I’ve spent a lot of time in my career working on content calendars, mostly for companies and clients. I’m sharing my experience with content calendars in this episode and whether I really think everyone needs one. I also offer suggestions on how to make a content calendar or schedule work for you and your creation style.
Have any reflections on this episode or want to share how you’ve used (or not used) content calendars in the past? I invite you to share in the comments below. Enjoy the episode!
Below is a transcript of the episode for your reference—please excuse grammatical errors!
Welcome back, creators! This is episode eight of the Mindful Content Creator Podcast, and today I want to talk about something that I'm frequently asked about and have also created myself many times, and that is the content calendar or the content schedule.
I've created content calendars at my corporate jobs and for individuals with their own businesses, and these were very detailed calendars outlining when and where to post, and the exact topic of that post. And these calendars were sometimes followed and sometimes not. So for my answer to the question of, “Do I need a content calendar?”, I'm going to quote the amazing and wise Yin Yoga teacher, Bernie Clark, who says this in response to many questions about the practice, usually about whether a pose should be practiced a specific way, and he says: “Yes. No. Maybe. It depends.”
I know not everyone loves that kind of answer. Some people want a very clear answer and some people love the openness. But wherever you fall, I'll try to help you get some clarity on what's right for you with the information that I share in this episode.
I say it all the time, but mindful content creation is about working in a flow that's best for you and not for someone else. So whether you need a content calendar really depends on how you work. And I have talked about this a little bit in previous episodes, specifically episode five when I talked about your content creation style and the “when” portion of that.
There are upsides and downsides to content calendars. So let's start with the benefits. An upside is obviously the organization. It guides you and keeps you on track to create and share content. You won't feel lost on what you're creating week to week or day to day, as long as you have it mapped out on your calendar in advance.
In my corporate life, I definitely used content calendars all the time. Corporate life thrives off of plans, and that's typical because you're always working in large teams or on projects that have multiple moving parts. I was always creating the “working backwards” communication calendar as we called it, working back from the date of launch or the date of the event to schedule the appropriate deadlines. I'm still a fan of that to an extent, especially if multiple people are involved in a project, but it isn't always necessary.
I think having a content calendar will benefit you if:
One, you are the type of person who thrives under structure and organization. You like to have things mapped out and ready to go day to day, and you like working ahead.
Two, you have a team. If you have other people writing some things for you here and there, or editing some things, keeping everyone in sync and on track will be good for you and for them.
Three, you have a lot of product launches or events to share that have clear deadlines in regards to when they are live. So in that case, a working backwards calendar can really help.
And for the downsides, the main downside to a content calendar is that it can feel too formulaic or restrictive, and you quickly fall off of following it because it doesn't feel creative or fun.
So having a detailed calendar might not work for you if:
One, you prefer to follow your intuition, especially with creation, and find yourself to be most creative when you're going with the flow.
Two, you tend to feel locked in by schedules or plans, so content creation could become more of a chore than a creative outlet.
Three, you don't do well with deadlines or they make you anxious. I've always disliked tight deadlines and feeling like I'm timed or racing to get something out. So I'll be honest in saying that a strict schedule can make you more anxious about creation and force you to create because you feel like you have to.
So a major downside is that it can be really easy to end up creating a calendar that you don't really use or keep up with, and that can make you feel bad or guilty or like you're behind. And when we start to feel that way, we can stop ourselves from creating altogether, and that's what we want to avoid.
Ultimately, a lot of this will depend upon whether you're someone who likes to be intuitive and to go with the flow, or if you crave structure. And different people thrive under the different structures, and there's really no right or wrong.
You might even fall somewhere in between. And sometimes people who go with the flow could benefit from some sort of loose structure. My friend Tanisha White once said something that stuck with me about structure versus flow, and she said that it's great to go with the flow, but a lot of times you need some sort of structure so you know which direction you're flowing in. Otherwise you kind of just flow all over the place a little bit lost, and I think that's totally true. I've seen it and I've been that person.
