How will your marketing team use social media in 2022? As we continue to adapt to a primarily digital-first life, social media channels can be vital in helping brands (re)engage their communities and provide new content experiences.
The reality for many teams, though, is that they are unable to drive meaningful results from their social media activities. There are many reasons for this, often including a lack of team resources, competing priorities, or a misunderstanding of how to best engage a social media community.
An essential way to address this problem is to build a social media calendar that strategically balances your team’s priorities and provides a roadmap of content for your social media channels.
In this #ContentChat we explain how to build an effective social media content calendar with digital marketer Brandie McCallum (@lttlewys). Read the full recap below, where we explain what to include in a social media content calendar, how often you should update your content calendar, our favorite tools for social media management, and more. If you’re looking for further support in setting your social media strategy, check out our past blog post that details how a social media audit can improve your content strategy.
Q1: What should a useful social media content calendar include? Do you have a favorite template you can share?
A social media content calendar should only include the necessary information your team needs to execute its social media strategy. Some teams document only a few details, while others detail a range of key information.
Brandie recommends tracking hashtags and images in your social calendar.
A1: Hashtags and images. I don’t…. I am #OldSchool and use a notebook & excel spreadsheet for my calendar, lately, tho, I’m leaning into @Agorapulse‘s calendar! #ContentChat pic.twitter.com/EgNSbl1N1G
— Brandie McCallum (@lttlewys) December 6, 2021
Erika’s social media calendar details the type of content that should be posted on a specific channel at a specific time. Download her template calendar from this blog post.
A1: Your social media calendar needs to guide you through how frequently you want to post what kind of content on which social media channels. I walk through some of my thoughts on this topic, and link to a simple template, here: https://t.co/73ShJ3GiE9 #ContentChat
— Erika Heald | Content Marketing Consultant (@SFerika) December 6, 2021
The community shares a few other details you can document in your social media calendar, including the goals, team to-do’s and status updates, links shared in your social media posts, and handles or accounts to tag in your content.
Hmm, not seeing goals and CTA’s in many content calendars! It’s important to not forget you want people to take an action from your content! #contentchat
— Brandie McCallum (@lttlewys) December 6, 2021
Good point! While I include that in my social media plan, I haven’t usually added those fields to my calendar. But that’s mostly b/c I struggle to get client team members to fill in that many particulars. #ContentChat
— Erika Heald | Content Marketing Consultant (@SFerika) December 6, 2021
A1: A helpful social media content calendar should include:
Monthly to-dos (broken down into little bits of tasks)
Weekly to-dos (broken down into little bits of tasks)
Daily to-dos#ContentChat https://t.co/SeRSyrEPUT— Kathryn Lang – hopesmith and dream ignitor (@Kathrynclang) December 6, 2021
A1. A useful social media calendar should have,
👉Time and date
👉 Description of scheduled posts
👉 links associated with these posts
👉 Status i.e. scheduled/not started
👉 Campaign # #ContentChat— Shruti Deshpande (@shruti12d) December 6, 2021
A1: In addition to many of the things already listed here, we like to include a targeted persona for each post. That helps us focus our language and balance our calendar. #ContentChat
— Olive & Company (@oliveandco) December 6, 2021
A1: A few things I like to include (but everyone’s calendar looks different!)
-Channel
-Content type (text post, photo, video, etc.)
-Hashtags
-Handles to tag
-Marketing goal/category the content ladders up to#ContentChat— Melanie Graham (@WriterGirlMel) December 6, 2021
Love me a solid hashtag list!! Especially, branded ones!! #contentChat pic.twitter.com/KavmR37fYw
— Brandie McCallum (@lttlewys) December 6, 2021
Loving the ‘content type’ bit for a calendar #contentchat
— Shruti Deshpande (@shruti12d) December 6, 2021
It helps people be accountable and not say “but there wasn’t anything we could share” b/c when you mix and match content types and topics there is ALWAYS something you can share! #ContentChat
— Erika Heald | Content Marketing Consultant (@SFerika) December 6, 2021
However you structure your calendar, ensure that you plan time and resources to monitor for engagement, reply to your community content, and engage in “social” activities that can be impossible to plan for.
A1 A calendar is good for planning, but it shouldn’t limit your use of social media. Still need to be listening and replying and engaging with your followers/community in real time. You can’t plan for or schedule that. #contentchat
— Martin Lieberman (@martinlieberman) December 6, 2021
I mostly agree with this, BUT, if you are managing someone else and want to make sure they engage in specific listening or amplification opportunities, it can be helpful to put those in as a to-do for that day of the week, specific date, etc. #ContentChat
— Erika Heald | Content Marketing Consultant (@SFerika) December 6, 2021
That’s tru, Martin. But you also, want to start/direct the conversation in an effective manner. Planning that out makes things less chaotic! #contentChat
— Brandie McCallum (@lttlewys) December 6, 2021
@martinlieberman Completely agree. It is seldom that I plan posts ahead of time, rather I see what my following is engaging in that day- and go from there. Great insight!
— Kendall McDonald (@kendallpmcd) December 6, 2021
