How To Schedule Your Posts In WordPress using the Workflow Automation Feature
WordPress has a really neat feature that lets you schedule posts. In this tutorial, you will learn how to schedule articles in WordPress.
WordPress has a really cool feature that allows you to postdate or backdate posts. This is a very useful feature that many WP site owners haven’t discovered yet.
Publishing fresh content on the WordPress site on a regular basis helps you get more pages indexed on search engines, drive new prospective customers to and keep your site readers coming back for more.
There may be instances, however, where you may not want content to show immediately.
For example, here are some situations when you may not want to show a WordPress post immediately after adding it to the WordPress CMS:
- You travel a lot but you still want blog posts being published on your blog while you’re gone.
- You would like to remove a previously published post and automatically it again at a specific time/date later.
- You want to start publishing a daily post with the latest news about a certain topic for your blog readers, but they live in a different time zone than you. You want them to receive your updates every day before they start work, but this means that you’d have to get up at 3:30 am to publish your blog post.
- You set aside one day each week to create a whole week’s worth of blog posts, or you outsource your article writing to freelance writers who send you many articles each month, but you don’t want to publish all of your new content at the same time!
- You launch a private content membership area and would like to “drip-feed” content to members over a period of time.
Wouldn’t it be great if you could just add a bunch of blog posts to your blog in one go, and then have it automatically “drip-fed” to your blog so that only one new blog post got published each day, or week, or every few days?
You could then implement a “set and forget” system for scheduling and publishing fresh content to your site that would keep your visitors regularly engaged, and be free to work on other areas of the business … or leave for a while and know that your blogging strategy is still working for you.
Well … with WordPress you can! You can set a date in the future to publish your blog posts and WordPress will schedule and automatically publish or republish these exactly as you have set.
In the tutorial below you will learn how to schedule WP posts to publish at a later date/time, as well as time-saving tips on how to automate certain aspects of publishing your content for scheduling.
Complete the tutorial below to learn more about Work Flow Automation Feature in WordPress.
How To Schedule your Posts in WordPress – Step-By-Step Tutorial.
WordPress allows you to easily modify the date and time of your published blog posts, including setting exact dates and times in the future. This lets you create or add posts to your website, which can then be pre-set to go live at any given date and time of your choice.
You can schedule WordPress posts to publish at a later date using the Quick Edit feature when viewing a list of all your posts, or you can schedule them as you’re adding or editing new or existing blog posts.
Scheduling Posts In WordPress Using The Quick Edit Function
To schedule WP posts using the Quick Edit method,
Log into your WP admin area and choose Posts > All Posts …
In your Posts page, find the Post you want to edit, then hover your mouse over the post title to display the options menu and click on Quick Edit…
The Quick Edit feature expands to reveal all the the “Quick Edit” options for editing the Post …
Go to the “Date” section …
WordPress allows you to edit the date and time of your post, simply by changing the values in the fields and selecting options from the drop-down menu …
Tip: You can schedule blog posts in WordPress in the future or backdate post dates to show content as having been published prior to the original date of publication.
This is great if, for example, you’ve been away and would like to publish an account of the day-to-day events and would like your blog posts to match the actual dates you’ve been away. Another reason to backdate the blog posts would be to give a brand new site a little bit more of an “established” look. Similarly, you can set all content to publish in the future if you plan to launch the blog after getting everything set up and configured.
***
Change the date of your post to whatever date (and/or time) you would like your post to show as having been published (future or past) …
Note: To schedule a post as being published in the PM, you will need to use the 24-hour clock. For example, to display 1:00 PM enter 13:00 in the post scheduling section. The time your post will actually end up being published is determined by the location settings specified in your Settings > General section.
***
Click the Update button to save your changes …How to Schedule your Posts in WordPress
Your post will now show as being “Scheduled” in your Posts section …
Your post status will also display as being “Scheduled” inside the Quick Edit > Status area …
Work Flow Automation Feature – Adding And Editing Posts
If you are creating a new post, you can schedule your post to publish at a later date and time, by clicking on Publish immediately > Edit…
Change the date (and time if you want) of your post and click the OK button …
Remember to click on Schedule to save your settings …
Note: To backdate a post, simply edit the date before you click Publish, as described above. In this case, the button will not change to Schedule.
