By Carole Hayward

I write blog posts for several different clients in fields ranging from church events to pet care to science teaching. Regardless of the topic, I have to be able to break down the writing of a blog post into manageable tasks, or blogging would dominate my entire business.

I find that writing a blog post can be broken down into measurable chunks of time. To maximize my time and to keep the rate I charge for writing a blog post reasonable, I need to spend no more than two hours per post, from start to finish. In my mind, I break the process down into distinct steps.

11 Steps to Writing a Blog Post

1. Research: 30 minutes. I spend half an hour looking for resources to support my topic. These resources become the links for my blog post. I read up on the topic using these resources. My personal writing style is to do the research one day, ruminate on what I’ve read, and then write the next day. Time doesn’t alway allow for that, but I find my writing is better if I work this way.

2. Choose Keywords: 5 minutes. I find it helpful to know my keywords before I begin. Integrating the keywords as naturally as possible into my writing is much easier if I know them from the start. Otherwise, I have to go back and insert them into my writing, and that always feels forced to me. Explore B2B’s article How to Find the Right Keywords to Find Search Engine Results breaks down the essentials you need for your strategy.

3. Craft a Headline. 5 minutes. Even if I end up editing it when I’m finished, I find it extremely helpful to have a headline to focus my writing. It prevents me from straying from my original point.

4. Write Post. 40 minutes. I aim for 500 words per blog post, but sometimes the topic demands a longer post. I write the introductory paragraph, a subhead, and ideally, a numbered or bulleted list of salient points.

5. Include a Call to Action. 5 minutes. Whether it’s to let me know what they think or to share experiences that they’ve had or to pass this onto their colleagues, I include something for the reader to do next. TextMark’s blog post Getting to the Point: How to Write an Effective Call to Action has great tips.

6. Add Links. 10 minutes. I decide which resources were the most helpful in  my research and which ones I actually cite in my post. I embed the links and I prefer to have them open in a new page, so I do that for each link. I usually have a minimum of three links in a post.

7. Insert Media. 5 minutes. Depending on how the client’s blog is set up, I insert the photos, video, and/or featured image required. Using my keywords when I insert the image helps with search engine optimization (SEO).

8. Check SEO. 5 minutes. I use the WordPress SEO plugin, and I find it helpful to see how it scores my post from the headline, use of keywords, subheads, images, and reading level. I then adjust or correct as needed.

9. Proofread, Preview, and Polish. 10 minutes. I read my post out loud. I find this helps me catch mistakes that my eyes alone might miss. If time permits, I try to have others check my work as well. I think everyone benefits from having an editor, even editors! I also click on each link to make sure it actually goes where I want it to. Previewing the post helps me see whether the images look right, the text wraps properly, and the line spacing is correct.

10. Incorporate Client Feedback. 5 minutes. I write an e-mail to my clients including the draft post, image, SEO score, and full text, and I ask for their feedback. Ideally, I like to send it to them at least the day before the post should be published. I don’t publish a post until I get the okay from the client, even if it disrupts our set schedule. For me, approval trumps consistency (although I strive for consistency, it’s not always possible to hit the mark).

11. Publish. 0 minutes. It doesn’t really take any time to publish, but it’s the most satisfying part of the process for me, so I savor it!

I could have included scheduling how to push the blog post out through social media, but I think of that as a separate set of tasks from the blog post itself. This breakdown helps me craft quality blog posts in a timely, cost-effective manner. It took some time to figure out what approach works best for me. It may take you longer when you first get started, but with practice, you will get faster too, without sacrificing quality. I’d like to hear how other writers break down the writing of their blog posts.