Organization as a writer is important to working as efficiently as possible. If your work space is a mess, you can’t find materials you need, or you’re overwhelmed trying to remember deadlines, then you will fall behind on your orders.
But another organizational tool that will help in the long run is creating a plan for your work itself. It’s a good idea to create outlines for the work you will be doing in the future, so that you can dive right in and get started on the assignment. Use the same structure for each type of project. Making generic outlines for press releases, blogs, articles, or any document will save so much time. This way, you already have a template to fill in after a quick brainstorming session. An outline will help organize your ideas and present your material in a way that flows. Formatting the documents ahead of time will allow you to dive right in and get to work.
Start each outline with a place to put your structure title and subtitle. It may seem like a small task to complete ahead of time, but you’ll want to take any guess work out of formatting and things you’ll need to get done. Setting up small things like this also ensures you don’t forget small details that mean a lot to the client.
Below the title and subtitle, create a generic template for an introduction. Set aside space for a few lines or however long your intros usually are. If you find yourself starting documents in the same way most of the time, consider writing up an outline with questions or sentences where you can fill in the blanks.
Next, use bullet points to represent where the body of the article’s paragraphs will be. Once you start working on a new assignment, you can easily fill in the space next to the bullet points with subjects and notes relevant to the article topic. Once you have your paragraph subjects picked out, you can group related ideas together. If needed, create subsections within the paragraphs.
Finally, make a place in your template at the bottom for a conclusion. This will remind you to wrap up the article and include client website links or additional resources if you have them. Once you’re done with the template, it may look something like this:
Structure title
Subtitle
Intro: Introductory sentence 1, introductory sentence 2, transitional sentence
Body paragraph 1
Body paragraph 2
Body paragraph 3
Conclusion: with Call to Action (For more information about this topic, visit the website here.)
If you’ve done any research or used other sources for information, you’ll want to create a section to list these resources. This list can go after the conclusion. Feel free to customize your outline however you want. Starting the brainstorming process like this is intended to help you and save time thinking about how you’ll approach each project. Whether you use a premade outline or make it yourself, organizing your thoughts and ideas will make the writing process easier.
