Mind Mapping

It seems like a lot of people who are both prolific and successful writers use the mind mapping method of organizing their thoughts. I didn’t really like the idea of mind maps until I tried one years after learning the outlining/brainstorming method.

If you don’t know about mind maps, they’re essentially a visual representation of the ideas or topics that you want to cover in an article. A really simple mind map for an article might look like this:

(This image is from the free mind mapping software called FreeMind, though I often as not use a piece of paper to do my mind maps.)

How Mind Mapping Works

I don’t remember what this method of outlining was called when I was in school, but I remember using it there, too. You simply write your main topic in the center of the page, draw a circle around it, then have subtopics branch off of that.

More details or sub-subtopics branch off from the subtopics, and so on, as detailed as you want or need to get.

I tend to use mind maps to focus my thinking in a broad overview sort of way, then go back and flesh out more specific topics in an outline or list format.

But the point of using any outlining method is to use it in a way that works for you, so as you work with mind mapping or any other method, you’ll find out your own best ways to use it.

Mind Mapping Software

As I mentioned, you can do a mind map on a piece of paper, or you can use mind mapping software. There are many free options out there as well as a few pay programs. Play with a few of the free ones if this is a style that interests you before shelling out money for a paid version, which you may never need anyway.

Like outlining with note cards, mind mapping is a handy way to get your thoughts organized before writing a query, doing an interview and writing the article itself.

A mind map truly gives you a road map to follow to get your writing where you want it to go.

Keep Your Article Organized with Notecards

I have lately become a big fan of notecards. Maybe it’s because I don’t trust my brain to remember anything anymore (what with the 10-month-old taking a lot of my attention), or maybe it’s just because using notecards is a great way to keep story ideas — and the stories themselves — organized.

Notecards for Ideas

I like writing down each story idea I have on a notecard as it comes to me. This helps jog my memory if it’s a few weeks (or, let’s face it, a few months) before I get to really working on the idea.

Sometimes I’ll write down just a few words or phrases (like “organic baby food: mass produced, local, make yourself), while other times I’ll write down more specific topics I want to cover in the article or even what might turn out to be the lede of the article or the query.

Some other potential things to include on your notecards might be:

• a general outline of the article you intend to write
• questions you want to answer
• sources you want to talk to
• potential markets, if you have some in mind
• the format of the article, such as personal essay, Q&A, list, etc.

Notecards for Article Writing

Using notecards is also a great idea once you’re writing the article. I vividly remember putting together a presentation when I was in junior high that involved hundreds of notecards containing different facts I had uncovered.

I probably wouldn’t suggest going that far for an article, but each major point or subtopic that you want to cover in your article could get its own notecard.

For example, if you had questions you wanted answers to, each answer could be on its own notecard. Or you could imagine the subheadings that might be in your article and give each one of those a notecard.

The point of the cards is not to write the article itself on them, but to highlight the major points, facts or quotes that you want to be sure make it into the article. That way you won’t get overwhelmed by all the information you’ve collected and forget something really important.

If you’re writing a short piece, such as a blog post or a brief, one notecard may be sufficient (as it was for this post). Just write down a quick outline of the major points you want to hit and move on from there.

Notecards are an easy way to sharpen your thinking and organize information before you start writing so that even your initial draft will be well organized and include all of the most important information. It makes the writing faster, too, when you have a good idea of what you want to say and in what order before you sit down to write.

Storing Your Cards

I like to keep my cards in a plastic recipe box to keep them organized and so I won’t lose them in the middle of a project. You may find that a stack on the desk (maybe rubber-banded for extra security) works just fine for you.

I keep stacks of blanks on my desk, by my bed, and often in the diaper bag so I can jot down notes for articles and ideas wherever I am or whenever I get a spare moment.

Quick Tip: One a Day

If you’re like me — like most people, I’d imagine — your stack of magazines, newsletters and other things to be read is taking over your workspace, as well as other places in your home.

It can get to be overwhelming. How can you ever get through so much information when there’s more coming in all the time?

Well, you can’t. And that’s OK. You just have to accept that not every piece of literature in your home or office is going to be completely digested. And then you have to start getting rid of the things you’re willing to let slide.

This week, and for as long as you want or need to, take at least one thing off the to-read pile every day. Read it, or skim it, or recycle it or pass it on to someone else. Just take action. Once you get started you’ll probably get a little obsessive about it, so limit your time working on this to half an hour or so a day.

You’ll feel so much better as you see that stack get smaller instead of larger, and you’ll realize that a lot of things you’ve been holding onto you don’t really need anyway.

Quick Tip: Stay on Top of Organization

The major weakness in my freelance business is that I’m a little disorganized. I’m a piler rather than a filer, so my desk is pretty much always a mess. I don’t print out a lot of stuff, but I seem to always have a stack of written by hand blog posts and articles, books for review, bills, check stubs and other stuff all over the place.

It would do me good to make the effort every evening — or even just once a week — to make sure that my desk is cleared of everything but the essentials. Starting with a clean workspace in the morning is a great motivator, and it’s actually possible to me more creative when you aren’t surrounded by clutter.

Taking time to clear your space would do you good, too.

