What do cross-country road trips, wedding speeches and social media marketing have in common? Planning Using a social media calendar is always the best option!

Most marketers now recognise that social media is an integral part of an effective inbound marketing strategy. With so many social networks available to us, it is critical to stay organised and plan when and what you will share on these platforms.

What is a social media calendar?

A social media calendar is a summary of your upcoming posts organised by date and time. A social media calendar can be a spreadsheet, a digital calendar or an interactive dashboard.

To get the most value from your social media calendar, you can include the following:

• The date and time at which a publication will be published
• The social network or network account will be activated on
• Materials to be included, such as copy, hashtags, links and graphics.

How to create a social media calendar

To create an effective social media calendar, you must:

1. Conduct a social media audit.

A social media audit assesses your social media presence, accounts and engagement so you can see what's working, what's not and where improvements need to be made. To find out how to conduct a social media audit, click here.

2. Choose your social media channels and the content you will publish.

After conducting a social media audit, you should have a comprehensive understanding of what channels your audience uses and the type of content they prefer. You should use your findings to determine which social media channels you will leverage and the content you will publish.

For example, you may notice that your audience prefers your behind-the-scenes content on Instagram, but goes to Twitter to ask questions and learn more about your product. In that case, you can post fun behind-the-scenes photos and Reels on Instagram, then use Twitter to share information about your product and answer consumer questions.

3. Decide what your calendar should include.

Your social media calendar should be tailored to your business and objectives, so you should include information in our calendar that will enable you to get the results you want.

To begin with, your calendar should include the following:

• The platforms you are using
• The day and time your publications will be published.
• Links, graphics, videos and copy

As you become more proficient with your calendar, you may want to expand it to include the following:

Platform-specific materials include Reels, TikTok LIVE, surveys, purchasable publications, etc.

Geolocation

Associated or vertical campaigns, such as product launches and competitions.

4. Get feedback.

Once your calendar is complete, share it with your team and stakeholders to get their feedback and make sure it meets everyone's needs. As you use the calendar, you may find ways to improve or expand it; you will need to be open to ongoing feedback.

What is the best social media calendar?

Now that we've laid out useful points for setting up your social media. The best social media calendar saves you time, streamlines processes and helps you work smarter, not harder.

We recommend you to consult our unlimited marketing and design plans, we are a team that will help you in the planning of your entire social media strategy.