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Organizing
Google products – My favorites are Google Keep and Google Calendar. I also use Google Sheets and Google Docs for most of my working documents and lists.
I Heart Planners – www.iheartplanners.com – Laura has many free printables on her site.
Scattered Squirrel – www.scatteredsquirrel.com – Alli also has TONS of free printables.
I use these products every day to keep myself organized:
Binders – Avery heavy duty one-touch EZD view binders. I use several 2” binders for organizing blogging and daily household items and 3” binders for organizing recipes, Elite Blog Academy materials, and household product operation manuals, etc.
Monthly dividers – perfect for visually representing 3-month chunks for goal-achieving purposes.
“Pretty” dividers – With insertable tabs — a little expensive, but the two sets I purchased make my Elite Blog Academy binder look so nice!
“Wide” dividers – With insertable tabs, wide enough to show even when using page protectors in your binder.
Binder snap-in bookmarks – I just discovered these and love them for marking my places in my blogging and personal binders!
Page protectors – I mostly use these for recipe binders and to hold appliance manuals. “Regular” for things like recipes & “multi-page” for thicker appliance manuals.
3-hole punch – I print a lot of things to go in my binders, and not all of them belong in sheet protectors. A good easy-to-use paper punch helps me actually get the things I print where they belong – in a binder, not a pile!
Clipboards – The newer-style low profile clipboards are so nice! They aren’t bulky, so I can slip them into my file basket or between the pages in a binder to keep my place while working.
Pens – I’ve found that when writing by hand, it REALLY helps to use a pen that writes smoothly — pens that scratch or skip drive me crazy. My favorites are Pilot G-2 07 for a bolder line and Pentel RSVP Medium for a finer line.
Highlighters – Even though I hate how printer ink smears a bit when highlighted, I still find myself using them on hand-written notes, daily planner sheets, etc. I like this Bic brand because they feel good in my hand.
Hanging files – I use a lot of these, and then further divide materials within the hanging files with regular file folders.
Sticky notes – Honestly, I’ve tried to get away from using sticky notes, but I just love them! My favorites are the bright colors. Because if I’m using a sticky note, it’s because I really want to notice it!
Clear magnetic pockets – I have 4 of these on my fridge. One for each child’s school calendar (one in high school, one in college), one to show our latest debt paydown printout, and one that holds a collage of “stuff” that I don’t want randomly scattered on the fridge. Nothing else is allowed on the fridge.
Pocket dividers – These are amazing. I first read about them in the book The Sunday Basket (the book is included as part of the Conquer Your Clutter Super Bundle or available on Amazon).
Basket – Something like THIS basket will keep your “Sunday Basket” files organized and at the ready. My basket is a little larger. I happened to have it lying around the house when I began using the Sunday Basket process, and I like how it works for me because it holds everything I need, including my daily 2” blogging binder.
Menu board – I installed a tempered black glass board as a backsplash over the stove in my kitchen and use these wet-erase chalk paint markers to write in our weekly dinner menu. It’s fun and a little different than what you usually see for a home menu board. (FYI, I first tried these dry-erase neon markers and they were horrible! Don’t waste your money.)
Make Over Your Evenings ecourse – I LOVED this course. It was more comprehensive than I had expected, and really helped me prioritize my evening activities and thought process in order to get my days started right.
Make Over Your Mornings ecourse – If you can’t seem to get it together in the morning, you might want to try this course.
Conquer Your Clutter Super Bundle – One of my favorite ebook/ecourse/printables bundles EVER! You can read some of what I like about it HERE or check out the entire bundle HERE.
Blogging
How to Start a Blog: The Super-Easy 5-Step Beginner Guide – My post to help walk you through setting up your blog.
Make Money Blogging at Any Level – Victoria Pruett
Even if you think your blog is too small to make an income, Victoria’s tips will teach you that you CAN earn money from your blog even with low monthly page views.
Building a Framework – This blogging course presented by Abby & Donnie Lawson (think Abby of Just a Girl and Her Blog) delivers on the promise of “You don’t have start your blog alone.” It’s real, it works, and it will help you understand what blogging is all about (AND how to conquer the tech overwhelm)!
If you’re not familiar with Abby’s style, CLICK HERE to get her FREE Guide to the 5 Types of Blog Content That Will Boost Your Blog Traffic.
Elite Blog Academy – This course is only available once per year, and it’s definitely worth the money if you’re a new blogger with big dreams, or if you’ve been blogging for a while and your blogging experience isn’t turning out the way you had hoped. The step-by-step course framework will take you from the very basics of blogging to becoming a full-fledged business. Blogging is not for the faint of heart, and this course requires a willingness to buckle down and get to work. That said, for those who are willing to do the work, it also comes with a 100% money-back guarantee.
SPECIAL NOTE: Elite Blog Academy is currently closed to new enrollment. If you have ever thought about blogging, you should sign up for the waiting list. Signing up does NOT obligate you to purchase the course, but you will be one of the first to hear about new freebies and information for the next class.
Although Elite Blog Academy is currently closed, you can still grab some awesome FREE resources, which I’ve linked to below. Signing up for these does NOT obligate you to purchase the course.
EBA Blogging Assessment – Take this free blogging assessment to discover whether or not blogging is for you.
Blog Structure Blueprint – A simple template for an organized blog.
”7 Surefire Ways to Boost Your Blog Income Overnight” E-Book – Great, actionable tips!
Goal Setting Workbook for Bloggers – You can’t succeed if you don’t set goals.
More blogging resources:
Elite Blog Academy Blog – Blogging tips and information.
Bluehost – This is the hosting company I have used since I began blogging over a year ago.
Tailwind – This program is an official Pinterest partner and will help you schedule your Pinterest pins. It can help you figure out the best time of day to post, shuffle your posts, etc. I like the visual layout and drag-and-drop capabilities. Click HERE to get a credit to try your first month free.
BoardBooster – This is my favorite tool for Pinterest scheduling. It saves me HOURS of time every week.
Buffer – With the free version of Buffer, you can schedule up to 10 Twitter and/or Facebook posts at a time. My two favorite things about Buffer are being able to preview and choose various images for Twitter, and the ability to “re-buffer” a post without having to completely re-write it. The paid version allows more posts and more social media accounts.
Hootsuite – I like this program mainly because you can schedule a ton of Twitter posts for free. The paid version is extremely powerful, and you can set it up with feeds from other social media sources to streamline your overall social media scheduling time.
Canva – I find this photo and graphic creation program extremely easy to use. It’s what I use for all of my blog graphics and many of my printables. Plus, it’s free unless you use the premium options.
Unsplash – Free photos to use as you wish.
Pixabay – Mostly free photos. Some require you to credit the photographer, so be sure to check before you download!
Melyssa Griffin’s website – www.melyssagriffin.com – Melyssa’s site is a great resource for beginning bloggers and those who want to take their blog & business to the next level.
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