Reading the comments on one of my recent posts reminded me of something I’ve wanted to address in a long while: Do some of us keep too many drafts?

You might have guessed that this post itself has been a title-only draft since May… just like a whole bunch of other posts:

So, I can definitely use myself as an example of a blogger who keeps far too many drafts for his own good. But first, how did I eventually notice I was keeping too many drafts? Bloggers keep drafts for as many reasons as writers do (e.g. penning down ideas, crafting structure, editing for quality and mistakes, writer’s / blogger’s block), if not more (e.g. waiting for a press release, sleeping on a controversial piece), so numerical values can’t be the sole sign of “drafteritis” since some reasons will necessitate more drafts than others.

Well, what happened was I found that:

1. Just Looking at All My Drafts Discouraged Me from Publishing Any of Them
   When you have too many drafts, it tends to become an albatross around your neck. This psychological symptom is similar to the one you experience in your non-web life (think filing… urghh), and is equally burdensome. Some, like me, may try to avoid solving the problem by posting only recent ideas, breaking news, or anything that just isn’t an “old” or “incomplete” idea languishing in the cupboard. Moreover, when you already have a lot of posts as drafts, you tend to think that yet another draft never hurts.
2. The Large Number of Drafts Became Unmanageable
   This is the more technical argument. When you have too many drafts, it becomes difficult to manage them in whatever software you are using. For WordPress, when drafts accumulate, you get the “…and 10 more >>” after the most recent 15 or so drafts on the “Write Post” page. In desktop blogging software like BlogJet and w.Bloggar, you’ll have to sift through a long list of .bjd and .post draft files.
3. I Was Holding on to Drafts for Too Long
   Too long refers to drafts that have been kept past their optimum publishing period. For example, some posts are time-sensitive and should be published before a certain time or event, e.g. product launches, conferences, etc. Even those not time-sensitive become time-sensitive when another blogger publishes something on it first. If that blogger’s post takes off, you’re left with nothing but echo if you publish yours. Of course, this can be solved by modifying the post to reflect what has already been said.

So, if you happen to suffer from the same symptoms I did, what should you do? Here’s a few steps I took:

1. Only Publish Drafts Until You Run Out of Them
   The most obvious, but most effective method to combat drafteritis. This won’t work for the more newsy type of posts, but for longer, anchor posts (which most drafts tend to be), there’s no harm finishing all your drafts first before venturing onto new ideas.
2. 2 Minute Rule
   The popular GTD (Getting Things Done) 2 minute rule can work wonders if you tend to put simple, short posts onto drafts. Basically, the 2 minute rule states that: “If it would take less than 2 minutes to do something, just do it right away. Two minutes is a guideline, roughly the time it would take to formally defer the action.”
3. Set a Time Limit for Each Draft
   Set something like one week as a time limit for each draft, meaning that you should publish the draft before that limit is up. One you get into the flow of doing this, it stops being so difficult – especially if you make sure the time limit you set gives you enough leg space to manouever.
4. Just Press Delete
   Don’t be afraid of just deleting a 4-month old draft. If it’s past its due date (e.g. been talked about, doesn’t add to conversation, you have too many better posts to tackle), getting rid of it may be necessary. Don’t forget that posting too many weak posts can hurt your blog.

Notice I didn’t include “raising your posting frequency” as a step to take. I felt that not everyone can or should do this since you’ll tend to burn-out or disorient your readers by doing so.

Hopefully, these steps will work for you as they are working for me (I’m proud to say I cleared 30 or so drafts across many of my blogs this week, while adding only slightly more than 10). And if you happen to have even more ways to combat drafteritis, feel free to post your thoughts in the comments.

Update: Basic Google search has helped me find a good post on how to manage draft posts . It introduces an interesting idea: Post your drafts onto a test blog (which you should hde from the public), and work on it in a blog setting – where you can categorise them and perform full-text searches. If you use desktop blog software, this method becomes more effective as managing multiple blogs is a forte of such software.

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