How to Build a Powerful Social Media Calendar?

 A social media calendar is just like the Marie Kondo of your whole social media strategy. It sounds like a big responsibility at first, but you can be guaranteed it'll pay that time back in the end. 

Whether you are planning to post in a grid on Instagram or reels, or a textual post for LinkedIn, you need to plan it way before publishing. Note all details like the platform, the ideal time to post, and the idea behind the post! 

In this guide we will share some tips or build a creative social media calendar. 

What Exactly is a Social Media Calendar? 

A social media calendar is an outline of your forthcoming social media posts, and it can be organized in a spreadsheet, Google calendar, or creative dashboard. 

Each entry in a social media calendar usually includes some blend of these elements: 

• The precise date and time the post is going live 

• The platform and account where the post will be posted 

• The post's caption copy and innovative assets (i.e., photos or videos) 

• Links and tags that are supposed to be in the post 

• Any additional appropriate information like it will be a post or a story. 

Why manage your posts through a social media content calendar? 

 

Save Time by Being Systematized 

Your social media marketing goals have a critical point in common with many of the other purposes in your planner: they take exertion and attention every day.  

Maintaining a social media calendar lets you plan, divide your work, sidestep multitasking, and note down all your creative brainstorming ideas for later. 

It's the best way to make sure you'll never find yourself scrolling through regular motivational quotations hoping to find something to post again. 

And even though you'll be posting daily, maybe twice a day, that doesn't mean you need to be babysitting your feeds frequently. Detailed social media calendar tools allow you to schedule social media posts earlier in time and, just as required, direct audience engagement from one place. 

Post Regularly 

Whether you're trying to enhance your Instagram likes, your YouTube subscribers, or you've managed social media KPIs, the first tip from experts will always be "post invariably." There is no shortcut for it. 

Why? 

Always showing up in your audience's feed is the key to contending with them on social media. Engagement raises your organic reach via the platform's algorithm, so your posts get delivered to new eyes, and new people start following your brand. And making authentic connections with a growing audience is the one true path to increasing your conversions. 

Occupying your social media calendar with posts ahead of time allows you to post always, whether it's a slow news week or your most significant rise of the year. 

Make More Occasional Typos, and Also Lessen the Risk of Big Blunders 

Planning your posts ahead of time means that you can build defense into your workflow. Copy-editing the text, fact-checking details, or even vetting it with executive stakeholders like the lawful team or C-suite are all a lot easier when you're working days or weeks in advance. 

A social media calendar, especially one with built-in team member approvals, is the best way to control a low-key humiliation, like posting the same message across channels. 

Get More Ambitious with Your Social Plans 

The world's biggest social media brands often run numerous campaigns simultaneously—long, medium, or short-term, paid, and organic. And that's just the day-to-day posts. 

Once your plan is nailed down, your magnificent brain is released up to dive into even bigger questions.  

Should you operate an Instagram contest?  

Start examining for influencer partners?  

Maybe it's time to get your brand on LinkedIn or submit a social media employee program. 

Whether you're driving a five-person content team or you're publishing your Story while mixing bleach for your 3 pm client's pastel ombre long-bob, conveying your social game to the next level means getting methodical. 

Don't Miss Out on Appropriate Moments 

A social media calendar allows you to strategically follow global moments relevant to your brand's audience. Don't even miss out on the minor details. 

Like, for instance, Star Wars Day. 

How to Create Social Media Calendar? 

There are eight steps to developing an influential social media calendar: 

1. Audit your social networks and content 

2. Select your platform wisely 

3. Choose what your calendar requires tracking 

4. Create a content library for your assets 

5. Select a workflow 

6. Begin preparing your posts 

7. Invite your team to study and use their feedback to enhance 

8. Begin publishing then scheduling 

9. 
   

Tip: If this is your first time creating a calendar for social, you might want to break open our focus to making a social media marketing strategy first. Your calendar will be all the more helpful in having clear goals to underpin it. 

