Is it taking you ages to write blog posts?
You’re not alone…
Whether you’re new to blogging or you’ve been running your blog for a while, the time commitment can be really overwhelming. Just getting one post published each week can be a struggle, especially if you’re focused on producing high-quality long form content.
Even if you’re not a natural writer, there are lots of ways you can speed up your writing process. Writing faster means you can publish more often—or you can spend more time on other vital activities to grow your blog’s traffic.
First, let’s address a common worry about writing faster…
One of the worries that some bloggers have is that by speeding up the writing process, they’ll compromise on quality.
I don’t believe that’s true. Sure, some methods for speeding up might affect the quality of your post – if you decide to shave time off your process by skipping editing completely, that’s probably going to result in posts that have typos or other glaring errors. And if you simply hand the whole process over to an AI tool that can whip up an entire blog post based on a one-sentence prompt, you won’t be producing something of your usual quality.
But in many cases, working more effectively improves the quality of your finished posts. Let’s say you speed up by cutting out distractions when you’re drafting: your post might flow better as a result, with smoother transitions between sections. Or how about you speed up by nailing your outline before you start writing the post—you’ll have a well-structured piece that covers all the most important points.
With each step we cover, we’ll be looking at how to write faster and better. Along the way, we’ll take a look at some key techniques that top bloggers use to consistently produce high-quality content.
Whatever type of posts you write, and however long or short they are, you’ll be going through these different steps of the blogging process:
Each step is important, and by recognising each of these as distinct parts of the blogging process, you can look at how to speed up and write even stronger posts.
We’ll take a look at ways to be more efficient and effective at each step … but before we dig into that, let’s tackle a huge issue that’s probably on your mind as you think about writing fast.
As a freelance writer, I’ll admit to some mixed feelings about AI (artificial intelligence). On the one hand, I think tools like ChatGPT are very cool—I’ve had fun playing around with them. But I’m also keen that the machines don’t put me out of a job!
The good news for me is that AI really isn’t at the point yet where it can replace a skilled blogger (or freelancer, author, or journalist). I don’t think it’s a good idea to “speed up” by simply handing the whole blogging process over to AI. You might get a technically competent piece of writing, but it’s not going to be as engaging and well-written as a post produced by a human.
But AI definitely has a role to play, and it can help make your posts stronger. I like to see AI as a bright intern. You wouldn’t hand over full control of your blog to an intern … but you might ask them to carry out some preliminary research or to write a rough outline for a post.
As we go through the steps, I’ll give you some ChatGPT prompts you can use if you want to speed things up using AI. If you want to go further, I’d recommend using a premium AI tool aimed at bloggers—some good ones to check out are:
The first step of the blogging process is to come up with an idea. You can’t get very far without one!
To write a really good post, you want an idea that works for both your readers and for search engines. That means doing some keyword research if possible, so you can figure out something that people are searching for online, and write a post to meet their needs. Obviously, you also want to choose a topic that’s relevant to your readers.
If you’re struggling, here are some great ProBlogger posts to help:
Some of my best articles have come from reader questions. They work well because if one reader wants to know a particular answer you can guess many more do too. If you can’t find anything useful in your own comment area or inbox, go look at another blogger’s comments or a forum.
(How to Generate Post Ideas When You Are Stuck, Chris Garrett, ChrisG.com)
There are plenty of AI-powered keyword research tools out there. ClickUp has a great list here.
ChatGPT Prompt
Give me [X] blog post ideas for a blog about [TOPIC]. The audience is primarily [A BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF YOUR AUDIENCE]. For each idea, tell me the primary keyword to optimize for.
Example: Give me 10 blog post ideas for a blog about personal finance. The audience is primarily people in their 20s and 30s who feel a bit daunted by getting on top of their finances. For each idea, tell me the primary keyword to optimize for.
Once you’ve got a clear idea in mind, it’s time to craft an outline for your post. This is such a tempting step to skip, especially if you’ve got a title that gives you a pretty clear picture of how your post is structured. 7 Easy Ways to Improve Your Morning Routine, for instance, is clearly going to be a listicle.
But spending just 10 minutes outlining your post could make a massive difference to how quickly you can draft it. Those 10 minutes might save you an hour or more … and result in a much better finished piece.
When I’m outlining, whether that’s for my own blog or for a client piece, I like to include:
Some posts are easy to structure, like listicles and how-tos. Others are a bit trickier, like an A vs B comparison review, where you could give all the information about product A first, then cover product B … or you could do a point-by-point comparison of features, pricing, and so on. Even a list post can be tricky as you need to decide on the best order to present your different points.
The advantage of writing an outline is that you can experiment with structure until you’re confident you’ve got something that works and flows well.
A good outline gives you a holistic view of how your article will come together.
Aim to be as thorough as possible. The research process is key to ensuring that you have as much detail as possible.
