Blogger Organisation: The Importance Of Working Ahead And Building A Buffer

Last month I wrote about a simple way to create a good schedule in order to reduce the stressful side of blogging. Once you have it in place, another important aspect becomes obvious: writing the articles.

My favourite method of achieving a steady flow of articles is to work ahead and building a buffer in the process.

Why is this important? 

The best way to illustrate why is by looking at one of the most popular projects when it comes to world of blogging: blogmas.

Blogmas is the time of the year in which each and every blogger makes Christmas themed blog posts during the advent period. At least half of the people who start with it become inconstant, skip days or quit. This is often due to the fact that they write their posts on the day. Sooner or later you are going to encounter a day on which you can't write - may it be for work or personal reasons.

Jenny wrote an article that discuses what to consider before taking part in such a challenge. 

However, when you worked ahead, all you need to do on publishing day is press the "publish" button and schedule a few social media posts. Building a buffer can help you to work in advance and take pressure off your shoulders. And see there, the whole world is not going to collapse around you.

What does building a buffer even mean? 

Basically it means having finished posts ready in advance and should you be unable to write new posts for a week that it doesn't set you back or causes a great rift to open up.

At the time of writing, I am over a month ahead for Wednesday blog posts - this means I can do more side posts and, if push comes to shove, and I can't write for a week, it won't do any damage.

How to build a buffer

To be able to build an efficient buffer you need to work ahead and know which posts await you in the future.

Then the task of creating a buffer begins - which works similar to start slow and finish strong. Alongside your regular post you are going write an additional post per week. So you start with two posts per week.

This means that you have this and the next week cover, and the next week you are going to write for the third and forth week. In week three, you are already crafting posts for week number five and six and so on ...

If you write twice the amount you post per week, you are going to see the desired result. At the beginning it might look a bit weak but if you are consistent you are going to have a wide range of posts that are available weeks, even months, in advance.

This is the basic principle and it all sounds very simple. By doing that you are going to avoid lacking in articles and you are going to keep your audience engaged and entertained.

Next month, we're going to look at how to juggle different categories on your blog!