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How I came up with ideas for 3 years worth of blog posts – in one day!

by Mona-Lisa September 23, 2019

Coming up with a lot of ideas for your blog

Coming up with good blog post ideas is a major pain point for most bloggers, as well as planning and producing the content.

Raise your hand if you have ever found yourself panicking over not having the blog post that should go out tomorrow ready, and your brain just won’t come out to play as you struggle coming up with something to write about.

Me too! Not for the past few years though, as I started producing content for multiple sites I simply could not afford the time or stress working that way.

I over time developed and refined processes for coming up with ideas, planning, producing, posting and sharing content. Today I would like to share with you a super easy exercise that lets me come up with content ideas – for years ahead!

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The number of tasks you should do every day – to move your business forward

by Mona-Lisa September 16, 2019

Hi! Today I want to address a challenge that most entrepreneurs face at one point or another – and of course what you can do about it.

When you have decided which direction you want to take your business, there is a lot of work to be done. Not only do you need to prioritize your tasks, but you also need to keep ticking those boxes at a steady pace.

| Also read: The one question to ask yourself when deciding what to prioritize in your business

Finding the motivation and confidence to keep pushing forward day in and day out can be a BIG ask! After all, we are not machines, we have good days, bad days and everything in between.

Feeling overwhelmed up to the point where you get nothing done? That just makes you human.

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How to easily turn a blog post into an e-book – for free

by Mona-Lisa September 9, 2019

Have you been wanting to write an ebook? Or been wondering how to turn your blog post into one? You are in luck! Today’s topic is how to turn content you already have into an ebook.

Why would you want to?

Creating an ebook from scratch can take a long time. You need to write it of course, but styling it and making it come together in a nice looking and easy to read format puts many people off trying to begin with.

Taking advantage of the content you already have saves a ridiculous amount of time. Repurposing content in different formats and for various channels is, therefore, something you should always be doing.

An ebook is often used as a content upgrade for blog posts, something you give away for free for instance when someone signs up for your e-mail list.

It can be given away as a bonus for signing up for webinars, courses or challenges, or marketing your business by publishing it offering it for free with no action required.

Turning your blog post into an ebook

The easiest way to create an ebook is by taking one of your existing blog posts and turning it into a PDF.

You do this by first installing the free Chrome-extension Print friendly & PDF or go to printfriendly.com.

Turn a blog post into a pdf

Use the extension or paste the URL depending on which option you went with. Delete text and images that you don’t want to include by placing your cursor over them and left click when the section turns yellow.

When you are happy with the result, click the PDF button and voila – your brand new ebook is being downloaded to your computer, just like that!

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Must-have Chrome extensions for bloggers

by Mona-Lisa September 2, 2019

As a blogger, you seem to never have enough time on your hands. If you are like me you rejoice when you stumble across tools and tricks that allow you to do things faster.

This week I would like to share with you some of the Chrome-extensions I use to speed up my work and get better results. A browser extension adds functionality to your browser so that you can perform tasks super fast!

Grammarly

Grammarly is the magical spell-checker you wish you always had. Write better and get help from Grammarly whether you are writing a blog post or a social media post. Grammarly works pretty much anywhere on the web and has been a trusted companion of mine for years.

Planyway for Trello

Planyway is a calendar planner for Trello. You might not be that impressed yet considering Trello does have a calendar power-up you can use.

Planyway, however, is far superior and my favorite feature is that you can easily drag and drop a card straight from a list into the calendar. Just as easily you can make the card stretch over several days in the calendar, useful for events and marketing activities and any other task that would go over a period of time.

Planyway completely changed how I use Trello in my workflow. With the other extensions mentioned above, I am now able to use Trello for far more projects and tasks than before, and what’s more, they are saving me a huge amount of time every month.

WhatRuns

This helpful Chrome extension tells you which tools run on a specific website, such as fonts, analytics tools, and plug-ins.

SEOquake

This great SEO-extension gives you information right on the search engine result page about the difficulty level of your keywords as well as data on your competitors.

You can also Analyze websites / perform a page audit. Get information such as what parts of your site are optimized for SEO, suggestions for changes you can make, information about backlinks, lets you look at how your competitors are doing and much much more.

Print friendly & PDF

Turn any of your blog posts into a PDF with this brilliant and easy to use tool. It even lets you delete pictures or text you don’t want to be in the final PDF.

ColorZilla

Came across the perfect color? Use the ColorZilla’s color picker on any website to sample and save the color!

Screencastify

Lets you record videos of your screen, with or without your webcam inserted into the video. The free version can record up to 10 minutes. Automatically uploads videos to Google disk!

Tiny Notepad

A simple notepad available straight from your browser when you just need to write something down real quick.

Siteimprove

Test your site to find out if it is compliant with WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines). WCAG is a technical standard to make sure that websites are easy to understand, use and read.

This extension gives you suggestions for improvements even right down to the contrast of the colors you use on the website. Brilliant.

Black menu for Google

Access all Google services from within your browser – including search, Disk, Google Analytics, mail or whatever else – and customize the view according to preference.

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How to stop spending time on the wrong things

by Mona-Lisa August 26, 2019

You’ve decided to start a business, get fit, learn a new language – or some other goal that requires dedication and work.

You sit down by your computer to get started, but after a while, almost subconsciously, you open up a new tab and type in Facebook, or a news site, a forum or youtube.

