Blogging is not just a mere hobby these days, it is more like a full fledged business, for there is a good amount of money to be made but a lot of competition to go along with it as well. To stand out among the rest of the pack, you need serious dedication, patience and hard work, all of which can end up taking a lot of energy and making you feel exhausted as you tread along on your journey.
In this post let us take a look at a few practical tips that can help you stay stress-free while blogging and manage your blog effectively, without feeling the drudgery of it all:
1. Write on a topic you love
The number one reason why most bloggers have a difficult time writing on their blogs is that they don't remain focused on a topic they love and try to write articles on every topic they feel would be lucrative for them, in order to cash in on different niches.
While this may not be a bad idea necessarily, especially if you have the required skills, passion and knowledge about them, writing so much content on obscure topics may well end up overwhelming you and you run a serious risk of being burned out very soon.
That's the reason you must have probably heard prominent bloggers say that you should write on something you are passionate about and do not go after the money. By doing this, you will never feel the pressure of coming up with new content on a regular basis, and the money will naturally flow if you keep following up on the good work.
2. Allocate Time for Different Tasks
Setting aside a certain amount of time everyday for each blogging related task would ensure you don't get distracted while working on your blog and become stressed later to finish off what you had decided to do initially.
Instead of checking your emails, reading feeds and analyzing the stats of your blog ever so often, you should try to finish off the important activities first as they matter the most for the growth of your blog. Not only that, if you have a habit of checking in on your competitors and constantly tracking their movements in SERPs, stop doing that right now.
Ideally, you should try to allocate one hour for writing and one hour for other equally important tasks such as building backlinks & networking with fellow bloggers in your niche.
3. Outsource If You Can
If you have a day job and are finding it difficult to devote time to your blog, you should consider outsourcing some aspects of blogging such as writing articles, building backlinks or social networking.
There are a number of sites like Elance, Fiverr etc. which you can use to outsource your work pretty cheaply. Doing this can take a lot of pressure off you and you can work on other things if time permits. However you should make sure that you have a backup income source before you start spending on your blog, and you should also try to limit the amount of money you spend, or the expenses can rise up pretty steeply, leaving you in deeper waters.
One rule that I generally stick to when it comes to any online business, is to spend 10-20% of what I make on improving the business. I would recommend you to try the same as well, as this would help in accelerating the growth of your blog and also take off a lot of load from your back.
4. Allow Guest Posts
Since most of us refrain from outsourcing content for our blogs, especially newbie bloggers who haven't made much money from blogging, you can allow other bloggers to submit unique content to your blog with a backlink or two in return.
This results in mutual benefits, as the guest blogger would get free backlinks & recognition and you would get free content flowing on your blog. These days this strategy is being used successfully by most of the bloggers.
However before this starts appearing as the ultimate solution to you, you would have to make sure your blog is at least PR 2 before guest bloggers flock to your blog. Also do not accept too many guest posts and try to write articles yourself frequently as you do not want it to affect your readership.
5. Keep Articles Up Your Sleeve for Emergency
Whenever you have some free time, try to write a few of articles as these can come in handy when you are unable to write on any given day due to time constraints.
When this happens, you can just schedule these articles to ensure you maintain a regular posting frequency on your blog and your readers will never be disappointed with you as far as getting fresh content on a constant basis is concerned.
I personally employ the same strategy and target writing at least 3-4 articles on weekends, especially in the mornings when my mind is free & raring to go. I then use these as buffer articles and whenever I find myself unable to devote time to my blog, they come to my rescue.
While these were a few tips from my side that I have been using to remain stress free while blogging for the past few years, you can integrate them with some other creative ways that help you unwind during stressful times. Also, I would recommend you to follow the tips that I’ve mentioned diligently or you face the danger of procrastinating and eventually being unable to meet your goal of staying stress free.
