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7-Figure Small with Brian Clark
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Copyblogger FM: Content Marketing, Copywriting, Freelance Writing, and Social Media Marketing
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Youpreneur with Chris Ducker
Zero to Book
Copyblogger FM: Content Marketing, Copywriting, Freelance Writing, and Social Media Marketing
hosted by Darrell Vesterfelt and Tim Stoddart

Get Ready Now for a Creative and Productive 2017

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Previous Episode:The 4 Pillars Every Online Business Is Built On More Episodes Next Episode:Bad Writing Advice: The 'Post Truth' Episode

All Episodes:

March 30, 2020

The Advantage of Email Marketing, Featuring Nathan Barry of ConvertKit

March 15, 2020

How to Write Content That Resonates

March 9, 2020

How to Conquer Your Fear of Selling, with Leah Neaderthal

March 2, 2020

How to Build Remarkable Products to Grow Your Business, with Ramit Sethi

February 17, 2020

What You Should Talk about on Your Podcast, with Tara McMullin

February 9, 2020

How to Win at Search in 2020

February 3, 2020

How to Turn Pro as a Freelance Writer

January 27, 2020

Marketing Segmentation and Personalization with Brennan Dunn of RightMessage

January 20, 2020

Podcasting Still Matters, with Pat Flynn from Smart Passive Income

January 13, 2020

The New Look Copyblogger in 2020

January 8, 2020

New Year, New Copyblogger

October 23, 2019

The Self-Reliant Entrepreneur with John Jantsch

October 2, 2019

Consistency Will Take You Further

September 25, 2019

The Past, Present, and Future of Online Learning

September 16, 2019

How to Get More of the Right Things Done

September 9, 2019

Why the Future Is Still Email

September 3, 2019

What’s Next for
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August 26, 2019

How Smart, Nimble Companies Are Using Webinars Today

August 19, 2019

The Clarity Method: A Conversation with Tim Brownson

August 12, 2019

Digital Business Trends and the Latest on the Rainmaker Platform

August 5, 2019

4 ‘Naive’ Business Principles for Enduring Success

July 8, 2019

How to Write an Epic Blog Post, Part 3: Polishing and Promotion

July 1, 2019

How to Write an Epic Blog Post, Part 2: Getting It Written

June 24, 2019

How to Write an Epic Blog Post, Part 1: Thinking and Research

June 17, 2019

3 Almost Magical Headline Ingredients for More Traffic, Engagement, and Shares

June 10, 2019

Lessons Any Business Can Learn from an Impressive Influencer Marketing Fail

June 3, 2019

13 Ways of Looking at a Headline

May 27, 2019

The 7 ‘Bad’ Habits of Incredibly Successful People

May 20, 2019

Writers: How to Move from Making a Living to Driving Revenue

May 13, 2019

Choose the Right Frame to Boost the Power of Your Content

May 6, 2019

How Copywriting Teacher Belinda Weaver Reenergized Her Email List for Massive Engagement

April 29, 2019

3 Reasons Why Really Good Writers Sometimes Can’t Find Great Clients

April 22, 2019

3 Slightly Embarrassing Emotions that Drive Effective Copywriting

April 15, 2019

Get 10 Content Marketing Boosters in 20 Minutes

April 8, 2019

Becoming the ‘Chief Empathy Officer’ of Your Copy and Content

April 1, 2019

One of the Most Important Marketing Decisions You’ll Ever Make

March 18, 2019

What Nobody Wants to Hear about Content Marketing

March 11, 2019

Getting Your Big, Scary Projects Finished: A Conversation about Growing Gills

March 4, 2019

When Is It Time to Bring in a Professional Copywriter?

February 25, 2019

Using Content to Systematically Move Prospects Toward a Purchase

February 18, 2019

Understanding the Lifecycles of Your Website, with Pamela Wilson

February 11, 2019

5 Ways to Manage a Stress-Induced Creative Slump

February 4, 2019

3 Ways Strategic Content Can Drive Measurable Business Outcomes

January 28, 2019

The Social Media Platform Every Content Creator Should Be Using in 2019 (Nope, It’s Not Facebook)

January 21, 2019

Real Talk about Generating High-Quality Content

January 14, 2019

A Conversation with Paul Jarvis about Staying a ‘Company of One’

October 29, 2018

The 3 Plus 1 Foundational Elements of Effective Persuasion

October 22, 2018

5 Essential Copywriting Techniques from Copyblogger

October 15, 2018

5 Ways to Recover Your Professional and Creative Confidence

October 8, 2018

5 Stinky Sardine Secrets to Make Your Content More Fascinating

September 24, 2018

The Mindset ‘Hack’ that Frees Your Creativity and Makes You Happier

September 18, 2018

How to Kill Your Sales and Mess up Your Business: Lessons from a Used Car Salesman

September 4, 2018

The 7 Things Writers Need to Make a (Good) Living

August 27, 2018

Are You Making These Social Media Marketing Mistakes?

