My Weekly Schedule

I talk a lot about the importance of scheduling and about my schedule being my life line. It's true - I would be horribly lost without it! I thought then, I would share my crazy weekly schedule with you all.

This is a general week in my life, some weeks shifts change and then my schedule changes. For all I swear by my schedule, if things change, I live with it easy enough.

The Schedule

9-11 - Link posts up with that day's linkys, comment on the other posts, and schedule a few tweets about them

11-12 - Check email, and respond to them. Read and respond to blog comments

12-4 - Write some posts, take and edit pictures, work on next month's schedule of what is being posted when

4-6 - Check email again, do some non-blog related writing

6-12 - Make a conscious effort to step away from the laptop!

12-1 - Publish the day's post(s) and schedule tweets for them. Instagram update.

1-3 - Read and comment on blogs I follow

 

Work days, I do pretty much the same except I'm usually up a lot later to fit it all in. Good job I'm more of a night person! I do get to skip the writing posts part, because I pre-write posts for work days. I like to have an idea of what is being posted when for about a month in advance, even if it's just a title, although this often gets tweaked as the time gets closer.

 

Sunday's I also spend a couple of hours scheduling tweets for the coming week.

 

When I see it all written down like this, it looks kind of crazy, but it actually works, although I think a bit of flexibility is key.

 

What does your schedule look like?

 

You can find me here: Twitter Bloglovin Pinterest and Instagram Please do stop by and say hi!

 



Three Top Tips For Beating Blogger's Block

Feeling uninspired? Read on for my top three tips for beating blogger's block.

1. Pre-plan.

At some point when you are feeling motivated, work out roughly which content you want to post when - you can always tweak it later to allow for anything topical that comes up.

Make a list of topics you want to write about at some point to refer to when you are feeling uninspired.

Write down some potential headings, or even a couple of short posts to hold in reserve for a bad day, so you still have content going out.

 

2. Walk away

Not forever, obviously. Take five minutes - make a coffee, go for a walk, read a chapter of a book, do some laundry - anything that isn't blog related. Concentrate on the task at hand and don't think about the post, it's amazing how many times you will come back and know exactly what you wanted to say all along.

 

3. Just write

Start writing, even if it's utter rubbish (you can always delete it). Usually starting writing is enough to get your creative side going. If you really can't think of what to say, type exactly what is in your head. I once started a post with a line somewhere in the region of "Why am I sat looking at my screen at 1am with no post written". It went from there and was soon written!

 

Do you have any tips to add on how you beat blogger's block? Let me know in the comments!

You can find me here: Twitter Bloglovin Pinterest and Instagram Please do stop by and say hi!

 

Guest Post: My Life Being Self Employed By Sarah

Today's post is a guest post from Sarah from A Positive Beginning. If you haven't had chance to check it out yet, here is a little more about her:

Sarah is the owner of the blog, A Positive Beginning, where she enjoys helping others discover their true potential with the Law of Attraction. She believes that by removing negative habits from one’s lifestyle one can have the life they truly want. When she is not blogging, she enjoys reading, traveling, and engaging in art activities.

Sarah's post is all about taking the plunge and going it alone as a self employed blogger. Enough from me, over to Sarah!

My Life Being Self-Employed by Sarah

 

About 6 months ago, I left my corporate job to start a life being self-employed. It has been quite a journey too! With many setbacks along the way, I’m very surprised of my accomplishments to this day and can say that for anyone who has a goal, to stick with it, no matter what! Even when there were times for me where I wanted to go back into the corporate working life and taste the regular income, I knew that deep down I wouldn’t like it. It had no value to me and I felt that there was a better way for me to help people.

For a few months, I decided I would do reselling on eBay. It was a very lucrative business, but unfortunately it was a very competitive one too. In the beginning it was hard to get noticed, but after a while with more experience, it became easier. I even started to make enough to pay for my bills but it wasn’t enough to save up anything. Just when I thought all was going well though, sales all over eBay started to decline and it became so bad that I had no choice but to stop reselling and it left me stuck since I didn’t have a backup plan.

So for about a month I made time to figure out what my passions were and discovered my interest in self-development and blogging. It was an intimidating area because I knew nothing about coding or getting a blog started for that matter, but once the idea settled in, like really settled in, I became determined to learn! It took several months of nothing but writing for my blog to look official and once I had more than a dozen articles up and running, I was finally able to relax a bit and engage in my favorite activities such as:

·         Drawing/painting

·         Watching movies

·         Fishing

·         Exercising

·         Traveling

·         Spend time with family

Of course, to this day, times still get stressful like they do for everyone, but with hope and persistence, I know everything will work out! Even though my bills are on edge, I have what no corporate job could offer me, which is happiness and control. I can now help people in an area that truly matters to not only them, but to me as well. Although it took me a while to find this happiness, it was completely, and totally worth it!  I just had to follow my intuition.

Show Sarah some love! Visit her blog, and like her Facebook page! And of course, leave some comments below!

You can find me here: Twitter Bloglovin Pinterest and Instagram Please do stop by and say hi!

