If you treat your blog as a potential source of major income, you’ll have to plan ahead. If you intend to attract advertisers or even grow readers of your niche subject or topic, it is best to plan your content ahead of time. That’s where the editorial calendar comes in.

Having an editorial calendar “frames” and grounds you on the “theme” for the current month. Obviously, editorial calendars plot out your feature articles on a monthly basis. This can greatly improve your blog as you focus on something specific and avoid the inevitable “writer’s block” – which may strike out-of-nowhere.

Making your own editorial calendar is easier than you think.

Let’s start by having a few guidelines when making your own calendar

1. Plot out holidays or seasonal stuff – Christmas, Halloween and Valentine’s are a great way to start. For example, focusing on articles related to love on February is a no-brainer. Check out the ones I did. Also, your topic (in this case, gaming) may have some special events during certain periods of the year. E3 is a good way to theme your calendar.

2. Break it down – First list down general categories for the month and then break it down into smaller, weekly chunks. If you plan to focus on Christmas gaming articles for December, you may allot games featuring Santa on the first week, the best selling games of the Holidays on the second, a Christmas buyer’s guide on the third, and finally the best geek gifts for Christmas on the fourth. Sounds great? Okay! Let me use that in my example below.

3. Review and revise – stick to it as much as possible. But once you have new ideas, don’t fail to update your editorial calendar on a regular basis. Some great ideas will eventually hit you when you least expect it. So always have pencil and paper ready or at least have the ‘notepad’ function of your mobile readily available so you’ll be able to jot it down.

4. Optimize – by checking sites such as Google Trends, you’ll see what the world is talking about. Although it won’t allow you to see what’s hot a couple of months from now, you’ll be picking up trends and see if you’re headed into the right direction. Most hits and referrals are made by Google and trust me, Google’s a friend.

With the above in mind, let’s make a sample calendar for my blog for the balance year of 2008:

• August – Casual Games
  • Industry review (week 1)
  • Crazy Kart OBT
  • Pinoy Crazy Kart items
  • How to “win” at Casual Games
• September – The Road to LIVE 2008
  • Local tournaments in retrospect
  • Interview with LIVE semi-finalists
  • Logistical nightmares
  • Preparing for RWC
• October – LIVE 2008
  • Post event coverage
  • Actual event coverage
• November – Halloween
  • Best of blood and gore
  • Surviving a Zombie invasion
  • Halloween classic movies
  • Trick or treat and prank gadgets
• December – Christmas
  • Xmas games
  • Best selling games of 2008
  • Holiday buyer’s guide 2008
  • what to get a geek this Christmas

 This list is just the tip of the iceberg! With it, I am able to source out new ideas and know what to research on certain months. It will make my life easier when planning content for my site.

I’m sure it will help you in yours.

Best of luck and happy blogging!

> GM Tristan

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