As a brand, if people do not know about you, it is difficult for them to become your customers. Well, technology has made it easy to put products and services in the face of prospective customers. Social media has made it possible for brands to reach and engage multiple audiences. Though social media is quick and easy for sharing news related to a brand, there are individuals and marketers who do not understand that they need to plan content ahead for audiences to get the most out of their brand. A developed social media strategy for digital marketing will always help you meet your audience right where they are.
To plan content your content calendar to stay topical and relevant by using a Social Media Content Calendar. This way, you can cover the content and schedule for different social media platforms you use. Creating one might seem daunting, but we have an article on how you can come up with relevant content.
We will start recommending you carry out an audit of what you already have going for you. If you do not have any existing activity, this guide is still perfect to get you started. So, why do you need a Social Media Content Calendar?
Organization
The reason anyone will get a calendar in the first place is to stay organized, this is the same for a content calendar. With an organized process, all activities can be seen at a glance. You can maintain a balance between previous and future posts as there will be a fresh perspective for your digital marketing on the various platforms. Also, this helps you with consistency across all social media platforms and your brand can maintain a strong presence.
Relevancy
As mentioned earlier, planning your content provides the opportunity to stay topical and relevant. Creating your plan early is important, this gives time for your team members to give ideas and feedback that can help you improve for optimal performance. This in turn, your brand’s marketing and goals are achieved in the long run.
With a diverse team, there is a low chance you will get your content plan wrong, only if you don’t seek their help. Each individual has unique knowledge that can influence decisions for each platform your brand uses. Always be sure to include current trends and information that solves the problems of your audience. This will help you stay at par with peers in the industry and amp your chances of closing sales.
The key is relevancy and each content theme or topic you ut in your content calendar should match this.
Credibility
To build credibility and trust with your audiences, you still need to be consistent on all social media channels. It is critical for early birds to get to know about your firm. In no time, they learn that your brand is reliable to always share useful information and has the expertise to help with their challenges.
As your audience anticipates your posts, you can keep adjusting your plan and update your calendar to meet their expectations and current discussions. Surely, they will feel connected like they are part of your brand. With this, your following can increase, and your trustworthiness is sustained.
Saves Time
Reflect on the times you and your team decided to make social media posts and with no prior plan, you all decided to brainstorm and delegate tasks a day or even a few hours before you post. Do you think this was efficient? Well, though this might have paid off, it is definitely time-consuming and not efficient. Having a content calendar in place to cover tasks is great! You get to allocate the best resources effectively and on time. You will carry out your research where needed to stay on schedule so there is no last-minute hassle.
Having in place what you want to post and when on your calendar can serve as a to-do board for you and other team members. They get to know what they are supposed to do for posts prior to them being distributed.
On-Time
Another advantage a social media content calendar has is its ability to keep you on track. In order to publish content that will create engagement with audiences, consider related campaigns and events happening. Find out what you and your audiences need to know about what is going on in your industry. Tailor this for posts to be promoted on social media. With a calendar, you can set reminders for specific events/holidays, so your brand is not missing out on what’s important.
Higher Quality Content
These days, it is not unusual to see a post that you can tell there is no creative team behind it. From copywriters to graphic designers, telling them to stop all they are doing at a point in time to make emergency posts on social media will most likely not let them give their best. With a content calendar, you give your team the opportunity to develop the best content that supports your brands’ marketing goals way before it is needed because at the end of the day, you want high-quality content that will spur interaction and engagement.
Tracking
Your schedule/calendar is completed. It is important to track certain metrics associated with your goals as this will make room for improvement. Your calendar with let you plan for experiments to improve your social media performance. Be open to testing out what may work for your brand, either the type of content, how often to post, the length of your captions, the hashtags you use, and so on.
If you have been avoiding the task of creating a social media content calendar, maybe you thought you did not need one or it would be a waste of time, try to rethink. With the influx of fresh news and ideas daily, it is easy to get caught up in the day-to-day of managing all social media accounts. However, this should not discourage you from building a healthy online presence for your company/brand.
Planning and sticking to a well outlined social media calendar with a focus on the content you know your audience wants to see is essential. So, how can you create one? We are going to highlight tips, tricks, and the best calendar apps to make this process simple. Whether it is your first time, your calendar needs to simple, well detailed, easy to understand, and tailored for your brand.
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Carry out an audit
To begin, you do not want to make the same mistakes you have discovered that need improvement. Get to know your current strategy and identify the gaps, areas of improvement, and opportunities. This is to refine your plan and boost your return on investment (ROI). Consequently, you can do this as often as you’d like or quarterly.
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Select your Social Media Platforms
It is not so easy to stay on top of your social media game when there are other tasks that need to be completed. To clarify this, take some time out to understand the audience you will be targeting. You do not have to understand all the information at once. For the best results, it will take dedicated time.
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Decide what your calendar will track
While you think about what your masterpiece calendar is going to look like and what it is going to be used for. Also, outline the information and functions it will provide for your brand. Include who is doing what and when it needs to be complete when it is approved, when it is published and how well it performed. Include details such as;
- The social media platform to be used
- Date
- Time schedule for posts
- Visuals – images, videos, graphics etc.
- Copy/Caption for the post
- Link to assets used
- Link to published post
- Specific format on Platform (Ads, live stream, story, etc.)
- Affiliated campaign for the post
- Value the post will bring for your brand
- Paid or Organic post
- Analytics and results
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Create a content library
This includes all the assets used in your calendar. These are sensitive data and should be treated accordingly to prevent loss or corruption of files. Use your company’s intranet or one of the various cloud-based software – Google Drive, Dropbox, etc. Look out for the following features before choosing one.
- Availability of space for large files.
- Mobile and computer friendliness
- Easy sharing with team members
- Privacy features.
- Provision of links to individual files to add to your calendar.
Make sure you are organized with this library. You should be able to minimize the time you take to find assets, if not review the format used to save files.
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Get to sketching
With all the information garnered, you should proceed with inserting your daily, weekly, and monthly social media activity. To help with this think of the following:
- The process to develop new ideas, content topics and assigning related tasks
- How often will you post on each platform
- The best time you want to post
- Predictions of your content ratio
- Who needs to approve your post
Depending on the complexity of your team, you might need to create a separate tab to break down processes and definitions for each member for clarity. Look at this example below.
Source: Digital Opportunity Trust
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Create your Posts
If you are at this stage, you probably have ideas for your plan and social media channels that you cannot wait to implement. You can either craft all the posts for a month or more depending on the time you have. If not, you can design posts as you go along by referencing your calendar. Allow room for adjustments with the content you have.
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Review, review, and review
You have completed your posts, you can now consult team members for their input if any. As we stated earlier that your calendar should be simple or complex depending on your brand, however, it must not lack clear understanding by people who need to use it daily.
This is important for times when the creator may be sick or needs to take a leave, so work can go on without them.
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Start scheduling
Your social media content calendar is ready to run. You can start scheduling posts to go out consistently. It takes time to manually post, and if you get really busy, scheduling posts is advised. There are digital tools that can also manage your feeds.
Great examples of Social Media Content Calendars apps and tools you can use are;
You have the information you need to plan out your social calendar from content to scheduling posts, engaging with followers, and tracking your progress on all social media platforms. All you have to do is execute!
