Social media marketing is not an unplanned road trip. Some understand that from the beginning and others come to realisation much later. When you look at a brand’s Instagram posts, Twitter threads, and Facebook page—you must notice how a post is not singular. Let’s talk more about creating a social media content calendar.
Think of it like a domino chain.
For a domino chain to work, the pieces must be aligned properly. They must have similarity in them while the placement must be precise.
That is the function of a social media calendar; it aligns your posts according to your brand voice and tone, and the message you want to send across. Through your effective social media content calendar, you will have a continuous image throughout your digital marketing.
Once you tip the first piece, you cannot add the third. You have to prepare in advance to some extent.
Here are the six dominoes to creating an effective social media content calendar.
Domino One: Research
Knowing your target audience works in two ways:
- Preferred Platform – Are your potential customers on Instagram, Facebook or Twitter? Do you need, really need, a TikTok social media presence? How much time does your audience spend on these platforms? The answers to these questions are important as they will help you target the right niche for your company.
- Active Hours – Social Media Analytics can tell you in depth about your audience’s gender, age, and geo-location. You will also be able to track your peak hours throughout the week, i.e. when the majority of your audience interacts with your content.
- This is also the stage where you should focus on your past social media efforts and see what worked for you.
- It is important to categorize your failures and your success to create a formula that is set for your brand.
As Aslan said, Things do not happen the same way twice, dear one.
That formula will not be your solution.
You will have to experiment and try new things. However, make sure you keep record of your past work, because it helps in deciding what tone you’ll be setting for the coming weeks. Knowing what your audience is like will enable you to better cater to their needs.
Domino Two: Brainstorming
This is when you can let your mind wander.
- Think of the month ahead and set goals.
- What is it that you want to achieve? Do you have a new product or service to showcase?
Maintaining your brand’s social media content is a dedicated effort, let your team of copywriters work on your brand’s unique content.
Having a social media calendar will help you plan ahead, group similar tasks, avoid multitasking, and focus on tasks that require the most of your creativity.
- It’s hard to get into the flow of thinking up new ideas, but once you’ve entered into that state of mind—there are no limitations.
- Decrease the effort of going into that creative bubble every single week by brainstorming for the month ahead at once.
Remember: This can be a guideline or an in-depth brainstorming session. It depends on how you’d like your content calendar to be.
Domino Three: Creating your Calendar
Your social media calendar can be as specific as you want, or it could be simple and short. There are no set rules for what is enough.
Simply, what works for you in the end is the answer.
Here’s a checklist:
[ ] Create Platform specific formats. (Feed Post, IGTV, Story, Poll, Live Streams, Ads etc.)
[ ] Organic or Paid Marketing?
[ ] Schedule for the Posts
[ ] Who will approve?
[ ] Time (Time Zones)
[ ] Visuals (Illustrations, Graphics, GIF, Video etc.)
[ ] Link to Posts
[ ] Captions
[ ] Hashtags
You can have a weekly or monthly social media calendar. Weekly social media plans will remove the bulk of your workload, while monthly content calendars will help you plan according to the season and events.
Tip: It is good to have your content and calendar synced. Most calendars will let you upload your media beforehand.
Domino Four: Feedback
The whole purpose of social media calendar is to:
- Take away the spontaneity and create a sense of direction for your team.
- Make it a coordinated group effort.
Share your calendar with your team of copywriters, graphic designers, social media account managers, and communications/marketing specialists. Arrange a group meeting and try to find inconsistencies or errors in your plan.
Find out what’s missing, and if your social media plan is bulletproof, you’re good to go. If not, try to revise with the feedback received.
Domino Five: Schedule Posts
Schedule your weekly and monthly posts. Make sure your social media posts are in high quality, the captions match, and the hashtags are relevant.
- Make sure you’re using a content calendar that syncs and works on all your devices. This will enable you to post on the move.
- Have all those who manage the social media accounts, get access to your calendar.
Domino Six: Tracking Your Progress
Social Media Analytics have a major role. In this step, we come back to the first domino.
- Tracking what works for your brand and then improving it is as important as the base research you have conducted.
This way you can plan out a better social media calendar for the next month by knowing what format, type of content, time and frequency of posts gathers the most engagement.
Conclusion
We’ve learned that social media calendars help us in being:
- Consistent and beat the algorithm by having a decent engagement leading to an organic reach.
- Prevent errors (such as similar content being posted on multiple platforms) or typos in your content.
- Social media calendar is a visual spread of your digital content that allows you to plan for festive seasons, and brainstorm more by giving adequate time to your team of copywriters, social media managers, designers, and content writers.
- Provide a long-term vision for your company so that you’re able to effectively allocate your workforce and time.
If you need help in creating your social media content calendar, or managing your social media accounts, please contact us now!
