How to Organize Passwords. Blogger tips for password protection and organization.

It’s day eight of the free travel blogging course based on my 2021 E-book entitled 30 Days to Launch a Travel Blogging or Writing Career. This episode shares how to organize passwords to simplify your blogging life. Follow this series to create the habits to be a successful travel writer or blogger!

This podcast and series publishes on the 2nd Wednesday of every month and is designed to help you build a travel blog your readers love as well as help you achieve your goals as a travel writer or blogger.

How to Organize Passwords

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This series is here to help you launch a successful travel blogging career and create the habits to be a successful travel writer or blogger.

30 Days to Launch a Travel Blogging or Writing Career E-book Day 8

Today’s topic is password protection and organization. Passwords might not be the sexiest topic or the most interesting topic, but I promise to offer some great tips so your passwords are organized and not a painful part of your blogging or travel writing day-to-day.

In the next few days of the course, if you haven’t already, you’ll be securing your URL, social media and many more accounts, so it’s the perfect time to decide how you are going to store and organize your passwords.

If you already have your website domain and social accounts, it’s never too late to get organized with passwords. Password organization sounds like it should be simple and an easy task, but it can be a super frustrating and time-consuming issue if you don’t organize them in a simple way.

Download the FREE PDF worksheet for day 8 before you read on!

Where to Organize Passwords

First, Make sure all the passwords for your website and blogging career are in one spot. It could be a word or excel file. It could be handwritten in a notebook. It could be a Google Doc. Or use the downloadable page provided in the homework PDF for today to keep your passwords. If you visit bitw.com episode

Choose one place and take the time to list everything you currently have a password for that is associated with your travel blog and travel writing.

This list should include social media accounts, bookmarking sites, blog passwords, email accounts, Gmail, analytics, hosting and any other accounts you have that are associated with your blog or travel writing.

As your blogging or travel writing career moves forward you will find that the number of accounts created and passwords you collect will be somewhat surprising. From ad networks to affiliate networks, as well as influencer groups, other blogging networks, travel writing organizations, courses you sign up for, and news networks. This list will grow and grow as you get deeper into your travel writing or travel blogging career.

For some of you, this may be a quick and easy task. You may have used the same password for every account or already have most passwords listed in one document.

For others (like me) who use a different password for every account and are not always good about keeping your list in one location, it could take quite a while.

Never Use 1 Password for All Accounts

If you are one of the people who has used 1 password for everything — stop doing this! It’s not secure and if one account is compromised, you are in trouble.

Your passwords should be strong and don’t need to be 100% different. You could have a core password that the first letter, numbers and special symbols change.

Don’t Let the Snowball Effect Start!

If you start from the beginning organized it will help tremendously. Again, if you are listening with dread because you have already created several accounts associated with your travel website or freelancing career, it’s better to organize now than continue to have your passwords all over the place or in some cases, no place at all.

The worst is if you are away from your main computer or maybe on your phone and trying to access an account or site and can’t find your password, so you do a password re-set, but don’t have your original password list location available and think you’ll remember or deal with it later.

It can really be a snowball effect. You re-set you password on the road or on your phone, but you have a list somewhere else with your passwords, so next time you are on your laptop or home computer and login it may still remember your password — but the password has now been updated — and your list is showing the old password, so you now in need in updating the password again.

Believe me, it can get messy!

I used to keep all my passwords in a notebook that I kept at my desk, and I’d take a photo of the pages of passwords when I traveled, so they’d be on my phone, now I use Google Drive and Last Pass for working with my VAs and have the apps on my phone, so in almost all cases I can access the files and for any reason, I need to change a password — I can update the Google Doc. There are times when traveling that I might not be able to access the doc, but in reality if I can’t access Google Docs I probably can’t log into anything else either.

Google Drive files are stored in secure data centers. If your computer, phone, or tablet is lost or broken, you can still access your files from other devices and Your files are private unless you share them. But, Google Drive isn’t the MOST secure — so do your homework as to the level of security that is comfortable for you.