August 20, 2018

Fix These 7 About Page Mistakes for More Traffic and (Possibly) Better SEO

August 13, 2018

7 Ways to Boost Your Creativity

August 6, 2018

A 10-Step ‘Checklist’ for Your Content Marketing Site

July 30, 2018

The 3 Keys to Publishing Strong Content … Even If You Aren’t a ‘Great’ Writer (Yet)

July 23, 2018

Fix These 3 Points of Failure to Get Better Results for Your Content

July 16, 2018

Big Changes at ConvertKit: A Discussion with Founder Nathan Barry

July 9, 2018

3 Skills to Master to Become a Marketing Badass this Year

June 18, 2018

The Quiet Power of Conversational Copy

June 11, 2018

5 Rules of Thumb to Relieve SEO-Induced Stress

June 4, 2018

How to Use the GDPR to Make Your Business Stronger than Ever

May 14, 2018

‘Good Karma’ Selling that Works: A Conversation with Tim Paige

April 30, 2018

How to Get More Comfortable (and Effective) at Selling

April 23, 2018

Privacy and Permission in the Wake of Cambridge Analytica

April 16, 2018

Seth Godin and How to Create Change

April 9, 2018

Email? Chatbots? Social? How Are We Supposed to Reach People?

March 26, 2018

The Double-Edged Sword that Can Make (or Break) Your Content

March 19, 2018

Make More Progress by Getting (Gently) Out of Your Comfort Zone

March 12, 2018

Are You Doing Content Marketing Wrong?

March 5, 2018

Storytelling for Modern Content Marketing (Part 2 of 2)

February 26, 2018

Storytelling for Modern Content Marketing (Part 1 of 2)

February 19, 2018

10 Quality Factors Search Engines Need to See on Your Site

February 12, 2018

A Simple Content Strategy to Make Your Site Massively More Useful

February 5, 2018

How to Avoid a Heartbreaking Business Failure

January 29, 2018

Hey Writers: Let’s Get You Paid What You’re Worth

January 15, 2018

5 Keys to Making Your Content More Shareable

December 18, 2017

3 Observations on Trends (but not Predictions) for 2018

December 11, 2017

3 Tips Now to Build a Strong Foundation in 2018

December 4, 2017

The 3 Success Factors that Help Writers Earn a Great Living

November 27, 2017

How to Recognize a Great Content Idea

November 20, 2017

How to Cultivate a More Meaningful Gratitude Practice

November 13, 2017

Advice for Poets, Advice for Killers

October 30, 2017

Face Your Business Fears on Halloween Week

October 23, 2017

How to Make Smarter Decisions about Your Website

October 2, 2017

A Series of Unfortunate Content Events

September 18, 2017

The Evolution of a Successful Copywriter

August 28, 2017

7 Ways to Improve Your Marketing by Harnessing the Power of Evil

August 14, 2017

Smart Questions from our Brilliant Audience

August 7, 2017

Does the Web Have Enough Patience for Your In-Depth Content?

July 31, 2017

How to Write (Much Better) Blog Comments

July 17, 2017

Which Works Better: Positive or Negative Content?

July 10, 2017

How to Attract the Exact Customers You Want

July 3, 2017

How to Create Stability and Success as an Artist

June 19, 2017

Two Powerful Resources for Life-Changing Growth

June 12, 2017

How to Turn All that Marketing Advice into Action

June 5, 2017

How to Develop a Compelling Marketing Idea in 4 Steps

May 30, 2017

Getting Over the Fear of Selling

May 22, 2017

Talking Community and Digital Business with Tara Gentile

May 15, 2017

Plagiarism, Self-Deception, Bad Sandwiches, and Other Interesting Disasters

May 1, 2017

Professional Writers: Find Out How to Get Certified by Copyblogger

April 17, 2017

The Painful Core Lesson Taught by 3 Astonishing Big-Brand Fails

April 3, 2017

5 Mindset Habits that Actually Work

March 27, 2017

On Grammar, Usage, and Not Being a Great Big Jerk

March 20, 2017

Creative Strategies for Content Writers

March 13, 2017

A New Ultra-Easy Resource for Creating Excellent WordPress Sites

February 20, 2017

Thriving Freelancers and Clients from Hell

February 13, 2017

Politics, Content Marketing, and the 2017 Super Bowl Ads

February 6, 2017

Copyblogger Book Club: Winning the Story Wars

January 23, 2017

3 Content Marketing Strategy Fails (and How to Fix Them)

January 9, 2017

The 2017 Content Excellence Challenge: Your January Assignments

December 19, 2016

Bad Writing Advice: The ‘Post Truth’ Episode

December 12, 2016

Get Ready Now for a Creative and Productive 2017

December 5, 2016

The 4 Pillars Every Online Business Is Built On

November 28, 2016

Orbit Media’s Latest Survey of 1000 Bloggers

November 14, 2016

Have You Already Missed the Podcasting Gold Rush?

November 7, 2016

Getting More Traffic, Links, and Shares to Your Content

October 31, 2016

5 Quick Wins for Content Marketers

October 24, 2016

Announcing: An Intriguing New Tool for Collaborative Content

October 17, 2016

A New Book to Make Content Marketing Easier

October 10, 2016

Behind the Scenes at Copyblogger: Our New Email Approach

October 3, 2016

The ‘Obligatory’ Structure of Effective Content

September 26, 2016

7 Powerful Content Strategies Borrowed from Advertising Masters

September 15, 2016

How to Handle Demographic and Psychographic Segmentation (without Looking Like an Idiot)

September 8, 2016

Ethics, Professionalism, and Good Manners for Content Marketers

September 1, 2016

3 Questions that Can Haunt Creative Professionals

August 25, 2016

How to Give and Get Exceptional Testimonials, Part Two

August 18, 2016

How to Give and Get Exceptional Testimonials, Part One

August 11, 2016

Are You Leaving Money on the Table with Weak Headlines?

August 4, 2016

Content Marketing for Nonprofits

July 28, 2016

The One-Two Punch that Creates the Most Successful Copywriters

July 21, 2016

Pokémon Go: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

July 14, 2016

5 Suggestions When You’re Writing About Controversy

July 7, 2016

Announcing: A Breakthrough Educational Collaboration between Copyblogger and U.C. Davis

June 30, 2016

How to Break Past the #1 Conversion Killer

June 23, 2016

The New Age of Marketing Automation: Powerful, Simple, Cost-Effective

June 16, 2016

How to Make a (Really Good) Living as a Freelance Writer

June 9, 2016

Self-Publishing, Side Hustles, and Doing It All: A Conversation with Linda Formichelli

June 2, 2016

A Process for Content Marketing Success

May 26, 2016

Content Marketing Best Practices: Getting Email Opt-Ins

May 19, 2016

Behind the Scenes: Adventures in Advertising

May 12, 2016

Trump, Apple, and Facebook Advertising: Content Marketing News for May, 2016

May 5, 2016

Sally Hogshead and the Art of Fascination

April 28, 2016

Behind the Scenes at the Rainmaker Digital Company Meeting!

April 14, 2016

Social Media News, Social Media Constants

April 7, 2016

Strategies for B2B Podcasting, with Clark Buckner

March 31, 2016

Content Marketing Success Stories: Fitness Powerhouse Examine.com

March 24, 2016

Behind the Scenes: An Inside Look at the Rainmaker FM Redesign

March 17, 2016

Our Latest Advice and Resources for Digital Business Owners

March 10, 2016

Should Content Publishers Adopt Google’s New AMP?

March 3, 2016

7 Ways to Get Smarter with Social Media Listening

February 25, 2016

Content Marketing Shout-Out: Orbit Media and Andy Crestodina

February 18, 2016

The Tactic You Should Steal from Copyblogger

February 11, 2016

Content Marketing News for February, 2016

February 4, 2016

Email Marketing: The Misunderstood Powerhouse

January 28, 2016

The Secret Weapon Behind Great Websites: The Role of the Content Editor

January 21, 2016

Behind the Scenes: The Relaunch and Re-Imagining of Copyblogger.com

January 14, 2016

Trends and Predictions for Digital Commerce: A Conversation with Brian Clark

January 7, 2016

2016 Content Marketing Resolutions

December 28, 2015

The End of The Lede, The Beginning of Copyblogger FM

November 10, 2015

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November 3, 2015

Long or Short? The Content Length Question Answered, Once and For All

October 27, 2015

The Simple Publishing Hack That Gives Old Content New Life (Plus 3 More Tips)

October 20, 2015

The Surprising Truth about Earning a Profit from Your Content

October 13, 2015

How to Move Your Audience From Infatuation to Love

October 6, 2015

3 Things Your Audience Wants You to Know about Useful Content

September 29, 2015

Revisiting Authenticity: What It Is, What It’s Not, and Why It Matters

September 22, 2015

Publishing Lessons from Dave Pell, the Most Fascinating Email Newsletter Writer in the Business

September 15, 2015

Why Content Creators Should Kiss Their Programmers

September 8, 2015

Finally — A Podcast about the Superiority of Written Content

September 1, 2015

Hot Seat: Grilling Jerod on Using Audio Content to Seed a Content Arsenal

August 25, 2015

How to Optimize Your Headlines for Content Discovery with Vinegar (Before You Die of Cholera)

August 18, 2015

5 Stories That Explain Jerod Morris (Plus One Massive Marketing Lesson)

August 11, 2015

Lede Potpourri: A Big Idea, Talking About Demian Behind His Back, and Lessons from #PM15

August 4, 2015

How to Attend an Industry Conference Like a Boss

July 28, 2015

Getting the Most Out of a Conference When You’re There to Promote, Part 1

July 21, 2015

How Much Does the Modern Content Marketer Need to Know About SEO?

July 14, 2015

Are Podcasters Digitally Sharecropping Without Realizing It?

July 7, 2015

Celebrating Our 101st Episode (with a Special Guest Interviewer)

June 30, 2015

Why The Phrase ‘Leaders Are Readers’ Should Die

June 23, 2015

Why You Should Think Outside the Box About Online Courses

June 16, 2015

The Proper (and Safe) Way to Republish Old Articles

June 9, 2015

How to Grow an Audience on LinkedIn by Repurposing Content

June 2, 2015

Key Takeaways from Three-and-a-Half Hours with Henry Rollins

May 27, 2015

Rapid-Fire Takeaways from Authority Rainmaker

May 19, 2015

The Proper Way to Grow an Audience on Medium

May 12, 2015

The Introvert’s Guide to Launching a Successful Podcast

May 5, 2015

The One Quality All Popular Podcasts Share

April 28, 2015

Proof That Grit Is the Only Way to Reach Your Potential

April 21, 2015

Do We Celebrate Failure Too Much?

April 14, 2015

Choose Yourself Part 2: James Altucher Fights Back

April 7, 2015

Should We Fear Content Shock? (Or Could It Actually Be a Good Thing?)

March 31, 2015

Should You Really ‘Walk in the Direction of Your Fear’?

March 24, 2015

Is ‘Choose Yourself’ Good Advice … or New-Age Phooey?

March 17, 2015

Is Authority Earned or Bestowed?

March 3, 2015

Dan Pink on How to Succeed in the New Era of Selling

February 24, 2015

Here’s How to Answer the Most Important Question in Life (and Make a Living from It)

February 17, 2015

Sally Hogshead on How You Can Unlock Your Natural Ability to Fascinate

February 10, 2015

How to Learn from Your Successes

January 27, 2015

How to Learn From Your Mistakes

January 13, 2015

Lessons Learned from Conducting Two Monster Audience Surveys

December 16, 2014

Adaptive Content: A Trend to Pay Attention to in 2015

December 2, 2014

The Most Important Lessons You Should Have Learned in 2014

November 18, 2014

How We Built Our Careers Online (And What You Can Learn From It)

November 4, 2014

Interview with Brian Clark: How Customer Experience Maps Help You Develop a Smarter Content Strategy

October 21, 2014

How Empathy Maps Help You Speak Directly to the Hearts of Your Audience

October 7, 2014

How to Ignite a Feeling in Your Audience

September 23, 2014

Are You Overlooking This Cornerstone of a Smart Content Strategy?

June 26, 2014

How to Curate Knowledge, Turn it Into Wisdom, and Build Your Audience

June 19, 2014

How Successful Writers Curate Ideas

June 13, 2014

The 5 W’s of Link Curation

June 6, 2014

Why You Should Curate Content (And How to Do It Right)

May 30, 2014

How Freaks and Misfits Can Succeed in Business: A Conversation with Chris Brogan

May 23, 2014

The 2 Reasons People Don’t Click on Your Buttons … And How to Overcome Them

May 16, 2014

Chase Customers, Not Clicks

May 9, 2014

How to Be Authentic

May 2, 2014

How to Close With Style

April 25, 2014

The Best of Seth Godin on Copyblogger

April 17, 2014

How to Choose Arresting Images for Your Blog Posts (And Why You Should)

April 11, 2014

Removing Blog Comments: The View So Far

April 4, 2014

How to Use Internal Cliffhangers

March 28, 2014

Hangout Hot Seat with Brian Clark

March 21, 2014

How to Tell a Seductive Story

March 14, 2014

How to Create Exquisite Subheads

March 7, 2014

How to Write Killer Bullet Points

February 28, 2014

How to Write Damn Good Sentences

February 21, 2014

How to Use Persuasive Words

February 14, 2014

Michael Stelzner on Capturing Emails and Committing to Quality

February 7, 2014

How to Nail Your Opening

January 24, 2014

How to Write a Magnetic Headline (in Under 15 Minutes)

May 18, 2012

Seth Godin on When You Should Start Marketing Your Product, Service, or Idea

May 11, 2012

How to Attract an Audience by Integrating Content, Social, and Search

March 30, 2012

Why You Should Build an Audience Before You Build a Business

March 16, 2012

How Chris Brogan Built His Content Platform

March 9, 2012

Jay Baer on How to Turn Interested Prospects into Lifelong Customers

March 2, 2012

A 30-Minute Copywriting Course from a Master of the Craft

February 24, 2012

The Path to a Legendary Copywriting Career

February 17, 2012

5 Tips for Affiliate Marketing Beginners

February 10, 2012

Why Not Sell Physical Stuff With Digital Media?

February 3, 2012

Whether You Call it Blogging or Not, Online Content Still Rules

January 27, 2012

Answers to the 3 Biggest Email Marketing Questions We Get

January 20, 2012

How to Newsjack Your Way to Free Media Exposure with David Meerman Scott

January 13, 2012

Steven Pressfield and the War of Work

November 18, 2011

The Strategy Behind the Copyblogger Redesign

November 11, 2011

7 Ways to Create an Email Marketing "Snowball Effect"

November 4, 2011

Warning: If You're Not a Privacy Nut, You're Losing Sales

October 28, 2011

The 3 Kinds of Writing That Builds a Business

October 21, 2011

The Art of Seductive Writing: A Conversation with Robert Greene

October 7, 2011

Why Content Marketing Doesn't Suck

September 30, 2011

Are You Weird Enough to Succeed at Content Marketing?

September 23, 2011

What Works With SEO Right Now and Why No One Does What You Want

September 16, 2011

Are You Flushing Your Marketing Down the Social Media Toilet?

September 11, 2011

Seth Godin on Blogging, Business Books, and Creating Content that Matters

September 2, 2011

The Return of Copyblogger Radio …

June 10, 2011

Answered: Your Most Burning Content Marketing Questions

June 3, 2011

How to Get All the Clients and Customers You Can Handle

May 20, 2011

Is Content Marketing Worth the Work?

May 13, 2011

How to Write Nearly Undeletable Emails

May 6, 2011

Is the Online Gold Rush Over?

April 22, 2011

The Art of Enchanting Online Marketing with Guy Kawasaki

April 15, 2011

The Market for Something to Believe in is Infinite: An Interview with Hugh MacLeod

April 8, 2011

How to Constantly Create Compelling Content

March 25, 2011

The Content Marketing Question You Need to Answer … Now

March 18, 2011

Good SEO is Simple. Really.

March 4, 2011

Did Social Media Kill the Marketing Star?

February 25, 2011

How to Write (and Execute) a Simple but Powerful Business Plan

February 17, 2011

How to Kick Groupon to the Curb and Become a Local Hero

February 3, 2011

Convert … Or Die

January 27, 2011

Attention: Is Your Headline Getting Any?

January 20, 2011

How to Craft Landing Pages that Work

January 13, 2011

Why Every Smart Business is in the Media Business

January 5, 2011

2011 Content Marketing Predictions

December 15, 2010

Tim Ferriss on How to Reinvent Yourself with Blog Marketing

December 8, 2010

The 6 Elements of an Influential Web Experience

December 1, 2010

Your Staggeringly Unfair Marketing Advantage

November 17, 2010

How to Get Some Action

November 10, 2010

The Foundation of All Marketing that Works

November 3, 2010

Introducing Copyblogger Radio

December 12, 2016

Get Ready Now for a Creative and Productive 2017

See ya, 2016! We’re starting 2017 early this year.

This year has been a rollercoaster … so I’m proposing we kick 2017 off early.

To get where you want to go professionally, you’ll need to create excellent content, and to create enough of it to make an impact.

We want to support your efforts in doing exactly that in the coming year … so we have a new community project for you. Each month, both here and on the Copyblogger blog, we’ll propose a pair of “prompts” — one aimed at improving your content quality, and the other aimed at improving your content productivity.

We’ll sharpen our skills by having fun, enjoying the process, and putting the time in … all in the spirit of creative play.

In this 19-minute episode, I talk about:

  • Why the key to creative productivity rarely lies in “resolutions” (and where to find it instead)
  • Two creative prompts for December … to fit in when you can
  • The habit prompt I’m playing with this month … and how it will help your year to come
  • Some thoughts on working with habits during the craziness of December holidays

Our December, 2016 prompts

  • Quality: Play with some fiction vignettes or snippets (see the resource from Stefanie in the Show Notes below)
  • Quality: Write a short page about a value that’s important to you
  • Productivity: Write a page or so “every day” (as you define it) at a consistent (-ish) time of day

Drop us a note in the comments — here or on the blog — and let us know if you’ll be playing along!

Listen to Copyblogger FM: Content Marketing, Copywriting, Freelance Writing, and Social Media Marketing below ...

Get Ready Now for a Creative and Productive 2017Sonia Simone
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The Show Notes

  • If you’re ready to see for yourself why over 194,000 website owners trust StudioPress — the industry standard for premium WordPress themes and plugins — just go to Rainmaker.FM/StudioPress
  • Our own Stefanie Flaxman is offering weekly creative writing prompts you can play with
  • My post on improving productivity with tiny habits
  • My podcast on the “values hack” (and some other productivity boosters)
  • I’m always happy to see your questions or thoughts on Twitter @soniasimone — or right here in the comments

The Transcript

Get Ready Now for a Creative and Productive 2017

Voiceover: Rainmaker FM.

Sonia Simone: Copyblogger FM is brought to you by StudioPress, the industry standard for premium WordPress themes and plugins. Built on the Genesis framework, StudioPress delivers state-of-the-art SEO tools, beautiful and fully responsive design, airtight security, instant updates, and much more.

If you’re ready to take your WordPress site to the next level, see for yourself why more than 190,000 website owners trust StudioPress. Go to Rainmaker.FM/StudioPress.

Well, hello there. It’s really good to see you again. Welcome back to Copyblogger FM, the content marketing podcast.

Copyblogger FM is about emerging content marketing trends, interesting disasters, and enduring best practices, along with the occasional rant.

My name is Sonia Simone. I’m the chief content officer for Rainmaker Digital, and I like to hangout with the folks who do the heavy lifting over on the Copyblogger blog. You can always find extra links, extra resources, and the complete show archive by going to Copyblogger.FM.

My unofficial name for today’s episode is “Goodbye to the dumpster fire.” Taking a look back at 2016, plenty of things I’m not particularly excited about. Let’s try a fresh page for 2017.

I like to think of it as starting early on the new year, because I’m done with this one. I’ve been thinking about my new goals for the upcoming year. I’ve been thinking about content quality. I’ve been thinking about how to become a better writer, a better podcaster.

Before we head into the December holidays, which are always a little bit of a crazy time, I want to think about my own habits, my own goals, and my own processes for the new year, and just get a nice head start on doing something fresh and on really working on something positive.

I think you guys know, I really want you to get where you want to go with your content. Whether it’s your own business, or you’re working for someone else. Whether it’s your career, whether you’re a freelancer. I want you to have more of the things you want in your working life and fewer of the things you don’t want.

Why the Key to Creative Productivity Rarely Lies in ‘Resolutions’ (and Where You Can Find It Instead)

Habits are how that happens. When we improve our habits, we improve the quality of what we produce, the quality of what we create, and the quality of the day-to-day existence of our lives. I’m very much about habits rather than motivation, resolutions, or avowals that never really go anywhere. Habits are really how you get where you want to go.

I’ve talked about my ‘habit’ habit earlier. I will give you guys a link. Again, if you go to Copyblogger.FM, I’ll give you a link back to some other resources about cultivating these kinds of small habits. We’ll do the one-minute review now.

As you probably can figure out — it’s probably somewhat self-evident — what you do every day adds up to what you did this year and what you’re going to do next year. When you’re working on new habits, new ways of approaching your work, or improvements to your productivity, you always want — in my opinion, this is reasonably well backed up by science — 95 times out of 100, you’re better off starting very small. In fact, absurdly tiny is not too small.

We human beings are a funny kind of a creature. We really crave novelty. We crave new things, new experiences. We get excited by what’s new, and yet we fear change. Keeping your habits small is a way to introduce something new, exciting, shiny, fun, and interesting without freaking out the part of your brain that’s very change resistant and concerned that we’re going to go off the deep end and create some kind of havoc.

You know these are turbulent times. These are very swiftly changing times. I think that our poor little monkey brains are particularly resistant to change when the external environment is a little more stressed. Small habits will keep you from freaking yourself out, and they will help keep you from self-sabotage or just from that feeling that you want to climb under the covers and drink hot chocolate until March.

New productive change, new productive habits start with itty-bitty, teeny-weeny habits. And then grow them if you need to. If you’ve been on the same teeny habit and it’s not automatically taking off, then just nudge it up a little.

Just a concrete example: If your tiny habit is “I’m going to write one paragraph every day,” and at the end of three weeks you’re still writing one paragraph every day, and the momentum hasn’t kicked in to start writing a page, two pages, or three pages, then you can just tick that habit up: “Okay, I’m going to write two paragraphs a day.”

You always want to schedule room for what some people call the ‘bonus effort.’ In other words, you want to whenever you can — you’re little “Okay, I’m going to write for one paragraph a day.” That should have some free time on the end of it, so that if you feel so motivated, you could write a couple of pages. You could write three, four pages. In a wonderful world, maybe you’d write five or 10 pages, if you just had a really hot day. When you can, schedule around for that bonus effort.

Two Creative Prompts for December … to Fit in When You Can

In 2017 both this podcast and the Copyblogger blog are going to give you some ideas. Ideas for habits, or practices. Fun, small, very achievable things you can do to move forward with your content goals. Because every content goal that’s worth having involves creating content of high quality and doing that consistently.

We’re halfway through December 2016, and I’ll throw a couple of ideas at you that you can play with. That you can just noodle around with, so you can hit it very seriously if you want to, if you’ve got some bandwidth.

Frankly, if you want a little bit of an excuse or a reason to disengage from all the hustle and bustle that the holidays can bring, just say, “Oh, I’d love to sit here and talk politics with my aunt and uncle for another two or three hours, but I’ve got my writing exercise to do, so I’m just going to do that.” If you need an excuse, I will be happy to provide you with one. I can even make some permission slips available, if we need them.

Here are some ideas for habits that you can work on in December. Not like crazy people. Not to put another thing on the pile that’s threatening already to topple, but just some ways to play, noodle, give yourself a break, and take some time for yourself.

The first idea is one that I have been doing lately, and I’m really enjoying it. Which is that the first thing I do in my work life for the day is I get some writing done. About a page is what I’m shooting for. Again, sometimes I go way over that, and sometimes I just go ahead and hit about the page. This is not a groundbreaking habit. We’ve heard this one many times before. I’m getting a lot out of it.

Now there have been times in my life when that was honestly the last thing in the world I wanted to do, was to write first thing. I’m not particularly a morning person. Right now I’ve actually managed to structure my life so I don’t have to get up super early, so that’s one of the things that helps me. I get up around eight in the morning – which, if you have a kid in school, is like princely late. Sleeping in — that helps me actually have a brain first thing in the morning.

If first thing doesn’t work for you, try last thing at night. That was always the one that tended to work well for me. It’s a little bit of free time for most of us, so maybe nine o’clock at night, ten o’clock. I don’t know when you go to bed. Let’s say an hour before you start getting ready for bed, you give yourself some space to do writing of some kind.

If that’s not workable, maybe lunchtime is workable. Try to find 20, 30 minutes in your day. You’re not necessarily going to need all of it. Where you can, just carve out consistently some time to work on your writing.

I like to do it every day. However, a lot of people like to put a Sabbath in there. They like to have one day off a week. Totally workable. Lots of great work has been done by people who take one day a week off. If you want to take the whole weekend off, totally legit. You structure it the way that works for you, not the way that works for me.

I like to do this page by hand most of the time. You may hate that idea. Again, structure it the way you want to structure it. Just as an idea for December, try doing one page of writing at some consistent and predictable time of day.

The Habit Prompt Sonia’s Playing with This Month … and How It Will Help Your Year to Come

One of the things that we’re working on here in December in a low-key way, in a way that we’re not beating ourselves up if we fluff a day or two, is we’re working on creating the space for our 2017 habits.

In December we’re just noodling around, finding that space. That consistent time, that consistent prompt before lunch. If you are in a day job, maybe it’s the first 20 minutes of your lunch break. Maybe it’s an afternoon break, when everybody else goes out for a smoke, and you go spend some time writing. I don’t know what it is. Maybe you go for a smoke and do some writing.

I want you to think about creating the space for your 2017 habits, because we’ll be using this space for working on becoming a better writer, a stronger writer. Writing better stuff. And that’s whether you write text, whether you write podcast scripts, video scripts, infographics. Even if you’re … let’s say you’re a graphic artist, so apply it to whatever creative form of expression that you are doing for your content.

Now for December, I’d like to use the time for basically play time. It would be my preference, if you can swing it, that you not work on podcast scripts or blog posts specifically, but more fooling around with ideas. Just noodling and playing with ideas, rather than trying to create finished work. Partly because, remember we talked about that craving for novelty.

It will be fun and interesting, and that will make it enjoyable and rewarding. If it’s enjoyable and rewarding, the habit will settle itself into place much more easily. It will be easier to switch gears and then do more worky work when we get started in January, February, or March.

I’m talking about writing every day. Please note I’m not talking about publishing every day. I think a lot of times we hear that advice — “Writers should write every day” — and we think that we’re supposed to be writing a blog post every day or something like that.

I think that’s fatal to good writing. What it makes you do is it makes you write safe, it makes you write tight. You’re fearful of committing to anything kind of whack, because it’s going to get published.

Just write something. It might be nonsensical, it might be an experiment. It might be a little bit of dialogue, a story. Write something that pleases you and interests you. If it turns into something publishable, that’s fine. Don’t try and force yourself to write content for publication every day. That’s a whole different ballgame.

If you’re a journalist and that’s what you do for a living, you’re kind of used to that rhythm. That’s fine. I’m talking about playtime, not necessarily about published work, for this little fun habit that we’re establishing.

Playing around with Fiction-Writing Prompts

If you’re at a loss for what to write about, you could actually start playing around with a little bit of fiction. Fiction writing is so powerful for content creators, because it’s all about capturing dialogue. It’s about capturing mood in just a sentence or two. It’s about subtext. It’s about subtlety and nuance. Fiction writing, screenwriting, and poetry are marvelous for content creators.

Our editor-in-chief, Stefanie Flaxman, has a personal blog of her own called the Revision Fairy. She’s been doing fiction-writing prompts on her blog. She just gives you an idea for a little scene, a little scenario, or a vignette, and you can just write a page on that.

I would advise you not to try and write finished short stories. That’s not play. That’s already work. Just write a little scene, write a little scrap. Write an interesting little vignette. Again, just for your own eyes. If you ever polish it, that’s sweet. That’s wonderful. Just write something for your own eyes and play.

I will give you the link for those writing prompts at Copyblogger.FM. I’m also going to be talking about our content goals on the Copyblogger blog, so you can catch all the links there as well.

Some Thoughts on Working with Habits during the Craziness of December Holidays

Another exercise you might want to play with this month, partly because it’s the end of the year, and I think it makes people reflective. Partly because we have some very meaningful holidays in this year and the different traditions. This might be a great month for you to do some prompts from your values list, from your list of the values in your life. Things like freedom, justice, community, family, faith, or integrity. You know, those abstract words that stand for what really give our life meaning.

That’s another idea for a writing prompt for one of these days, is take one of your values or take a bunch of your values and just write a paragraph or two, a short page about what that means to you. How it’s playing out in your life, maybe how you’re struggling with it.

I think sometimes people do this exercise, and they think that your values are what you’re already good at. But if you’re struggling with family — you’re struggling, you’re working a lot of hours — and you’re not getting your family what you want to, that’s a great thing to write about. Remind yourself of how important that value might be in your life, just as an example.

My intention this month — or for this year, actually, for 2017 — on Copyblogger is that every month I will give you guys a content prompt. So a prompt about making your content more excellent. And a habit prompt — something about your rhythm of working or your productivity that you might be able to tweak. We will work on both of those as a community.

For December our habit prompt is writing every day, defined by you. That could be every workday, it could be six days a week, or it could be seven days a week. Then the content prompt is to play with some fun writing. Play with some values writing, or play with some fiction. Again, for your eyes only. You only share it if you feel like you are ready to work it up into a publishable piece.

I have a proposed list for 2017 that I published on the Copyblogger blog. You can just go swing over there and look at it. These are the prompts I think I’m going to do for content quality for the year. This is the list I’ve put together now that I think we’re going to work on together.

We might tweak a few of those, because a year is a long time, and there might be something more fun or more interesting to work on. You can see the whole list there.

I really hope you will join us. I’m interested in this as a community project. It is all about doing our best, to show up to ourselves and honor ourselves as content creators. If you miss a day, nobody’s going to beat you up. It’s not about that.

It’s about striving, and literally every day, as creative professionals. Or as just creative human beings, we have to re-show up. We have to show up again to our own work and remake that commitment. We’re always falling off the wagon and getting back on. Always.

If you’re a little bumpy on creating your habits, we all have the excuse “It’s December. December is a crazy month.” Just play with it, and strive without kicking yourself in the teeth if it’s not perfect.

Do swing by the comments here at Copyblogger.FM or at the blog at Copyblogger.com. Let us know how it’s going for you, what’s interesting to you. If you have specific things in 2017 you want to work on, let us know. We can be flexible. I’m really looking forward to seeing you there.

Let’s bid farewell to this challenging year and start paving the groundwork for something really magnificent, wonderful, and transformational in 2017.

Thank you as always so much for your time and attention. I’ll see you on the blog.

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