Audit Your Social Media Networks and Content 

Creating a clear picture of your existing social media efforts will let you determine areas for progress and options for new measures. An audit is key to fine-tuning your content plan and increasing your ROI. 

• Imitator accounts and ancient profiles 

• Account protection and passwords 

• Objectives and KPIs for each impressive version 

• Your audience, their demographics, and personas 

• Who's responsible for what operates on your team 

• Your most prosperous posts, campaigns, and tactics 

• Gaps, underwhelming results, and prospects for improvement 

• Essential metrics for estimating future wins on each platform 

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Allocate some devoted time to go through all of your social assets. Then rest assured that you'll tackle your refreshed social strategy with the best information. That is, the data is unique to your audience, accounts, and business. 

Determine Your Social Channels 

In the rush of the daily grind, it takes a concerted struggle to find the time to stay on top of new developments. 

• This is why you should take a sec to make sure you're precise on each social media platform and its demographics. Review best practices for business marketing plans, too.  

Choose What Data Your Social Media Content Calendar Needs to Follow 

As you figure out what this lovely plan will look like, you want to map out the information and functionality this tool will provide you. 

Maybe you're creating fresh for, say, your side-hustle accomplishing social for local indie rappers. In which case, an easy spreadsheet might do. 

But if you're handling a seven-person team with a dozen other consumer-facing brands, you're going to want something that can tell you who's doing what, when it's done, when it's approved, and when it's published then how prosperous it was. 

So, we recommend you start with primary details: 

• Platform 

• Date 

• Time zone 

• Caption Copy 

• Creatives (e.g., photo, video, infographic, gif) 

• Link to published post 

• Link to assets 

Also, add more refined details that you might find helpful: 

• Platform-clear format (e.g., feed, IGTV, Story, poll, live stream, commercial posts, etc.) 

• The upright or campaign is affiliated with a product launch, event, contests, annual giving, general brand awareness, etc. 

• Geo-targeting  

• Significance (i.e., Is it a short-lived post or a big-budget evergreen post that could be reclaimed or cannibalized for parts?) 

• Paid or organic? (If paid, then extra budget details might be valuable) 

• Has it been approved? 

• Is it posted?  

• Analytics and results 

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Create a Content Library for Your Assets 

Some call these content warehouses, media resource databases, or digital asset pools. 

Regardless of what you name it, your collection of graphic content should not be living on your phone or in a cluster of desktop folders marked with misc or something. 

Make a habit of using Dropbox, Google Drive, your organization's internal network. A social media content library has a few key features: 

• It's ample enough for large files. 

• It's obtainable from your phone as well as your desktop. 

• It's efficiently shareable with team members, but you can rely on its privacy attributes; 

• It provides links to separate files so that you can drop them into your calendar. 

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The way you set up your content database is almost as essential as your social media calendar. The less digging around for assets you have to do, the sounder. 

Establish a Workflow 

Ok, now that you've collected all potential information, it's time to start drawing in the bones of your daily, weekly and monthly social media tempo. 

You'll want to consider: 

• How frequently do you want to post per channel; 

• The ideal time to publish (based on your analytics); 

• What will your content proportion look like; 

• Who will approve posts, and how contact will work there; 

• The process is for brainstorming new ideas, not allocating and making them. 

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Tip: Once you have a social media workflow drafted, consider writing it in an easy-to-access place. The more involved your team, the more valuable it is to break down reports and techniques so that they can easily understand the calendar when you're not responding to texts from coworkers. 

Begin Preparing Your Posts 

At this point, you're presumably sprinting with ideas. Take some time to go through the old "misc social" folder to some ideas and start dragging together some discrete posts. 

As you work, consider how your calendar feels. If it's demanding and picky, maybe you want to dial back some of the points.  

If your business requires some external help in preparing social media strategies, then you are in the right place! 

The Big Unit is the best social media marketing company in Melbourne, with a peak record of highly successful business strategies and cheerful clientele.