Your post is now scheduled for publishing on the date and time you have specified …
If you are editing an existing post, you can also schedule a post to be republished in the future, by clicking on the Edit link next to the Published on: section …
Change the date (and time if you want) of the post and click the OK button …
Click on the Schedule button to save your republishing settings …
Your post will now show as being “Scheduled” inside the Post Edit > Publish area …
The post will now show as being “Scheduled” in a Table of Posts …
You can also see which scheduled posts are queued for publishing in the WP dashboard’s ‘Activity’ screen …
Congratulations! Now you know how to publish WP blog posts at a later date.
Let us show you now how to republish WP blog posts.
How To Schedule Your Posts In WordPress
Useful Tip: The above method also works for editing WordPress pages.
Work Flow Automation Feature – Republishing A WordPress Post
In some situations, you may want to republish an old post. If so, there are a few different options you can use to do this:
Edit Post Date And Time
You can reschedule a post by changing the date and the time the post was published. Enter a new date and time, then click Schedule.
When the scheduled time arrives, the post will jump from its current place in your timeline to the most recent spot on your blog and display the new date and time. The link for the post will also be updated to reflect the new publication date.
Note: When you reschedule a post, it will not redistribute to the email subscribers. If you need the post to be redistributed to your email subscribers, use the option below.
Edit Post Status
You can republish a post simply by changing the status of the post to Draft, clicking Update, and then clicking Publish again …
When you do this, the post will automatically redistribute to your blog subscribers. However, the publication date and time will remain the same, so the post’s link and position in your timeline will remain the same.
Tip: If you want a republished post to display first on the blog, you can just make it “sticky” …
Work Flow Automation Feature – Un-Scheduling A Blog Post
If you’ve scheduled a blog post to publish later, but then change your mind and decide to publish it immediately, just head back to the Edit Post screen for a scheduled post.
In the Publish feature, click on the “Edit” link next to the date a post is scheduled to publish:
Now, just enter today’s date and time (tip: if you’re not sure of the exact time just type in an hour or two earlier than the current time showing on your clock) as a scheduled post time and click on OK …
Click Publish …
Your post will be published right away …
Troubleshooting Scheduled Posts
If your scheduled post failed to publish when the scheduled time arrived, check the following:
- Is your timezone set correctly in your Settings > General section?
- Check the Post Status. Did you save the post as a “Draft” instead of scheduling it?
- Did you click the “Schedule” button after modifying the date/time settings? For the post to publish, the Schedule button must be clicked.
- Did you schedule too many posts for publishing? Are you using bulk post scheduling plugins to queue up thousands of posts? Depending on the resources of your web server, you could experience problems. If so, try decreasing the number of scheduled items and see if this solves the issue.
Automating Post Scheduling With Plugins
You can automate various aspects of publishing and scheduling posts in WordPress with plugins.
Queuing Posts For Publishing
Queue Posts is a free WP plugin that lets you place new posts and pages in a queue for later publication at a specified interval …
Whenever you create a new WordPress post or page, the plugin gives you the option of queuing it for later …
This is great if you are scheduling a number of posts for publishing at a later date and would like these to be published in a specific order, or between specific times and intervals …
Bulk Schedule WordPress
There are a number of WordPress plugins designed for “autoposting” or “autoblogging” (add content automatically to WordPress sites).
AutoPost Scheduler
Auto Post Scheduler is a free WordPress plugin that will schedule ‘auto post checks’ to publish new posts and/or recycle old posts automatically.
Use a plugin like Auto Post Scheduler to publish new posts and/or recycle old posts automatically. There’s no need to schedule post times individually and recycling old posts can revitalize traffic.
This plugin is especially useful if you are importing a large number of posts, as you can set the Auto Post Scheduler to publish posts at whatever frequency you choose as well as setting a range of other options …
To learn more, visit their website: Auto Post Scheduler
WPRobot
Although you may not want all of the features of an “autoblogging” plugin, a plugin like WP Robot includes a module that allows you to bulk import posts or article files into your WordPress site, and then set these to automatically publish at regular or random intervals at a future time.
For more details about this plugin, visit the plugin’s site: WPRobot – WP Autoposting Plugin
Want more help with WordPress? Feel free to add your thoughts below and share this tutorial with your friends.
***
WordPress is huge and can sometimes be overwhelming about where to start. As you move on to the next Page, you will have a clearer picture of where to start and progress to building a professional WordPress Site.
***
Disclaimer: This site is not associated with WordPress or any of the WP-related products reviewed on this site. We may derive a financial benefit from sales of products advertised, reviewed or linked to from this site. All images and information used in this review have been supplied from the plugin’s website and sites that provide Premium WordPress Services
