Author: Franz Malten Buemann

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Find out how you can get started with online marketing, and which GetResponse plan is right for you. This article features some of the digital tools that come standard within each plan!

“We have a 9 a.m. meeting? Hold on — let me scour the internet to find content for the morning tweet.”
Sound familiar?

Scrambling for social content is nothing new. We have meetings. We miss deadlines. Things come up. And it’s really hard to get any meaningful amount of work done when you have the next social media update looming over your head every 30, 60, or 90 minutes. Social media content moves so fast that you might occasionally feel thrown for a loop, which is why a pre-scheduled social media content calendar should be your new best friend.
To make social media content easier for companies to plan and schedule across the accounts they manage, we created a social media content calendar template. And because this field moves so quickly, we’re always updating this template with the latest social platform features to help you share your content strategy at a tactical level.

Use the Above Template to Plan Out Your Social Media Holiday Posts

What’s in this social media content calendar template?
Every social media content calendar is different and should be customized to fit your unique social media strategy. In this one, you’ll find a schedule tab, your monthly planning calendar, a repository for website content, and updates for each of the top social media platforms:

Twitter
Facebook
LinkedIn
Instagram
Pinterest

The great thing about this template is that as new social media platforms become popular and part of your content strategy (looking at you Tik Tok and Clubhouse), you can simply copy the spreadsheet and repurpose it for that new channel.
This blog post will walk you through exactly how to use a social media content calendar template to stay on top of your social media content planning for each channel.
Pro Tip: HubSpot customers can also schedule content through HubSpot’s Social Media Management Software, or use this spreadsheet to organize and upload content. Detailed instructions for doing this can be found in the cover sheet of the template.

How to Create a Social Media Content Calendar Template
When you open the social media content calendar template, you’ll notice the bottom of the Excel spreadsheet has several different tabs, most of which are dedicated to a specific social network.

Since each social media network is a little different, you don’t want to craft a generic social media post and use it across LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest. Instead, it’s best practice to create a different worksheet for each platform.
Why?
A few reasons. Image sizes vary across all platforms, the types of content that work well on Facebook might tank on Twitter, and external links are great for Twitter but nearly impossible to use effectively on Instagram.
You can certainly promote the same piece of content across those networks, but that doesn’t mean you’ll craft your update the same way for each of them. In fact, you may want to add additional tabs if you’re active on other networks, like Quora or YouTube.
How to Use this Template
The following subsections will show you how to fill out each of the tabs you see in this template — Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Pinterest. But before we get to that, let’s start with the Monthly Social Calendar.
Monthly Planning Calendar
The tab Monthly Planning Calendar provides an overall snapshot of your monthly social media campaigns. It’ll help you coordinate with other stakeholders and keep all the moving parts in order. Here’s what it looks like:

There are three sections to take note of when you edit this template. First, the color-coding key. Each color represents a type of content or campaign you might coordinate, like ebooks, webinars, blog posts, product launches, and so on. Though only some of these might be relevant to you, they’re just the beginning of what you may want to include here — so be sure to add and remove categories that align with your own types of content.
The other two sections you’ll need to edit are the Month and Year at the top of the calendar, as well as the cells below each day of the week. In those cells, you should enter the type of content you’ll be promoting that day and color-code it to align with the campaign it’s supporting.
Instead of deleting all the content in this spreadsheet each month, I recommend copying this worksheet twelve times over and creating a separate sheet for each month. (If that gets to be too overwhelming, you can always save those tabs as a separate workbook.)
Planning Your Social Media Content Calendar for Twitter
Alright, now let’s get to the social media content part of the calendar. This section will be the longest because all subsequent sections will draw on the instructions we go through here. If you only read one section in this whole post, make sure it’s this one.
Let’s say you want to add some tweets to your scheduling template. Scroll over to the Twitter Updates tab in the content calendar spreadsheet, where you’ll see this:

The first four columns, Day, Date, Time, and Date & Time are there for your convenience, and if you choose to use a third-party app for pre-scheduling your tweets (like HubSpot’s Social Media Management Software), then these columns will be useful. For now, just fill in the date for when you’ll publish updates to Twitter, and the time at which you’d like them to go out. The Date & Time column will automatically change based on what you type in the previous two columns.
Now, let’s move over to the Message column. Here, input the copy you’d like to appear in your tweet, bearing in mind you should cap it at 217 characters to allow enough room for a link. (Read this blog post for a full character count guide.) This spreadsheet will auto-calculate the number of characters you’ve entered to keep you on-point, turning yellow and eventually red as you approach 240 characters.
After you’ve composed your tweet, paste the URL you’d like to include in your tweet in the Link column. Be sure to include UTM parameters so you’ll know whether these tweets are driving traffic, leads, and customers. This is an important step to remember if you’d like to demonstrate ROI from social media. You can also use the Campaign column to add an associated campaign which helps with more detailed tracking and reporting.

Finally, in the Image column, attach the tweet’s image (if you have one). For Twitter, we recommend images that are 1200 x 670 pixels.
(Click here for a full cheat sheet of social media image sizes.)
If you’re having trouble attaching your image to the spreadsheet, follow these steps:
Step 1: Click on the cell where you’d like to place your image.

Step 2: Click Insert in the top row, then click the Image button, and finally, click Image in cell to choose your image.
Step 3: In the Insert image window, choose the option your photo will come from. In this example, we uploaded an image from our computer.

Step 4: You’ll now see the image appear in the cell.
Pro Tip: This process is just for organizational purposes. If you decide to upload the spreadsheet to your social media publishing software, it will not attach — you’ll have to do that manually. If you’re a HubSpot customer, details for how to bulk upload your Twitter content to the HubSpot Social PublishingTool can be found within the downloaded template.
Planning Your Social Media Content Calendar for Facebook
Now, let’s talk about how to plan your Facebook marketing content with this template. First, navigate to the tab in your template labeled Facebook Updates.

