
Can A Blog Planner Help Your Blog Grow
When I first started blogging, I didn’t have any formal way of keeping track of the tasks, or projects that I was working on. I simply had a little note book, where I’d jot down high-level points and work from that information.
There were times when it got overwhelming, since my notes were not very organized and I had everything crunched together like my notes for the post, for marketing, my affiliate details, my passwords, and other tasks related to running a blog site.
To add to that, I’d sometimes forget to work on those tasks. I didn’t have a proper way of keeping a schedule, so my posts were not completed and posted on time. I was falling back on my social media posts, late on responding to emails, failing to keep track and updating my affiliate links, and all of these were impacting my blogging business.
I had to act. I had to do something so that I can better manage my blog and be serious about it if I were to make money.
Taking a break from writing the content, I started working on my Blog Planner. I had to have a plan for my blog.
Again, I came up with a list of all the categories that are important for running my business and I designed the pages for each of those categories. I’ll explain those categories or pages in more details but first let me share how my blog planner helped me.
As mentioned, without a Blog Planner I had challenges finding topics, hitting deadlines, keeping my work organized and missing on other tasks that were important to grow my blog.
Once I started using my Blog Planner:
I got more organized. I had all my information organized by the category.
More convenient. I was able to find information more easily without digging through papers. I had all my info readily available whenever I needed it.
Met deadlines. With my planner, I was getting ahead and already knew what tasks needed to be completed that week. I was able to publish my posts consistently and stayed on schedule.
Helped with content writing. Knowing what topics to write about, and what research is needed, helped me write posts more easily.
Helped me stay on track with trending topics due to proper planning.
These benefits were very helpful for my overall blogging business and I’m so excited to offer my Blog Planner to you!
If you are experiencing the following, you need a Blog Planner.
Struggling to understand the blogging strategy and unable to make sense of what needs to be done to make it profitable
Unable to accomplish your business goals and unable to figure out what is that you are doing wrong
Don’t know what marketing strategy to use
Tracking maintenance items
My Blog Planner includes the following important items:
About My Blog
You probably have heard this before, businesses without any plans fail. Planning is the most crucial step for any business including blogging. You need to have a thorough understanding and an easy to follow roadmap of your blog business.
What is the purpose of your business? What are your business goals? Who is your audience?
ABOUT MY BLOG will help you:
Set the goals
Set the mission statement
Describe the theme
Determine the target audience
Decide which features will your blog support (example: newsletters, social media, etc)
Determine the email accounts and their purpose
Determine the social media channels and what you will use them for
How would you reward your audience? Giveaways, Discounts, etc.
The Post Planner
Once you have a plan for your blog, now it’s time to plan your content. What topics are you going to write about? What you need to do before writing your blog? What needs to be included in your content to make it more presentable and marketable.
THE POST PLANNER will help you address the following details:
Title
Category
Publish details
Type of post
Description
Checklist
Keyword research
Social media channels
Affiliate/sponsors
Offers
Links
Additional notes
The Newsletter Planner
Is your newsletter providing outstanding value to your subscribers? Are their repeated offers that are not very helpful to your subscribers? How often should you email the newsletter?
THE NEWSLETTER PLANNER will help you:
Set the goal of your newsletter
Decide on the theme
Decide on the Send Date
brainstorm a catchy subject line
Provide brief introduction
Decide on the content, links, images, announcements
Set the Stats (goals)
Include any other important information
Social Media Strategy
Defines how you are planning to use social media to achieve your goals. How often are you going to post on social media, what type of content you planning to post.
SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGY will help you:
Define the goals for your social media channels
Create a basic social media content strategy
Decide on publishing/posting schedule
Research the keywords and hashtags.
Blog Finances
If your goal is to make money with your blog, it is very important that you track your income.
BLOG FINANCES will help you track (monthly):
Date the transactions occurred
The expenses
The income
Balance
Memo
Total Revenue for the month
Total Expense for the month
Profit/loss
Was the result expected?
Notes (anything to note on any of the transactions or ways to reduce expenses or increase income, etc).
Brainstorming Ideas
You need good ideas to make your blog, newsletter, more interesting. Think about what type of post you’re going to write, when you plan to publish it. Jot down your ideas so you don’t forget about them. Are the titles engaging enough? How are you going to drive traffic to your website?
