Swipe my Content Planning System
The exact way I plan my content for Instagram
Do you have a good process for planning content for social media?
It used to be a struggle for me to come up with five posts a week.
That is until I created my content creation system.
And now there is no guesswork and no staring at the screen trying to come up with a good post.
And in fact, I love the process of planning and creating content now!
So I am excited to share with you the exact way I plan my Instagram content so that you can swipe it for yourself.
The system I use includes the Ultimate Content Calendar I created to speed up the planning for me and my clients. It's an all-in-one content planning tool and Airtable template. And I'm making it available for you!
Stay tuned for more details on the Content Calendar. But don't worry - my system works without the template also!
Below is my fool-proof recipe to easily and effectively plan your content.
Plan Your Topics a Month in Advance
At the end of every month, I start planning the topics for the following month.
Side note on planning: Some people like to plan, create and schedule all their content in one day for the entire month. And if that works for them, that's awesome.
I like to plan out my topics a month out but then wait until the week before (and sometimes the week of) to create the content. It gives me the flexibility to adjust the caption based on what's happening that week or my mood. Creating the content is something that I enjoy so I like spreading out the work over the month.
Do what works for you and your workflow and creative process!
Step 1: Decide how often to post
How often you post on social media or send your emails out is entirely up to you. If you are trying to grow your account, I believe it's important to show up weekly with quality content. But that doesn’t mean you have to post everyday. Figure out a schedule that works for you and stick to it. Read more here about how to be consistent on social media.
Add holds on your calendar for all the days you plan on posting. Utilizing a calendar for your content planning is key for me. I used to add it to my to-do lists but that doesn't give me the full picture like a calendar view does. I also love the flexibility of moving a topic from one calendar spot to another in a Calendar view (which you can do easily in my Ultimate Content Calendar).
Step 2: Build out your calendar
Now it's time to fill in those holds on your calendar with topics. Here we aren't trying to write the caption or create the graphic. Just the general topic you will cover that day. Of course, if you have ideas for the actual content, make sure to note those in the description!
Start with what’s already happening.
What do you have planned for this month? Are you launching anything or speaking at any events? Are you doing any writing that can work well with social media posts like for your blog? Add those to the calendar first.
Add in national and social media holidays.
There are so many holidays now to create content around. Choose the ones that fit within your content pillars and add them to your calendar. (Note that the Ultimate Content Calendar comes with 180 Social Media holidays built in!)
Plan theme weeks or a series
I like to do a theme week once a month. Take one idea or concept and break it down into something smaller with a different angle each day. It’s a quick way to fill up a week of content! Another option is to do a series of content. For instance, if you've written a blog post with 5 steps, turn those 5 steps into a weekly post for 5 days. So every Tuesday you post about one of the steps.
Assign days to each content pillar or content type.
Fill in the rest of your calendar by assigning a day to each of your content pillars (the main topic your brand is known for). With three main pillars and two supporting pillars, there are five days of content each week right there. Or maybe you'd assign a day to a content type so every Monday you have a quote or Wednesdays is for Reels.
Step 3: Gather inspiration and new ideas
So you have your calendar built out, but you still need to come up with the individual topics for those content pillar or content-type days. Here are my top three places to get that inspiration:
Instagram - Search the hashtags related to each of your content pillars. What are other accounts talking about? Any ideas you can swipe?
Answer the Public - Find out what other people are searching for on the internet. Type your content pillar into the search bar and you’ll be flooded with ideas!
Pinterest - Another gold mine for ideas. Their search results are ranked by pins that are currently trending. Use those ideas and you’ll also be trending!
Topic Prompts - The Ultimate Content Calendar comes with over 90 topic prompts so you are never at a loss for what to post!
Add those to the notes section in your calendar.
Start Creating Your Content a Week in Advance
As I mentioned above, while I plan out my content topics a month in advance, I do the brainstorming and creating the content in the week leading up to the post.
Step 4: Brainstorm the Specifics
So now you know the topic you want to post about but what's the meat of the post going to be? What story or tips will you share? Will it be a photo or a graphic you design on Canva? Or maybe you'll go the video route and do a fun reel.
This can be the hard part for most people, including myself. You want your content to be authentic to you and your brand. It's not enough to take a topic and just write about it. You want to tell a story, paint a picture, give value in a way that only you can, and connect with your audience.
So this step is one not to rush. It takes some brainstorming to think about the best way to authentically convey your message around a topic. When you take the time to do some intentional brainstorming, you will no doubt have those aha moments that will lead to a great post!
Here's my process:
Every Monday, I take a look at the following week's content calendar and make a mental note of what topics I need to brainstorm about. Usually, it's about 3 posts a week that I don't already have the full content mostly nailed down.
I jot down my immediate thoughts into the notes section of those posts.
For the ones where I am still stuck on what I want to do, I task myself a mini-brainstorming session during the times I think best and am most creative:
in the shower
walking the dog
working out
mindlessly scrolling Instagram
In the mini-brainstorming sessions, I start with the topic and just let my mind wander. It doesn't take me long before I have it all written out in my head. As soon as I can after I have that aha, I add it to the notes section. I usually also have new ideas for future posts that I add to the "My Ideas" tab in the Ultimate Content Calendar.
This process rarely fails me. I can stare at the computer all day long and never come up with anything, but I start washing my hair and the ideas just come flooding out!
Step 5: Batch the work
Now that I know what I'm going to post, it's time to get to work creating the content. And this is where I try to batch the work as much as possible. Batching is the process of grouping similar tasks to do them all at one time. So in one sitting I may create your graphics for the week in Canva or edit the photos in A Color Story App and in another sitting, write all of the captions. It really can save you a ton of time as you aren’t multitasking with different skill sets at once.
Once I have the visual piece done, I go into Later where I actually draft my caption from my notes, create the first comment with my custom hashtags for that post, tag any relevant accounts, add my location and schedule!
And that's it! The process does go very smoothly once I get all my topics planned out on my Calendar.
Get the Ultimate Content Calendar
It’s an automated base in Airtable that serves up over 90 content ideas, 190 social media holidays in an easy-to-use template that takes the stress out of content planning. Watch it in action here.
Save time, stay organized, and never run out of content to post!