Balancing Blogging and College
Finding a balance between being a full-time student and being a blogger can, at times, feel like a challenge. Somehow, I’ve made it work, and I’m going to share my best tips with you. If you have any questions about how to create a schedule or what you should do to help balance college and blogging, don’t hesitate to send me an e-mail at livingthegraylife@gmail.com!
PLAN AHEAD
Planning ahead is everything. For you, planning ahead could mean planning the next week’s blog posts. Or, it could mean scheduling the next month’s blog posts. Whatever it means to you, plan ahead. For me, I like to schedule as far in advance as possible. Right now, I have blog post ideas planned out through the end of December. By doing this, I am able to visualize what I need to do to make sure the posts go live on time.
I may not have specific days planned out for my posts in November or December, but I have a general idea of what I want to cover in that month. Sticky notes are my best friend. I will jot down all of my ideas for posts, even if they aren’t that great, and I will stick them to my editorial calendar. I have my calendar set up on a monthly basis. This way I can easily see what I need to write and when everything will go up.
SCHEDULE POSTS
Scheduling posts is how I maintain a consistent blogging schedule while in college. I will write posts days or weeks in advance. For example, the dorm room tour post that I put up last week was written back in September. I like to keep a stockpile of pre-written posts that I can schedule if I need a filler post for a specific day or if I just ran out of time. Scheduling posts is also great for when life gets busy. When I have midterms or finals, the last thing I need to be worrying about is writing blog posts. I need to focus on school and passing my exams.
When I first started blogging, I was so confused when I read tips on how to be a better blogger and someone would talk about how they had posts scheduled weeks in advance. I think being comfortable with scheduling posts and having a list of ideas to write about takes a while to develop. But, always schedule posts. It just makes life easier.
DEDICATE TIME
Blogging is not a spur of the moment thing to do. Blogging takes time. From writing the posts, editing pictures, revising, and promoting, blogging can sometimes feel like a full-time job! I typically dedicate on full day a week to blogging, whether that be a weekend or a week day. I’m not saying that I don’t work on my blog throughout the week, because I totally do. I just dedicate on specific day to get the bulk of my blogging done.
Typically, I dedicate Sundays. Saturdays are reserved for college football and homework and Fridays are dedicated to homework. I sit down from about noon to five and work on writing posts, editing images, and plan posts. Blogging can take as much or a little time as you want to dedicate, but know that the more time and effort you commit, the better your posts will be and the better your blog will do.
DON’T OVER-COMMIT YOURSELF
Know your limits. Know how many posts you can comfortably put out in a week without sacrificing quality. In the blogging world, there is this whole debate between quantity vs. quality. Personally, I only want to publish posts that I am proud of. Posts that I feel like actually have meaning and weren’t written just because I need to have three posts a week. Having a system will definitely help with not over-committing yourself. Set aside time to write, plan your posts, and schedule your posts.
IT’S OK TO TAKE A BREAK
Breaks are good for everyone! Back in September, I was struggling with getting adjusted to college and balancing blogging. I decided to take an entire week off. That was actually a very hard decision for me to make. I didn’t want to let down my readers, but I knew it wasn’t ok for me to be missing post deadlines that I had set for myself. Taking that week off gave me a breath of fresh air when it came to blogging. I was able to collect my thoughts and plan posts for the next few weeks.
If you’re feeling overwhelmed by your current blogging schedule, you can also try to reduce the number of posts you upload in a week. I have been trying to upload three posts a week, but, again, back in September, I changed my schedule to only two days a week. That helped me create better content and not be as stressed. Now, I’m back to three posts a week.
Hope this blogging advice helped! I know trying to find a balance between blogging and college can seem impossible at times, but I promise it’s doable! Let me know if you have any questions or just need some advice! I love hearing from you!
-Abigail T.
