When you learn to manage your time properly, you crank up your productivity. The amount you can get done, as opposed to what you used to accomplish in the past, can truly amaze you when you take advantage of proven time management techniques, and apply them to your blogging activities.
The Pomodoro Method
This may sound a little weird at first, but a lot of bloggers have found it extremely effective at managing their time. Developed in the late 1980s by Francesco Cirillo, the Pomodoro Technique helps you eliminate burnout, manage distractions and use time effectively. It also helps you create a healthy work/life balance.
Choose a blogging task which needs to be accomplished. Set a timer for 25 minutes. Work on that task, ignoring anything and everything else, for that full 25 minutes. If some other task or idea pops into your head, jot it down and worry about it later. Take a 3 to 5 minute break, and repeat the process with another task. Once you have completed 4 Pomodoro sessions, enjoy a longer 20 or 30 minute break.
(If you don’t have a timer, OnlineStopwatch.com is a count-down, count-up, stopwatch website which is free to use.)
Time-Blocking
When you were creating a blogging task schedule earlier, you may have noticed that some activities require more time than others. This is where time-blocking can help. Rather than multitasking and putting out fires whenever they pop up, schedule blocks of time for certain activities. Be very strict with your time block management, and only work on those tasks scheduled for that time-frame.
“Stealing” Free Time
Very early in the morning and late at night, you can “steal” free time for blogging tasks. Some people spend 1 hour in the morning and 1 or more hours in the evening doing absolutely nothing. This is certainly okay if you have designated this as your free time. However, maybe you don’t realize how much free time you let slip through your hands each day.
Start recording blocks of time during your day where you accomplish very little. You may be surprised that on a regular basis, often daily, there are 15, 30 and 60 minute chunks of time where you could accomplish some small but necessary blogging responsibility. Start recording how much free time you waste every day, and you might just be amazed at how much more you get accomplished.
Time-Management Applications
When you create an editorial calendar or blogging task schedule, automate some of your blogging tasks and outsource others, you are well on your way to effective time-management. Add the following time-management and to-do list applications and websites you can access from your smartphone or tablet, and your blogging productivity gets an even bigger boost.
- Focus Booster
- TOGGL
- Rescue Time
- Focus@Will
- Remember the Milk
- To-Do Calendar Planner
- Google Calendar
- Harvest
- Timely
- Time Doctor
- Any.Do
- ToDoIst
