How To Use Calendar Blocking For Your YouTube Videos With Jessica Stansberry from Hey Jessica

Last updated on June 15th, 2024

If you’re a marketer or business owner there can be a lot to keep track of, and it seems like it never ends. But Jessica Stansberry of Hey Jessica recently made a video recently called: “How to use Calendar Blocking to get More Done!” And we thought this could really help our listeners keep organized and get more out of their time when it comes to managing their YouTube marketing, so we asked her to stop by the podcast.

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TRANSCRIPT

Dane Golden:
It’s time for the Video Marketing Value podcast. This is the podcast where we help marketers and business owners just like you get more value out of your video marketing efforts. My name is Dane Golden from VidAction.tv, Where we help you up your game on YouTube for business and transform your viewers into loyal customers. And I have another business, new business called VidTarget.io, where we help you save time and money through more targeted YouTube ads, along with my cohost. She’s the powerhouse video marketer from San Francisco. She’s R-E-N-E-E T-E-E-L-E-Y, Renee Teeley from Video Explained, hello, Renee.

Renee Teeley:
Hello Dane. You know what Dane? Today I am honored to be co-hosting this podcast with you.

Dane Golden:
You are honored, but are you thrilled?

Renee Teeley:
I’m honored. I’m thrilled. I’m ecstatic. I’m all of the things.

Dane Golden:
She’s all the things. And Renee, what do you do at Video Explained?

Renee Teeley:
At Video Explained, we offer video production and consulting services to help companies use video to build credibility, generate leads, and convert leads into customers. So all those important things to keep your business running.

Dane Golden:
All the things. Okay. And for you, the listener, you should always know that you can follow along in your podcast app with the transcript and links and please share and review us. It really does help. And today we have a special guest. It’s Jessica Stansberry from, Hey Jessica. Hello, Jessica.

Jessica Stansberry:
Hi. I think you guys might be my favorite people ever. That intro is like next level. I love it.

Dane Golden:
Absolutely. Hey Jessica, we asked you on today because when you’re a video marketer or a business owner, there can be a lot to keep track of and sometimes it seems like it just never ends, but you made a video recently called How to Use Calendar Blocking to Get More Done. And we thought this could really help our listeners keep organized and get more out of their time when it comes to managing their YouTube marketing. And also just to say, we focus on marketers and business owners. So if we could talk about it, as far as that angle, does this topic work for you?

Jessica Stansberry:
Of course. Yeah. I’m here for it.

Renee Teeley:
Awesome. I love it. So let’s start at the very beginning. What is your definition of Time Blocking and what are some of the keys to planning and writing a video script and other pre-production issues that you can do in terms of Time Blocking?

Jessica Stansberry:
Yeah, so I think I have a different definition of Time Blocking than what a lot of people talk about, because normally when you see people talk about this, it is very much so, like let’s say on a Google calendar and they block out from eight to 10 to do this, or from 12 to whatever to do that. And they have all of their hours in their day accounted for, and I approach it in a different way. So I know what times I have to work on each day, because one, I have children and I’ve had children at home now for months and months and months, and months. And somebody please tell me, I can send them back to school really soon.

Jessica Stansberry:
Oh my goodness. But even before that, right, I had to do school pickup and I had to do this. And so I don’t know every day of the day to work or every hour of the day to work. So I know each day what hours I have to work. And I view it more as task batching in the time I have available. So I personally only want to be on the phone one day a week. And that’s Tuesdays for me. We’re recording this on a Tuesday. I don’t do calls. I don’t do interviews. I don’t do anything other than on Tuesdays because I know that in my brain, I can’t context switch that much. If I’m on the phone and then I need to jump into this task over here, like film a video or whatever, that’s too much bouncing around for my brain and for most people’s brains, right.

Jessica Stansberry:
So I approach it from a task batching arena and fit that into my calendar. So on Mondays I will batch anything that needed just to be recorded together because I’m in that brain. I’m in that mindset. Like, okay, I’m here, I’ve got my makeup on. We’re going to record some things. And I put that all in one block of time so that I’m not switching back and forth. I do all of my admin things during a certain group of time, like checking my emails or responding back to things or responding back to customers or answering comments on YouTube. All of that’s in a block of time. And then, like I say, calls are in a block of time and then batching together writing or planning out the video scripts and things like that, it’s all in a different block of time.

Jessica Stansberry:
So I don’t look at it like I need to plan out every single hour of every day. I look at it more like, okay, here are the hours that I have available today. What can I get done that are like tasks in this amount of time? So to answer the second part of your question, as far as planning and writing the video script and other pre-production issues, I batch those into all in one day. So if I am looking at my calendar and I’m like, okay, I need to plan out the videos for next week or I need to make some notes or do some keyword research or whatever. That’s all kind of the same arena. So I will say, okay, on Friday, I’m going to batch all of this out in this two hour span that I have while my kids are playing with the neighbor kids or whatever. So I kind of batch everything together so it makes those pre-production things just as easy as the production pieces.