The first three columns, Day, Date, and Time are there for your convenience. Scroll over to the column labeled Message and input the copy you’d like to appear in your status update, corresponding to the days and times you’d like those updates to run. Then, move to the Link column and input the link that’ll be included in the update. (Don’t forget that UTM parameter.) If you’d like the update to be tagged to a certain campaign, include this in the Campaigns column. Finally, attach an image just like you did with your Twitter updates — if you’re using one. (These images should fit the dimensions of 1200 x 628 pixels.)
Planning Your Social Media Content Calendar for LinkedIn
LinkedIn Groups let you start conversations with your Group members and share company updates on your Company Page.

To begin, fill out the first column, Message, for every post you create, including those for a Company Page or a Group. Simply enter your copy into this column, and then navigate to the next two columns, Link and Campaign. Here, you’ll add your URL with a UTM parameter that you’ll use to track activity. Then add the campaign in the Campaign column, if you’re using one. If you’d like to use an image for an update, attach one using the instructions we shared earlier. We recommend uploading the image in the dimensions of 1200 x 1200 pixels for a clear, professional-looking post.
Planning Your Social Media Content Calendar for Instagram
Now, let’s move on to setting up your Instagram photos and videos. Scroll to the tab in your template labeled Instagram Updates.

The first three columns, Day, Date, and Time are there for your convenience. Head on over to the column labeled Message, and input the copy you’d like to appear in your post’s caption, corresponding to the days and times you’d like those updates to run. Keep in mind that although Instagram captions can be up to 2,200 characters long, they cut off in users’ feeds after three lines of text. The exact length of these three lines depends on the length of your Instagram handle. (Read this blog post for a full character count guide.)
Next, move to the Link for Bio column and input whichever link you plan to put in the bio when you publish the accompanying Instagram post. Oh, and don’t forget the UTM parameter.
If you’d like the update to be tagged to a certain campaign, include this in the Campaigns column. Finally, attach an image just like you did with your other social media updates — we suggest you edit it to be 1080 x 1080 pixels. (Here’s the cheat sheet of social media image sizes.)
Pro Tip: Even though you can’t schedule Instagram stories automatically, you can still add them to your social media content calendar. Stories also support links once your account has over 10,000 followers, so you can include specific links for these types of posts in your content calendar. The dimensions for Instagram Story posts are 1080 x 1920 pixels.
Planning Your Social Media Content Calendar for Pinterest
Next, let’s go over how to set up your Pinterest Pins in advance with this template. Navigate over to the tab in your template labeled Pinterest Updates.

For your convenience, we’ve added Day, Date, and Time columns, but you can skip them if you don’t need them.
Next, go to the column labeled Message, and enter the information for the pin’s description. Then, scroll to the Link column and add the link you’ll be including in the update. (And seriously, don’t forget the URL Parameter.)
If you’d like the update to be tagged to a certain campaign, include this in the Campaigns column. Finally, attach an image the same way you did with your other social media updates — we suggest you edit it to fit the dimensions of 1000 x1500 pixels. This is the standard size, but Pinterest Pins can be much longer if your audience responds to longer content. Just make sure your Pin fits the aspect ratio of 2:3.
Content Repository (Or, Where to Source Social Media Content)
This template also provides you with a tab called Content Repository, which should help you keep track of all your content and maintain a healthy backlog of fodder to make sourcing social media content easier.

As you create more assets, you’ll likely want to resurface and re-promote those pieces down the line, too. To ensure you don’t lose track of all of that content, record it on this tab so you’re never at a loss for what to publish on social media. If the content you’re promoting isn’t evergreen, be sure to include an expiration date in the column marked Expiration so you don’t promote it after it’s out of date.
This tab will also help you maintain a healthy balance of content. Here you can include a mix of original content, curated content, various formats and types, and lead generation content vs. MQL-generating content.

Perfecting your social media content calendar doesn’t have to be a chore. With these essential components, you’ll have a foundation to organize your social media strategy at a tactical level.
Key
As you noticed in earlier sections, your stakeholders will appreciate having an easy-to-read key that they can use to understand the information in the calendar. We’ve color-coded our example here, but you don’t have to go that extra step if you have fewer channels and types of content to differentiate between. As long as your key is clear, just about anyone in your organization can view your social media content calendar and understand exactly what’s happening on all platforms.
URLs and UTM Parameters
We’ve harped on these UTM parameters throughout this post for good reason. They’re critical to tracking the success of your campaign. Without them, you won’t know what’s working and what isn’t.
URLs and UTM parameters are similar, but they’re not one and the same. URLs are the links you’ll want to share from your website (or even another website if you’re curating content) on your social media platforms.
On the other hand, a UTM parameter is an extension of your URL. It’s a string of tracking code that’s appended to the end of the URL and it helps social media marketers track how well their posts are driving traffic to their website. By tracking and analyzing UTM parameters, you’ll be able to see what content is meeting your conversion goals and what content is better for engagement on social media platforms.
Date and Time
If you have stakeholders or other teams that rely on your social media content, you’ll quickly see the benefit of including dates and times in your social media calendar. When teammates can view the calendar and identify exactly when a post was or will be scheduled, they’ll be able to quickly proceed with their workflow which is beneficial for you, too. That means you won’t be interrupted to give status updates about every Tweet on the docket for the day.
Message
Transparency and context are invaluable when it comes to social media content calendars. Giving a brief synopsis of the message or even sharing the caption for a post can go a long way in helping others within and outside your team understand what the intent of the post will be.
Pro tip: If you’re adding a video to your social media content calendar that isn’t finished, consider adding a short Loom video that gives an overview of what the video will be about.
Campaign
When it comes to tracking, it’s too late to start when the campaign is over. Start tracking your social media campaigns in your content calendar. You can make this prescriptive by having a dropdown list of predetermined campaign names, or if your campaigns are few and far between, simply copy and paste the names next to the corresponding content.
Pro tip: Align your campaign name with the campaign section of your UTM parameter for seamless tracking.
Image
Your social media content calendar will become just another spreadsheet without some imagery. Since much of your social media content will probably be visual, add a thumbnail-sized version of the image that will be included in the published post. Coupled with the message, stakeholders who view the calendar images will have a pretty good idea of what will be shared and when. To make editing your images for each platform easier, check out this cheat sheet for ideal image dimensions on each platform.
Don’t Forget to Interact With Your Followers
Whether you use this spreadsheet to plan your content or upload it to a third-party app, you’ll still need to supplement these updates with on-the-fly content. Breaking news hits? Whip up a quick update to share it with your network. Did someone in your network tweet something interesting? Give it a retweet with some commentary. Got a fascinating comment on one of your updates? Respond with a “thank you” for their interaction.
Coming up with and scheduling your social media content in advance is a huge time-saver, but it should go without saying that you still need to monitor and add to your social presence throughout the day.
Finally, we encourage you to experiment with your social media publishing. This template provides publishing dates and times for each social network, but you may find those are way too many updates for you to fill, or perhaps too infrequent for your booming social presence. If this is the case, you should adjust your social media publishing frequency as needed.
Now that you’ve got the ins and outs of a social media content calendar, download the one below for free and start planning your content.
Editor’s note: This post was originally published in January 2020 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

When people arrive at your Facebook Page, where do you think they’ll look first?
I’ll give you a few hints. It’s a visual piece of content that sits at the top of your Page. Its dimensions are 820 pixels wide by 312 pixels tall. It takes up almost a quarter of the screen on most desktop browsers.
That’s right — it’s your Facebook cover photo.

A cover photo can transform your Facebook Business Page from a passive repository of your business’ activity to an inviting community. Whether you’re using Facebook to generate leads, close your next sale, or create a customer network, knowing how to create and optimize your Facebook cover photo will be essential to the success of your Page.
In this post, you’ll learn Facebook cover photo best practices with real-world examples of each tip we recommend. To get started, let’s dive into Facebook cover photo dimensions.

Sometimes called your Facebook banner, this graphic is one of the most noticeable parts of your Page. Facebook sets specific dimensions for cover photos in order to create a standard look across all Facebook Pages no matter what device they’re viewed on. Therefore, you’ll want to follow Facebook cover photo best practices and optimize your cover photo for the correct dimensions.
When you consider the Facebook cover photo dimensions above, it can be tough to balance creativity with the requirements of the platform. Mobile and desktop screens have different requirements and will display the same cover photo differently. Here’s what to look for when optimizing your cover photo for mobile and desktop devices.
How do Facebook cover photos appear on mobile screens vs. desktop screens?
It makes sense that mobile devices would display a smaller version of the cover photo than a desktop screen would, and the image below describes exactly why that happens. As you can see, there’s a lot of space around the perimeter of the photo that could be cut off when a visitor is viewing it on a mobile screen vs. a desktop screen if you’re not careful with your design.

Therefore, it’s best to place the important parts of your content in the green space. Doing this will make sure everyone can see your cover photo properly regardless of the device they’re using.
Need help getting started? Below, you’ll find Facebook cover photo templates and best practices to guide you when designing your brand’s cover photo artwork.

1. Abide by Facebook’s cover photo guidelines.
It seems like a no-brainer, but following Facebook’s cover photo guidelines is the first step to keeping your Facebook Page visible on the platform. I’d highly suggest reading through the full Page Guidelines, but here are a few important things to keep in mind for your Facebook cover photo:

Your cover photo is public.
Cover photos can’t be deceptive, misleading, or infringe on anyone else’s copyright.
You can’t encourage people to upload your cover photo to their personal timelines.

If you get caught violating the above terms, Facebook could take action against your Page. And while Facebook doesn’t explicitly say what will happen if you violate their cover photo guidelines, it’ll be pretty inconvenient to have your Facebook Page removed because of a cover photo infraction.
2. Make sure your Facebook cover photo is the right size.
As I mentioned earlier, the Facebook cover photo size is 820 pixels wide by 312 pixels tall for desktop screens, and 640 pixels wide by 360 pixels tall on mobile screens.
After spending time designing the perfect cover photo, the last thing you’ll want your visitors to see is a truncated version of it. If you upload an image smaller than those dimensions, Facebook will stretch it to fit the space. That means Facebook may only display a third of the image you designed.
If you want a no-hassle way to make sure your cover photos are the right size, download our pre-sized template for Facebook cover photos.
Featured Resource: Facebook Cover Photo Templates

Download the Free Templates
3. Don’t worry about the “20% text” rule.
Back in 2013, Facebook removed all references to the 20% rule on text in cover photos, but that doesn’t mean you should use a lot of text in your design. The previous rule stated that only 20% of a cover photo could display text. Although this rule might sound restrictive, the sentiment behind it had merit — you want your visitors engaged with visuals, not a wall of text.
If you’re going to use text in your cover photo, keep it concise and let the imagery speak for itself. You can see how we struck this balance on HubSpot’s Facebook Page below.
For more cover photo inspiration, check out our Facebook Page.
4. Give your cover image a focal point.
Think of your cover photo as the portion of your Page that’s “above the fold.” If it’s distracting or confusing, people will be more likely to click off the Page.
Many of the best Facebook cover photos include a focal point along with a color scheme that aligns with the rest of the brand. Remember, your social media accounts are extensions of your business and they should make a good first impression on visitors.
Great Facebook cover photos also have ample negative space to make the subject, the copy, and the elements unique to Facebook (like the CTA button on Facebook business Pages) stand out even more.
Here’s an example of a good use of negative space from The New York Times:

And here’s another example from social media management platform Sprout Social:

5. Avoid blending the contents of your cover photo with your profile picture.
With some clever design techniques, you could manipulate your profile picture and cover photo so they appear as if they’re two parts of the same canvas.
One of Paris’ old cover photos is a great example of this:

You can still do this on your personal profile, but Facebook no longer sets up Business Pages this way. Now, as shown in the examples earlier in this article, the profile picture is completely separate from the cover photo. So, instead of merging the two photos into one, have them complement each other with similar colors or contrasting patterns while still adhering to your brand guidelines.
6. Draw attention to the action buttons on the bottom right.
You may have noticed in a few of the cover photo examples above that the primary call-to-action (CTA) buttons were different. HubSpot’s CTA button says “Follow,” while Sprout Social’s says “Sign Up.”
Depending on your business, you can launch a Page on Facebook with a unique CTA button to the bottom right of your cover photo. Take the placement of this button into consideration when designing your cover photo.
LinkedIn Learning does this in a subtle way below, placing the graphic of a person on a laptop over the “Sign Up” button, drawing your eye to that blue CTA.

Note: While it might seem like a good idea to add directional cues like an arrow to get people to click on the CTA buttons, note that those CTA buttons don’t appear the same way on the mobile app. In other words, it might be confusing to mobile users if you directly integrate the cover photo design with the CTA buttons.
7. Right-align the objects in your cover photo.
Since your profile picture is on the left, you want to add some balance to your Facebook cover photo design by placing the focus of the image on the right.
Take a look at these cover photos. Which one looks more aesthetically pleasing?
Right-aligned focus:

Left-aligned focus:

Doesn’t the right-aligned cover photo look and feel a lot better? In Samsung’s new cover photo, the biggest design elements (the profile picture, the text, and the two phones) are evenly spaced. In Samsung’s old cover photo, your attention goes immediately to the left side of the Facebook Page, causing you to miss the name of the product on the upper-right side.
Not only is adding balance a crucial element of design, but it also allows your cover photos to be more visually effective on mobile. This brings me to my next point…
8. Keep mobile users in mind.
Statista reports that 98.5% of Facebook’s user base accesses the social network from mobile devices like smartphones and tablets. That’s huge — and it’s exactly why it’s so important to keep mobile users top-of-mind when designing your Facebook cover photo.
On mobile, a much smaller portion of the cover photo is visible. The right side is typically cut out entirely.
Let’s take a look at what Cisco’s Facebook Page looks like on a desktop browser versus on Facebook’s mobile app.
Desktop:

Mobile:

It’s important to note that the text in Cisco’s cover photo doesn’t appear. While right-aligned visual elements look great, be careful not to put important content so far to the right that it gets cut off when being viewed on a mobile device.
9. Include a shortened link in your cover photo description that aligns with your Page CTA.
If you want to use your cover photo to support a Page CTA, make sure your cover photo description also includes a text CTA and links to the same offer. This way, any time people view your cover photo by itself, they can still access the link.
Here’s this practice in action on the Adobe Creative Cloud Facebook Page:

Pro tip: Shorten your links and add UTM codes to track the visitors who view your cover photo and click the link in the description. Shortening and tracking features are available in HubSpot’s Marketing Hub and with tools like Bitly.
(If you want to learn more about how to write effective call-to-action copy for your cover photo description, download our free ebook on creating compelling CTAs.)
10. Pin a related post right below your Facebook cover image.
Pinning a post allows you to highlight a typical Facebook post at the top of your Timeline. It’s signified by a PINNED POST title on the top right of the post, like on Behance’s Page below:

How does this relate to optimizing your Facebook cover photo? Well, if you’re spending time aligning your Facebook Page CTA, your cover photo design, and your cover photo description copy, you should also make sure to post about the same thing directly to your Page and pin that post to the top of your Timeline.
That way, your visitors have one very clear call-to-action when they land on your Page (albeit in several different locations) — which will give them more opportunities to convert.
How to pin a Facebook post:Publish the post to Facebook, then click the three dots on the top right corner of the post and choose Pin to Top of Page.

Facebook Cover Photo Sizes that Work for Your Business
Choosing the right cover size for your Facebook Page may seem simple, but it can have a huge impact on users and prospects visiting your Page. An ill-fitting cover photo or video can look unprofessional and give the wrong impression about the quality of your products or services.
With the tips in this article, you have the information you need to create a Facebook cover photo that embodies your brand and engages users on the platform.
Editor’s note: This post was originally published in July 2020 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

What do cross-country road trips, wedding speeches, and social media marketing have in common? Planning.
You could improvise all three, but it’s better to have a plan for what direction you’re heading — especially when developing your social media content strategy.
By now, most marketers recognize that social media plays an integral role in an effective inbound marketing strategy. And with so many social networks available to us, it’s important to stay organized and have a plan for when and what you’re going to share on these platforms.

Let’s dive into our list of top tools to stay organized and on top of your game.

Social Media Content Calendar Tools to Plan Your Messaging
1. HubSpot’s Downloadable Template for Excel

Content Calendar
Price: Free

Download This Template
Marketers might already use Excel for different types of reports and data analysis in their roles, but this multifaceted tool is perfect for social media content calendar organization, too. Excel can be customized according to the priorities and metrics your team is focused on, so it’s a great option for planning ahead.
The good news? We’ve already done the heavy lifting for you by creating a free, downloadable social media content calendar template using Microsoft Excel. Marketers can use this template to easily plan out individual social media posts — monthly or annually — while keeping an eye on bigger picture events, holidays, publications, and partnerships.

Use the Monthly Planning Calendar Tab above to get a bird’s-eye view of what’s coming down the content pipeline in a given month.
In the Content Repository tab, you can add the content you’ll be publishing on this tab to keep track of which pieces have been promoted already and to easily recall older content that can be re-promoted.
On the Social Network Update tabs, you can draft and plan out social media posts in advance. These tabs are for organizational purposes, then you’ll manually upload the content of the posts to a social media publisher.

For more on how to use the templates, check out this in-depth guide from my colleague Lindsay Kolowich.
This free resource can be used to draft social media posts, or it can be bulk-uploaded into a publishing app to maximize efficiency. (HubSpot customers: You can use this spreadsheet to organize content and upload it directly into Social Inbox. For instructions on how to do this, check out the template’s cover sheet here.)
Why we like this social media tool:
Marketers with small teams and heavy workloads will love this intuitive template. It acts as a social media content planner, tracker, and archive. This makes it perfect for sharing your social plan with stakeholders and referring back to it when you need to repurpose old content.
2. Google Drive

Content Calendar and Asset Organization

Price: Free for personal use. Google Workspace plans for businesses start at $6 per month.
Google Drive has several helpful features that make it easy for social media marketers to build out an effective content calendar.
Here’s an example of how a team might use Google Calendar to track both their editorial and social media calendars to make sure they’re aligning posts with new blog content. These calendars can be easily shared with multiple teams to avoid scheduling conflicts and ensure that campaigns are aligned.

Marketers can also use shared Google Sheets to schedule posts on social media, track the status of different pieces of content, and assign tasks to team members — all on the same platform as their calendar.

With the help of Google Docs, users can keep comments all in one place and collaborate on different projects without emailing back-and-forth or having to schedule a meeting. This is a particularly useful feature when editing content for social media, which may need to be drafted and approved quickly.

Why we like this social media tool:
Google has several products that can be used together to create quick, seamless workflows. Whether you’re publishing dozens of posts per day across multiple platforms, or ramping up one channel for your freelance business, you’ll find value in the Google Drive system. The best part is that HubSpot customers can link their Google Drive accounts to the HubSpot portal to easily upload files from Drive into the HubSpot software.
3. Loomly

Content Planning, Creation, Publishing, and Calendar

Price: 15-day free trial. The Base plan is $25 per month for 2 users and 10 accounts when you choose the annual agreement.

Image Source
If you want more mileage out of your content calendar, you can turn to an all-in-one content planning and publishing platform such as Loomly.
Loomly offers tools beyond content scheduling and management. This tool goes further, providing inspiration and direction to help you create content. It also allows you to manage your content assets, schedule posts, view them as a list or a calendar, and analyze what posts are working vs which ones need work.
Loomly’s most robust feature set includes a collaboration and approval environment so that teams can submit mockups, provide comments, see version logs, and flag for approval. This can help you streamline processes for efficiency when there are “too many cooks in the kitchen” on a particular project.
Why we like this social media tool:
If your team is responsible for organic and paid social, this tool can do both. And for your team who wants to avoid using their personal account for social media duties, they can respond to comments and replies directly in Loomly — that means they won’t need to login to each native platform to engage with followers.
4. Trello

Task Management and Content Calendar

Price: Free for individual use. The Standard plan starts at $5 per user per month, billed annually.

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Looking for an organizational tool that’s highly effective for team collaboration? Try Trello. This platform offers a full calendar view which makes it easy to visualize what content is going out, and when. More specifically, social media managers can use Trello’s flexible assignment “cards” and customizable “boards” and “lists” to map out to-do lists, manage a content calendar, plan a campaign, and store brainstorm ideas.
You’re not limited to just one structure, though. Users can customize boards according to their needs. For example, a team could create a board to organize social media posts for a given week, on a specific platform, or post ideas around a topic, such as a campaign or awareness day.
Why we like this social media tool:
Trello cards can be assigned to different team members, marked with due dates, and commented on. Users can even customize labels with different publication statuses so the entire team can see the progress of their social media posts and when they’re due on the calendar. The labels could also indicate different social networks that content is being published on.
5. SproutSocial

Social Publishing and Content Calendar

Price: The Standard plan starts at $89 per month for five social profiles, billed annually.

Sprout Social’s social media calendar and publishing tool make it easy for teams or individuals to plan and schedule all of their social posts. You can schedule content to automatically post to Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and more.
You can also tag each social post and add notes to better track and report on your posting strategy and campaigns. Additionally, their publishing suite includes a tool called Optimal Send Times which analyzes your social media data and automatically publishes at a time your audience is most engaged.
Why we like this social media tool:
Coming up with social media content ideas isn’t always easy. Sprout Social’s social listening tool lets marketers like you uncover niche conversations that your audience is interested in. From there, you can join the conversation for brand awareness or start your own conversation on the topic to grow your following.
6. Evernote

Content Calendar, Task Management, and Asset Organization

Price: The Basic plan is free. Create a custom template using the Personal plan for $7.99 per month.

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Evernote is a note-taking app that marketers can use to keep track of all the moving parts that comprise a social media campaign.
The tool also features yearly, monthly, weekly, and hourly logs, which make it easy to keep track of when you’re publishing content on social media, when you’re producing blog content, and other team-wide priorities. (Evernote offers customizable templates for each of these that can be downloaded into the app.)
Another useful feature is Evernote’s Web Clipper extension for Chrome. Marketers can use this tool to easily save links to their Evernote Notebook for sharing later on.
Why we like this social media tool:
The Evernote mobile app also boasts some interesting features to help marketers keep their social content ideas straight. For example, you can easily snap a photo and save it to your Evernote files for review later. This feature is of particular value for social content creators looking to maintain a backlog of photos to publish on Instagram.
7. Hootsuite

Social Publishing and Content Calendar

Price: The Professional plan starts at $49 per month and starts with a free 14-day trial.

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Hootsuite offers a built-in Planner tool to help you create campaigns, identify publishing gaps, and collaborate with your content creation team. Its primary features are in social publishing so that you can release content to your networks in advance, but it also has rich features for collaboration and post approvals.
You can even curate content from other sources without logging into your account. Once your content is created, you can preview it with the Composer tool, which displays according to each social network’s unique format.
Why we like this social media tool:
Cross collaboration is a big deal on just about any marketing team, and Hootsuite has a way to make this even easier. The social publishing platform comes with a built-in content library that serves as the single point of truth for your entire organization. Does your sales team need a product feature cheatsheet? Customer service looking for details on the latest product feature? All that and more can be found in your team’s Hootsuite content library.
8. Agorapulse

Social Publishing and Content Calendar

Price: The individual plan is free, or you can use the Pro plan for small teams starting at $79 per month.

