How to Create an Editorial Plan

To develop a valid social media strategy, it is necessary to plan the content to be published across various social channels by setting up an editorial plan.

Once the plan is in place, you can start publishing content that needs to be creative and engaging to allow interaction with the posts by the followers of the various social pages.

How to conduct an analysis for implementing an excellent editorial plan

To implement an excellent editorial plan for social media, it is first of all necessary to evaluate the initial situation. This involves analyzing:

• The social platforms used and which of these are actually able to generate results;
• Which social platform is best suited for achieving good engagement around the brand;
• How often content is published on various social channels;
• The type of customers who use social media, and how many of them do so to seek support when purchasing one of your products;
• Carefully evaluate which social channels work better and which do not, thus trying to focus more resources on the functioning channels, avoiding maintaining too many at the same time, also risking managing them not to their fullest potential.

Knowing your target 

To build an excellent social strategy, and consequently a good editorial plan, it is necessary to know and analyze the target perfect for your brand.

There are various tools that can help you in this analysis, including the main ones Google Analytics and Facebook Insights. 

Defining the right social channels for your target 

Very often, your defined audience target will not always be attracted by the same type of social media; it will indeed be necessary to choose more diversified channels in order to engage as many target audiences as possible.

Some statistics conducted by Spredfast in 2020, reveal the following data for these platforms:

• Facebook: with about 2 billion active users monthly, it ranks as the most used social media across all ages;
• Instagram: with 1 billion active users monthly, it is the most widespread among the age group of 18 to 29 years old;
• Pinterest: with an audience of 300 million, it has been the pioneer of online shopping through social media. It is mainly used by users in a higher age bracket, between 30 and 49 years old, and of these, the majority are women (70%);
• Twitter: with about 300 million active users monthly who are aged between 18 and 29 years old, however, it has seen its growth halted in recent years;
• LinkedIn: with 300 million active users monthly who are aged between 25 and 34 years old, it is the favored channel for establishing connections and relationships among professionals.

After carefully examining the various channels, always check the strengths and weaknesses of each related to your business, so that you can choose the right channel for spreading your content.

How to create an editorial plan

To create an effective editorial plan, it is necessary to follow steps to work orderly: 

• Set the main goals; 
• Consider the most important dates throughout the year;
• Draft a calendar for each month;
• Share compelling and high-quality content on various social channels;
• Create engaging posts;

Setting main goals for the editorial plan

One of the first steps in creating an editorial plan is to define the main objectives that a company wants to achieve through social media.

In order to set objectives, a company must know its mission, and the potential that each social media can have on its business.

Consider the most important dates throughout the year for the editorial plan 

Before even planning posts for various social media within the editorial plan, it is important for a company to pay attention to evaluating days by considering some important points throughout the year, such as holidays, or even events that it plans to organize.

In this way, studying the plan and distributing content over time will be simpler and more effective.

How to draft an editorial plan for each month 

To create an editorial plan that is engaging for every month, it may be helpful to think of a theme for each period, and based on that, create creative content and engaging for users of various social channels.

For instance, if you run a bakery, you could make December the "month of bakers," and then post every week a video or photo on Facebook and Instagram featuring one of your favorite bakers with their name and one of their best desserts; or you might switch it up by posting a video or photo of a baker preparing a special dessert, and so forth.

You can indeed get creative in all sorts of ways, as long as you do not lose sight of one of the most important points when publishing content on social media: envisioning what might interest users and creating engagement.

Making content timely, diversified, and aligned with a specific monthly theme will spark interest among the company's clients and encourage engagement across various pages.

How to create engaging posts within your editorial plan 

To engage fans and potential new customers of a social media page, it is important to publish a variety of engaging posts, such as:

• Publishing photos of the team and the company's products;
• Publishing photos of the interior and  exterior of the business;
• Publishing educational posts, such as video tutorials or articles;
• Engaging users with questions like for example polls or
quiz;
• Repost user-generated content;
• Create a contest and offer a discount on a product as a prize;
• Share reviews from the most active users.

Work efficiently with Framework360

To best convert the periodic results of your editorial plan, you will need to organize your website well and integrate it with your social channels.

Furthermore, once you have outlined your editorial plan, you can fully exploit it by linking it to your online business through the Framework360 platform.

Here you can find various plugins for integrating different social aspects, such as those related to Facebook itself or direct messaging.

Discover Framework360.