Dane Golden:
Wow. And what about the production itself? What do you do in terms of Time Blocking for planning when to shoot, when the videos, how does it guide how you set up and manage the days you shoot the videos?

Jessica Stansberry:
Yeah, so right now, and this changes based on the strategy I’m implementing in my video marketing or in my life, right. Like with my kids home, I had to change some things around, but right now what I do is every Monday is a filming day and every Tuesday is an editing day. So every Monday I film generally two to three videos. That’s kind of my goal. I have them planned out on the Friday before. So Friday again, I block out some time to say, here’s where we’re going to plan. Here’s how we’re going to do that. And so then when I sit down on Monday, I’m ready. I have all my notes. I’m done. I’m ready. All I have to do is film. And then on Tuesday, if I’m editing the video that gets added to my plate, if I’m sending it off to an editor, it goes off to them but I still have some things I need to do.

Jessica Stansberry:
So that way I’m only filming one day a week and I’m not having to think like, Oh my gosh, I forgot my video for next week, or I forgot that thing I was going to film and I batch every filming thing into Monday. So let’s say I need to do like a Facebook ad or any kind of video that’s non-YouTube or non-platform specific. I batch those in those days as well.

Renee Teeley:
Yeah. So I’m a big fan of batch producing content, especially when it takes you a lot of time to set up and get ready. And if you’re going to go through that process, do more than one video and designate that time. I really love that approach. What about the things that you potentially need to do over multiple days? Like promoting videos on social media and engaging with your viewers? How do you allocate time there and responding to YouTube comments?

Jessica Stansberry:
Yeah. So good question. So my videos on YouTube specifically go live on Tuesdays and Fridays. So I allocate the first 30 minutes after each video to make sure I’m in the comments because that’s where it’s most important for me to be there honestly. And so I allocate that time specifically, and then my team takes over from there as far as answering comments. So if it’s a comment that is published on my channel after about the first hour of a video, I’m probably not the actual one answering. And now they will sometimes be like, “Hey, this person has a very specific question.” It wasn’t just like, “Hey, this video is awesome, thank you.” Where they can answer it. And if that is the case, then I bulk that into my admin time throughout the week.

Jessica Stansberry:
So I generally have some admin time every day, like oh, I’m going to spend this hour doing admin work and that’s kind of where I’ll jump in to do that. But as far as promoting on social media, we generally do that the day of the video or the day of the content going live. And we have it pre-produced though. So when I edit a video or when somebody edits a video, there’s also some Pinterest graphics that are created because Pinterest is a big traffic driver for me.

Jessica Stansberry:
So we create Pinterest graphics, which are also conveniently the perfect size for Instagram stories. So it works great and we just publish those on Instagram stories. I will get on my stories and talk and say, “Hey, I have a new video today. Or I have this new thing today, or I have this new blog post or whatever.” And it takes 12 seconds. So as far as promoting on social, that happens in real time. But the pieces we use to promote are done in the editing process of the video. And then as far as the comments, it kind of depends on when the comments come in as to who is answering them.

Dane Golden:
And could you tell our listeners a little bit about what kinds of tools you use to stay organized and some of the ways you use these tools differently, like Google calendar, and I believe you’re a advocate of ClickUp, that type of thing.

Jessica Stansberry:
Yeah. So I used to be a Trello lover and actually some of my still most popular videos on YouTube are Trello tutorials, but I found ClickUp, I don’t know, not quite a year ago probably and I fell madly deeply passionately in love. It was kind of like I had the bad boyfriend in Trello, like he was good enough. He kind of checked the boxes, but not totally, not in all areas. He was mean to me in some places, but then he’d be good to me and take me out to eat. Like it was that kind of thing. And I found ClickUp and he was like, no, I’ll be good to you all the time, right. That was the difference.

Renee Teeley:
I personally love ClickUp.

Jessica Stansberry:
And as far as how I use them, so the way my brain works, I cannot stand, cannot stand to open my Google calendar and see that every minute of every day is blocked out. I know that some people really enjoy that. They’re like, “Oh, well, I know what I’m doing from eight to nine or from nine to 9:30.” Or whatever. It gives me anxiety. I don’t want to feel like I’m tied to my calendar and that makes me feel like I’m tied to my calendar. So generally the way I use it is, like I say, Tuesdays are a little different because they are call days. So of course have those in my Google calendar so that I actually get a reminder that on my phone that says, “Hey, you’ve got to be on a call in a few minutes.” Because if I don’t, I will forget.