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Similar to Hootsuite, Agorapulse offers social publishing tools and a content calendar so that you can manage your social media accounts with ease. This includes scheduling (or rescheduling), queuing, and bulk uploading posts, which is incredibly helpful for teams who use quarterly or monthly content plans.
Why we like this social media tool:
What makes Agorapulse different is its social inbox that allows you to manage all the interactions from various platforms in a single place. After all, content isn’t just a one-and-done activity; it’s about building awareness and engagement with your readers as well.
9. StoryChief

Content Planning and Distribution

Price: Team pricing starts at $90 per month, billed annually.

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If you want more from your content calendar than simply knowing when posts go live, StoryChief is the option for you. With StoryChief’s smart calendar, you can better strategize and plan your content strategy across channels.
It displays much more than your timetable — it also allows you to assign collaborators to tasks and filter them by campaign. StoryChief self-describes its tool as a “content distribution platform” that unifies analytics and publishing across multiple channels for a more simplified approach to content creation. Best of all, it syncs with HubSpot and all of your favorite calendar apps.
Why we like this social media tool:
Believe it or not, there are quite a few similarities between social media marketing and SEO marketing. StoryChief bridges this gap with its SEO Copywriting tool. By highlighting the areas you can improve your copy for the reader (and subsequently the search engines), you can write clearer, more engaging content that works on both social media and on your website or blog.
10. ClearVoice

Content Creation and Management

Price: Request a free consultation for pricing.

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So what about content planning and creation? ClearVoice offers content creation tools to fit into your workflow. While their big claim to fame is their Talent Network Search which allows you to find and connect to content creators to work on your projects, ClearVoice also has features for task management for internal and external collaborators.
You can create, edit, and approve projects in an interface that makes editorial management easy. It also includes a dashboard and dynamic editorial calendar with plenty of interactive functionality, and integrations with other popular software.
Why we like this social media tool:
Not every social team is working for a big agency or client. For freelance content teams who want to stay organized and on time with their social media publishing, ClearVoice offers some of the same great features at a price customized to your team.
11. Zerys

Content Creation and Management

Price: $40 per document plus $49 per month for project management.

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Zerys is another platform that matches you with your ideal content creation freelancers. However, it markets itself as a platform dedicated to content success, offering features for content planning, production, publishing, promotion, conversion, and analytics.
Why we like this social media tool:
You can manage unlimited content projects, plan keywords and titles for blog content, hire writers, and view all deadlines on an integrated calendar. With the project management features that Zerys offers, in-house writers can use the platform to produce quality work on time every time. It also integrates with HubSpot so that publishing is a breeze.
Social Media Templates
HubSpot’s Social Media Calendar Template
If you’re new to setting up social media calendars, HubSpot offers a pre-made, free, and downloadable template that you can use to schedule out full weeks of posts.

HubSpot’s Social Media Content Calendar Template for Startups
This template is very similar to the one seen above but also has tabs that work as a repository for content ideas. The template also includes helpful tips for posting on specific social media networks.

If you’re aiming to get all of your ideas down in order to develop a big-picture plan for your social assets, we recommend starting with this template.
The Benefits of Using a Social Media Content Calendar
We’re all busy, and inevitably, tasks slip through the cracks. Social media content is no exception.
Just like with blogging, a successful social media strategy requires regular publishing and engaging with followers to see positive results — whether that’s in terms of SEO, brand recognition, lead generation, or all three.
So, if you’re not already using a social media content calendar, here are three facts to pique your interest:

You can pivot flawlessly when plans change by using a content calendar. With a social media content calendar, marketers can plan out posts for entire weeks or months in advance, which frees up working hours to strategize for the future. The best part is that you can always leave space for breaking news or current events in your industry. Otherwise, you’ll spend valuable time each day searching the internet every day for content to share, which is a known productivity killer.
Grow your audience on each platform by curating content specifically for them. Social media marketers should take the time to craft custom messages for each network because the audience expects to see something different on each one. For example, your Instagram followers want to see Reels and Videos while your Twitter followers like quick sound bites and shareable quotes. Planning this content in advance using a social media calendar will save you time throughout the week and ensure you’re being thoughtful and intentional when you post on each site.
Optimize your social strategy by tracking the performance of your content each month. Without a calendar, social media marketers are publishing content into the void and are unable to track big-picture and past performance. With a calendar, marketers can look back and analyze which content performed best so they can adjust their strategy accordingly. If a particular type of post received a significant amount of views, you could recreate it for a different topic and see the same success.
Take advantage of social media holidays to tap into a new, but relevant audience. With the help of a calendar, marketers can plan for holidays and observance days, such as National Cat Day, when they can tailor their content and engage with a wider audience.

