10 Tips that will help you blog more; on your smartphone…

As I sit here watching my youngest at soccer practice, it dawns on me. I have 60 mins with nothing better to do than sit on my phone.

Now I could just scroll through social media, but I despise being unproductive and this time can be better used to blog. Then the thought dawned on me “when were other good times to blog and how could I make it easier?”

Dead hours :
These are hours or short pieces of time, where you have no other choice but to be on your phone. There are lots of these, like public transport, kids sports, doctors waiting rooms and even while the family watches TV. I am not suggesting you become socially awkward, but anytime that you would normally be on social media is a great time to blog instead.

Social media:
What about social media, um, delete it! “Wait, what did he just say?” I hear your internal monologue scream! Let’s be honest, social media just gets in the way and does nothing to improve you as a human being. Exiling it from your mobile phone means no distraction. Now everytime you want to check your socials, use this as que to blog instead! I’m not suggesting you delete them entirely, but remove them from your phone and keep them restricted to your iPad or Laptop.

Blog from your phone:
Now that you no longer have those pesky socials distracting you have time to write instead. Blogging from your phone might be the single best thing you can do to increase your blogging output. It just makes so much sense, your phone is always on you and it’s so convenient to anywhere. You will be surprised how much you can get done in about 30 mins. Hmmm… 669 words to be exact

Reward yourself for doing it:
This is generally going to be done in times that aren’t exactly working hours. So make it an enjoyable process and get motivation from the fact that you are being productive rather than scrolling through other people’s photos.

Don’t make it about volume;
Make it about creativity and consistency. Quickly jotting down an idea or expanding on an existing idea. Small amounts often are easy to do and breeds creativity, this very easily leads to getting hooked into creating more. Whereas committing or pushing yourself to write 300 or 1000 words before you get off the train will stifle your creativity, because it brings a different atmosphere that feels too much like work.

Easy to start and stop:
Your phone is always with you and super convenient to just throw down a few notes and pop it back in your pocket for later. A laptop takes and isn’t as inconspicuous.

Don’t commit to finishing:
This is controversial and I’m not sure on this one just yet. But let’s run with it for now. When I sit at my desk, I start and finish the same piece before moving onto anything else, or I end up with a number of unfinished pieces that never see the light of day. Your phone should be seen as an ideas hub that breeds creativity not a chore or place of work.

Enjoy the process:
I can’t stress this enough. Your phone will soon become your secret productivity weapon, rather than a time suck, but be sure to focus on creativity and not production.

Get a content buddy:
Much like anything else in life, it’s more fun with friends. Share ideas, tips and tricks with each other. Motivate and congratulate each other on achieving something many others could not.

WordPress smartphone app:
WordPress has an app that allows you to blog directly to your website. I am still a fan of blogging to an editor first, but this might be a good option for some.
Bonus Tip: Use tools that sync with your computer, so you can continue without fuss when you are next back at your laptop or desk.

Make sure your new content ideas are easy to find when you finally sit down at your desk for editing, so use tags, titles and folders to keep them organized and accessible. There is nothing worse than writing a great piece and not being able to find it!
I use Notes on my iphone with a folder called Blog ideas. Google Docs will also work, then just copy and paste your new blog into Grammarly or Language Tools for a quick editorial.

What are you waiting for?
Tell me your favourite hacks to get you writing more often.

Part Two: Find Success in Blogging

Realistically, with planning alone wont get you your success. It takes discipline and consistency, just like you go to the gym. You train for a session, you look into the mirror, what do you see? nothing.

Train another session and look into the mirror again, nothing. However if you trust the process and carry it out for 2-3 months, you see something change in the mirror!

So back to blogging, once you have set performance goals for your blog, next thing you do is act in order to hit those goals. After such, you evaluate your performance and look for ways to improve your plan. Optimization goals allow you to seek new opportunities to improve on yourself that will be a prerequisite in getting your page to the next level.

Breakdown Your Goals and Take Actions. Using the creation, performance and optimization outline here are 7 goals to keep you on track:

Creation Goals:

1. Come up with at least 3 fresh ideas or concepts related to your niche. Think out of the box and ensure these were not yet popular or heard of before in your specific niche. These new concepts will become the backbone of your future blog posts. Your audience will be curious and engaged when you come up with something they have not read before.

2. Focus and start on having one expert product related to your niche of course that will build your expertise. Once you have this, you will be able to attract readers be sought for.

3. Do not be confined with your own blog page, create your social media pages and have it updated also. Learn to come up with podcasts or vlogs that could entice your audience.

Performance Goals:

4. When you have created your backbone of fresh ideas, next on your blogging goals is to have a constant stream of new content. It is totally up to you to how you could manage to have regular published blogs. You could start from having one post per week, then try to step up to two per week and so on. Try to publish more valuable content.

5. Once you have come up with your SMART blogging goals, then pick any metric of your preference and try to notch it up by 5 or 10% every after a specified timeframe. Write down your goals and work on them.

