If you create any kind of written material for your business, an editorial calendar is a must. Flying blind is not a good marketing strategy and winging it is not sustainable. With a plan in place, you can keep your content flowing at a steady pace.
What Is an Editorial Calendar?
It sounds very high-level but an editorial calendar does not have to be complicated. It’s just a central place to store your ideas for content, with a few additional details to track what is being done, when, and by whom.
There are probably apps available for creating such a calendar, but my clients and I find that a spreadsheet works great. You can easily share a spreadsheet between collaborators if you work with multiple creators; the fact that spreadsheets are basically free is an added bonus.
What Should I Include in My Calendar?
Think of the main things you want to track. Again, it doesn’t have to be complex. Here are some standard columns for a blog calendar:
- Subject/Title
- Keyword
- Key Points/Theme
- Featured Image
- Due Date
- Completed/Published Date
If more than one person is involved in the content creation process, you might want to have additional columns for:
- Writer Name
- Submitted Date
- Writer’s Notes
And if you have a separate editing process, you might want a column for the editor’s name and the date editing was completed.
You can do the same thing with other types of content, just by adding another tab or sheet to your spreadsheet. For example, a tab for social media might include a headline for the post and photo ideas. A tab for website or long-form content might include things like a word count in addition to the other columns listed above.
From there, you just fill in the blanks to complete your content schedule.
Pretty It Up
Spreadsheets have lots of formatting options. You can use a certain colour to indicate completed posts, or colours for particular writers.
Here are a couple of examples using some of my content. (I’m the only writer in my business but I added some fictional colleagues for demonstration purposes.)
First, a blog calendar:
And here, a social media calendar:
Easy to Set Up, Easy to Maintain
Once you get a format in place for your editorial calendar, it will be easy to maintain and update. You can always add or remove columns as needed and squeeze things in if you find something timely you want to write about.
One final word of advice: be reasonable. Make sure you keep your schedule manageable or else you’ll fall behind and get discouraged. More on that in my next post.
Photo of clocks by Tima Miroshnichenko on Pexels.