45 minutes later you realize that you’ve wasted a lot of time on nothing, and now you have to go grocery shopping, pick up the kids or do some other task.

Sound familiar? Or, you don’t even get as far as to sit down by the computer, because there is always something else you need to do.

Having progress towards your goal requires good habits

Our modern and high tech way of living where entertainment is at our fingertips at all times, we have trained ourselves for instant rewards. We have a phone in one hand and a tablet in the other while watching a show on TV, as just one channel at the time no longer is enough.

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Blogging – the right topics to keep readers coming back for more

by Mona-Lisa August 19, 2019

The right topics to blog about to keep readers coming back for more

We have a sparkling new week ahead of us, and what better way to kick it off than taking a look at how we can make sure to produce the right content for our blog?

As a blogger most likely you have been (or still are) struggling to create enough content. You know that it is not enough to produce just any content, it has to be quality content, and you need to blog consistently.

Adding to that, you need to create the right type of content. If you are running a fitness blog, probably you would not blog about your guitar-lessons or recipes for high-calorie cakes.

Not to say that people who are into fitness are not also into guitars or cakes, but there is no obvious connection where you can assume that they will be.

Why should you care?

If your ambition for your blog is building a brand, creating a loyal group of readers, or get your opinion on given topics heard, making money from your blog and so on – you need to think like a business.

You are not just writing for your mom or best friend, or for yourself as was the case if it was a journal or diary. You have a specific purpose for your blogging, which also means you have a specific audience for your blog.

Sometimes, especially if you are new, it can be hard to pinpoint exactly who your ideal audience is. Your blog might simply have seen the light of day because of your passion for a given topic, without you for a second considering who the person that might be interested in reading about it is.

Even when you DO know who that audience is, finding those blog-topics can be challenging!

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Fear of failure – crush that self-doubt and fulfill your dreams

by Mona-Lisa August 12, 2019

Get rid of fear of failure, crush that self doubt and live the live of your dreams

She pulled the scarf up to protect against the cold and looked down to make sure her baby daughter was still wrapped in her blankets.

The little one was sleeping, and Joanne made it inside the coffee shop where she sat down by a table near the window.

Warming her hands on a steaming hot cup of coffee, she tried to push away the depressing thoughts that seemed to be controlling her life. With no job and being the sole provider for herself and her daughter, she felt that she was most certainly the biggest failure there ever was.

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4 must have free SEO browser-extensions

by Mona-Lisa August 5, 2019

You have most likely heard about Search Engine Optimization (SEO), and perhaps even dabbled in making your website lovable for search engines and are paying attention to your rankings.

As a business owner or blogger you naturally want to bring people to your website, and getting free, delicious traffic from search engines is a fantastic way to do that.

You can pay for that traffic using advertisement in search engines, social media or on other websites. While advertisement can be a great idea in many cases when you stop paying the traffic from those sources also stop.

When you stop paying for ads, the traffic stops

For that reason, it is well worth investing your time learning a bit more about SEO and put the things you’ve learned into practice.

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How I save a MASSIVE amount of time creating graphics with Stencil

by Mona-Lisa July 29, 2019

Do you find yourself constantly hunting for stock photos for your blog?

Perhaps also spending a lot of time creating the main illustration image as well as other graphics for your posts? Oh and let us not forget – the need to create social media images on top of everything else.

Welcome to the club!

Pictures are attention-grabbing, they make articles easier to read and on top of that – they can drive traffic to your blog.

We know we need them, but we also really need to cut down on the time we spend on these tasks.

Fortunately, we now have access to free or cheap tools, like Canva and Stencil, that makes it easier and faster than ever before. I am on their paid plans, but they both offer free forever plans to get you started. How great is that?

Earlier I used the free versions but upgraded to have access to more pictures and functionality. I will do a complete Canva vs Stencil review and comparison later on, but today I will focus specifically on how I use Stencil to accelerate my blogging.

Create blog graphics faster

Up until recent times I would have to:

Take a picture or go to a stock photo site, find a picture and download it.
Open the picture in Photoshop, crop and adjust, add text and other elements if needed (quite time-consuming).
Export the picture and download it to my computer.
Upload the picture inside of WordPress or wherever.

Today I can do ALL OF THOSE TASKS WITHIN WORDPRESS. That’s right, without ever leaving WordPress I can create as well as add a picture to any post or page.

So how does it work?

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WHAT DO YOU WANT TO ACHIEVE?

Launch your business »

Boost your productivity »

Get more traffic »

How I came up with ideas for 3 years worth of blog posts – in one day!

The number of tasks you should do every day – to move your business forward

How to easily turn a blog post into an e-book – for free

Why would you want to?

Turning your blog post into an ebook

Must-have Chrome extensions for bloggers

Grammarly

Planyway for Trello

WhatRuns

SEOquake

Print friendly & PDF

ColorZilla

Screencastify

Tiny Notepad

Siteimprove

Black menu for Google

How to stop spending time on the wrong things

Blogging – the right topics to keep readers coming back for more

Fear of failure – crush that self-doubt and fulfill your dreams

4 must have free SEO browser-extensions

How I save a MASSIVE amount of time creating graphics with Stencil

Up until recent times I would have to:

WHAT DO YOU WANT TO ACHIEVE?

Launch your business »

Boost your productivity »

Get more traffic »

The problem

The solution

Why would you want to?

Turning your blog post into an ebook

Up until recent times I would have to: