How to use Notion for blog tasks | Notion for Blogging

This addition to the Notion for Blogging series is one I’ve been itching to share with you: managing blog tasks in Notion. If you’ve been here before, you’ll know I’m a bit of a productivity nerd. I’m always looking for ways to optimize. In all my years of tinkering, I’ve found nothing compares to Notion for managing your blog and brand.

Staying on top of tasks is a crucial element of that. After all, you’ve got a million and one things to keep up with. Auditing posts, creating graphics, guest post outreach — that’s truly just scratching the surface.

It can be tempting to scribble them down in a notebook (or on a scrap of paper), keep a running list in Google Drive, or use a task management app. (I should know because I’ve tried them all!)

But wouldn’t it be helpful to see your tasks alongside your content schedule, brand kit, product plans — ya know, all that stuff you need to manage your brand?

I thought so, too. Which is exactly why I practically squealed with delight when I discovered Notion: an all-in-one tool that combines the functionality of several programs into one powerful, minimalist app.

Alright, I’ll stop rambling now. Let’s get to the goods you came here for: how to use Notion for blog tasks management!

Why should you use Notion for blog tasks?

If you’re anything like me, you’ve tried just about every task manager out there, and none of them quite suited your needs. Sure, they all had great features, but something was always missing.

Where other task managers exist in isolation from your content, Notion is an ecosystem that combines every element of blog and brand management. That includes your blog post drafts, campaign planning, brand kit, SEO, expenses — literally everything you need to run your blog successfully.

Right now, your blog tech stack might look something like this:

• Google Docs for drafting and storing your blog posts
• Asana for planning tasks
• OneNote or Google Keep for note-taking
• Hootsuite, Buffer, or another social media scheduler for your social media content calendar
• Google Calendar for your blog content calendar

These are just 5 examples, but there are dozens more apps out there you might be using in isolation from each other. And Notion can replace all of them. (Except maybe the social media schedulers. But when the API finally comes out, who knows?)

Switching between several tabs can get cumbersome and interrupt your flow state. Inputting information into every single app, setting reminders and notifications, then pulling the app back up when you need it takes time and quite a few clicks and keystrokes.

Notion combines the functions of all of those apps — and then some.

Here are a few other reasons why you should consider using Notion to manage your blog tasks.

See your tasks alongside your content and product plans

What do you currently use to plan your content and products? I’m willing to bet whatever apps you’re using don’t integrate seamlessly. There’s inevitably some tab-switching involved.

That’s not the case with Notion’s linked database feature. Let’s take my own setup for example. I use a content offers database to plan all my campaigns (including the Notion for Blogging series).

In the Notion for Blogging page, I’ve planned out every element of my offer, including the Notion blog templates, their contents, and pricing.

Underneath that, I’ve embedded my content creation hub and editorial task list side-by-side. I’ve created filtered views (which we’ll cover shortly) so I see only content and tasks related to the Notion for Blogging campaign. This shows me exactly what content I need to create and what tasks I need to cross off my list to complete this campaign!

Organize and sort your tasks on a granular level

A lot of task management apps out there provide list and board views of your content. Some of the task managers I used, including MeisterTask, required you to upgrade to paid versions to get additional views like calendars and timelines. The free versions of other task managers, like ClickUp, don’t give you unlimited custom fields. That’s super important if you’re looking to create a fully customized workflow.

Notion does all that and so much more for free. You can add unlimited custom properties, unlimited items, unlimited views, and even share your workspace with up to 5 people for free.

How to set up a Notion blog tasks manager

Want to try your hand at creating a blog task management solution in Notion? Here’s a step-by-step guide to get you started!

Step 1: Create a new page

Step 2: Decide what type of page you’d like

You can keep your page empty and add whatever blocks you like for a hub-style design. Or you can create a full-page database. Whatever you choose, I recommend creating at least an inline database for maximum organization and the ability to embed it elsewhere in Notion. (You can also open inline databases as full pages in Notion.)

My own editorial task database is an inline database on my blog dashboard:

To create a full-page database, just select a database type when you create your new page.

To create an inline database, type “/” on your keyboard, then select “Table – Inline”. (You can also choose other views, like Calendar, Gallery, Timeline, Board, or List.)

