 As much as I
enjoy blogging, there are times it becomes an ordeal, especially when I
am plagued by deadlines or a heavy workload. As I've reported before,
being an empty-nester and night-owl allows me to devote 2-3 hours per
day to the hobby -- most of the time. When I can't, it shows. How can
you maintain a good blog in less time? Here are a few ideas.
- Read
less. Whether you use 'push' tools (RSS feeds) or 'pull' tools
(browsing your blogroll), you're probably trying to read far too much
every day. How much of what you read, and see in the news, really
matters? I've cut the number of periodicals I read by a factor of 5,
and I rely on the people in my blogging and other communities to catch
what little I miss as a result.
- Read
what you do read less often. I used to scan 150 blogs three
times a week, and now I read a selected few twice a week, and the rest
only every 14 days. One day a week (usually Saturdays, when the
blogosphere is quietest) I spend an hour serendipitously scanning my
beloved Salon blogs (especially new ones) and specialized online
journals.
- Filter
your reading. Use news filters to capture only articles on
subjects that are of particular interest to you. If that still produces
too much, narrow the filters until you're down to a manageable volume
(for me that's 20 carefully selected articles a day). A good way to
tell if you're filtering out important news is, after reviewing the news that makes
it through your filters, check out Technorati's Breaking News
or Google's Top
Stories or the NY Times' Most E-Mailed Stories.
Eventually you'll reach a balance between too much and too little, and
you'll no longer be a news junkie.
- Read
faster. On average I read two books a week, and with practice
I've learned to speed read. The key to this is focus -- it's said that our mind
can process information at ten times the rate most people read, so you
need to avoid distractions and mental wandering and 'read with a
mission'. And no, that doesn't take the fun out of it -- in fact
because my comprehension is higher I think I enjoy reading more than I
used to.
- Browse
faster. Learn to scan through large numbers of articles, long
reports and web pages to recognize the 10-20% that is actually worth
reading. Use headlines, synopses and abstracts to decide what not to read, and be critical in deciding what to read.
Once you know thousands were killed in the Iran earthquake, what
further detail is really useful? Who cares what's happening to Michael
Jackson, no matter how lurid the headline? Why get worked up about the
latest hysterical Code Orange alert? Instead, use the time to read
analysis and background on stories that are unsensational but which
have longer-term and more important implications for the world, and for
you personally.
- Be
more focused in your writing. Pick a few topics about which you are
passionate, that you think others may or should be passionate about,
and write mostly about them, rather than writing a little bit about
everything under the sun. Evolve your list of topics over time. Be
creative and proactive and attentive in what you write about, rather
than being reactive so your blog articles are always 'wrenched from the
headlines'. That gives you more scope to differentiate yourself from
the A-listers, who have the headlines covered, and while that may cost
you Google hits it will ultimately draw a more faithful audience. And
of course, as you learn in Journalism 101, write about what you know
(or at least do your research).
- Write
faster. Writing courses can teach you this. It's a matter of
discipline -- using outlines, starting with your thesis and your
conclusion and then logically filling in the rest, being organized,
doing your research first, avoiding distractions and not over-editing.
- Write
more concisely, and if necessary, less often. Tight writing can
actually take longer than
concise writing, but it will discipline your thinking, and when you get
good at it it will save you time, and your readers will appreciate it
too. If your writing is really good, you can write less often -- every
second or third day -- without losing your audience.
- Tell
true stories and provide live, first-hand reports. Write looser.
That's not a contradiction of #8. True stories tend to write themselves
and require less discipline to recount, and they're engaging to read
and they're unique -- no one else can tell your story. (Invented stories are harder,
however.)
- Split
the workload with other bloggers. You can join a group blog like
Radio Free Blogistan
has become, or you can simply agree with some other bloggers interested
in the same things that interest you, to focus on different aspects of
the subject and cross-link to each others' blogs. That requires you to
write less and brings you readers from the other blogs.
- Narrow
your audience. If you focus on a narrow group of potential
readers, like those interested in Harry
Potter or the South
Beach Diet, you can develop truly rabid fans, and make it much
easier to decide what to write about.
- Learn to
type properly.
- Budget
your time. If the time you're spending (or think you should be
spending) blogging has you stressed, maybe your blog has become a Quadrant III
activity. Time to revisit the purpose, and budget time for your blog,
so it either becomes more important or less urgent.
- Give
yourself time to think, to experience offline, and to think creatively.
This is the most important
time-saver of all. Don't just react to what you read and see in
the news. Get away from reading and your computer and other media, take
a walk, do things that stimulate your creativity and give you unique
material to write about, talk to people to get different viewpoints and
ideas, clear your mind, think about what's really important to you,
what you really believe, what you think needs to be done and said, and
then write about that. The time you spend in unencumbered thought will
be saved many times over in the process of reading and writing: You'll
know exactly what you want to say, your enthusiasm and creative energy
will make your writing easier, faster and more entertaining and
valuable to readers, and you'll find it much easier to say 'no' to
wasting time reading and writing about things that are suddenly much
less important.
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MADE IN CANADA
trust your
instincts 
