When we surveyed 70 content and marketing executives about their top content challenges, two of the biggest pain points they shared were:

1. They had trouble getting good content.
2. They had no time to plan their content.

I've seen this repeated by my own clients over the last 20+ years—even clients at huge national and global corporations. (You'd think these businesses would have their content all dialed in, but they often don't.)

A content calendar would have helped solve both of these problems, but our survey respondents and clients are so busy on the hamster wheel of creating content that they don't have the time to develop this crucial planning document.

The result: content executives and their teams are writing content just to "feed the machine." They throw content online whenever they can on whatever topic is the most in-their-face at the time. Their stress peaks every week (or every day) when they're faced with generating more content topics without any help or guidelines. And of course, their results are less impressive than they could be.

Creating a content calendar may seem like a daunting, time-consuming project, especially when all your time is spent actually developing content. But it doesn't have to be. When I build content calendars for clients, it takes me just three days. (This includes designing a long PowerPoint slideshow for the client to present to their team—which is completely optional.) And these calendars work.

In this Playbook, I show you how I do it—and how you can do it too, no matter how much (or how little) you have in the way of resources, budget, buy-in, or support. Once you develop your calendar, you'll save yourself time and pain, decrease your stress, and streamline your content production over the next three months.

Oh, and your content will be more impactful too. Isn't that what it's all about?

Intro Video

Please watch the Intro Video (below), for a quick overview... and then get ready to create a content calendar that works!

Having trouble playing the video above?  click here

HOW THE CONTENT CALENDAR PLAYBOOK WORKS

Here's what to expect as you work your way through the Playbook, and how you can make it happen as quickly and easy as possible.

This can be a very messy and subjective process, and my goal in this Playbook was to systematize it...to distill everything I've learned over the past two decades into a repeatable method—one that streamlines the process as much as you possibly can for what is essentially a creative endeavor.

WHO IS THE CONTENT CALENDAR PLAYBOOK FOR?

The Playbook is for you if you:

• • Are a content manager, content director, editorial director, marketing manager, or other similar role, whether for an employer or for your own business.
  • Have been tasked with developing content for your company to build authority, encourage prospects through your sales funnel, attract organic traffic, etc.
  • Have a low budget or lack other resources.
  • Are struggling to create as much content as possible on your own or with a small team of freelancers or internal writers.
  • May not have all the planning documents you wish you had, like customer avatars, mission statements, and messaging platforms.
  • May have little buy-in from the sales team, internal SMEs, and other key people or departments.
  • Are feeling stressed—and maybe even a little burned out.

I've developed the Playbook especially with you in mind. You'll learn how to get prepped for success, the exact steps to building an effective content calendar, and how to stay motivated through it all.

THE MODULES

The modules explain everything that goes into developing a full content calendar. Do the steps in order. However, you may be able to shorten or omit some steps depending on your situation; for example, maybe you only have two main competitors and not five. Or you're a one-person business and so don't need to bother asking ask questions and getting support from a sales team. Or maybe you recently did an audit of your own content, so there's no need to do it again.

I recommend reading through all the modules before putting the plan into action. Reading them first—and quickly familiarizing yourself with the worksheets and other tools—will help you understand how one task flows into the next, and will inform your decisions as you go through the process.

Finally, keep in mind that throughout this Playbook, we're looking for completion, not perfection. Over-analysis is the downfall of many a content marketer. We want to get you unstuck. You can always course-correct if you need to, so don't break your momentum by striving for perfection.

THE TOOLKIT

The Toolkit consists of all the tools you'll need to complete each module, such as worksheets, checklists, etc.

You can fill out the worksheets using Adobe Reader or in your browser; just be sure to select "With your changes" when you download a completed worksheet from your browser. Or you can print the worksheets out to complete by hand.

THE VIDEOS

Most modules include one or more embedded videos. Watching these are optional, but highly recommended as they contain some information that isn't available in this written text.

Each of the videos has a quick overview of what you’ll be doing and why. I then illustrate the steps using a fictional company called SuperFood POS—a small business that offers point-of-service software for restaurants. If you’re not familiar, point-of-service software is a set of computerized systems that allow restaurant owners to take payments plus track sales, cash flow, and food inventory.

In these video walkthroughs I share my screen to show you how I’d accomplish each step for SuperFood POS if they were my client.