How To Manage Creative Social Media Work

It is two different things to be creative and get that creativeness turn to something visual or touchable like texts, pictures, products and SoMe content. I have noticed that blogging is a constant learning process where you can get better and better at making, writing, connecting and marketing. Today I want to share you some of my thoughts from the the journey here. 

What are your specialties and what are you good at? Be bold and mark your territory!

Social media and blogging

It is quite typical for a creative person to get many new ideas in every minute but the challenge is how to sort out the very best and get those ideas to reality. We are living in a fast paced era and reacting speed matters a lot. Speed and quality are in a constant battle with each other. I am a person who likes to do things properly, evaluate and develop to get the best possible result. Nowadays blogging and producing social media content has become as professional as editing a magazine. Even though these are coming closer to each other I would like to pic three factors that differ from traditional magazines: 1. Process of thinking or making is more visible. Blogging allows you to show and write about the making process in a different way. You don´t have to come out with a perfect result. Instead of that you can show how you came up with an idea, tested and tried and what you learned. 2. Speed. Have you noticed how bloggers and social media has talked about some phenomenon a long before it is on the print media or TV? It is easier to test a new thing on social media and see if people get interested. 3. Lots of people interacting and talking about the subject makes a rough diamond come to jewel.

The Idea

I am a DIY, crafts, home decor and recipe blogger so making and finishing material products are an essential part of my blogging, this way about 40% my work is very traditional. Still in the end all is about ideas and communicating them to others. I know this and yet this especially has been a thing to learn for me. How do I book my calendar for sketching, writing and editing so that I get ideas I want to share for people to read? Have you been in a situation when you come up with a great idea and it floats in your calendar's to do list for ages and then one day you notice that someone else has found the time to write about it before you did? You notice that all the novelty value has gone because you could not manage your creative work and act quick enough for some upcoming trend.  What is even worse is if you thought your idea was a bit silly, dumped it and then it comes a big hit. This is where we come back to the factors that make social media and blogging special; namely showing the process of thinking and interacting with others. People read weak signals and the ideas you get might not be unique in the sense that someone else might come up with the same idea and it comes a trend even though you would not participate in the process. But who would not want to be one of the first people to talk about a coming trend?

Booking time

Booking your great idea to your calendar is the first step to get it done. Remember also to estimate the amount of time you will need to get it done. I am usually too optimistic when I book my calendar. I might dream about doing a project in a day when it might take a week. Try to write down all the steps you have to go through before you have an actual finished post to show. Consider factors like weather or short time of daylight that might have an influence on taking photographs. Also buying or collecting equipment might take some time. Sometimes sketching the idea into a form that can be realized might take many work days.
A good idea is also to broke a bigger project into pieces and make long term plans to get a bigger entity done. This has worked for me. I have a long term plan to improve my blog with pages that work better, social media and create a contact page. I am also working on to make a a better professional brand. These are both things that take time and need developing. When I finally got my DIY page updated I was very pleased and step by step I am learning and making more improvements.
What comes to blogging and social media activity I think it is good to be brave and release beta versions and tell people about the process. This also the way to get in to the discussion early enough. You can always write more about that topic later as you evaluate it from a new perspective. On my opinion this is the way to keep social media and blogging fresh and new instead of old fashioned but safe.

Develop your skills and ideas

The ultimate best part of blogging has been to develop my skills and learn from other talented bloggers. Don't be afraid to think big and follow lots of people. By following many different accounts and blogs you will get your daily boost of motivation. I think it makes you pro if you have the courage to connect and interact globally with people from different countries and branches. This way you will learn from the best and find the weak signals. It is also a way to evolve your own ideas and inspire others.

Do your own thing is a good advice what comes to blogging in general and especially in content and communicating your personality. Still I believe that sometimes it is also good to compare your work to other's so you know what areas of your work you could develop. Here I think about the technical aspects like social media presence, info pages, blogging schedules and taking part to popular phenomenon and shared activities. During the past year or two I have read lots of blogging advice. Sometimes the rules of blogging, especially technical advice about picture quality or page design, can put you down.  And I have come up to that conclusion that I will blog, learn and improve things little by little. Still even if you got right sized margins it is content that matters. And you can set the future goals high while you continue to play at the meantime.

I am always trying to tell myself to be bold and not to be ashamed the creative work I have done. It is hard though but there is no sense to put a lot of effort to blog posts and projects that you are not brave enough to show to others. I would say if you have a need to create: write, photograph, draw, paint, make crafts, cook, bake, DIY, sing, what ever it is you have to do, do it. It is for people to decide if they are interested in what you are doing. It is not a worst case scenario to have more creativeness in the world. Forecast the weak signals and try things before they are big hit, no one will remember how you hyped a thing that never became a hit! they will remember how you were the first one to write about something that became a hit.

Are you a blogger or do you like to read blogs and get inspired? What are your experiences and advice for blogging and social media?

Have a wonderful week!

Sannu