Easy Ways to Create a Social Media Schedule
Having a hard time managing your different social media accounts? Perhaps you need a schedule to help you organize your posts. Here’s how you can do it.
As a digital strategist, managing social media is no joke.
For some, they may think that it is an easy job. You just have to log in and post content.
But if you are handling social media accounts for businesses, it is more than just posting. Imagine handling Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter, Youtube, Instagram, etc. all at the same time.
It’s crazy and overwhelming!
You need good content.
You need a strategy.
You need to be organized.
And you need to be consistent.
To tell you honestly, it is a lot of work. And there’s no room for mistake.
That’s why you need a social media schedule that is effective for your organization/business.
But how and where to start?
Here are the steps that I always follow when I make a social media schedule:
Step 1 – Know the interest of your audience
Don’t just go ahead and post. Know what, where and when to post. Know what is relevant and valuable to your audience. Know what they are talking about and what they want to hear. Once you’ve unlocked this, it would be easy to create content and material that you can distribute in different social media channels.
I use Canva when creating visually appealing social media content.
Step 2 – Decide on how often to post
Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Pinterest, etc., have different best times to post. Their effective use also varies to the quantity of post being published.
There are social media that do not necessarily need 2 or 3 posts a day like LinkedIn.
However, there are social media that needs frequent posting to be more effective, like Twitter.
You have to study and strategize properly on how to distribute your content. This will also help you in creating the right amount of content for a given time.
The most important thing that you just have to remember when deciding on how often to post, it is not about quantity. It is about quality.
Hootsuite is one of the best tools in scheduling your content on different social media platforms. It also has an automatic posting where it posts content during peak hours.
Step 3 – Curate or source great content to share
Creating content is not easy. And you can’t expect yourself to create original content every single time, forever. Your mind will get tired and you’ll probably end up crazy, especially if you need original content every minute.
The best way to source great content is to browse on different websites that are relevant to your brand. Curate blogs, news reports or articles from these sites. Curate as many as you can.
Feedly is a great website when searching for quality content for curation. It is easy to use and gives you a wide range of articles in different areas. It also has an app that you can download so you can easily browse articles on your mobile phones.
Step 4 – Fill up your social media editorial calendar
Once you’ve figured out what your audience would like to see or read, how often do you plan to post this and where to source your content, you can now plot it in your editorial calendar.
There are free templates out there that you can use. But you can also create your own. You can customize it according to your social media goal and requirements. Just make sure to organize it in a way that you can easily use. Stick with it and make necessary adjustments if need.
Having a social media schedule will help you be organized in managing your accounts. It can also help you be productive. Just remember that social media success is not a one night thing.
It takes a lot of time, research and trial and error to perfectly find the right strategy for your brand. So be patient.
If you want to know more about social media management, make sure to subscribe to our newsletter for weekly tips!
If you need help with social media content or creating a social media editorial calendar, check out our 365 Days Social Media Content Strategy
May you have more followers on social media.
The Digital Strategists Team