Bloggers: Creating a One-Year Plan

It’s February 2016 and you’re ready to start a new blog, or you’ve got a blog but wish you could make it [better, profitable, more consistent, more popular]. How do you make 2016 the year it all comes together? Here’s the secret: You don’t.

You make 2017 the year it all comes together, and you use every inch of 2016 to get it there.

If you’re anything like me, you’re blogging on top of a separate full-time job, not mention your private life with family or friends, so time is limited. Trying to get your blog up to speed now is going to result in a lot of half-baked strategies like a social media account you don’t update enough and content that is sparse or filled with other people’s ideas. Give yourself the next eleven months to do it right. Not only will you have a top-notch product by 2017, but you’ll feel less harried in the scramble to the top.

First, start by listing all your goals. Then, list all of the tasks you must complete to achieve those goals. Finally, divide those goals over eleven months, taking into account any months that may give you more or less free time. For example, I don’t work as much in the summer, so in my one-year plan, I’ve added the time-heavy goals to June, July, and August; whereas December is nuts because of the holidays and travel, so I haven’t added on as much there. In the execution of your goals, you’re welcome to dip into the projects of future months if you feel inspired, but not at the sacrifice of this month’s goals.

Below, I’ve given you Anglonerd’s one-year plan so that you can (1) see what the structure of a one-year plan can look like and (2) get some good ideas on how to boost traffic to your own site. Please feel free to use the same strategies I used, and let me know if it helped you!

Anglonerd magazine’s one-year plan

February

Goals: Get Anglonerd into the hands of extremely popular brands and create better SEO around the web.

1. Work on the Sketchbook Project edition of Anglonerd magazine and mail it into the Brooklyn Art Library by March 1st.
2. Launch the Spring 2016 issue on March 1st. The issue is nearly complete. I just need to do some last-minute adjustments before launch.
3. Write my March piece for my new monthly column for Brit Movie Tours. Need to come up with an England-centric travel story idea.
4. Guest blog for popular websites, such as Head Butler to get my name out there and possibly get some traffic to Anglonerd.com.
5. Launch my first giveaway: probably just a walking tour to start. Try Rafflecopter.

March

Goals: In 2017, half of the content will continue to be entertainment reviews while the other half will be educational with an emphasis on science; build a mailing list

1. Learn one new science fact every day. Use Pocket to keep track of my sources. Keep a journal of these facts organized by subject matter (especially useful for facts heard on the radio, since sub-sections of audio clips are not easily bookmarked). Create a finite list of “online tribe” members — brands who you trust to give the correct scientific stories and load them into Feedly. Choose a time of the day (before bed?) to look at Feedly each day and pull the most interesting articles into Pocket.
2. Start to put together a mailing list. Ask friends to sign up. Ask hardcore fans to tell five people about the new mailing list and monthly giveaway. Start pulling together prize packs to go with the monthly walking tour giveaway. Tweet every three days about the newsletter with one consistent newsletter graphic, and do it at a staggered time of day. Start to think about the design of the newsletter itself with Mailchimp’s templates. Track down everyone in my Anglonerd email inbox and invite them to sign up.
3. Work on a travel piece for my monthly Brit Movie Tours column.
4. Do a second giveaway. If Rafflecopter didn’t work, try something else.

April

Goals: Anglonerd will have 100% illustrations by me or images that have been given to me by the creator. Nothing will be posted without permission, not even using creative commons rules.

1. Start doing one drawing every week for forthcoming and past articles. Put them and their process shots on Instagram (@ AnglonerdSelfies). Use Medium to share and teach illustration in a variety of different illustration styles.
2. Continue to learn one new science fact every day.
3. Work on a travel piece for my monthly Brit Movie Tours column.
4. Send out the first newsletter with the monthly giveaway.

May

Goals: Save time the rest of the year by getting monthly tasks out of the way in one swoop.

1. Launch the Summer 2016 issue by June 1st.
2. Write six travel pieces for my monthly Brit Movie Tours column, to be sent in each month.
3. Create six newsletters and put them in drafts or schedule them to go out once a month. This only works because I work 6–9 months out. By May, every piece for the rest of 2016 will be written and scheduled, so I’ll know what needs to go in the newsletters.
4. Continue to draw and Instagram weekly.
5. Continue to learn one new science fact daily.

June

Goals: Consistency of URLs across all platforms; continue to work 6 months out, even with the new editorial structure of 2017.

1. Begin to migrate acrossthepondtv.wordpress.com to anglonerd.wordpress.com. Reduce categories to (1) column (2) post format (3) review item format (4) genre. Do not move over images. Add one original drawing for each post. Update all the call-back links.
2. Start writing 2017 science posts, while continuing to write entertainment reviews. Create a massive backlog for 2017.
3. Continue to draw and Instagram weekly.
4. Continue to learn one new science fact daily.

July

Goals: Increase clicks, awareness, and followers.

1. Start scheduling tweets of the new Wordpress URL so that you’re tweeting 20x per day. Each tweet is a different back catalog article. Reuse the same article about 5 times but staggered 2–3 days apart and at different times of day so you are not hitting the same audience with the same content. Use all my own art in the tweets. Tag people and use hashtags.
2. Continue to migrate the site to anglonerd.wordpress.com.
3. Continue to draw and Instagram weekly.
4. Continue to learn one new science fact daily.
5. Continue to write science posts for 2017 publication.

August

Goals: Increase the number of blog posts published to twice per day to help gain visibility and SEO.

1. Start reading interviews with British entertainers and use one pull quote as a stand alone article, which is essentially filler that may draw people in. Buzzfeed does this with silly lists. Boing Boing does this with links. Arch News Now does this with news items. The editorial content (2x/week) is the gold, but you need to fill it with lots of other stuff (2x/day) to bring people in and have consistently updated content. Schedule these small quote pieces for 2017.
2. Finish migrating to the new Wordpress site.
3. Launch Fall 2016 issue by September 1st.
4. Continue to draw and Instagram weekly.
5. Continue to learn one new science fact daily.
6. Continue to write science posts for 2017 publication.

September

Goals: Optimize SEO.

1. Look into Yoast plugin and Long Tail Pro to add keywords to my articles.
2. Continue to draw and Instagram weekly.
3. Continue to learn one new science fact daily.
4. Continue to write science posts for 2017 publication.

October

Goals: Create a spike of attention to the new site.

1. Look into advertising options, such as Facebook ads for specific articles.
2. Continue to draw and Instagram weekly.
3. Continue to learn one new science fact daily.
4. Continue to write science posts for 2017 publication.

November

Goals: Get everything in place for December 1st launch.

1. If you’re re-doing the website, finish web design by the end of the month.
2. Continue to draw and Instagram weekly.
3. Continue to learn one new science fact daily.
4. Continue to write science posts for 2017 publication.

December

Goals: Promote the hell out of the new site.

1. Get popular websites in science, illustration, and British entertainment to run news stories and interviews.
2. Find a popular science brand to guest blog at regularly.
3. Continue to draw and Instagram weekly.
4. Continue to learn one new science fact daily.
5. Continue to write science posts for 2017 publication.

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