I’ve been in the game of content creation for, well, a bunch of years. One thing that I’ve learned well is how to write a blog post and write it quickly. Hey, when you’re getting paid by the post, you learn how to be fast!

So, I thought I’d share with my readers my tips for going from an idea to a published post in less than 60 minutes. Got those timers ready? Get ready. Get set. Go!

Figure Out Your Topic

Don’t know what to write? Take a look at what others in your field are writing about to brainstorm some ideas using BuzzSumo. Here is a more traditional way to brainstorm, too.

Time: 5 to 10 minutes

Do Your Research

You’ve got a fantastic idea, but don’t start typing yet. First, plug the topic into Google’s Keyword Planner to decide which keywords will be best for your post. Don’t get too caught up in picking, just choose a couple that have low or medium competition, but have high monthly search (over 20,000 searches is ideal).

Time: 5 minutes

Summarize Your Content

To make the writing process as fast as possible, summarize the different parts of your post you want to talk about and then use them as your H2 headers.

Time: 5 minutes

Fill in the Blanks

Now that you have your headers, fill in the blanks until you talk about everything you wanted to cover in the post.

Time: 15 to 20 minutes

Finish Up Writing Your Blog Post

Now, write the intro, the closing paragraph and the call to action. Once you have those wrapped up, don’t forget to write a meta description.

Time: 10 to 15 minutes

Add Some Multimedia

Add some flash (and some search engine love) to your post by adding some media. Search for free content or create your own using:

• Giphy for gifs

• Meme Generator

• Pablo for quotes

• PhotoPin for Creative Commons photos

• Creative Commons for Creative Common photos

• YouTube for embeddable videos

• NVD3 for charts

• Mapbox for maps

• ClipSafari for clip art

• easel.ly for infographics

• Survey Monkey for surveys

• Office Sway for presentations

• Pond5 for historic media files

• GetEmojis for emojis

Time: 10 minutes

That’s all there’s to my process. Pretty simple, huh? Trust me, once you get the hang of it, you can crank out blog posts in just 15 to 30 minutes without breaking a sweat!

Need some tips on writing better content or becoming a content writer for hire? Read my book: