A Simple Framework For Writing Blog Posts
By: Shaunta Grimes
Tags: Byob, Writing, Blogging, Creativity, Productivity

One of the most frequent conversations I have with people who want to be bloggers is that it takes them so long to write a blog post. Several hours, or even days, to come up with a thousand words they can hit publish on.

For a long time, I was at a loss. If you can write more than 10 words per minute, it really shouldn’t take you more than an hour or two to write a blog post. Maybe longer if you have to do a lot of research or it’s really long and in depth, but even a beginning writer should be able to get a thousand words out in two hours, tops.

It finally occurred to me that this was one of those instances where something that seemed really easy to me actually isn’t for everyone. I’ve been writing for so long that I’d internalized the ‘how.’ I didn’t think about it, I just did it.

We all have stuff like that. It’s probably what you should be writing about, in fact. Because if something is easy to you, you can bet there are people out there who wish it was easy for them.

During a Ninja Writers call someone asked if I had a system and I was like…well, yeah, I guess so. And I did my best to describe it. I expected them to laugh at me. Honestly. But they ate it up.

I wrote it up that day and the rest is history. The PSST Framework was born.

Yesterday, we talked about choosing the stories you’ll use for your Blog-Your-Own-Book Challenge project. Today, we’re going to talk about exactly how to get each of those posts ready to write.

I hope what you’ll learn will help make sure you actually write your BYOB project all the way to the end. I also think that this system is something that will make you a better blogger overall.

We’re going to talk about a simple framework I use as a pre-writing exercise for my blog posts. The PSST Framework does a couple of things. It helps me make sure that I write a solid blog post that does what I want it to. And it helps me to write it faster.

PSST stands for: Premise, Story, Subheads, and Take Away. Before we get started with each of those sections, I want to talk about three ways you can organize these posts.

In a Notebook

This is the simplest, lowest tech way to organize your posts. Just get a notebook — they’re cheap right now, in anticipation of school starting. Dedicate a page for each of your 31 blog posts.

On Dabble

If you want a digital program for organizing your BYOB project, I’ve been enjoying using Dabble. You can read about how I have mine set up in the post below. I’ve included information about how I use the PSST Framework in Dabble.

In Drafts

Another alternative is to start a draft for each of your 31 posts. You can work on the PSST format right in the post itself. It might be a little more difficult to keep track of your posts this way, unless you don’t start any other new drafts from now until September.

Let’s take a look at each section of the PSST Framework.

Here’s a screenshot from my Dabble plot grid.

Screenshot:author

In Dabble, you can’t change the name of the first column, so in this case ‘Premise’ is actually ‘Book Scenes.’ I’ve also added a last column for the opt-in I want to include in each post, which is helpful because one purpose of these posts is to grow my email list.

For subheads, I’ll need to click on the card to pop it open so I can see what my subheads actually are.

Screenshot: Author

I want you to notice that there are really only a few words in each section. Just enough to remind me about what I want to write.

Premise

This is just another word for ‘title.’ The first step in the PSST Framework is to write the premise of your blog post in a single sentence that will stand as a working title.

Think about it like a working title, actually — because I don’t want you to get caught up in making it perfect right now. And as an added bonus, you’ll need it to be very clear so that you remember what you want to write about later.

Titles should be very concise and clear. Like newspaper headlines. In fact, my favorite exercise for deciding if a title is good or not is to read it to someone and ask if they can figure out what it’s going to be about. If they can’t, I haven’t been clear enough.

Story

Once you have your premise down, your next step is to think about what story you’re going to tell. Even the most teacher-y blog post starts with a story that helps to ground the reader in what you’re about to teach them and why they should care.

A sentence should be enough. Just enough so that you can remember the story you want to tell. You might want to go a little more in depth if you’re afraid you won’t remember.

For instance, in my post ‘what are teeny tiny goals’ I noted that I’ll tell a story about how teeny tiny goals changed my life. I know which story I want to tell and I’m confident I won’t forget. But if I wasn’t so sure, I might add another sentence or two.

I’m a Teacher Writer and like most Teacher Writers, the story is the hardest part for me. I get so excited about just sharing my idea, I forget I’m a storyteller first. And that the story is important to the reader.

(I had to go back in and add a story to this post, after I’d written it. And I actually wrote ABOUT adding a story in this post. See what I mean?)

Subheads

This is the hardest part. You’ll have to think about your premise and what it is you want to tell your reader. What do you want them to know?

Don’t worry about writing perfect subheads that you’ll actually use in your story. Just write a few words or a sentence that will remind you of the sections you want to include in your post.

This is a loose outline of your post. Here are the subheads for my post about teeny tiny goals.

Screenshot: Author

I’m quite sure those won’t be my actual subheads — but they could be. When I look at them, I can see the structure of my post, with a story at the top and a take away rounding the whole thing out.

I’ve given myself enough information so that writing this will be significantly easier than just looking at a blank page. All I need to do is fill out each section with two or three paragraphs.

I haven’t over thought the whole thing. This doesn’t have to be a detailed outline that you could turn into your sophomore English teacher for a grade. Just a few words is enough, I promise.

Take Away

The last part of your post is the take away. What do you want your readers to come away from your post with? It might be any of these:

Solidarity — just the knowledge that they aren’t alone. This is common with personal essays, in particular.

The ability to go out and do a thing. This is common for how-to or DIY posts.

A particular feeling or emotion — hope, escape, desire, etc.

Information that they came for. For instance, if you were writing a book review, the take away would be a recommendation for or against the book.

A tool or other resource tied to your post.

Sometimes the take away is explicit. You’ll end with a paragraph that tells the reader exactly what you hope they’ll do next. Other times it’s more subtle. A personal essay will rarely actually end with ‘I hope you know you’re not alone’ even though that actually is the take away.

Optional: The Opt-In

An opt-in is something that you offer your reader in exchange for their email address. I’m going to talk about this more in the next week, but for now know that you can add the opt-in to your framework if you want to.

I hope you will for BYOB, because the goal here is to build an audience for your book in advance of publishing it. Your opt-in gives people a way to stay in touch and be notified when you publish or when you have something new to offer.

Once you’ve been doing this a while, you’ll have a collection of opt-ins that you can offer whenever it’s appropriate in a post. You can see that I have FRED offered as an opt-in twice in my first three BYOB posts.

FRED is a downloadable blank calendar readers can use as an accountability tool.

And if you click on that hyperlink, you can download it and get on my email list. See how that works?

That’s it.

You have a couple of weeks to go through the framework on all 31 of your blog posts. If you do that, the process of actually writing them will be so much easier and faster. You’ll increase your odds of actually following through.

(HINT: That was my take away for this post!)