through your posts a couple of times before scheduling or hitting publish.

For major projects, such as eBooks or courses, I have someone edit all of my work for me, which I highly recommend.

You can also find editors on Fiverr or Upwork.

Invest in a blogging course

I often hear people ask why they need to buy a course if they can get the information online for free.

And I always reply with this – You totally can.

You can (usually) find what you get in courses online at no cost, but it would take you foreverrrr.

This is similar to going to college, you could find what those people teach you online, but it would take you years and years and you probably wouldn’t want to do that.

Whether you take a course or not is up to you. A lot of people try to avoid courses altogether at all costs (I understand, I used to be this way). I was trying to save as much money as possible until I realized running a business isn’t free. You buy 1 course where someone who’s running a profitable blog knows what they’re doing. You implement what you learn from the course. You work hard.

You get results A LOT faster than someone who’s trying to wing it. If you’re taking blogging as a business seriously, save your time and learn from someone who knows what they’re doing. 

I recommend the Pro Blogger Bundle which includes 4 of the best blogging courses. I’ve personally taken all 4 courses and they’re exactly what took me from newbie blogger to full-time business owner on Fitnancials. I was getting little page views before one of the courses called Pinterest Traffic Avalanche. Now I’m getting enough traffic from Pinterest alone to make my blog a full-time career. You learn absolutely everything you need to know to start and run a profitable blog and business. These 4 courses were created by bloggers who made $100,000+ in their first year running a health and fitness blog.

Are you not sure where to start on creating a profitable blog? I recommend checking out this course roadmap to figure out where you should get started first!

Content Calendar

At the beginning of every year, I encourage creating a content calendar that gives you ideas and topics to publish every month.

Doing this ahead of time is crucial because you can make sure you’re publishing content before a major holiday hits.

For example, I would publish posts at these times for these specific holidays:

January – Publish content related to taxes, having the best 2019, Valentine’s Day, etc.

February – Spring break related content.

March – How to save on summer travel, getting ready for graduation, etc.

April – Publish Mother’s Day and Father’s day related content.

May – Graduation content, moving to a new state or home, etc.

June – Free summer activities, staycation ideas, etc.

July – Publish back to school content, getting ready for college, etc.

August – Back to school recipes, saving money at school, etc.

September – Publish Halloween-related content.

October – Publish content related to fall, holiday shopping, gift guides, etc.

November – Publishing content around taking control of weight loss, fitness, finances, etc. New Years resolutions are approaching.

December – Similar to November, start pushing out similar content related to New Years.

The above is just to give you a general idea of what kinds of things you should be posting during specific months.

I recommend publishing content at least 2 months ahead so this can get seen on Pinterest and other platforms in time.

Google Calendar

Google Calendar is a handy free tool that lets you schedule your day, week, month, or year in advance.

One of the things that have shot up my productivity is setting a dedicated amount of time to a certain task.

I’ve found if I should just give myself no set allotted time, I’ll take much longer to complete a project.

For example, if I want to complete 2 blog posts in 1 day, I will plan to do this in a certain amount of time, such as 4 hours.

If I do not finish it in 4 hours, I move on to my next task.

This is called time blocking.

With Google Calendar, I can set up a time block that will give me 4 hours to create 2 blog posts.

Time blocking is incredible because you produce more results this way.

At first, you will find it uncomfortable to work this way, but eventually, you will create a habit of time blocking and you’ll prefer doing things this way.

Time management and productivity

Creating good time management practices doesn’t mean filling your day with more tasks, but instead limiting what you do to certain things to simplify your life.

Instead of working hard, you can work smarter.

Here are tips for better time management:

• time blocking
• creating a calendar ahead of time of your day, week, and month
• answer emails only once a day
• use social media only at night for a limited amount of time

Perfect Post Checklist

Before publishing any post, use my free perfect post checklist to make sure you’ve hit all major points when writing a blog post.

This free download (which you can print out btw!) is a huge time saver as you’ll know that you completed all major tasks when it comes to publishing an article.

Hire a virtual assistant

If you find that you are spending too much time on tasks that are minor, and rather spend your time doing things that are producing incredible results for your blog, a virtual assistant is a fantastic idea.

Virtual assistants can save you hundreds of hours.

They can be in charge of the tasks that someone else can easily do, such as scheduling blog posts, creating social media images, and so on.

You can find a virtual assistant on Fiver, Upwork, and blogging groups.

If you’re interested in becoming a virtual assistant, my friend Kayla teaches people how to do exactly what she does, which is a virtual assistant full-time from home with $10K VA.

Legal Templates

Did you know there’s a legal side to blogging? Yeah, I know, another thing to think about.

This can become a headache and take a ton of your time figuring out how to make sure your blog is compliant with laws. 

This is why Amira, lawyer, and business coach, decided to create the Legal Bundle.

The Legal Bundle includes everything you need to comply with the law and protect your blog and online business.

Included in the Legal Bundle is a customizable privacy policy template, disclaimer template, and terms and conditions template for your website. Amira makes this bundle affordable to help protect bloggers and online business owners. It’s packed with a ton of value (did you know there are 9 bonuses included with the 3 legal templates?).

Plus, she has a private FB group for people who buy the Legal Bundle, which is a great community to ask questions about these sort of things. 

Hiring a lawyer JUST for a consultation ranges from $250-$500 for 1 hour. And unfortunately, you can’t go copying other bloggers legal pages. 

What to read next: How I Built A Profitable Blog While Working And Being In School Full-Time

Don’t forget to sign up for the free resource library and get exclusive access to free printables & planners related to saving and making money, meal planning, and more!

What do you do to save time when blogging? Let’s share in the comments.

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