Did you know that you can schedule blog posts to publish at a predetermined time?
When I first started keeping a blog for a business, I thought it would be an overwhelming experience. I couldn’t imagine being tied to my computer at a certain time every week to make sure that I was publishing a post. It turns out, I was worrying for nothing. WordPress makes it extremely easy to write a blog post ahead of time and schedule it to publish automatically at whatever day and time you want.
First, make sure your time zone is set properly.
This might sound silly, but when I first started experimenting with scheduling blog posts, I couldn’t figure out why they weren’t posting at the time I was scheduling them for. Eventually, I figured out that my time zone wasn’t set properly so I was actually setting the time for 5 hours before I thought I was.
As you can see in the screenshot below, if you go to Settings –> General, you will see a drop down menu where you can choose the appropriate time zone for where you live.
Next, draft your post just like normal.
Write your post, add your images, proof-read, proof-read, proof-read. Basically, this step is the same whether you want to schedule your post for later or you want to publish it immediately.
Schedule Your Post.
When your post is all written and formatted how you would like, it’s time to schedule the post. In the top right area of your screen, you will see a heading called “Publish”. In the options under that, you will see a small calendar symbol, the words “Publish Immediately”, and a button to “Edit”.
If you click on “Edit”, an option will appear for you to choose what day and time you would like your post to publish. After you chosen the appropriate date and time, you click “OK”.
After hitting “OK”, the “Publish” button will change to say “Schedule”. You just click on that, and then you’re ready to go!
Your post will become live to the world on the date and time that you specified, and you won’t even need to be near your computer!
So now you can go ahead and write blog posts as far ahead of time as you’d like. Here’s a high-five for being organized and pro-active!