Jessica Stansberry:
But that’s really the only thing that goes in my Google calendar. And then I use ClickUp and ClickUp’s calendar view specifically to plan out my day by task. So again, if I know it’s a Monday and I know I need to film this video, this video, this video, this podcast episode, this thing, whatever I need to book into that day, I will have a list for the day, and I know when I’m working and I don’t need it on my calendar, like screaming in my face. So that’s kind of how I use them. I use ClickUp to manage the tasks and put due dates on them so we get them done and Google calendar is really only for me to see when I have calls and when I am committed to being on someone else’s schedule as well. And then I kind of combine the two to come up with what happens every day.

Renee Teeley:
So that is definitely the best description that I’ve heard someone used to describe a Trello versus ClickUp. I love it. That was so good. I feel the same way. So I know we talked about this before we started the podcast, but I’m actually signing up to ClickUp specifically because of your videos on YouTube. They were so good and I was looking for a different tool and it does a check more of the boxes than Trello does for me. In terms of using ClickUp, so you talked a little bit about how you use it to manage your own tasks and blocking things out. Can you talk a little bit about how you use ClickUp in terms of managing team members and managing the process with remote contractors or virtual assistants?

Jessica Stansberry:
Yes, of course I can. So I have an editor who edits my videos and my podcast. So she kind of handles all editing. Then I also have an OBM, which is an online business manager. So she manages all of the high level things in my business, so “Oh, we’re going to do this, let’s get a process for it.” Right. And then I have a customer service assistant and I do have some other remote contractors that we pull in for projects, but those are my three that are mostly on my team all the time. And essentially what happens is especially, let’s take a YouTube video, for example. We have a process in place and we know exactly who does every step of the process.

Jessica Stansberry:
So I don’t have to tell them what to do or give them tasks necessarily. They’re just given. So, okay, when I film a YouTube video, we know that I have to film it. Nobody else is filming my videos, right. So I have to film it. And then my responsibility after that is to get it uploaded to Dropbox or Google Drive or wherever we want to do that. And then it becomes the editor’s responsibility. And then when she’s done, it becomes my OBMs responsibility to upload it into YouTube. And then I have to go back and circle back around to optimize it. So there’s all these pieces and we have created processes for basically everything we do. So the podcast, the YouTube videos, any Facebook ads or courses we have or anything like that. And we have all of these processes so there’s never like, I don’t have to give it to somebody usually, unless it’s an off kilter project, which in that case, we just assign it to that person and give them a due date and…

Jessica Stansberry:
And this is another one of the pieces that I love about ClickUp is you can go to your home screen and filter tasks by the ones assigned to you and the ones with the closest due date. And so that’s kind of their responsibility to say, “Okay, well it’s Monday and I’m working right now, right? And I need to go see what I need to do this week.” And then they can do it whenever they want to, as long as it’s done by the due date. So that was another, it was a huge reason we switched to ClickUp because things were getting lost in Trello. And it wasn’t really easy to kind of filter by the person or filter by the task or the thing. And so now everything’s in there and my team members literally just go in every day and say, “Okay, well, these things are assigned to me. Let me check these boxes.”

Dane Golden:
And please send us your ClickUp affiliate code because we’ll put that in the show notes so you can get credit when people sign up for that. I know that wasn’t the intention of this, but you’re being such a good advocate for it, might as well get you some credit for it.

Jessica Stansberry:
Sure, and I’ll definitely send that. And I actually have a mini course on ClickUp as well with some ClickUp templates specifically for business owners. So I’ll send you both of those links just in case you want to share either one-

Dane Golden:
Oh, yeah let’s do that.

Jessica Stansberry:
…but they’re also both on my website too, so I will make sure they’re in your show notes. I’ll get them over to you as soon as we’re done recording.

Dane Golden:
And what is a good mental approach? Because a lot about being organized is just not feeling overwhelmed and yet feeling on task. So can you dive into how you approach this from a mental approach?

Jessica Stansberry:
Yeah. I think it’s different for everybody. And I think that’s the part that people miss, right? People are like, “Oh, well so-and-so is really successful and they do this, right? So, and so is really successful and they say, they wake up at 5:00 AM and they work from here to here and they do this thing and this is how they do their calendar.” But that may stress you the heck out, right? It may be like, Oh my gosh, I can’t do that. And I think really from a mental standpoint, you have to just try things out as far as task management and calendar management and project management to see what feels good to you, because you’re going to catch where the holes are. So again, it stresses me out beyond belief for me to look at a calendar that’s completely blocked off, right.

