How to Balance Your Blog with Your Full-Time Job {Part 2}

Good morning! Today, I want to do a follow up on a post I wrote last year titled, “How to Balance Your Blog with Your 9 to 5.” It’s a topic that gets brought up a lot, from both bloggers and non-bloggers. In general, people are curious about how other people balance all the responsibilities in their lives. 

I won’t lie. Some days managing a full-time job with my side hustle is a big struggle, while other days it comes naturally. Each day is really different, and that’s what I like about having a few things going on. If all I did every day was go to work, come home and watch Netflix, I’m sure I’d get bored pretty quickly. {This happens sometimes!}

I saw a meme once that said something about Beyonce having the same amount of time in her day as everyone else. It’s true. No one has more time than anyone else. You’ve just got to learn how to manage and really maximize your time. If you missed part 1 of How to Balance Your Blog with Your 9 to 5, you can read that here. In part 2, I’m breaking down 5 additional tips! 

Let’s get into it, shall we? 

1. Find an accountability partner

I’m a huge fan of collaboration over competition. With so much hate being spewed around the Internet these days, it’s so important to join forces with other bloggers instead of trying to tear each other down. I love chatting with a few close blogger friends {aka accountability partners} about my upcoming posts, ideas I have for potential brand partnerships, and the goals I’m setting for myself each quarter. They keep me on track and offer up suggestions on how to blog better. Of course, I also do the same thing for them. It’s a two-way street. Sometimes, I’ll tweet to one of my friends and tell them that I’m working on a post that’s slated to go live on a certain date. Just putting that info out publicly helps keep me accountable to complete the post on time. 

Simple tip: Choose 5-10 blogger friends and ask them if they’d be interested in starting a closed Facebook mastermind group. Mastermind groups are great because they give you a platform to solicit for help and offer suggestions to others. Take it one step further by designating a certain day of the week for people to share a recent blog post that they’ve published. It’s a great way to get more views, comments and shares on your blog. 

2. Set short term and long term goals

Goal setting is so incredibly important, especially if you have a lot of different responsibilities. It’s a great way to keep your priorities top of mind and only focus on the tasks that will make a difference in your business. My to-do list for my full-time job and blogging are structured the same. At the beginning of every day, I write down a list of long term goals, with a few blank lines in-between. Then, I go back and fill in the spaces with short term goals for each long term goal. I like this process, because it helps me visualize the smaller tasks that need to be complete in order to get a larger project done. 

Simple tip: Write down one long term goal that you have for your side hustle. This might be: write an e-book, partner with X brand, make $5,000 monthly. Then, work backwards. Write down short term goals that you need to reach in order to eventually accomplish that long term goal. If your long term goal is to write an e-book, your short term goals might be: brainstorm title ideas, write a table of contents, write chapters 1-5, write chapters 6-10, find a graphic designer. Make sure to include deadlines for each goal! 

3. Keep your blinders on

When you have a full-time job and a side hustle, you appreciate every extra minute of time that you have. So when I’m really pressed for time, I’ve learned to keep my blinders on. What do I mean by this? I don’t spend hours and hours reading other people’s blogs. I keep my focus on my own blog and the task at hand when I’m on a tight deadline. By doing this, I’m not only using my time wisely, but I’m also not being swayed by the voice and style of other bloggers. 

Simple tip: Use Microsoft Word or Pages to write posts. This way, you won’t need to open the internet and won’t be tempted to start browsing other blogs, Facebook or Pinterest. 

4. Create evergreen content

Evergreen content has made a huge impact on how I balance my blog with my full-time job. If you’re not familiar with the term “evergreen content,” let me explain. Evergreen content is relevant all year long. For example, Father’s Day content is not evergreen, a post about healthy recipes on-the-go IS evergreen. When I have some free time on the weekends, I like writing evergreen content in bulk and saving each draft in WordPress. That way, I always have something to post – even on days when I’m completely drained and need to get an extra hour of sleep. 

Simple tip: Write a list of evergreen post titles. This weekend, instead of marathoning Netflix, take an hour and write down a list of evergreen post titles that work for your blog. Then, write a general outline for each post including any tips you want to mention or photo ideas you have. If you’re feeling really productive, go ahead and write an entire post or two. 

5. Automate social media posts

Scheduling posts is such an easy way to save time and allow yourself to focus on other aspects of your business. I don’t always follow my own advice, so I need to get better at doing this. Take a look at some of your favorite bloggers on Twitter. Are they posting every hour or two? Yep, they probably are. And you know what? I can almost guarantee you that they aren’t wasting hours of their day creating and posting these tweets. They’re doing it all ahead of time and scheduling them out. They’ve got it down to a science and you can do the same too! When I’m scheduling posts consistently, I definitely see an uptick in social engagement and blog views. There’s no denying that. My favorite platform is HootSuite, because it’s free, allows me to schedule Facebook and Twitter content, and has a decent amount of analytics. 

Simple tip: Time block an hour of your week for scheduling social media content. It’s okay if you don’t have your blog content written yet for that week, you can at least re-share old posts {as long as they are still relevant!}. In addition to blog posts, you can also share tips and tricks related to your niche, branded inspirational quote graphics, content from other bloggers, and so much more. The possibilities are endless. 

// I hope you found this post to be helpful! If so, click the share buttons below. Talk soon. xo, Nicole