BRAINSTORMING IDEAS WORKSHEET will help you:
Write down ideas for your posts and decide on publish dates
Write down content ideas for your newsletter and decide on the send date
Brainstorm engaging titles and sub-titles for your posts
Find ways to increase traffic
Giveaway Details
If you are planning to host giveaways for your audience, you need to put all your details together for that as well.
GIVEAWAY DETAILS will help you:
Set the goal
Giveaway start and end dates
Giveaway description
Set rules of entry
Platform or channel that you’ll use for the giveaway
Number of entries you expect
Number of entries received
Winner announcement date, etc.
Maintenance Checklist (Weekly & Monthly)
In order for your blog to be successful you need to make sure your blog stays in great shape along with all other things that are linked to your blog.
MAINTENANCE CHECKLIST (WEEKLY & MONTHLY) will help you ensure:
Your plugins are working correctly
Your page load time is efficient
Your pages are displaying correctly
Your menu links are working
Your posts are up-to-date
There are no broken links or 404-error pages
SEO is working
Social Media links, images, profiles, pin boards, etc., are working as expected
ACCOMPLISHMENTS (MONTHLY/YEARLY) will help you track:
Number of posts that were posted
Number of emails sent
Number of visitors
Number of pageviews
Income
Number of guest writers
Number of freelance writers
Number of giveaways
Number of Social Media followers (for each channel), etc.
Keyword Research Worksheet
Keywords are so important for driving the traffic to your website and using Google Analytics you can research the keywords which you can include in your posts.
Affiliate Details
Do you have the passwords written down so it’s easier for you to look them up. Do you remember which affiliates or partners you’ve signed up with.
AFFILIATE DETAILS – will help you create a list of affiliate networks and partners you signed up with along with the userids and passwords that you use to login to their affiliate program and any other special notes or requirements that you need to know for that particular affiliate. Keep this log in a safe place.
Additional:
Weekly/Monthly Calendars – these calendars will help you write down any important tasks/events that you need to take care of for that week or month.
Contact Details – do you have all the contact info for your blog. Do you know who is your technical support team, your hosting provider, etc.
Social Media PLANNING
How often do you update your posts or announcements? How often do you connect with your followers? How many new followers you got?
Under this social media strategy category, you will have the following pages:
Social Media Planner
Objective/goal, target market, advertising, etc.
Monthly Calendar
To-Do List
Income Planning
If your goal is to make money with your blog, it is very important that you track your income.
In order to plan and track your blog you would need the following:
Income worksheet
Affiliate Programs
Sponsored Ads (Sponsors)
Products
Monthly Calendar
Checklist
Marketing Planning
Every business needs a marketing plan in order to be successful. You have to market your business, in order to get your services or products to your potential buyers. To get your blog to your readers or target market, you have to promote your blog. You have to reach out and tell your target audience what you have to offer.
Under Marketing Planning category, you’d get the following pages:
Checklist
Facebook Ads
Pinterest Pinning and Tracking
Promoted Pins
Worksheet: Advertising Fees
Email Marketing
Follow-ups (calendar)
Growth Planning
How are you planning to grow your blog business? Should you create your own product and sell to your audience? Network with other bloggers who are in the same niche. Get more training? Create YouTube videos? Podcasts? Digital Informational Products?
You will get:
Growing Plan
Product Planning
Media Relations
Networking
Contacts List
Monthly Calendar
Annual Review
At the end of each year, an annual review will help you get a good insight into your blog business. What worked well and what did not work so well and can be improved? What should you continue doing that brought more visitors to your site or helped you make money.
Annual Review worksheet
Achievements
Need Improvements
Reinvent Options
What’s my goal to achieve with Blog Planner?
I’d like those who use my Blog Planner to:
Have a practical business plan for their blog
Set their blogging goals
Create useful and engaging content
Focus on social media planning
Know their audience or target market well
Track and grow their income
Gain a good understanding of how their blog is doing
Build relationships with other bloggers
Be proud about being organized
A bog planner helps:
Maintain a consistent posting schedules across website and social media channels
Avoid last-minute rush to find content or information to share with your audience
Stay on track with trending topics due to proper planning