Discussion Post - Staying Organized

How do you stay organized? - From Anonymous

When I first started blogging, I was a pantser.  I was writing posts on a whim, because I was finding my schedule, my stride.  I knew I wanted to write reviews, but to be honest, I didn't put ANY thought into planning posts out, writing notes about reviews, or thinking farther ahead than one day.  Which, to be honest, was a disaster.  By the time I wrote my review or my meme, fixed dinner, and folded laundry I had NO time to visit blogs.  Everything I did felt hurried, rushed, thrown together at the last minute.  

Then I discovered the ability to schedule posts with Blogger and that SAVED me.  I started experimenting with the feature, which is SUPER simple - as you're writing your post, you click "Schedule" then "set date and time" and THANK GOODNESS for this! 

I'm off every Sunday, so along with being "catch up on cleaning" days, Sundays are my blogging days.  I visit blogs for IMM/book hauls, and then I sit down and write and schedule my posts for the week ahead, including reviews, memes, etc.  The end result?  Every day the next week (sometimes there is one day I just can't find something to post) at 8am,  a post goes live.  It's amazing. Sometimes this takes me an hour...sometimes four or five, but when I'm done, I have a whole week's posts done and THAT means that through that week, I can spend more time commenting on YOUR posts instead of writing my own.

Now in terms of what I'm reading...oh Lordy, that's a whole other story.  

I have an excel spreadsheet that I use to list the books I need to read each month, be it a review request, an ARC, or whatnot.  (I long ago gave up on reading anything from my actual bookshelf of TBR books! LOL).  I also use my Calendar on my BlackBerry and set up reminders for myself a few days in advance of this tour review being due, or to set up a giveaway/etc.

Finally, my Gmail account probably looks like a Post-It ad with all the labels and folders I have.  I have a folder JUST for "publicity" emails (ie ARC requests/etc), a specific folder for each tour site I'm involved in, a folder for correspondences with authors, and so forth.  I use my labels like crazy, and I'll mark things for follow-up and so forth. 

Being organized as a blogger is a LOT of work, but it is so, so worth it in the end!  I'm free to visit my favorite blogs, and hop on over to YOUR blogs when y'all comment here.  So...how do YOU guys stay organized with your blogs? 

Have a question about blogging?  Was there something I didn't cover in this post that YOU want to know about?  Ask me here and I'll do my best to answer ASAP!