Creating a new document in Craft
When I first tried to set up my publishing checklist in Craft, I thought it would be a quick ten minute job. Open new doc, type the tasks, done. But no. I was already knee deep in three other tabs — one was a half-finished Airtable automation, another was Zapier telling me my webhook didn’t have permission. By the time I clicked back into Craft, I had already forgotten my clever list title.
In Craft, the plus button in the lower right corner opens up a menu for creating a page. I clicked that, chose “New Document,” and waited… only to realize I was still inside another workspace from some old collaboration I had abandoned months ago. Pro tip — check the workspace name in the top left before you start typing. Otherwise, your content might vanish into some dusty folder you never open again 😛
For a publishing checklist, I started with a plain text page instead of a fancy visual card layout, because toggles work better when line spacing is simple. Craft saves instantly, so there’s no save button to press — you just start typing and it sticks.
Structuring the checklist without overthinking
A publishing checklist is just a list of things you do before you hit publish — but if you make it too long, you’ll never finish half of it. I typed my core steps like bullet points, then highlighted each line and hit the slash command menu by typing “/toggle”. Craft turns that line into something you can click open and closed. I like toggles because it hides the messy details until you need them.
For example I wrote:
1. Confirm headline length fits
⬇ inside toggle: Note that Google likes headlines under a certain number of characters but Craft won’t warn you so you have to manually count or use an external tool.
2. Double check links
⬇ inside toggle: Open each link in a new tab to make sure it doesn’t 404.
Don’t worry about numbering perfectly here — Craft auto updates the numbers if you reorder them.
Adding subtasks inside toggles
Here’s where the fun starts and also where I almost scrapped the entire setup. Inside each toggle, you can press “return” and type a normal checklist item with a checkbox. That means you can have a multi-level structure: main item = toggle, sub items = checkboxes within it. It’s super satisfying ticking each off, but it also makes you painfully aware when you’re behind schedule 🙂
I keep my detailed tasks hidden unless I’m working on the specific publishing stage. For example in my “Image attachments” toggle I have three subtasks like “Check alt text,” “Verify correct size,” and “Compress under 200kb.”
One time I accidentally dragged a subtask outside the toggle so it looked like an entirely separate checklist item in the main list — which was confusing later when I had an image compression task showing up in the SEO section. If that happens, just drag it back inside the toggle until you see the little indent.
Duplicating checklists for new posts
Instead of rebuilding the list every time, I click the three dots at the top right of the document and choose “Duplicate.” This creates an exact copy with the same toggles and text. Then I just change the title and maybe tweak steps if that post has unique requirements (like a video embed or a different content platform).
Craft makes duplicates beautifully but be aware that it doesn’t reset checkboxes automatically. If you want a clean slate, select all tasks and hit space in each checkbox to uncheck them. I once forgot to do this and thought I had magically completed an entire post’s prep work — nope.
Keeping it visible when multitasking
Craft’s tab system is hidden in a way that if you close the app or get distracted by an urgent Slack ping, you might lose track of where your checklist sits. So I pin my publishing checklist doc by right clicking it in the sidebar and selecting “Pin to top.” That way, it’s always in the sidebar no matter which folder I’ve been wandering through.
During heavy writing days, I sometimes open the checklist in Craft’s web version on one monitor and keep my main writing doc open in the desktop app on another. This keeps me from accidentally scrolling past the checklist. It’s overkill, but it works ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
Using formatting to speed up scanning
My early checklists were just plain text and toggles, but when you’re under deadline, scanning for unfinished items is a nightmare. Now I use bold text for the main toggle labels and italics for anything optional inside. For warnings or reminders that I really don’t want to miss, I prefix the line with “⚠” — not an emoji, just a text character you can get from your keyboard symbols.
You can also color-code text in Craft by selecting it and choosing a color from the style menu. I mark finished sections gray to visually fade them out. It’s subtle but my brain notices it right away.
A quick backup habit to avoid disasters
I learned the hard way that even though Craft syncs instantly, it’s not immune to mistakes — like when I accidentally deleted a whole section of my checklist thinking I was inside another doc. Now once every couple weeks, I select everything in my checklist, copy, and paste it into a plain text file in my Dropbox. If Craft ever eats the file or I mess it up, I can just paste it back in.
This also helps if I want to migrate the checklist to Notion or some other platform without retyping the whole thing.
Why the toggle method actually sticks
I’ve tried Kanban boards, post it notes, calendar reminders — all of them look great for a day and then I stop using them. But toggles make the checklist feel lighter because you only see the pieces you’re working on. It’s almost like tricking yourself into thinking there’s less to do. And honestly, anything that makes the publishing process feel less like a factory line and more like crossing the last few steps in a treasure hunt is something I’ll keep using.