SOCIAL MEDIA CALEDAR- THE ANSWER TO WHAT TO DO & WHEN TO DO
If you ever wondered what you need to post next on your social media page, then I’m sorry to tell you that you’re not going to flourish on the social media front.
Social media is a dynamic space and it requires constant care and attention. If you don’t post good quality content regularly and engage with your audience and new features then it is not going to give you results.
But deciding what to post everyday on the day itself can be a daunting task because as an entrepreneur you will have much more important work on your hands. This is where a social media calendar will come in handy. At the beginning of the month, creating a spreadsheet or an excel sheet that shows all the posts you have to do for the month is a great way to get organised.
Social media editorial calendars are spreadsheets or apps used to schedule social posts in advance.
They are also used to plan when and which content will be shared, manage campaigns, track deadlines etc.
Actually, you can schedule a social media calendar for an entire year. This sounds scary at first but trust me, it pays back a great deal and you never have to worry about “what do i post next?”.
Before we start on how to organise a social media calendar, we must first look at why there is a need to invest in this tool.
- It saves time and helps you be organised. Imagine, spending half an hour to one hour every day and thinking about what you are going to post, your target audience, your captions, hashtags, campaigns, promotions… and not just for one social media platform but for all! And you need to post at the right time. Instead of wasting hours everyday for a whole year, so-cal apps and softwares keep you organised and they even have features to schedule posts where you can just put in the time and it will be posted on the desired platform on its own. It helps you plan ahead of time, batch your work, avoid multitasking and confusion.
- Posting consistently. People use social media because they want to stay up to date on what’s happening with their friends, celebrities and the world. Like we have a schedule for ourselves and follow a routine, we must also have a routine with our social media posting. Look at it from your own perspective. Everyday when you scroll through, you are bound to see a post by National Geographic. On the day that you don’t see this, then it irks you. Instead of being the person that posts randomly and gets no engagement, post consistently so that you always appear in the feeds of your consumers.
- Go back to school. Okay this isn’t literally, but what I mean is, check your grammar, punctuations etc. You want to avoid any stupid spelling mistakes and this is useful to keep in mind when you ar planning posts and captions days in advance. This will prevent you from posting the same message twice on different platforms or even bigger social media crises.
- Plan big. Once you’ve nailed down the schedule, you now have time to decide where you’re going to bring in bigger plans – events, contests, campaigns etc. You can lock down on where you’re going to start the events…during the holiday season or on a special day like valentine’s or independence day etc.
- Good quality content. It is not surprising to see an entire team of creatives working behind just one single social media post – designers, copywriters, photographers,etc. This is crucial because unless you have good content and a steady scheme to follow, then there is no point to your social media strategy.
Now that we know why we need social media calendars, it is time to finally see HOW to make one.
- Conduct an audit of your social networks and content
A social media audit is when you take steps to inspect, evaluate and optimize a business’s social media page. You’re going to see where you are doing well on social media platforms and where you are not. You will assess your website to see growth, opportunities and fatal flaws that hinder your growth!
In this article we will look at the quickest way to do a social media audit. Why quick? Because not every business has the time to look into it in detail especially during the holiday season.
Before starting an audit, you should make a list of things that you are assessing. For both a quick and a slow audit, you need to make sure you are measuring the following:
● Name and URL
● Engagement metrics
● Audience demographics
● Publishing metrics
● Referral traffic
● Channel specific metrics
- Choose your social channels
This may not seem like much but it is really important. You may be posting and advertising content on the wrong channel! Or, you may be doing it wrong! It is important to note that not all social media channels are the same, so your social media strategy should be different for every platform. It takes time and effort but once you get the hang of what to do and where, then you really are hitting the bulls-eye.
- Decide what your calendar needs to track
Social media calendars help you stay organised but it is important to organise them too. You may be measuring metrics and keeping schedules for more than one platform, which is why it is important for you to see what your calendar is tracking and where. These are some of the important categories that you need to take care of:
● Social media channel /app
● Date of posting
● Time of posting
● Copy of post or ad
● Visuals to be added (e.g., photo, video, illustration, infographic, gif, etc.)
● Link to published post
