photo credit: justmakeit

Ahh, the submit button on WordPress.

It’s kind of like the finishing line of a crazed marathon sometimes, when you click on the ‘publish’ button and see your latest article heading off in to the World Wide Web.

It gives you a feeling of satisfaction to know that you’ve updated your site, published some great content, and you’re hopefully going to get some decent comments flooding in.

The normal course of action for most of us when we publish an article, is to give ourselves some kind of reward.

This could be popping out for a bit, grabbing a coffee, or heading off to accomplish something simple from our ‘To Do’ list for the day.

Jumping on to that ‘publish’ button is the last step we take before congratulating ourselves, right?

BUT WAIT!

Is there anything we should be doing before we eagerly pounce to publish?

In fact, there are a few things we can do as a matter of course that could really improve our blog posting activity.

While I know it may seem a bit frustrating to delay the gratification of going straight to ‘live’, have you considered some of the following options rather than simply doing the usual write-publish-relax routine.

Check out some of the ways we can improve our publishing process…

Proof It

Don’t groan!

I know the thought of going back over your post and reading it again fills you with dread and boredom.

But your customers expect a well-written, clear article with no errors in it.

You owe it to your client base and your business to make sure what you’re about to publish is clear of typos, makes sense, and does what it needs to be doing.

Publish It Somewhere Else

You don’t have to publish everything you produce on your own site.

Take a look around at competitors, affiliates and fellow bloggers and see if they might want to use your material as a guest blogger instead.

This gives you a great backlink to your site, and opens your business up to potentially hundreds of new readers.

Pop In Some Links

When you proof your article, remember to look out for places where you can add in links to previous posts, affiliate shouts or mentions, or other valuable links.

We all know that these enhance your site for SEO purposes, so make it a part of your pre-publishing routine to see how you can increase referrals back to other materials.

Save It

As bloggers, our business activity ebbs and flows.

Consider setting a few good posts aside for the times when you’re too busy or stressed to keep your blog up to date, and you’ll be able to maintain a strong schedule of publishing even when you’re up against the wall with other deadlines.

SEO It

Make sure you follow my free guide:

12 Steps To Boost The SEO Of Your Blog Posts

Preview It

Make sure you hit the ‘Preview’ button before the ‘Publish’ button…just to make sure every looks and works exactly as you expect.

Every time you write a new post, think about how you can improve your client communications, enhance the post itself, or get the best possible leverage from what you’ve just created.

This is your resource, and it’s a valuable asset.

Give it the consideration it deserves before you automatically rush to the ‘publish’ button and make that cup of coffee!

What pre-publish tasks do you do?

Please share your views in the comments below.