If you’re anything like me, you’re very methodical about grocery shopping. You probably know when the best days and times are to go and make out a detailed list beforehand. If you’re really into it, you may even have a path mapped out in your head. If you’re anything like me, you take grocery shopping seriously because you’re on a budget and have to stick to a plan.
As I was peddling around my local market, I started to think about how my writing process is a lot like my shopping process and wanted to share the tips and tactics with you in case it might help you out.
1. The Time – There’s always a perfect time to shop, just like there’s a perfect time to blog. I can almost here the cries out outrage around the blogging community of, “What! Joey, how can you say there’s a perfect time to blog? You don’t really believe that.”
I believe the perfect time to blog is the same as the perfect time to shop. It’s the time you have planned and prepared for. Whatever time of day that might be, if you’ve planned for it, then it’s the perfect time to blog. It’s never good to just shop up to the grocery store whenever you’re hungry because you’ll leave with a whole lot of crap and very rarely will it be well-rounded. Sit down and have an understanding of what you want to find when you get to the store, then go get it.
But first, you will need to create…
2. The List – When shopping, the list is a detailed account of what you’re going to get out of your trip to the store. In writing, your list should serve the same purpose. Have written down or in your head a detailed list of what you want to bring to the table: points to consider, topics to include, ideas to show.
Without a list, you’re more likely to end up with a useless hodgepodge of sentences and words. It’s always easier to walk out of the store with what you really want when following a list rather than hoping to remember everything once you get there.
After you create the perfect list for this trip to the store, you need to maximize your time by planning…
3. The Roadmap – Do you remember the last time you had to go to a new grocery store? The time it took scanning the aisles and roaming the floor to simply find where they keep their pickles? How much easier is to to get in and get out when you have your path already mapped out?
The same is true for writing. However annoying it might have been in high school when your English teacher made you turn in outlines for your term papers, they really do help when you know how you want to structure your trip. Once you have your list, map out which point will lead to which other. It doesn’t have to be pretty or even written down, but know in your head how everything connects together. If you have the App Store on your computer, I recommend Mindnode, it’s mindmapping software and pretty freaking great.
Now that you’ve gotten what you need and you know how you’re going to get it, it’s time for…
4. The Payout – You can put every, single item in the grocery store in your buggy (if you have a big enough buggy), but it won’t matter if you can’t bring it all home. Whether it’s cash or credit, paper or plastic, or some sort of shopper card, you have to bring the goods to package it all together and generate the payout.
This item is more intangible than the rest, but it’s the one you should have with you at all times. This is what sets you apart and you should be ready and willing to use it to bring everything home every time you step into that store. I’ve called it Digital Personality or voice or whatever, whatever you call it and however you articulate it to your audience, be ready to use it to bring it all home.
The Feast
The plan works for large trip and small ones, feasts and snacks, just make sure you have all the facets in place for a successful trip to that store so you can continually bring home what people want.
What do you think? What things do you always include in your list? Do you even make one? What benefits are there to just showing up to the store and winging it?
Thoughts?
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About Joey Strawn
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