In developing your content marketing strategy, you’ve familiarized yourself with your organization, determined your marketing goals, and gotten to know your target market and audience. This allowed you to choose the type of content and establish your resources budget.
In step six, it’s time to plan out that content by creating an editorial or content calendar.
A content or editorial calendar is a great way to bring your marketing team together, stay organized, and stay on target. However simple or complex it needs to be, a content calendar will help you plan, write, and schedule your content on a daily, weekly, or monthly schedule.
When creating your calendar, there are a few things you should account for:
- Frequency of content
- Topics covered
- Types of content you create
- Who will use the calendar
- Length of time needed to create, edit, approve, and publish content
- Platform used to manage the calendar
- Where content will be distributed
- Key dates, events, or milestones that require content
- Status of each piece of content: Concept, editing, published, etc.
Considering these factors, try to plan your content out for the next 6-12 months. The specific software or platform you use for your calendar can be as simple as a free Google Doc or Sheet, a Trello account, or more complex CRM software.
Be sure to factor in support tasks like brainstorming sessions and market research. Your calendar should also include details like the content’s goals or audience (if it’s narrower than your overall marketing strategy), target keywords, and specific calls-to-action to include.
Creating a 6-12-month editorial calendar can help your marketing team keep track of your content and topics, and help the execution of your marketing strategy go more smoothly.
Emily Jacobs: Freelance Writer 