The pressure to remain relevant in social accounts – as well as maintain a perfect reaction rate when circumstances require it – is intense. Katrina Bell explains how to set about making it work.
Being a social butterfly is exhausting – many business owners feel they have to pivot to a side-hustle in content creation on a daily basis. This is why a social media calendar should be the bedrock of your campaigns – the only way to be successfully timely and agile across multiple accounts is to plan ahead.
Having a calendar in place can also limit time-zapping scrambles to create events-led content on the fly – knowing what’s coming up will help focus your attention on being creative and authentic to your brand rather than reactive.
Here are 5 steps to help you get started…
1. The template can be a document or a spreadsheet – it doesn’t have to be overly technical but it does need to be super-specific. On it you will include date, time, if there is a news or event hook. Then lay out in detail which platforms are relevant, what kind of content it will be, such as a video, and if there are any platform-specific technical considerations. For instance, image dimensions and orientation. Plus the date, time and any @mentions or collaborations that it might include.
There are plenty of online resources to get you started – for instance HootSuite offers a free Excel template download. There are also products available that offer a less DIY approach such as SproutSocial and Agorapulse, which you may already be using for cross-posting or reporting purposes.
2. The key is that the calendar allows users to see at a glance what is coming up, but also to drill down into the details. This overview is also a great insight into your activity patterns. Do you tend to stick to a particular day of the week? And if so, looking at your metrics dashboards, are these the times your audience is most active?
3. Do you have all the assets you need for the next month? That might include graphics, images, permissions. Or it might be as simple as ensuring that a filming slot needs to be filled by a certain date to allow for editing and review. Social media done in a hurry isn’t optimal and not having everything to hand makes cross-posting to several platforms at once a nightmare.
4. Of course you want to be able to react to real-time events if possible, however keeping a running schedule of sporting, cultural and news events is a leg up worth having. You may not immediately see the relevance of the Fifa World Cup or The Proms, but marking them well in advance can start the creative suggestions and increase agility should events go viral.
5. Your final job is to decide your metrics of success. For some, the role of social media is visibility, so you would tailor posts towards reach rather than engagement. For others it could be data collection or social proof, which is another way to describe online credibility. Every post scheduled needs to be assigned a role in your overall strategy. Otherwise it’s so much harder to assess how effective you have been.
