Organization is key. The better organized your overall content strategy, the better chance you’ll have of attracting, engaging, and converting your customers. If you want your content marketing strategy to succeed, you should be using content calendars.
What are content calendars, why do they matter, and how do you create them? Let’s take a look.
What is a Content Calendar?
How do you figure out what content to create? More importantly, how do you decide when and where to publish it? How do you keep it all organized?
By creating regular content calendars!
Content calendars are a planned-out schedule of what to post, when and how to post it, your budget, and who’s responsible. You can even plan out content updates, partnerships, promotions, and anything else content-related. It’s also part of how you map out your social media strategy. That includes both organic and paid posts, as well as ads, videos, and more.
Why Do Content Calendars Matter?
If you create content without a definitive purpose, you probably don’t need a content calendar. If you’re looking to grow your follower count, get more leads, or convert more customers, however, a content calendar is a surefire way to improve your odds. Why are content calendars so important?
The “Rule of Seven” refers to the concept that it takes about seven interactions with your brand for a customer to take action. While that’s more of an idea than a statistic, you’re not going to convert customers with a single piece of content–nor is disorganized, unpurposed content going to get you the conversion numbers you’re looking for.
Content calendars help ensure your content checks all the important boxes. It also helps maintain a consistent schedule and optimize your conversion funnel. Content calendars can even be an integral part of helping accomplish your goals. For instance, if you want more unique site visits, a content calendar can help ensure your content is in-line to help you get those unique visits.
How to Create Your Own Content Calendars
While there are plenty of online content calendar tools and templates, all you really need is a calendar and a plan. Regardless of the medium through which you create your own calendar, the first step is mapping out what kind of content to create. Your best bet is to stick to a handful of content pillars–major brand themes or topics of interest to your audience. Next, you’ll want to plan out how often you want to post. That means figuring out how often to post on social media, blog, send out emails, create videos, and publish any kind of brand content.
A content calendar is not the same thing as a social media calendar. You may plan out multiple Facebook posts a day, but that’s only a part of your content calendar. However, if the only channel you use is Facebook, your social media calendar is your de facto content calendar. Best practice, however, dictates leveraging multiple channels and a multimedia approach to attract, engage, and convert your customers.
The easiest way to create a content calendar is to simply establish what to post and when to post it. For example, on Tuesdays, you might publish motivational content and on Fridays, you might publish your sales for the upcoming weekend.
Don’t Forget to Update!
While content calendars primarily refer to creating and publishing new content, don’t forget to update your existing content. Part of your content calendar should include taking time to audit your social media and web content to make sure it’s still on-brand and relevant to your goals. If you see that your content needs reworking, make your edits part of your calendar.
The more you refine your strategy, the better your content will perform. Plus, an organized content schedule will help make sure you don’t forget anything.
Content calendars are a great way to optimize your content to create a winning overall marketing strategy. If you don’t already use them, consider creating one today!
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