This way, you can knock out each point without having to divert your attention away from writing.
(How to Become a Better, Faster, and More Efficient Writer in 7 Steps, Neil Patel)
Either use AI to create the outline first, then edit it to add/remove points—or write down your key points, then create an outline with AI to help you spot any ideas you may have missed.
ChatGPT Prompt
Write a detailed outline for a [XXXX] word blog post titled [“TITLE”]. Give a suggested word count for each subsection. Include a call to action at the end to [CALL TO ACTION].
Example: Write a detailed outline for a 1,500 word blog post titled “Zero-Waste Vegan Kitchen: Sustainable Cooking and Eco-Friendly Tips”. Give a suggested word count for each subsection. Include a call to action at the end to download my free vegan cookbook.
The stage of the blogging process that takes the longest is drafting your content. Perhaps you’ve had the experience of staring at a blank page on the screen, trying to figure out what to write: if so, you should find it much easier to draft now you have a solid outline in hand.
But even when you’ve got a clear outline, it can be hard to stay focused when drafting. The biggest problem that trips bloggers up here is getting distracted and going off-task. This can easily make a one-hour writing task take three hours … and it may also end up with your post seeming disjointed at the end of the process.
Here’s what you can do to dramatically improve your focus:
I use a writing tool called TextExpander — which expands custom keyboard shortcuts into frequently used text — for common copy, like my email sign-off, bio, mailing address, book titles, HTML codes, and words and phrases I often use in my writing.
(How to Write Faster: 10 Quick Ways to Hit 1,000 Words Per Hour, Linda Formichelli, SmartBlogger)
I prefer to draft without AI, but you may find it helpful to use AI to kickstart your writing – particularly your introduction, which many bloggers struggle with.
ChatGPT Prompt
Write a [XXX] word introduction to a blog post titled [“TITLE”]. The tone should be [TONE].
Example:
Write a 150 word introduction to a blog post titled “10 Common Blogging Mistakes Holding You Back (and What to Do Instead)”. The tone should be friendly, supportive, and encouraging.
If you started out with a solid outline, you’ll have found it much faster to draft your post. You’ll also save a lot of time when you edit your post, too. The fundamentals of your post will all be in place, and hopefully you won’t need to make any really major edits (like cutting out or adding in whole sections).
Most likely, your editing will involve:
AI can be a great help with points 3 and 4 here. I’d also recommend reading slowly through your post yourself, of course, but AI may catch things that you didn’t realise were wrong (lots of bloggers confuse it’s and its, for instance) as well as typos that you failed to spot simply because you’re so familiar with what you thought you wrote.
You don’t need to spend hours editing or aim for absolute perfection. One of the great things about blogging, compared with some other forms of writing and publishing, is that you can quickly and easily go back and correct mistakes.
If you’re using SEO software (like Clearscope or Surfer SEO), the editing phase is also a good time to optimize your article with these, making sure you’ve included relevant keywords.
Some writers think the best way to create outstanding content is to write a few sentences and then stop to edit all the errors in it. But at the end of their writing session, they may still be stuck reading and editing the same few sentences over and over without making any progress. […] To increase your writing speed, do yourself a favor and ignore all the typos and errors you observe while you’re still writing.
(9 Tricks That Can Boost Your Writing Speed, Sola Kehinde, Craft Your Content)
My favorite AI tool for editing is Grammarly: it does a great job of spotting not just errors (like typos and spelling mistakes) but also sentences where I’ve been too wordy.
ChatGPT is rather inconsistent (sometimes spots mistakes that aren’t mistakes at all, and sometimes misses mistakes) but you can give it a go for checking your text, using the prompt below.
ChatGPT Prompt
Check the following text for spelling and grammar errors. Please highlight errors in bold and give a recommendation to fix them. Do not give a recommendation that’s identical to the original text.
[TEXT OF YOUR POST]
Writing faster while also producing excellent content means getting more efficient at each stage of the writing process. Whether you’re coming up with ideas, crafting outlines, drafting content, or editing efficiently, you can speed up—and get better results.
Experiment with AI to improve your efficiency and blast through writer’s block, but remember that you have the final say over everything you publish (and the responsibility to make sure it’s accurate).
Pick one of the ideas above to try this week … and pop a comment below to let us know which one you’ll be incorporating into your blogging process. If you’re already using some of these tips, let us know which are working best for you.
Hard Truths – first-look review About Little White Lies Little White Lies was established in…
Welcome to Next Week on Xbox! In this weekly feature we cover all the games…
Motorola is onto something with the Edge 50 Neo – the results from last week’s…
This is last year's iPhone 15 Pro. We don't expect a radical redesign for the…
“Where should I invest my money, assuming that I won’t be able to buy a…
Hiro Ito and Robert McCauley have compiled a dataset(first discussed in this 2019 working paper) of the currency…