What Your Content Plan Should Include
Content creation is an essential part of your small business marketing plan. Whether you are posting on Instagram, sharing videos on TikTok, or drafting blog articles, you are definitely a content creator! While offering insights to your clients and sharing your thoughts with others is fun, it’s easy to run out of ideas or fall off your content schedule. That’s why you need a content plan.
A great content plan can help you get organized and set reasonable goals for your marketing efforts. Follow these steps to make sure your content plan has everything it needs to help you succeed.
Content Goals
Everything you do should tie back to a big-picture goal—and your content is no exception. Reflect on what you hope to achieve through your marketing efforts and how you will know they are effective. You can use SMART goal setting to add actionable metrics to your big-picture dreams. Here are a few examples:
I want to grow my potential leads by bringing 100 people to my website each month.
I will create social media content to reach 1,000 new customers.
I plan to upsell existing clients by creating internal email newsletters.
Once you set your goals, you can focus on achieving them through your content plan. For example, consider how often you will have to post on social media to reach 1,000 new people. Each piece of content you make brings you closer to reaching your goals.
An Editorial Calendar
An editorial calendar allows you to organize your content and stay on schedule. Too often, small business owners create content when they have time, which means it is inconsistent. They will share several social media updates one week and then their accounts will go dark when their workloads increase. An editorial calendar allows you to spread out your content for greater consistency.
Consider investing in a scheduling tool so you can create content in batches and publish it over a longer period of time. This allows you to create content for the month in just a few days.
Your Brand Voice and Tone
Every brand has its own unique tone that guides its word choice and flow of the content. Your branding is a reflection of you and your business. Even if you are the only one creating content for your company, spend some time thinking about your desired tone of voice. Consider how you want to speak to your audience and what you want them to think of you.
During these meditations, write down your dreams for your brand and other thoughts related to your content. Some people even create brand vision boards to guide their efforts. Whenever you create content in the future, you can review your branding guidelines beforehand to make sure each post is a perfect reflection of you.
Target Personas
As you develop your brand voice, work on your target personas. These are profiles of the people you will try to reach with your content. Some brands have a few different personas that they create content for, while others keep the focus narrow. The posts might have a slightly different tone or call to action depending on the personas they speaking to.
These personas can also make you more strategic with your content plan. Along with setting your goals—addressing why you are creating the content—these personas focus on who you are making it for. They can make you more mindful of the content you create.
Success Metrics
Your content plan doesn’t just tell you what to create, it can also report on the performance of existing posts. Set aside space in your calendar to record metrics a week, a month, and six months after you publish your content. This will help you track which concepts and ideas were the most successful.
At the end of each month, look at the content that performed the best and try to create similar pieces or styles that appeal to your followers. A few common key performance indicators (KPIs) to track include your reach, engagement, video views, website visits, time on site, and conversions. Here is a useful guide to learn more.
Grow Your Business Through Content Marketing
Your content plan can guide your blog and social media strategy. You can develop a timeline to share posts and see which ones performed the best. This process allows you to be mindful of why you are creating content and investing in digital marketing.
To grow your business in other ways, work with mentors who can help you move forward. At Sweet Sleep Academy, we have several opportunities to help you grow professionally. We offer mentorships and coaching sessions to hone your skills, and our upcoming workshops are great opportunities to learn more and connect with other entrepreneurs.
Enroll today today and begin the journey of taking your business to the next level with Sweet Sleep Academy!