Dedicated Password Organizer Options

For me, personally, I like the ease of Google Drive. But, the most secure way to store passwords is to use a dedicated password manager. Here are a few options.

KeePass
Dashlane
Sticky Password
1Password
RoboForm
bitwarden
LastPass

As I said at the beginning of this episode, this might seem like a fairly easy task, but for me, there is nothing more frustrating than having to re-set passwords or hunt passwords down, because it always feels like this scenario happens when I’m in a time crunch! So, learn from my mistakes and my new better organization.

Keep passwords organized and this includes having the following in one location:

name of the site
password
email used
security question

5 Password Protection Tips

If you decide to use a notebook or paper system, Use a pencil to write down your passwords as they may change.
Don’t label your notebook, Google Drive file or any password file manager with the word “PASSWORDS!”
If you are uncomfortable writing down the passwords in a notebook or in an electronic form, you can use a system where you give yourself “hints” instead of the actual passwords. This can be handy if your password keeper is lost or compromised. For a password like “fluffy1999,” you might write a hint like “cat+year” that you’ll definitely remember. Pick any memorable occasion or event to use this method.
Do NOT write password hints that are relative to other accounts, like “same as Amazon,” because that can become a big cross-referencing mess quickly when you change the referred-to accounts.
The last tip here is HUGE. do not use your birthday or your children’s names. If someone is truly trying to break into your accounts, this is way to easy.

Remember, now that sites are more and more security-focused, when you login to a site on a different device or from a different IP address, they might require you to answer a security question or use an authorization code.

Some sites also require you to update a password after a certain amount of logins or months, so this is something a bit out of your control. Believe me — it will happen while you are away from your computer ½ of the time.

For me, being able to update my Google Doc from anywhere is the BEST way to stay organized with my passwords. Choose the best option for you and make sure to keep the list up to date!

Bottom line: How to Organize Passwords isn’t the most glamorous part of travel writing, but password protection and organization will help you and save time!

Have you downloaded the FREE PDF worksheet for day ?

I hope you enjoyed this show and day 8 of 30 Days to Launch a Travel Blogging or Writing Career series.

About The 30 Days to Launch a Travel Blogging Series

This is part of a podcast series that airs on the first Wednesday of each month, where I share tips from my newly revised (for 2021) Ebook entitled 30 Days to Launch a Travel Blogging or Writing Career.

The 30-day foundation course lays the groundwork needed to launch a travel blogging or travel writing career from the launch of your website to landing media trips or creating your own paid-for solo travel!

Each of the tips from the Ebook, are short and come with a worksheet. In fact, make sure to click here for the pdf worksheet from today’s lesson.

Day 1: Knowing Your Why and Your Goal
Listen to the Podcast | Day 1 Blog Post
Homework Day 1: Download the PDF!

Day 2: Defining Your Travel Website Niche
Listen to the Podcast | Day 2 Blog Post
Homework Day 2: Download the PDF!

Day 3: Define & Find Your Competitors
Listen to the Podcast | Day 3 Blog Post
Homework Day 3: Download the PDF!

Day 4: Find Your Ideal Reader and Audience
Listen to the Podcast | Day 4 Blog Post
Homework Day 4: Download the PDF!

Day 5: 5 Ways to Brainstorm 50 Blog Post Ideas
Listen to the Podcast | Day 5 Blog Post
Homework Day 5: Download the PDF!

Day 6: How to Choose a Blog Names & Tag Lines
Listen to the Podcast | Day 6 Blog Post
Homework Day 6: Download the PDF!

Day 7: How to Create a Keyword Library for a Website
Listen to the Podcast | Day 7 Blog Post
Homework Day 7: Download the PDF!

Get All 30 Days Now! Purchase the Ebook for only $49
About Break Into Travel Writing: Learn everything you need to launch your travel writing career at BreakIntoTravelWriting.com; a podcast and website designed to help you build a travel blog your readers love as well as help you achieve your goals as a travel writer or blogger.

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