Social Media Calendar Examples
1. JotForm Social Media Calendar

JotForm’s social media calendar isn’t just visually appealing, it’s also functional. The tabs at the top reveal your social plan for every channel you execute your strategy on, including in-person or virtual events. If you’re modeling your social calendar after this one, don’t forget to include a tab for content details and who on your team will be responsible for creating the content. You might also include a separate tab for each month to keep things organized.
2. Firefly Marketing Social Media Content Calendar

Going a more traditional route with your social media calendar? Try a Google Sheets template like the one created by Firefly Marketing. Each tab is dedicated to a different month while the worksheet includes every channel you might need across the top. The rows are separated by week so you can easily identify the date and time a post is scheduled for publishing. Our favorite part of this template is the social media holiday column that is pre-populated with fun dates that your audience will love.
What is the best social media calendar?
Now that we’ve reviewed a few helpful tools to kick your social media strategy into high gear, it’s time for you to experiment with them. The best social media calendar is one that saves you time, streamlines processes, and helps you work smarter, not harder.
Several of the platforms we’ve suggested are free to use or offer a free trial. Have one person on your team test one out and report back on their findings. You might just find the tool that helps you reach your next social media KPI. Don’t forget, every social media team is different, and it could be a combination of these tools that helps you execute your strategy efficiently to drive ROI.
Editor’s note: This post was originally published in 2017 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection feature has put the future of open rates in serious jeopardy. Let’s take a look at what the future of open rates looks like.
Ask any marketer what they measure their email marketing results by, and without fail, one of the first statistics they’ll mention is open rate.
It makes perfect sense that this would be one of the first metrics named, as it’s often the top line on anyone’s email marketing analytics dashboard. As long as marketers have been sending emails to customers and prospects, they’ve been looking at open rates to give an indicator of success.
But with the release of Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection feature, all of that is about to change. For a very in-depth look at MPP and how it works, you’ll want to consult our guide on the topic. But for the sake of this article, you only need to know this key effect:
MPP takes away marketers’ ability to track open rates, meaning the future of open rates, and how we measure success in email, is changing in real-time.
But does this mean that the open rate as a meaningful metric is really dead? Let’s take a look at the future of open rates, and how we can start thinking beyond them from this point forward.
So, are open rates really dead?
Yes, pretty much! Listen, the is ____ dead?! conversation is usually an overblown, knee-jerk reaction to something. People have been trying to say this about email for years. But this time, it’s very true. Email open rates as we know them are a thing of the past.
Here’s a quick rundown on how Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection feature works.
When a user opts-in to Mail Privacy Protection, they’re allowing Apple to pre-fetch (or download), emails and email images to their device. This takes place with or without the user deciding to open and read the email message. Email image pixels, which indicate opens and open rates, are included in this pre-loading. This means an email may be marked as open even though the user did not open or read it.
Anyone using the native Apple Mail application to read their email, be it on an iPhone, an iPad, or a Mac, is able to turn these features on. And while we don’t know what the option rate will be, you can expect it to be high. Initial surveys show that this could end up affecting 30-40% of your total subscriber list, depending on your demographic.
With 30-40% of your open rate data becoming completely unreliable, we think it’s safe to say that, as this feature gets adopted, open rate will become an increasingly unreliable and unimportant metric.
Why you don’t need open rates to be successful
While this may seem sudden and drastic, the truth is, open rates have never been as reliable as you might think. While open rate was designed to reflect human interaction with an email, those numbers have already been skewed in the past by anti-spam filters, autoresponders, and an increasing number of mailbox providers who had already disabled open tracking.
So, though this is the biggest and likely final nail in the coffin, the open rate was never the solid, reliable metric that you might have thought.
Even at its best, open rate as a metric was not a key indicator of success — it was merely a proxy we used along the way. Website visits, purchases, revenue generated; those are the sorts of goals we’re after when crafting an email campaign. And in a post-MPP world, it’s more important than ever to keep their entire customer experience in mind, not just open rates.
Creative ways to track engagement without tracking opens
Yes, open rates offered insight into how engaged your subscribers were, and you might be worried about how to track reader engagement moving forward. Don’t fret, there are plenty of other, more important metrics to track that will give you a better understanding of how and how frequently subscribers are interacting with your emails.
Here are some ideas we have on optimizing your emails for engagement, beyond opens:
Use surveys to get a pulse on your subscribers
Including surveys in your emails moving forward is going to be clever for a couple of reasons. First, surveys are a great way to invite clicks in an email that might not garner many otherwise. Giving readers different ways to click on your emails will help you get a good idea of who’s engaged and who isn’t.
Second, surveys can be a great way to gather first-party data. You can ask your subscribers for their content preferences, or even gather information. Asking for data like their location or what industry they work in with help you segment your audience further, and deliver a more personalized email experience.

Chili Piper executes the survey idea well in a recent newsletter. There’s more content underneath, but leading with a survey in the intro gives readers a clickable element up top. It also gives Chili Piper the chance to learn more about their subscribers in a friendly, voluntary way.
Encourage replies
Replies are also a trackable metric that you can use to monitor email engagement. And what’s cool about this one is that inviting replies is much more personal. It shows that there’s a person behind the creation of that email, not just a company.
With this in mind, you’ll want to make sure you have a system in place for handling replies. Asking for replies in an email going to a huge list all at once could overwhelm whoever is replying to them on your team. But asking for a reply to a welcome email, for example, which goes out automatically at different times, is unlikely to overwhelm your inbox too much.
Look at user activity on your website
As we mentioned earlier, the goal of an email campaign is rarely just to get opens or clicks. Mor often than not, it’s what a user does after clicking through your email that’s important.
If you have access to Google Analytics or other tools on your website, use it to see what activity users ate taking after clicking your email. How many are purchasing a product? How many are scheduling a demo? It’s often the activity after they click an email that matters, and those are the high-value insights you need to include in your reporting.
How we’re adjusting in Campaign Monitor
Since Apple announced Mail Privacy Protection, our product team has been adjusting our analytics dashboard to show you meaningful, accurate metrics moving forward.
To give you the most reliable measure of email engagement, we replaced CTOR with click rate on the Campaign and Overview pages. You can still access CTOR from the Clicked column — check out the example below.

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We have added handy reminders about these email metrics that you can refer to. Click Learn more to access relevant resources on our Help Center.

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And remember, we’re in the early days of this, and we’re still testing and studying the impacts. We will have further updates for you once we have more information.
Wrap up
Yes, it looks like this is the end of open rate as a reliable email marketing metric. In the short term, we’ll need to rethink some of the ways we report success for email campaigns. But this also gives us a chance to reflect on what metrics really matter to our campaigns, and start optimizing for and reporting on those things.
The open rate is dead, but email is anything but.
The post What the Future of Open Rates Looks Like in 2021 and Beyond appeared first on Campaign Monitor.