Jessica Stansberry:
And even if it’s tasks I know I’m going to get done that day, for whatever reason, mentally looking at the calendar, it stresses me out. So I really don’t like to do that, but you know, Susie over here may really love blocking off her calendar that way. So I think the biggest thing is try some things out and see what works best for you and don’t think that you have to do everything the same way that someone else does it. But also that I am a very, very disorganized person naturally.

Dane Golden:
What?

Jessica Stansberry:
Yeah, I am. And I’ve had to combat that because I couldn’t have the business I have being that way, right. So I have to fight it every single day because I am… Trust me, ask my husband, he would be like, “She’s organized? Do what?” Because that’s not my natural instinct, but if you want success, you have to find a way to do that. So that is kind of how I approach it. Okay, this is not the way my brain naturally was working, but I have retrained it in a way to say, this works for me. This is how we’re going to get everything done because if I don’t do this, then I’m not going to have a business to talk about on podcasts, right. So I think really understanding that depending on how you are as a person, is how you’re going to be able to make these processes and make these things work in the best way for you.

Renee Teeley:
Yeah. I think that’s a really important thing to note is that figuring out what’s best for you instead of trying to force yourself to do something that doesn’t work, because when that happens, you just don’t continue with it. And then you’re not going to stay organized. And I think I’m like you, where it stresses me out if my day is completely blocked off because I know new things are going to come up and then how do you find the time to do that? So in terms of staying organized, what is one of the most under appreciated areas of staying organized when it comes to YouTube video planning specifically?

Jessica Stansberry:
Okay. So this is a good question. And I think I would have to go with actually having a process and batch producing. I think so many times people are like, I think, they think they have to be in real time all the time. And it’s like, well, I have to have a video on Tuesday. I have to have a video on Wednesday and it’s Monday. And you’re like, Oh crap, I have to do this. And when you’re constantly in that state, you literally get nothing else done. So if you’re wanting to stay organized, you have to get in a format of where you can batch produce and for different industries, for different niches or niches, however you want to say that, it’s different, right?

Jessica Stansberry:
It’s harder to batch produce blog style content. It’s harder to batch produce long form content than it is like really short, actionable videos. And I think there’s a really solid line where you can kind of say, “Okay, I’m going to batch produce, but I’m going to batch produce in a way that works for me and my content and my channel so that I’m not always going crazy.” So I used to batch produce something like 15 to 18 videos in one day. And I did that. Yeah, I did that for years. I actually just stopped doing that in the last three months. So I’ve literally for years done that.

Jessica Stansberry:
I would sit down and I would say, okay, today’s a batch filming day. I would film 15 to 18 videos, which were generally less than 10 minutes long. And I would pass them off to my editor and then we would take the process from there. And it was one long filming day, but then I was done for, I was only doing one a week at that point, I’m doing two now, but I was done for 15 to 18 weeks. That was a lot of content. So now I kind of revamped my YouTube strategy because I really wanted to pull more of a community element into my channel rather than it just being a tips and tricks and how to channel.

Jessica Stansberry:
And because of that revamping, I need to stay a little more current with my content because I want to be able to, let’s say something starts trending or let’s say something starts popping off on my channel. I want to be able to take advantage of that. So now I’m not saying 15 or 18 videos batched out. I’m usually about three or four so that I can stay in the moment and stay really attached to my own content, but still be batched out to where I’m not losing my marbles.

Dane Golden:
Wow. This is a lot. This is fantastic, Jessica. Jessica Stansberry, how can people find out more about, Hey Jessica and what you’re up to?

Jessica Stansberry:
the easiest way to do that is to go to my website. heyjessica.com. And we usually have everything posted up there somewhere based on what we’re doing. My YouTube channel is just, you can look for, Hey, Jessica, or my name, Jessica Stansberry, and on Instagram, I’m super duper active. So definitely come find me over there. That is also just my name at Jessica Stansberry.

Dane Golden:
Excellent. Thank you, Jessica Stansberry. My name is Dane Golden with my cohost she’s R-E-N-E-E T-E-E-L-E-Y. Renee Teeley. And we want to thank you the listener for joining us today. Don’t we Renee?

Renee Teeley:
Yes, absolutely. And today I want to leave you with a quote, as I once told my good friend, Dorothy Parker, the cure for boredom is curiosity. There’s no cure for curiosity. So I think this is especially important right now as social distancing is still in place. Take some time to learn something new.

Dane Golden:
And I want to invite you the listener to review us on Apple Podcasts. And if you can’t find that review button on your podcast app, click the share button instead and let your friends know that we would also like to help them with video marketing tips via this podcast. Renee and I do this podcast and our various other independent YouTube videos and other projects because we love helping marketers and businesses, just like you do YouTube and video marketing better. Thanks to our special guest Jessica Stansberry. Until next week here’s to helping you help your customers through video.