It's A Bloggers Life with Aby from You Baby Me Mummy

Welcome to the It's A Blogger's Life interview series.
As you may have seen, I posted a list of some of my favourite blogs at the start of the month, and what it is I love about them. Check it out here you will definitely find some amazing new blogs to follow if you missed it first time around. I asked some of the amazing bloggers if they would be willing to take part in this series and introduce themselves to you and share a little of their blogging wisdom.
I was so happy at the responses I got to my request - it really does go to show the strength of the blogging community and how bloggers help each other out.
Thank you to everyone who responded, and thanks to each and every one of you on that list for consistently publishing beautiful and inspiring posts that keep me coming back for more.
Anyway, enough from me, over to the interview.

Today we have Aby from You Baby Me Mummy

1. Tell us a little about yourself
Hi, I’m Aby, I am a 38 year old wife and mama to one feisty little girl. I adore photography, family movies and making memories.  Formally an Events Organiser, I am now a professional blogger.

2. Why did you start blogging?
I started my blog in August 2013 in a very amateur way.  I went self-hosted and started to become more involved in January 2014.
 3. What is your blog about?
My blog You Baby Me Mummy is a Family Lifestyle blog.  I share our family adventures and likes and loves.  No topic is off limits for me, if I care about it then I will write about it.  I am also an editor of an online collaborative magazine for bloggers, Live. Love. Blog.

4. What are the long term goals for your blog?
To continue to grow my blog, rise in the rankings and increase my readership further.  I also have plans to do something to help the wider blogging community, but as yet it is still an idea in my head

5. Any tips for bloggers?

Lots!  I run a successful Blog Club each week on my blog, which covers various different blogging topics.  I am also open to suggestions if anyone wants me to write about a certain blogging topic.

  6. Describe yourself in 3 words
Hardworking, Loyal, Supportive
7. What are your top 3 blogging essentials?
My editorial calendar plugin – Helps we plan ahead, move posts around and generally feel in control.
My phone – Where would we be without our phones!  Essential for mobile blogging and taking video and photos.
My DSLR – I love my proper camera, I take so many photos when I have my DSLR and I think the picture quality is great.


8. What would be your dream blogging assignment and why?
There are lots of brands that I would like to collaborate with.  Sometimes things pop into your inbox and they are amazing if maybe something you haven’t thought about doing before.  So I do love the unexpected side of working with brands.  However, very predictably I would love to go to America or to somewhere hot and luxurious!


9. If you could live anywhere in the world, where would you choose and why?
We would love to live by the sea.  I am not sure if we would choose to live outside the UK, so an idyllic Cornish village right on the beach would be amazing.  However, we are being relocated to France in 2017, so we will see how that goes!


10. Where can we find you?
You Baby Me Mummy: Blog, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest
Live. Love. Blog. Blog, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest


Show Aby some love - visit her blog, follow her on social media and of course, leave her some comments below :)

Thank you so much Aby for taking part!

Stay tuned for more It's A Blogger's Life - next up is Laura from Life With baby Kicks on the 12th!

You can find me here: Twitter Bloglovin Pinterest and Instagram Please do stop by and say hi!

Why I Started Using Images And How It Helped!

I think everyone has heard the saying "a picture paints 1000 words" at some point. I get it - it makes sense. But (there's always a but isn't there?) I'm also a firm believer that carefully chosen words can paint not just a picture, but a movie.

I like looking at pictures as much as the next person, but sometimes, I like to paint my own picture, decide for myself what the person is describing and how it would look.

When I first started my blog, I made the decision on day one that I wouldn't be using images. I figured a lot of the posts I write (all of them really at that point) were my opinions on various things, so they didn't require images.

I read all the posts telling me why I should use images, but I still wasn't convinced. In hindsight, I should have listened sooner - these posts were written by people much more established than me. It's not that I somehow thought I knew better, I just figured images weren't my thing.

Because I'm quite wordy, I'm happy to read a long post, even if it's just text. The mistake I made was thinking everyone else feels the same. I learned that they don't. People think visually and are more attracted to a post with images than a body of text.

With all that in mind, I then wrote this post and it didn't look right without images. I realised I had a choice to make - scrap the post or use images. It seemed pointlessly stubborn to scrap the post, so I caved and used some images, still not convinced it would make a difference.

That post received almost 4 times the views my posts were averaging at that time! I knew that couldn't be a coincidence, so I started doing a few more posts with images - and all of them did consistently better than those posts without images, regardless of the topic being discussed.

And that's when I had my epiphany moment!

- I realised the images don't detract from the words, even if the topic is a serious one, they add to it.
- I realised I could use images to show people my interpretation of the topic, but they would still read the words and would still be able to form their own vision of it!
- I realised that I preferred the look of my posts when they had images in them.
- I realised that I had opened a door to people who liked the post sharing the image on their Pinterest boards, something that had previously been impossible.

I would never have thought I would say this, but I am converted. If someone had told me at the beginning I would one day write this post, I would have laughed at them, but here I am writing it.

I now make sure I have at least one image per post, but I often have more.

That's not to say that I think a blog without images can't be successful - I don't believe that at all. I also don't like to tell people what they should or shouldn't do on their blogs, I just think if you don't use images, and you want an easy way to bring in more traffic, it's a definite option.

Tomorrow's post will talk in more detail about how to use images to boost your traffic.

Do you use images? Do you find they increase your traffic? Let me know in the comments :)

You can find me here: Twitter Bloglovin Pinterest and Instagram Please do stop by and say hi!