If you really start getting into this website publishing thing, and you’re hot to trot on the topic of discussion, it’s likely that you’ll get these little (or big) epiphanies from time to time, that will inspire you to get something typed out on the screen. New article ideas come along, sometimes just by pondering what it might be fun to talk about, or by someone elses inspiration through questions or interaction.
Whatever the idea generator turns out to be, you want to make sure you save the thought before something else comes along to distract you. There’s nothing at all wrong with using a pen and paper, it’s basic but effective, and my desk right now would validate that I walk my talk in this regard. But along with note scribbles that I’ll be lucky to read in a few days, I also like to use the draft function in WordPress to get a basic article started.
It may only contain a general title, and a few paragraphs of text, just to get the gist of the article down, or to help me get a little momentum on the writing of it. Whatever the case may be, the draft feature let’s you save the work for later additions, revisions, or editing, without the content ever becoming viewable by the general public, until you press the publish button.
You can view all of your current drafts in the dashboard area of your admin panel and for me, this serves as kind of a “to do” list of sorts. I’m reminded that I have some articles that I’ve yet to finish, and if I expect to win that Pulitzer I better get to it today.
Seriously though, great ideas are kind of the life-blood of a really good content site. Every inspiration that comes along needs to be saved, archived, or acted upon to really get the best stuff out in front of your readers. Store these thoughts in whatever place you find handy and accessible and you’ll find that coming up with great and useful topics and content really isn’t all that hard.