INBOUND 2021 — hosted with love by HubSpot — is a fully immersive, online experience that gives you access to transformative business trends, proactive conversations, and key actionable takeaways that future you will appreciate.
INBOUND has been hosted by HubSpot for over ten years, and is one of the world’s largest marketing conferences, attracting more than 26,000 attendees from 110 countries.
But this year, INBOUND is especially unique — as it’s built with remote work in-mind, so you can learn from anywhere with audio sessions, meetups, and on-demand content.
Additionally, you’ll hear from Oprah Winfrey, Spike Lee, David Chang, and more.
Here, let’s explore five reasons you’ll want to attend INBOUND 2021, according to HubSpot’s Global Events team.

1. BLACK@INBOUND
Black@INBOUND is a global community that gathers Black professionals across industries to grow and network. HubSpot customer Devyn Bellamy first founded Black@INBOUND at INBOUND to find and connect with other Black professionals.
Since then, Black@INBOUND has grown into a dynamic and interactive meet-up for passionate HubSpot fans and INBOUND enthusiasts.  
Don’t miss the Black@INBOUND events just for you — including our exclusive Meetup with the community at 3:45 PM EST on October 12. Join the virtual cookout and meet all the members of the Community. Then stay tuned for an amazing panel: Mentorship and Advocacy in Black Business Leadership. 

Black@INBOUND is an inclusive community intended for Black business professionals as a space to gather, connect, and share resources.
Black HubSpot users, customers, or fans are welcome to join this space by creating a HubSpot Community profile.
2. The HubSpot Podcast Network
The HubSpot Podcast Network Live will be live at INBOUND 2021! Yes, we want you to step away from your computer screen, give your eyes a rest, head out for a walk and learn from anywhere.
HubSpot’s Podcast Network is the audio destination for business professionals who seek the best education and inspiration to best approach the ever-evolving business landscape.
We will feature exclusive episodes recorded specifically for INBOUND from Entrepreneurs on Fire, My First Million, The Salesman Podcast, and the MarTech Podcast at INBOUND 2021:
Entrepreneurs on Fire
Host John Lee Dumas delivers the inspiration and strategies you need to fire up your entrepreneurial journey and create the life you’ve always dreamed of.
My First Million
Host Sam Parr and Shaan Puri brainstorm new business ideas based on trends and opportunities in the market and share the stories of how companies made their first million.
MarTech Podcast
The MarTech Podcast tells stories of marketers who use technology to generate growth and achieve success. It unearths the successes and pitfalls of industry experts and teaches the tools and tips that they’ve learned along the way.
The Salesman Podcast
The Salesman Podcast is the world’s most downloaded B2B sales podcast. Host Will Barron helps sales professionals find buyers and win business in a modern, effective, and ethical way.

3. HubSpot at INBOUND
Join us at HubSpot’s Product announcement, where you can join Yamini Rangan, Brian Halligan, and Dharmesh Shah as they continue to push the boundaries at HubSpot. Explore some of HubSpot’s new and improved product offerings and how we are focusing on customer success to meet our goals.
This is Yamin Rangan’s first INBOUND as the CEO of HubSpot.
Of her new role, Yamini Rangan said, “It’s the honor of a lifetime to partner with our founders to write HubSpot’s next chapter. My goal is to make our customers, partners, employees, and investors proud — proud to grow their businesses, careers, and futures with HubSpot … I couldn’t be more excited for the future of HubSpot’s journey.”
4. Diverse Spotlight and Breakout Speakers
Oprah Winfrey will be headlining INBOUND 2021.
Oprah Winfrey is a global media leader, philanthropist, producer, and actress. She has created an unparalleled connection with people worldwide, making her one of the most respected and admired figures today.
For 25 years, Winfrey was host and producer of the award-winning talk show, The Oprah Winfrey Show. In her role as Chairman and CEO of OWN: Oprah Winfrey Network, she’s guiding her cable network to success. Winfrey is also the founder of O, The Oprah Magazine, and oversees Harpo Films.
Oprah Winfrey’s exclusive session at INBOUND 2021 is all about the lessons learned on the road to success. See how Oprah — and yourself — can transform failures into lessons.
Spike Lee will guide attendees through an exclusive session that helps you draw ambition out of themselves and others.
Hasan Minhaj takes attendees with him as he explores different ways for you to find your inner voice and follow your passions.
David Chang of Momofuku helps you turn those passions into a business, and he gives you his secret recipe on how he did just that.
Additionally, join lifelong advocate and internationally recognized leader Judith Huemann for an insightful discussion on what ableist privilege looks like and what it means for companies to truly support disabled employees as a prominent community in the DI&B ecosystem.
Experience over 100+ similar sessions at INBOUND 2021 with some of the smartest and innovative thought leaders.
5. The Agenda
INBOUND 2021 offers an immersive and interactive digital experience for all attendees. You will get the chance to create a personalized avatar, join sponsoring partner’s meetups, explore workshops for personal development, and network with a global audience from various backgrounds and industries.
The agenda this year is extraordinary. You can find educational sessions, workshops, Ask Me Anything, debates, and meetup networking sessions. You can customize your agenda by filtering out tracks for Marketing, Sales, Customer Success, HubSpot Academy, and RevOps. There’s something for everyone.
How to attend?
The great thing about INBOUND 2021 this year is that it’s a fully immersive digital experience. You can attend from the comfort of your couch, hop on over to your favorite cafe, listen to sessions while you’re working out. There are endless ways to attend and enjoy INBOUND this year.
You can go ahead and claim your free starter pass, which will allow you to attend our exciting spotlight speaker sessions. You can purchase our Powerhouse pass, which gives you full access to the INBOUND 2021 agenda and platform.