Optimization Goals:

6. Familiarize yourself with Google Analytics and have it installed on your blog. With this, you can monitor your numbers. Try to look at your numbers at least once a week on the same day. Compare your current numbers with your performance goals and analyse your data. Here a video tutorial on how to install Google Analytics to your WordPress blog.

7. Have daily micro-goals and commit to achieving them. Try to start with simple tasks such as having one new idea per day or writing 200 words a day from a topic in your list. Do not be too very conscious of the quality of the article you come up with especially when you are starting. The important thing here is to embed in your system these practices so that it will be easier for you to write more in the future. When you achieve your micro-goals, eventually this will lead to more success.

So What Now?

After going through those blogging goals, a part of you may be thinking “Uh-oh, this is not as easy as I thought it was.”

Shut that voice down and decide to take action today. Brainstorm with your friends or your environment and start with having a new perspective. Blogging can be fun and income-generating so do not let this opportunity pass you by.

Part One: Find success in Blogging

Success do not happen overnight. Same goes for successful bloggers that doing well. They did not get to where they are right now right away.

Like you and me, they once too Google ‘how to write a blog post’. But what sets them apart is that they have goals, datelines and discipline. They envision these goals and stick to it, and so should you. Before the year ends, let us help you get ready to have a good jumpstart with your blogging goals and welcome the new year right.

Why Are Your Goals Important:

Regardless of what you do or what you would want to achieve, knowing what your clear goals are make a lot of difference. A whole lot. People who belong to the cream of the crop in their institution or field have vividly mapped out their goals and they commit every day of their lives to achieving those goals.

However, it is not all that. You must also be able to identify if your goals are the “right goals”. Do not just say “I want to get rich.” Instead proudly declare “I want to have a million dollars in my account before I reach 30.” When visualizing your goals for your blog page, do not just say that you want your blog to be famous. Create specific targets and aim for them.

Learn to have SMART blogging goals which I will tell you more later in this article.

How To Achieve Excellent Blogging Goals:

1. Focus On Creation

It is human nature to always look for something new and fresh every time and your blog must be able to answer the need of your visitors. If not, then they would end up bored and look for other pages to visit. A-lister bloggers dedicate themselves to come up with powerful content every single day.

As a blog owner, you ought to learn how to create worthwhile substance that will keep your audience entertained and engaged. Always be on the lookout for new opportunities and ideas related to your niche. As much as possible, do not let a day pass you by without coming up with a new idea or even a new blog content.

2. Measure Your Performance

When you set goals, quantify them. Give a specific time, amount of income to be generated or target number of visits for you to measure or gauge yourself at the end of a specific period. This is a very important step when setting your goals so you know whether you have achieved them or missed them and try better. When you have decided that you want to generate income from your blog then measuring your performance should be necessary.

Performance goals should be SMART which stands for specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and time-bounded.

• Specific – What are you specifically trying to achieve? Is your goals clear enough? Be specific and describe it in detail.
• Measurable – Numbers can give you a clear visualization and realization of your goals. How much time can you commit? How long can you continue blogging? Can you measure your progress? How much earnings do you expect?
• Attainable – Is your goal realistic enough? Can you really accomplish this goal?
  Relevant – Do you have the resources needed? How ready are you to take actions for this goal? Do you have what it takes?
• Timely – Set a deadline for yourself. Can you achieve the goal in this time?

Always aim to have SMART blogging goals. I believe up till today blogging is still crucial for any other industry as its still the main way to go for SEO (Search Engine Optimization). Therefore its something we should not neglect.

I love writing, whether about my personal thoughts or just about anything that captures my interest.

So for quite some time I have asked myself, “Should I start a blog?”

I dig on some research about the benefits of blogging, and man, I wished I started long before. Blogging allows me to learn more and earn more at the same time! Don’t we all want that? I have come up with a few yet topmost reasons why start a blog ASAP!

1. Speak Your Thoughts:
Blogging lets you become the head producer and director of your stories. You have the freedom to write about the topics that interest you and present them the way you want them to be. You do not worry about wrong inputs because you control the flow of information.

2. Learn Endlessly and Be Organized With Your Thoughts:
 When writing your blog entries, you will sometimes stumble upon topics you are not so familiar with. This becomes an opportunity for learning since you have to research more about the topic in order to come up with a high quality entry.

When I was starting my own blog, I’ve researched my way on how to start a blog, about WordPress blog, even blogging for money! Later on, these learnings turned into something productive. Also, blogging forces you to be more organized with your thoughts and see to it that one thought would flow effortlessly to another. You don’t want to be writing about your trip to Hawaii and talk about cancer on the next paragraph, right?

3. Build Your Audience Until Whenever:
With blogging, your audience will not be limited to your friends or followers only. Blogging gives you the chance to be connected to billions of people around the globe who is looking for information about a certain topic or interested about the same thing your publishing. With this, it aids you in marketing yourself or your business.

Blogging saves you a great deal of money versus highly expensive marketing campaigns while reaching out to anyone who has access with the world wide web. If this isn’t enough yet to convince you as to why start a blog, scroll down!

