Welcome to Episode 331 of Hit the Mic with the Stacey Harris.
All right, guys. As you know, I just came back from December unplugged… Okay, so technically I’m not unplugged during December, but I’m not in my office every day. I’m not sitting at my desk. I’m not creating content. I do tend to keep up with my social, although most of what goes out during December, I’ll be honest, is scheduled, unless it’s sort of an update of what I’m doing. I’m just not in it every day. I’m in vacation mode a bit more. We did really cool stuff over the last four weeks, and if you want to check that out, well then you should’ve been watching Snapchat and Instagram stories, because that’s where all of the fun silliness of those kind of things take place, for future reference.
Now, then. Here’s the deal. I still had a podcast, technically two, go up every week. My social media went out, things like that, but what I want to talk about is how I’m able to keep my content consistent even when I’m not in content creation mode, even when I’m not actively in my office, at my desk, doing the content creation hustle and all of that day in and day out, so that’s what we’re going to talk about today, because I want to. Sound good? All right. Let’s jump in.
Number one, I have a schedule.
Yeah, I know. It’s not sexy. It’s not exciting, but it really is the key to me keeping my content consistent because it allows me to know what I need to say and when I need to say it. It also, from a bigger picture, it’s the key to knowing that my content’s going to have a purpose. For example, this month we’re talking a lot about content and that’s because coming up on the 24th, we’re going to kick off a three-day launch your podcast challenge.
We’re talking a lot about content right now. We’re talking a lot about podcasting, and a lot of this podcast content will yes, feed information about podcasting, but this same thing is true if you do video, and the same thing is true if you write blog posts. Whatever it is, if you wan to be consistent, you need to schedule it. You need to plan what’s going to go out and when it’s going to go out, because that is how you can stay on top of it, but here’s the other side of scheduling that we don’t hear about enough. I’m guessing this isn’t the first time you’ve heard me talk about editorial calendars and scheduling content, much less anyone else in the online marketing space. Here’s the difference. I also want you to schedule time to create content. This becomes exponentially more important if you’re going to be taking a large amount of time off, so if you know that you want to take December off, or you want to take two weeks off in the summer, or you want to step back during the summer altogether, maybe you want to take June, and July, and August, and just not be as heavily into your business during those months, that’s cool. That’s your prerogative.
You are building a lifestyle, baby, but you need to schedule the time to create that content ahead of time, which means for me, in November, I have entire sections of weeks blocked out to podcast recording. I record for hours at a time getting ready for December. Seriously. Because I know I’m going to be taking that time off. If you want to take off a week or two, you might not need to make as much room to get ahead, but if you’re going to be taking off a larger chunk, you’re going to have to make sure that a large amount of time is scheduled for you to get that content created ahead of time. When you’re looking at your scheduling, don’t just schedule the time that you’re gone. Okay, this is what I want to go out, but also schedule the time to create it. Personally, really guys, this is one of those things that keeps me on top of my content and consistently getting out quality content all of the time, even when I’m not working, because I do like to be ahead for those times where I take surprise time off, either good or bad reasons for that.
I like to make sure I have that stuff ready to go, so I have content creation time on my calendar every single week. Yup, every single week I have time on my calendar to say, “Okay, this is what needs to happen. I’m gonna record one, two, three episodes on this day, whatever it is that needs to be done.” Make sure you’re scheduling time, not just scheduling topic ideas, all right? Here’s the other part of that. Repurpose the content you’re creating. When you are spending a ton of time creating content, you want to also find other ways to use it, and we’ve talked a lot about repurposing content in the last few months, partially because 2017 for me is all about doing more with less. It’s all about creating really great content that I can use a lot of ways so that you guys get what you need, so that I can do other things like serve my members, and Hit the Mic Backstage, and do lives, and speak more, and things like that.
For me, that’s really, really important. It’s also how it becomes really easy to take time away from content creation is to repurpose. Maybe you don’t post videos for four weeks, but instead you have repurposed your best of content into blog posts, or into audios, or whatever, or … You know what I mean? You can repurpose that. Maybe you talk about, especially this time a year, best episodes of the previous year, the things you need to know going in. Here’s six of the best episodes I did in 2016 that really are going to help you have a better 2017. Something like that. Repurpose that content you’ve already created, repurpose that value, repackage that value, and make sure that it’s really working for you. That’s another really great way to make sure that people are still aware of you, you’re still getting out there, you’re still giving value, you’re still serving your community, even when maybe you’re not directly available for vacation or whatever.
Again, we’re scheduling not only what we’re going to create but when we’re going to create it, so we’re scheduling post topics, and when they need to go out, but we’re also scheduling time to create those pieces of content. Again, whatever they are, video, podcasts, blogs, et cetera. We’re repurposing. We’re taking what we’ve already got, and we’re doing more with it. We’re taking the podcasts that we record and turn them into blog posts or guests posts, or LinkedIn publisher, or medium, or whatever. We are taking the content we have on our website and adding additional value, or extending the value. We are putting together collections of best-of episodes and videos, so that you can really, again, repurpose that value and give people value when maybe you’re not available.
For me, taking time off is a critical part of what I do. I have to step back. I’m really not very good at it, in all honesty. I am not very good at not being involved in my business. It’s a constant practice when I’m taking time off. I think this year we’re going to go on a trip where I have to be unplugged, so that will be interesting, but my social media stays going because I have a strategy for social and I have the tools in place to automate it when I need to. My content stays consistent because I have scheduled time for what goes up when. I have scheduled time for creation, and I’m repurposing, I’m reusing, and I’m bringing additional value into content that was already created. It really is the key for me. If you want to learn more about podcasting specifically and launching your podcast, if 2017 is the year you finally hit the mic, and launch your show, join us, join us, join us because I’m so excited for this. We’re going to do a launcher podcast, FREE CHALLENGE, three days we’re going to talk strategy, we’re going to talk gear, we’re going to talk launching, and we’re going to do it all together.
There’ll be daily emails, and then we’re also going to go live on Facebook each of the three days, as well as a bonus day on Friday the 27th. We’ll go live for a wrap-up. All of that, the signup to get you on the list, is over at thestaceyharris.com/episode331. You’ll see it right at the bottom of the show notes. Quick. You can just drop your information in. I will email you that we got it, and then I will email you on day one and say, “Let’s get started.” Okay? Do me a solid. Come join us for that, and if you have already launched your podcast and you want to know more about growing your audience, or marketing your podcast on social media, just come right over to Hit the Mic Backstage. That’s the best place to take the next steps. Either way, thank you for sitting down with me, thank you for joining me, and I will see you next week.
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