We all know that sometimes keeping up with posting on a blog can get troublesome for bloggers. You’re tired, bored, fighting writer’s block, frustrated with the lack of commenters, or just flat out too busy. This is where developing an editorial calendar, much like the major newspapers and magazines do, can help.

I’m speaking from experience here, folks. I own several blogs that had been tremendously neglected for some time, but I didn’t really want to let them go just yet. I decided to hunker down and create an editorial calendar for each blog to schedule my posts out ahead of time, so that when I had the time/energy/desire to sit down and get some posting out of the way, I had a concrete plan so I could post up to months in advance if I wanted to!

Now, depending on your niche topic, this might be more difficult for some of you than others, but never fear, for there is always a way!

If your blog is a “newsy” type blog - where you spend the first part of your day, 5-7 days a week, scanning RSS feeds for barely-reported news, and then quickly write up a post to get on the list of the first few to “break” the story, then what you need to do is break your editorial calendar down into subtopics for certain days.

Let’s say you have a tech news blog, and you cover anything and everything technology related. Set up a schedule so that certain days cover certain aspects of technology and development.

Monday - New Products
Wednesday - Product Reviews
Friday - Company Profiles

Notice, there are 2-4 days missing in that calendar (depending on if you want to be a 5 post a week blogger or a 7 post a week blogger). This is where you can fill in with your feverishly researched breaking news stories. Since regularly updated content is essential to the success of every blog, wouldn’t it be better to have guaranteed posts for a few days, and then fill in with the “Oh my God I have to blog this!” type stuff on a less frequent basis? Yessir, I think so. Instead of having to do that RSS feed research/fever posting 5-7 days a week, you can now bring it down to 2-4 days a week, without having to worry about missing days of content!

Now, here’s another take on this, so let’s stick with the tech blog and try another type of editorial calendar:

Monday - iPod/Apple
Tuesday - PCs/Microsoft
Wednesday - gadgets/gear
Thursday - company profile
Friday - other product reviews/link post to “news”

In this editorial calendar, you’re set up with pretty much 5 days worth of posts that you can write in advance. Let’s face it, as a small-time blogger (no offense, that’s what we all are when we start and up until we “make it big”), it’s highly unlikely YOU are going to be in the first 5 or 10 to post something newsy. So why not save Fridays for a weekly link roundup of the top blogs that HAVE earned that status, which will not only provide you with several less stress-induced posts to write each week, but will also give your readers links out to people you feel are an authority. It’ll also likely get you attention from those authority bloggers, which can never be a bad thing!

The real benefit to a calendar like this, is let’s say that you’re sitting there really finding some good stuff to write about iPods. Rather than write one post now and wait until next week, then scour your bookmarks or do the research all over again, you can post date that second and third post for the following two Mondays! So now in one fell swoop, you’ve gotten three posts out of the way, and you don’t have to research iPods again for weeks!

I found one of the best ways to manage an editorial calendar when posting is to have an actual calendar in front of me, with lists on each day for what posts go on which blogs. Then when I write my posts, I can cross out the calendar entry after it’s been postdated, so I know I’ve already taken care of that day on that particular blog. Plus, the crossing out of things has always made me feel like I’ve really accomplished something, and it motivates me to do more so I can cross more off!

Now, all that said, there are other ways editorial calendars can help spur activity on your blog:

• Visitors know what to expect, and when. So they know you’ll have something of interest to them on a certain day, and they can be sure to read and comment.
• Readers are allowed the chance to be more loyal, because they get used to knowing that you’re going to have X amount of posts per week, rather than sporadic posting. Research shows that inconsistent posting can lose RSS subscribers. (Among other things…)
• In the event that you choose to have multiple authors or you want to hire ghost writers, you can delegate the schedule so that you know certain things will be covered on a regular basis by others. This allows YOU more time to market your blog and be more social (commenting and linking and all is also quite time consuming, though essential!)

What are your thoughts on editorial calendars? Are you using one, and if so, what’s your schedule?

Popularity: 40% [?]

The internet is full of spammers, liars, and cheats. It’s a fact.

Owning a blog can put your site out there to be “bombed and pillaged” if you’re not on top of things, and one of the ways to keep that from happening is to provide a clear, concise comment policy.

I’ve personally been in situations where I’ve seen people getting ripped apart in arguments under a blog post, and it kills me that the site owner would sit back and let it happen. However, that’s part of their comment policy - they don’t delete anything unless it’s clearly classified as “spam”. Usually that’s when a simple bot comes along and blasts your last 100 posts with a URL or some kind of mile-long list of links to sex sites or the like.

Other people refuse to tolerate the negative bashing and simply delete the posts like that with no exception. Some will only do this if it’s bashing another commenter, while others will do it if it’s bashing them.

What about “signatures”? When someone leaves a comment and then puts their name and a link to their site in it at the bottom, that’s a signature. I’ve seen people comment with a 3-line answer and then put a 5-line signature at the bottom, phone numbers and all!

Personally, when it comes to spam, it’s handled by my sites’ spam filters. Some slips through, and I have to moderate it, but for the most part, it’s already caught and I don’t have to deal with it.

When it comes to blatant attacks and bashing, of my readers or other commenters, it’s gone. Deleted. Outta there. You want to argue with me and something I said? Present a valid, calm argument and it could benefit everyone involved. Start name calling and such, and depending on the blog (as I have several), you could find yourself outed (nothing’s ever truly anonymous) and/or given a good lashing right back. On this site, I’d likely simply delete it, but on some of the others I have, I’ll make a mockery of the “criminal”.

As far as signatures go, I don’t have a huge problem with them if you’ve left a reasonably valid comment (rather than “Thanks for the info”) that adds something to the discussion, and if they’re not like the 5-liner signatures I mentioned above. The reason being that when you leave a comment on a blog, you almost always have the opportunity to put your site’s URL in so that the name you use links to the site. There’s no need for a second link in the comment, you know? In the event that happens, I’ll simply delete the signature and approve the comment. If it’s one of those “thanks” kinds of comments, I’ll let it go through if there’s no signature, otherwise it gets deleted. You can’t add something of value to the thread, you don’t deserve even the default link.

What’s your blog’s comment policy? Do you have it posted somewhere, or do you just play by ear?

Popularity: 69% [?]

Now, I’m not going to try to convince you that this would be a great opportunity for a business blog, because I still feel that business blogs should be hosted, designed, and maintained by the company/entity itself. However if you’ve been considering getting into personal blogging, and want to get a feel of the “blog culture” without spending too much (or any) money, you could try Thoughts.Com.

Thoughts.Com is a totally free blog community where users can not only write blog posts on any topic they choose, but find themselves instantly attached to a whole bunch of readers. Bloggers can post photos, videos, podcasts, rate other members’ posts, and once a year, Thoughts.Com gives away a vacation to 5 of their bloggers!

Another pretty cool feature of this blog community that I haven’t seen much in others is their forums. Pretty much every topic under the sun is covered in there, making this a real community venture outside the realm of normal blog commenting. Unlike other free blog communities, the forums aren’t strictly limited to site issues or questions. It’s a community forum, where you can find others with similar interests and have a chat.

The format is pretty simple, and it’s easy to find other blogs based on a simple tag cloud. Comments and ratings seem welcomed by pretty much all bloggers, and the ability to either blog anonymously or put it all out there is pretty nifty too.

Again, if you’re really serious about blogging and trying to make some money with your blog, this isn’t the route I’d recommend. But for something fun, and a pretty large (despite it’s new-ness) community, it could be a cool thing to check out.

Popularity: 100% [?]