4. Establish Rapport and Potential Client Engagement:
If you’re into business, then it’s already a given that you need clients in order to make your business grow. Since blogging connects you to anyone at anywhere, then by giving concrete value through your entry, it would be easier to engage with your leads. These leads are potential buyers, and buyers mean money!

5. Be Known As An Authority:
Okay, we’re not talking about dictatorship here. When you already figured out how to start a blog, most commonly through WordPress blog, you’d realize later on that there are some topics that really interest you and would want to be known for them.

Hence, your audience sees you as a significant person in relation to a topic or idea at hand. It improves your image as a professional and your blogs can even become your modern day business cards. Great, right?

6. Doorway for New Opportunities:
When you’ve established yourself as a key person about a certain topic or issue, different opportunities will be knocking at your doorstep. Speaking engagements, guestings, coaching or mentoring, and even product sponsorships! All these are possible when you start your own blog page. Talk about getting famous, here’s your chance.

7. Expand Your Social Circle:
Blogging allows you to meet new people everyday from everywhere. These people might not just be potential clients but could turn into friends, business partners and suppliers. Who knows, you might just find The One through your own blog page? Exciting!

8. Supports Your Expertise:
Prior we talked about blogs as your new business cards but sometimes they could act as your resumes as well. When you’re applying for a certain position and claim to be a subject matter expert, you can back it up with your blog. How convenient it is.

“Should I start a blog?” Well, I tell you, why shouldn’t you? Enjoy your blogging!

Do you have a blog already? What inspires you to get started with blogging? And what are your struggles from the beginning to where you are now? Share your story to us and let others be inspired too.

Blogging is a way to translate your thoughts into words. This is a great therapy for those who can’t open themselves into others but can effectively communicate by writing. A blog becomes a venue for holding emotions and deep thoughts too.

But besides that, blogging also gives you the opportunity to earn real money. You can either use your blog to sell goods and services or have it as a site for advertisers to publish their marketing tools. Monetizing your blog can be a great excuse to make blogging an earning craft. The more you become better in blogging and using the appropriate tools, the greater your earnings will be.

So How Do You Start Earning?

The first step with monetizing a blog is setting your expectations. There are plenty of bloggers who can attest that you can earn as much as you want with blogging. In a way, this is true. But of course, real hard work is needed to earn lots of money from blogging. It can be for people who only want to blog in order to supplement their income for extra treats but there are also those who blog as their main source of income.

1. Pick a Profitable Niche
Rule of the thumb in finding a niche aside from having a profitable one is to not wander away from your interests. It would be easier for you to do research on related topics and keep a coherent content if you are truly interested about it. Look for relevant issues that are currently trending on social media. This assures you of a wider reach and a greater chance of having lots of traffic.

2. Make Use of Private Ads
Selling private ads or sponsorship space on your blog is an option if you want to work with advertising networks. You may directly contact advertisers and offer to have their ads on buttons, links, or banners. You can also accept paid reviews on their products. The best thing about private ads is that you are in control of the rates because there is no middle man who will take a part of your earnings.

3. Earn From Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is one of the oldest methods in monetizing blogs. It works by having advertisers post ad links from your site. An affiliate code is given thru the unique link that advertisers will give you for your site. If a reader decides to buy a product by clicking the ad on your site, you automatically get a commission from it.

4. Have a Business? Boost by Blogging
If you already have an existing business that you want to sell, a blog is a perfect solution to advertise your products and services online. Online marketing can be pricey if you are going to seek for such service from other companies. Instead of paying for it, you can instantly have your own online marketing tool by utilizing your blog. You may post related articles about the products that you sell. Set up an online shop and link it to your blog. It is both a win-win situation where you gain a lot of followers on your blog plus you get to have potential customers. It is a one-stop place to access your products as well as learn more about them.

5. Pay-Per-Click Advertising is not Dead
Pay per click or cost per click ads is the simplest way to earn from a blog. Although the rates can be so insignificant but yes, earning through this method can be pretty simple. Advertisements are usually in the form of banners that can be found on the sidebar, on top or below of a blog page. You earn for every click on each ad. Learn more about this method by searching for Google AdSense. It is the most popular network for PPC Ads and the easiest to use since Google chooses which ads are relevant to your content.

6. Sell Digital Products
You can virtually sell anything online and it is not limited to physical products. If selling for other people does not entice you, why not start your own digital content market? E-books and online courses is now a thing and there plenty of people who will pay premium for such products. If you enjoy writing too much, use it to earn more. You may start a content writing company and use the blog to advertise what services you can do. If app development is your forte, why not display your best works on your blog? You can even sell pictures, videos, and other media content for others to purchase and use on their own blogs.

So I’ve been writing articles for quite a while now and have to-date written about predominantly about handy code snippets that I’ve both come across and created.

That stuff is handy but I really want to share more of my business and user experience insights. Problem is, those types of posts are generally quite a hike in word count and I find I start out OK but quickly get lost. Too many words, not properly structured and I get overwhelmed.

Do you write?
What are the ways you get past writers block? Any help would be appreciated!!