AD - This post contains gifted items, but all opinions are my own!

During the lockdown, blogging became my full-time job. I loved working on it every day. I started a full-time accounts job after the lockdown had lifted, and the change was immense. I work 42 hours a week, meaning I can’t work on my blog as much. Despite having a job, I’ve managed to keep up my weekly posts and other blogging tasks. I wanted to show you how possible it was to blog while having a full-time job, and how I manage to balance all my responsibilities.

When you’re balancing work, social time and blogging, use a planner to become organised. Using the Amanthis journal, write down what you’re doing each day of the week. There are a month overview and weekly slots, so you can plan in as much detail as you’d like. There are also pages for notes which is where I write down blog ideas as they come to me. There are monthly quotes and pages to set yourself assignments. It’s handy to be organised, and if I didn’t plan my time, I wouldn’t be able to manage. If you're not feeling the gorgeous Mindset Journal, you can keep track of ideas in a spreadsheet or normal notebook!

Plan Ahead Of Time

I recently wrote a blog post about how I manage to plan my blog content MONTHS in advance. At the time of this post, I already have my next 4 months of content written. I use my Amanthis Journal to plan when I have work, apprenticeship study days and what blog posts go where. It allows me to plan my time out so I can balance everything. I sometimes use pretty pastel highlighters to colour code everything when the month gets busy!

When I say plan ahead of time, I mean a few things. First, I mean plan your blog posts. Getting writer's block and struggling for ideas can be a horrible feeling. Luckily, I have a few blog posts with different ideas for every niche!

300+ blog post ideas for every niche
200+ blog post ideas for Fall & Blogtober for every niche
120+ blog post ideas for Halloween for every niche

I'd recommend planning a month or two in advance. I currently have up to April 2021 planned out, but not all written. The second thing I mean by planning ahead is having a backup post in case your plans change. I have 3 back up blog posts in case I have to work late and don't have time to schedule a planned blog post. It allows me to be more flexible, and they have saved me many times. Finally, when you're planning ahead, make sure you know when things are happening. Use your journal to check if any events are coming up. There is nothing worse than thinking you'll have a day of blogging, but you really have chores and study to do. Organise your time wisely!

Allow Guest Writers To Contribute

Something that has helped me a lot is guest bloggers. I like having guests on my blog as it gives me a new content perspective, and means I don’t have to write a blog post. I like helping out the community too, so if you’d like to grow your blogging presence, I am always looking for guest writers. Guest writers write a blog post for me. Some will even give the post a social media shout out, so some of the promotion is done for me. I also like to do collaborative posts where I get a group of bloggers to help me write something. For example, I asked 16 bloggers what they wish they knew about blogging. It meant that I just needed to put the paragraphs together, and I had a blog post. Guest writers are handy, especially if you’re out of time or ideas!

Dedicate Time For Blogging

If you want to manage work and blogging, you’ll need to set time where you blog. You’ll typically have set working hours, so why wouldn’t you have set blogging time? Sometimes, It’s not as easy as dedicating an hour a day to blogging, which is where flexibility comes in. At the weekend, set an hour or two for writing content, answering email and comments and promoting your work. It may seem like a small change, but it will help you balance your time better. Make sure you write your blog time into your planner so that you don’t double book yourself with friends and family! If you want more of an insight into part-time blogging, I'd highly recommend you reading this post. It's about the confessions of part-time blogger, The Doubting Thomas, which I found to be very relatable! 

Schedule & Automate Where Possible

Every Sunday, I will schedule my weeks’ worth of tweets, pins and blog posts. It takes me just over an hour to sort everything out, but it means I don’t need to worry about promotion during the week. If you’re looking to manage a job and blogging, make sure you automate where possible. There are lots of free scheduling tools for Pinterest, Instagram and Twitter, and most blogging sites allow you to schedule your content for free as well. Automation means that you can be at work, meet your friends or even have a lazy day without having to think about blogging. Scheduling can be tedious, but if you put on your favourite series, you can make it a lot more fun. I’d recommend doing a week at a time, but if you’re up for it, schedule as much as you can while you’re in the zone!

Use Your Dead Time Wisely

Deadtime is something that has helped me blog a lot more recently. Deadtime is where you’re travelling or waiting around for something, and you’re just listening to music or watching TV. Your typical worker will have dead time during the commute, on breaks or waiting for work to start if they’ve arrived early. In that time, I like to blog as it’s the only free time I have. On the train, I aim to write around 300 words before my stop, meaning I am already partway through a blog post. I’m actually writing this blog post in deadtime – I get to work early and write away! You could be waiting for the washing machine to finish and manage to squeeze in a bit of scheduling or reply to comments on the train. Either way, make sure you use deadtime wisely. You’ll be surprised how much you can do when you’re waiting around for something!

Don’t Get Hung Up Over Statistics

When you're working and blogging, it can be hard to see your stats fall. It's normal for your readership and views to decrease when you're not working on it 24/7. When I was blogging full time, I had time to respond in comment threads and write guest posts for others. Now, the only promotion I can do is in my free time, which means everything is automated. There is nothing wrong with scheduling things, but if you're not engaging with others, you will see a small dip in statistics. It can be hard to accept at first, but it will increase over time. You just need to be patient and keep going. If you're still pinning, tweeting and sharing on Facebook, you're doing all you can.