I am someone who wants to follow her intuition more with content creation, but I do like to have just a little bit of structure. So while I have worked with clients to make really detailed content calendars, I don't believe any more that they're a hundred percent necessary. It made sense in my corporate life to do it when big teams were involved, but as a solopreneur, it doesn't always feel aligned.
Plus a calendar to me now feels really corporate and it's easy to let these calendars get centered solely around something you're marketing or selling. So even if you have a content calendar, I think it's important to remember to create, not just because you have something to sell or something to promote, but because you actually have something to say.
My structure comes now in the form of knowing which days of the week I want to publish or share something, and how many times a week I want to share it. At this point, I do not create much content that far in advance. I don't always even know what the topic is going to be in advance. I find that each week the topic for my podcast simply just comes to me.
I admit that sometimes I get that, “Oh no, what am I gonna talk about this week?” panic. But it goes away fast because almost as soon as I ask myself that question, the ideas start to drop in. Or I see something on my idea list that inspires me in that moment. And I think this is because I am more tapped into my intuition now than I was in my corporate life. And I'm tapped into my why for content creation and into my intentions, and it just makes things flow a little bit easier.
I use both the notes app on my phone and an app called Evernote, the free version, to log my ideas. I created notebooks in Evernote for each of my creative projects, and anytime an idea comes, I create a new note for it.
I write down any fragments or thoughts, or I even journal a little bit on the idea in those notes. Then when I'm feeling ready to create, I might revisit those notes and then intuitively select the one that I want to work on. I seem to always know instinctively which one is ready to go, or I may have an entirely new idea that week, and I'll just run with that and start working on it. So maybe you don't necessarily have a drawn out formal pretty calendar, but instead you have an ongoing list of ideas that you just kind of intuitively pull from.
My last piece of advice for those who are more of a go-with-the-flow type, but who want to try using a more detailed and specific content calendar, would be to try creating your content first, then schedule it into the calendar rather than the other way around.
So if you put, for example, an Instagram post on a specific topic onto your calendar for Wednesday at 2:00 PM and then when that time rolls around to create that post and share that piece of content, you might not actually feel motivated in that moment to create it. You might rush it then and then force it. But if you already had that hit of inspiration and wrote that post, or maybe most of that post, you just need to make final edits to it, then it becomes easy to schedule it, and some of that pressure of like you gotta create right now goes away.
Whether your calendar is fully flushed out or more loosely defined, just try not to force yourself to create if you aren't feeling it, and try not to feel guilty if it just doesn't happen for you that week because you had other priorities or other things going on. I believe in being devoted and committed, absolutely, but not at the expense of our mental, emotional, or physical health.
So if you miss a day or a week, it's okay. Make that decision, make peace with it, then come back fully rejuvenated for the next round. Who knows? You know, you might create something even better than if you had tried to keep up with every single week.
Let your community know you're taking a break if you need to, and all you have to say is that you're taking a break. I want to normalize this. It's okay not to turn things out constantly, and we don't have to tell people why. We don't have to have a reason why. We just need a break.
If you have no clue whether you'll benefit from having a calendar or not, the best thing I can tell you is to just try making one. I used to make mine in a simple Google spreadsheet or an Excel sheet, and you could even just use a physical paper planner. Sometimes it's more fun if you get to use, you know, colorful pens or pencils, and if spreadsheets and calendars just feel way overwhelming to you, just use a simple typed up document, noting the day and what you want to post. It doesn't have to be overproduced, it just has to work for you. And if you have a team, then having it work for both you and the team obviously would be good.
I want to know what questions you have about content calendars. What's been your experience with them? What have you tried? Head over to the community on Substack and leave a comment on the post for this episode. The link will be in the show notes.
I hope this was helpful for you and that you feel empowered to have—or not have—a calendar, whichever you choose. Thank you for listening. Until next time, creators.
