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It’s National Pizza Day, you had an idea for a post, ran out of time, and now it’s too late. Your business has a special promotion today, you meant to post it on Facebook in the morning, but you didn’t get to it until it became too late. You just realized you haven’t posted on your company’s page in a few days, and now engagement is down on your page.

We’ve all been there.

This is where content scheduling comes in handy. What you need is to create your content in advance and schedule it to go out ahead of time -- aka using a content calendar. In its most basic form, a content calendar is a schedule of what you’ll post and when you’ll post it. It can span multiple platforms, so you can use it to plan your social media marketing, email marketing, or both! Here are 7 reasons why you should start scheduling out your content today:

1. Strategic Social Media Planning

Social media is all about strategy. Looking at posting times, audience, and what kind of content you are putting out is important in creating a successful social media presence. Content scheduling allows you to get a birds-eye view of the content you publish.

Another benefit of content scheduling is that you can plan out promotions, ads, and posts in advance to make sure they all correspond and are sent out in a timely manner. This will enable you to reach your specific target market by scheduling all posts and social media updates during selective times during your promotion. By planning out your promotions in advance, you have a better chance of reaching more of your target market, staying on track with posts, and creating a successful promotion for your business.

2. Save Time In The Long Run

We are all busy and looking for ways to save time. Content scheduling can help with that! Yes, sitting down and creating a month’s worth of content will take time initially but once that is done, the benefits outweigh the initial effort. Here are some of those benefits:

• Plan posts months in advance
• Be active online even when you’re not physically available
• Get the freedom to focus on other aspects of your business

3. Write While You Feel Creative

It is a proven fact that certain times of the day are more conducive to creative writing. The benefit of creating all of your content at once is that you can select a time when you are feeling most creative to sit down and create relevant, diverse, and authentic content for your business.

*Pro Tip: We follow the 70-20-10 Rule for content creation, meaning 70% of the content should be interesting, inspiring, or entertaining, and useful for the primary base of your audience. 20% of your content should be concentrated on promotional offerings, whether it be an invitation to an event, a request for donation, or some other call-to-action. 10% of your content should be reposted or shared from other accounts, blogs, or content sources, allowing you to show that your Social Media strategy actually is social; building trust and a sense of reciprocity with your followers and influencers.

4. Stay Organized

Scheduling out your content in advance also helps you to stay organized. If you are working with a marketing team or graphic designers, you will be able to create or request graphics beforehand, and your design team will be grateful to have more time to work on them. This will also allow you to write down any important dates and holidays in advance so you don’t forget to post for them. National Donut Day may not seem important but plan a day to grab some donuts for your team, take a picture, and share it on Donut Day to show off your business's personality and really get in touch with your followers. People will “eat it up”!

5. Keep Your Business Top Of Mind

In order to really take advantage of the benefits of social media, it is important to create quality content and post frequently. It helps your business stay relevant, and the consistency in posting reflects well on your brand. Spreading out your content throughout the month keeps readers engaged and returning for more which in turn helps to create brand awareness and loyalty, build trust, and present your business as an industry leader. To do this, create a content calendar and schedule your content to go out at frequent intervals.

6. Analyze Your Content

We recommend using your content calendar or scheduling tool to keep track each post’s progress. This will allow you to see what types of content resonate with your audience and which do not. Keeping track of these metrics will allow you to hone in on what types of posts to create in future months.

7. Repurpose What You’ve Already Written

Another benefit of content scheduling is that you can re-use content that you’ve already written. Say you have a blog post that really resonated with your audience and received a lot of engagement -- You would want to re-post that at a later date. Not only do you know it works, but if you wait a few months, you could potentially reach a whole new section of your audience! This kind of content is called Evergreen content. Much like the way evergreen trees retain their leaves all year around, this content is always interesting to viewers. Now keep in mind that not every post you write will be evergreen content but when you do come across a great and successful post, keep it in your content bank for reposting at a later date!

Creating and scheduling out content for your business in advance is a lifesaver in the world of Social Media. As a social media marketing strategist for MC2 Design, I live and breathe by my content calendar. Between managing multiple clients’ social media pages and other social media marketing tasks, posting a single post is the last thing on my mind. I set time aside each month to create content for each client and assess previous trends in posting to make sure I stay up-to-date with my content. Then I use a tool like Buffer or Hootsuite to automatically schedule my content to go out at the right times and days during that month. It’s the perfect way to keep your business top of mind and on track while also having the ability to focus on the bigger picture!