The Importance of an Editorial Calendar
photo credit: shim + sons
So. Let’s talk blog today. You know you want to.
As much as you love the freedom involved in posting whatever you want to whenever you want to, your readers sort of don’t. Here are five key reasons you need to get your act together and consider an editorial calendar:
1. Editorial calendars combat writer’s block in a BIG way. By having a set schedule of your daily posts, you’re much more likely to narrow your focus and get down to business— faster and more efficiently.
2. Your readers will thank you. By knowing what to expect each day, readers will tune in to their favorite topics, which in turn increases your traffic. Double whammy!
3. Content means everything. By focusing your content and expanding your niche, you can cover a wide basis while maintaining consistency and voice.
4. Magazines have done it successfully for years— why shouldn’t blogs?
5. Editorial calendars give you purpose and relevancy.
Try a variety of editorial calendars on for size– format, type and topic. We guarantee you’ll find one that fits!
Why hadn’t i thought of this before? This is getting made TODAY. Thanks Bakery!
Another thing is that sometimes PR reps want to see your calendar to know when their product might get featured. I have been working on putting one together since getting requests for it.
Thank you, this is great advice. It’s just like the rest of your life–having a schedule takes the guess work and the dawdle out of your day. Not that we can always commit to a schedule easily!
Very cool concept. Got any examples?
Ditto the examples!
I LOVE schedules, and love making them even more.
Sarah, as far as examples are concerned, you can see a good example here: http://archrecord.construction.com/calendar.asp
You can do a complex one or a simple one, depending on your needs.
so right … i really try to do this, but sometimes, i’m weak
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That’s really good advice … which I must take on myself.
Whilst i can understand the benifit of creating a schedule i really think that one of the best things about blogs is there spontiniety?
Although i will deffonatly think about including some kind of schedule to my blogging….maybe an alternative to planning a month ahead is to specify a day for a certain type of post? ie Monday is weird building day?
We drive all of our blogs for our clients through ed calendars but they all work slightly differently (for the example pile):
1. Client A; Every month, we (all the stakeholders) meet as an ed team to decide specific topics, sources and angles. Those posts are written and made each week the following month.
2. Client B: We meet every month to brainstorm general topics. When the CEO/ Author gets inspired, he sends a post. We aim to make sure we have a new post every Thursday.
3. Client C: Every Monday we post a new story pulled from a litany of brainstorms in various meetings. We assure that each month we post at least one video, a few photos and a few text (to mix up the content).
4. Client D: We get random emails with hot topics every few days and decide once a week what the most relevant topic is and move with a post. Once a month we’ll review other pending topics but rarely to prescribe a calendar – only to keep the juices flowing.
Blog editorial calendars are not like newspaper/magazine calendars – they have budgets that drive how big the papers are, depending on ad revenues. We don’t have those constraints with blogs, although letting readers know what your frequency and voice is, helps immensely.
the weeks i plan out my posts are so much less stressful than when i don’t. but, of course, i’ve never formalized the process! now i’m guest blogging at two sites other than my own and i know i need help.
this will definitely be my organization project for next week!
Ruth, I totally agree. Many people work differently and depending on what type of blog you have or person you are, you will likely have a different approach to editorial organization.
I don’t organize too much on Design Milk, but I try to regularly post something in every category every week. Our contributors are on fairly regular schedules too. However, we don’t have every post planned right down to the specific topic.
With many blogs, you can’t do that because you need to be timely and have the ability to respond to the trends quickly, to Luke’s point above. There is definitely a need for spontaneity as well.
from this post till the “Welcome to the Bakery!” one…I have to admit that you’re doing great job here!
keep posting and helping all the bloggers of the universe!!
It’s maybe the FISRT blog I’ve red post by post…!
Congratulations!
and THANK you for all the advices
Cheers
C
Thanks so much Costas
i have tried this and it is helpful. but in my head I’m still a bit random. for example, i have weekly features…but daily features feel a little contrived. i do tend to spill all my thoughts out on a particular topic as it comes up which seems random…but usually it has to do with creativity…and overcoming obstacles…and then sometimes its just about pretty or funny things i come accross…or maybe a freebie or something nice…I am very new to blogging so I am hoping a natural pattern will reveal itself to me and I can go from there.
This was so, *so* helpful! While I agree with what’s been said above about allowing room for spontaneity, I have also been feeling the need for more structure, and this fits the bill perfectly. Even if I don’t stick to the editorial calendar 100%, it helps focus my energies and makes me feel like I’m getting somewhere (just wrote one up this week and so far, so good!) – thanks!
I did this out of necessity at the end of my first month of Scarf A Day – was going to burn out if I kept weaving a scarf every day but wanted to have some kind of content to post each weekday. Enter the weekly schedule: new scarves T-Th, a guest scarf on Friday, and any random scarf-related thoughts that pop into my head on Mondays. I plan the Friday guest spots well in advance so I don’t have to worry about them, I do the T-Th scarves as I’ve always done, and Monday’s there to let me be spontaneous.
This way my readers know what to expect and when to expect it and can come and visit on the days that interest them. I can also watch my website hits in Analytics to see which topics are of the most interest to my readers.
Works great for me but I may change it up every once in a while just to keep myself and my readers interested.
Niiice post thanks so much for this useful info