Step 3: Add properties

Once you’ve got your editorial task database created, it’s time to start adding properties. Here are the properties I use in my own task database:

• Task (Name property that automatically populates whenever you create a new database)
• Type (Select or Multi-select) — Writing, social, design, etc.
• Status (Select) — Not started, in progress, complete, awaiting, etc.
• Priority (Select) — High, medium, low
• Date (Date)
• Campaign (Select or Relation to a content offers database)
• Platform (Multi-select) — Blog, social media platforms, Canva, Tailwind, etc.
• Assignee (Person) — Especially helpful if you work with a small team in Notion
• Notes (Text) — Easy way to jot down notes and see them at a glance

Step 4: Add filtered views

Filtered views allow you to get ultra organized and see only tasks related to the parameters you set. For example, you might want to create a view to see all tasks associated with your next campaign. Or you might want to view only tasks due today, this week, or this month. Here’s how to do that.

1. In the upper left-hand corner of your database, click “Add a view”.
2. Title your view and choose the type: Table, Board, Timeline, Calendar, List, Gallery.
3. To add a filter, click the three dots in the upper right-hand corner of your database, then choose “Filter” > “Add a filter” > “Add a filter”.
4. Choose the parameters for your filters.

You can create as many views as you like, so feel free to get granular!

Step 5: Add sorting

Sorting is a great way to see your tasks in order of priority, publication date, status, or whatever parameters you choose. I like organizing mine by date and status, but you can sort your tasks however works best for your needs. Here’s how to add a sort to your Notion blog tasks database:

1. In the upper right-hand corner of your task database, click the three dots.
2. Click “Sort” > “Add a sort”.
3. Set your parameters.

Step 6: Embed your task database in other pages in Notion

This might come as a surprise to you, but you might not navigate to your editorial task database that often. One of the best ways to use databases in Notion is to embed them in other pages. (I call this an embed, but it’s actually a “linked database” in Notion.)

Here’s how to do it:

1. Navigate to the page where you want to embed your task database.
2. Type “/” on your keyboard to pull up Notion commands.
3. Type “linked”, then choose “Create a linked database”.
4. Choose your editorial task database from the list.
5. Add filtered views and sorting.

Here’s an example of how I’ve embedded my task database into my Notion for Blogging content offer plan (part of my content offers database) to see only tasks relevant to the campaign:

As you can see, I’ve also embedded my content creation hub and added filtered views so I can see my tasks and content side-by-side!

Ideas for your Notion blog tasks manager

Here are a few more ideas for organizing your blog tasks in Notion.

Create a recurring task list

Your recurring task list isn’t the same thing as your blog task management database. Whereas your database is a full-fledged task manager, your recurring tasks page is more like a list.

This page provides a big-picture overview of all the tasks you must complete each day, week, month, quarter, and year.

Add relations to other databases

In step 3 above, I mentioned that you could use the Select or Relations property to show which campaign a task is associated with. A relation is useful in this case if you’ve got a separate content offers database where you plan all your campaigns. You might also want to link tasks to individual content pieces in your content creation hub.

Here’s how to add a relation to other databases in Notion:

1. In the upper right-hand corner of your editorial task database, click the three dots, then select “Properties” > “Add a property”.
2. Under Property Type, choose “Relation”.
3. Select the database you’d like to link to.
4. Click inside the Relation field of the task.
5. Type the name of the offer or piece of content you’d like to link to.
6. On the left-hand side, click the “+” sign.

Here’s what that might look like when you’re finished:

Using Notion for blog tasks management: wrapping up

If you’re building a full content framework in Notion, it only makes sense that you’d organize your tasks in Notion, too. Since becoming a Notion nerd, I’ve sworn off tab- and app-switching for good!

Notion is the ultimate blog task management solution because it allows for maximum customization. Like I said before, I’ve tried just about every task manager about there. MeisterTask, Asana, Trello, ClickUp — you name it, I’ve test-driven it. And while they all had features I liked, I found every single one of them was missing something.

Because Notion combines the functionality of task managers, word processors, and spreadsheets, it’s replaced 5 apps for me. Yes, 5!

Keen to discover how Notion can unify your editorial tasks, content schedule, brand kit, SEO, and more? Check out the Notion for Blogging Template Pack, complete with 75+ pages and templates to manage every element of your blog and brand.

Save $15 for a limited time during the launch sale!

Prefer to set up your own Notion blog dashboard? You do you! I love playing around in Notion, so more power to ya. I’m still posting Notion blog tutorials right here through the end of February 2021 — subscribe so you don’t miss a post:

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Well, that wraps up this walkthrough on how to use Notion for blog tasks. Got ideas, questions, comments, suggestions? Meet me in the comments and let’s chat!

Until next time, happy Notioning!

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