Quick Tip: Recycling Research

Sometimes when you’re working on an article you’ll end up with more information than you need for that article. Maybe an interview subject went off on an interesting tangent, but it’s not really appropriate for the article you’re writing. Or you found out way more than you needed to know about a particular aspect of the topic you’re covering that will never make its way into the story you’re writing.

Always save all of this research and information in an accessible place (like your idea file, if you have one) and remember to revisit it when you’re looking for new story ideas. Using information you already have is a great way to make good money writing articles, because a lot of the research is already done when you get the assignment.

Remember, of course, to get back in touch with any sources you plan to use in a new article and make sure it’s OK that you use their quotes and information in a different story. Who knows, they might just give you more information that sets you on the path to yet another story!

Quick Tip: Keeping Track of Notes

The other day I mentioned that a simple piece of paper is a great way to jot down notes or even article drafts when you aren’t at your computer. If you use a notebook or random pieces of paper to jot down article ideas, try to go through once a week or two and compile those pieces into a computer document or single physical idea file or notebook.

And remember to read back through these regularly to find the gems you might have forgotten about or not take action on right away.

Quick Tip: Don’t Put Off Financials!

Don’t leave your bookkeeping or tax preparation all til the end of the year — designate one day a week (or at least one a month) to input receipts and payments into your bookkeeping system and file all receipts and paperwork promptly between sessions (or at least have a dedicated place for this stuff between sessions so you can find it all to input when you’re ready).

Quick Tip: Paper is Good

Don’t discount the importance of a piece of paper. Yes, computers and sell phones are great, but for me paper is still tops for jotting to-do lists, writing down ideas as they come, brainstorming and even drafting articles and blog posts when I’m away from my computer.

Whether it’s a fancy notebook or the back of an envelope, paper can’t be beat — as long as you have a way to keep track of your snippets.

Keeping Track of Market Info

One of the biggest organizational problems I still face as a freelancer is keeping track of market information for various publications that I might want to write for some day. Some of this information comes from websites, some from e-mails, some from reading a publication and thinking “oh, I’d like to write a story for them some day.”

Admittedly I’m not spending a lot of time looking for new markets right now, but one thing I’m trying out in the hope that it will keep me a little more organized on these issues is Evernote. If you don’t know about it, it’s a cool little free (or you can get a paid version, but I use the free one) program that allows you to copy portions of web pages into your account (say, just the contact information and editorial calendar, not all the ads), as well as pictures you take with your camera or computer, audio and video clips and more.

You can write notes to yourself (say, keeping a running tab of story ideas arranged by different tags) and you can access your information on a PC, Mac, your phone or through the web. They have a Twitter account you can use to tweet yourself information, or you can use a custom e-mail address to e-mail items to your account.

Adding general tags (for different kinds of markets, for example) makes it super easy to find what you’re looking for when you need it, but you can also use the search function to find relevant documents or pictures (it can even “read” the pictures and show you pics with those particular words in them).

The Evernote folks call the program an “external brain.” I’m not using it quite enough to go that far, but I do have a somewhat extensive collection of craft projects I want to make, items to blog about for one client, links to important information for another client, recipes and more.

I have tags for freelance writing and marketing resources, markets and story ideas, and I could add more extensive notes, research and other information to these as I flesh them out to write queries.

There are plenty of other programs like this out there (if you have one you like, I’d love to hear about it) but I find Evernote to be a useful, easy, powerful program that helps me keep little bits of information easily accessible in one place. And that’s a very good thing when it comes to juggling tons of market information (or anything else, for that matter).

On The To-Do List: Your Must Dos

My second job out of college was working as an editor and designer for my state’s biggest newspaper. I loved the work but ended up leaving because the work had to be done at night, and I missed my husband.

But I learned a great time management technique there that I still use to this day. There it was a space management technique, but it works for organizing time just as well as it organizes space.

For those of you not from the newspaper business, I’ll explain that newspapers often have what’s called a budget that describes the different stories that are going to be in the paper the next day. The editors and at least some of the designers and photographers have what’s called a budget meeting to decide the order and importance of the different articles so the designer can then put together the front page and other pages the way the editors want them presented.

But there are, of course, more stories available than can fit on the front page, and often more stories than can fit in the newspaper at all on any given day, so we had a ranking system that served as a way for the designers to know the priority of stories.

Setting Your Priorities

The basic rundown consisted of must run, should run and can hold. The musts were essentials, things we had to figure out a way to shoehorn in no matter what.

Should runs were stories that an editor liked or that had something to do with another story but that weren’t essential. We’d get them in if space allowed and not worry about them otherwise. Can holds, as they sound, were stories we could use if we had extra space but could ignore completely if things were tight.

Just describing the system you can probably see how you can use these priority rankings to make your to-do list a little more manageable.

If your list seems never-ending, always including everything you’d like to get done even though you know there aren’t enough hours in the day, this system can give you a bit of peace.

Just look down your list and quickly assign each project a priority: must, should or can wait. Tackle your must-do tasks first, then move on to the shoulds if you have time and save those items that can wait for last.

If you hate the word should, by the way, you can also just rank them with numbers by priority or A, B and C if you prefer.

This way even if you don’t get everything on the list done, you’ll at least be comforted by the fact that you got the most important and necessary things done and didn’t spend time on the things that could wait.

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