Social media planning for the chronically disorganised

You may be creative but your social media content won’t set the world alight unless it’s well thought out. Do yourself a favour and come up with an effective plan.

As Benjamin Franklin may or may not have said: “By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.”

That’s all well and good but if, like me, you’d rather stick pins in your eyes than spend a moment planning, the apocryphal wisdom of a long-dead Founding Father is unlikely to inspire behavioural change. And so it was that for many years, I ignored this sage advice, choosing instead to jump feetfirst into any given task and figure things out along the way.

While my laissez-faire approach wasn’t without success, it was always short-lived. At some point, I would inevitably run out of steam and, without any clear direction, become unreasonably enthusiastic about an entirely different project. On each occasion, I knew that – this time – things would be different. Of course, they never were and as a wizened writer, I now concede that ‘The First American’ (or whoever actually coined said phrase) was onto something.

This, in essence, is my ponderous way of saying that if you’re looking to strengthen your organisation’s online presence, you should probably develop a social media plan at the outset. It’s what Dr Franklin would have wanted.

Here are a few tips…

Spell out your goals
I know, I know… Your goal is simple: you want to strengthen your organisation’s online presence. I’m merely suggesting you take a moment to articulate what that means in practice. Would you like to grow your social media following? If so, come up with specific figures and a deadline. Is your aim to improve engagement? Then ask yourself what that entails.

Whatever your goals, always include metrics for success. If you don’t, you won’t know whether you’re making sufficient progress. And if you don’t know that, the chances are it won’t be long before you lose interest.

Define your audience
You can’t communicate effectively if you don’t understand who you’re targeting. And if you think your target audience is ‘everyone’, it’s time to go back to the drawing board.

This article, for instance, is intended for the organisationally challenged and easily distracted (bonus tip: write what you know). More specifically, it’s for aspiring social media types with bags of enthusiasm and tonnes of ideas, but who struggle to see things through.

Your target audience will no doubt be different. Travel agents, for example, may wish to target ‘people who want to go on holiday’. But that’s too broad. Do you want to engage people who are interested in package deals or bucket-list excursions? Are your offerings more likely to resonate with families, couples or individuals? How old is your typical customer? Again, specificity is key.

We’d all like to think that our content has mass appeal but, unless you’re incredibly lucky, it probably doesn’t. Personally, I’d love it if millions of people sought out this blog but, in reality, it’s only going to be read by a handful of people. The question is: are they the right people?

Be picky about your platforms
A mistake I made when launching ChattyDuck was to imagine I’d have enough time to create bespoke content for every social media platform. After all, I’d achieved this in my previous roles so why should it be any different for my own company?

What I failed to appreciate was that I hadn’t achieved any such thing. It was my colleagues who had drafted the posts and carried out day-to-day channel admin; I’d merely taken credit for all their hard work. If you have a team of people whose sole job is to create engaging content for your organisation, by all means – fill your boots. But if strengthening your online presence happens to be one of your many responsibilities, your best bet is to keep things manageable.

The good news is that you’ve already spelt out your goals and defined your audience, so selecting the most appropriate platforms should be a breeze. Pick one or two to focus on initially and monitor their performance. You’ll want to work to establish a presence on channels that are frequented by your target audience. For example, if you’re looking to sell excursions to middle-aged couples, Facebook is a solid choice. Millennials and young families will probably look for holiday inspiration on Instagram, whereas members of Gen Z are more likely to be found scrolling through TikTok. Remember, you can always add more in the future if you have capacity.

Pillars of (content) creation
Now that you’ve identified your goals, target audience and priority platforms, it’s time to figure out what you’re going to talk about. In this respect, content pillars are an absolute godsend – especially when it comes to maintaining your output over the longer term. 

Content pillars are the specific themes that you intend to focus on. Returning to our travel agent example, ‘Destinations’, ‘Travel Tips’ and ‘Special Offers’ might offer a strong foundation to build on. Clearly defining your scope before you start posting will provide inspiration while ensuring consistency. Over time (assuming you know what you’re talking about), your audience will come to think of your organisation as a trusted expert in its field and a go-to source of information.

Consult your calendar
If you’ve got this far, well done! All your fundamentals are in place. It’s now time to start developing content. But don’t just draft posts as and when the mood takes you.

Creating a calendar will allow you to map out your upcoming social media activities based on your content pillars. It will also provide an overview of how frequently you’re posting, helping to ensure your output doesn’t become ‘lumpy’. This is also a good time to consider how frequently you wish to publish content. Try to strike a balance between posting so frequently that you overwhelm your audience, and so sporadically that your followers are left wondering whether your organisation is still in business.

If time permits, it may also be a good idea to develop a combination of planned, ‘evergreen’ content and ad hoc posts. Evergreen content should not be time-sensitive, meaning it can be planned in advance (drafting and scheduling a series of posts at the end of each month is a sensible place to start). If you’re able to commit to a specific number of ad hoc posts each month, these can be used to keep your content topical (remember, Google Alerts are your friend).

If you succeed in putting all these pieces in place, you’ll give your organisation the best possible chance of maintaining and strengthening its social media presence over the long term. And, more importantly, you’ll make Benjamin proud.

But don’t despair if it all gets too much. Simply get in touch with #TeamDuck to find out how we (and by ‘we’, I mean my more organised colleagues) can help you achieve your goals.

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