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I struggle with organization on an ongoing basis.  With all of the various means of communication and media these days, it’s not uncommon for people to become overwhelmed.  If you’re a blogger, keeping track of upcoming posts, including product reviews, book reviews and giveaways can be a full-time job in itself.  If you’re like me, working full-time outside of the home, or like others and are SAHM, SAHD or even if you work from home.  Add email, cell phones, home phones, business phones, voice mail (BOO), text messages, social networking (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn) and you almost feel like running away to a deserted island.

Here I come to save the day!

Blogger or WordPress

Embed a Google Calendar in your Sidebar.  Save your blog post ideas, upcoming product review plans and giveaways in Google Calendar as PRIVATE.  If you are logged in you can see everything right there on your blog’s home page.  Others can only see PUBLIC events.  It serves as a constant reminder that I’ve got something I want to post.  I try to print out my daily or weekly agenda each day.

What in the world are PUBLIC events good for? I already have a blog.

I like to post friendly reminders such as upcoming holidays, reminders to enter your Coke Rewards Points or even links to posts for reoccurring events.  Older posts that have reoccurring events can be repeated on your calendar, thus increasing your post’s visibility until the end date of the reoccurring event.  Each month I have an entry in my calendar for what’s on sale that month.  I also entered a monthly reminder for woman to perform a self-breast exam.

WordPress Only

Download the Plugin, WordPress Editorial Calendar.  This plugin allows you to see all of your posted, draft and scheduled posts in a calendar format.  Not only that, but you can drag and drop posts if one day seems a bit heavy and another light.

As soon as I receive a product for review I immediately create a draft for a review and another for a giveaway.  Then I use my shortlinks to link them to each other so I don’t forget.  I’m constantly reminded within my blog how much time I have remaining to complete the task.

For giveaways or other limited time offers/deals/freebies (time sensitive posts), I also use the Post Expirator plugin.  It allows me to set an initial category and upon expiration a new category.  I linked my categories to my site menu, so for example I post a giveaway that ends on 5/31/2012.  My standard category will be Current Giveaways.  My Post Expirator category will be Past Giveaways and it will automatically recategorize itself on the selected date.  Alternately, you can even choose for the post to be deleted or changed to draft status.

Stay Tuned!

More great tips to follow!

If you’re on Blogger and are thinking about switching to WordPress, feel free to ask questions! I did it by myself (for FREE) with no help but the internet.

A huge thanks and a shout-out to Sweet Silly Sara for posing the question.

www.simplesharebuttons.comTell Everyone