Social media calendar template

Keeping track of your company’s social media content can be a challenge. There’s a lot to juggle, from the platform you’re posting on to the time and date posts will go live. Add in the nuances of posting on different social channels and the importance of aligning posts with your social campaigns, and running a successful social content strategy can feel nearly impossible.

There’s a better way. With Asana’s social media calendar template, you can ensure every post is on point before publishing. Our free template helps you visualize your entire lineup of social posts, reschedule on the fly, collaborate easily with cross-functional teams, and reduce bottlenecks.

What is a social media calendar template?

A social media calendar template is a framework that helps you plan and track your social media posts. Asana’s free social media calendar template makes it easier to collaborate with cross-functional teams and plan out upcoming social media campaigns. By providing a place to capture all the information you need to plan and run your social campaigns—including what’s going live, when, and on what platform—you can make sure your posts are diversified and align with your overall social media strategy.

Plus, Asana’s pre-built social media calendar template includes custom tags to keep track of important post information—such as what social media channel you’ll run the post on, the post’s copy and image elements, and the date and time the post goes live.

What are the benefits of Asana’s social media calendar template?

Our free social media calendar template comes pre-built with sections and custom tags designed to help you easily manage your social campaigns. Plus, since the template is created in a project management tool—rather than a static tool like Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets—it’s easy for you to adjust as priorities shift. With our template, you can:

• Visualize your entire lineup of social media posts at a glance.

• Schedule, track, and manage your content creation and content production all in one place.

• Brainstorm and capture new content ideas, track upcoming posts, and review metrics from previous posts.

• Assign, review, and approve work in one spot.

• Create a content repository by planning all your social posts in advance and easily balance timely and evergreen content.

• Keep all elements of your social posts—including copy, images, @mentions, and hashtags—in one easily accessible place.

• Quickly schedule or reschedule a piece of content by dragging and dropping in Calendar view.

• Use custom fields to gain clarity on which posts are going out, when, and on what channels.

• Align your social content with your marketing plan. Share your calendar with internal stakeholders for visibility and accountability.

• Use task dependencies to quickly view and resolve scheduling conflicts.

How do I use Asana’s social media calendar template?

Using Asana’s free social media calendar template is easy. Simply create a new project by duplicating our pre-built template—then fill it out with information for your specific social media calendar, such as:

• The platform or channel each post will go live on, such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Instagram.

• Relevant post information, such as the post’s title, the copy associated with the post, and any image or video elements included in the post.

• Your publishing schedule, including the date and time you plan to publish the post.

• The status of the post—for example, "writing," "in design," or "published."

• The category or marketing campaign the social post aligns with, such as "how to," "customer stories," "product launch," etc.

Once you’ve populated the template, use the calendar to visualize your social media campaign timeline and invite key team members and stakeholders to collaborate, like social media managers, content creators, or members of your marketing team.

Integrations for Asana’s social media calendar template

To get the most out of our social media calendar template, take advantage of the integrated features and apps that sync with Asana. These provide greater visibility for your team and reduce the friction caused by app switching.

Integrated features

1. Calendar View. Calendar View is a project view where you can see all upcoming and past work in a calendar format. Clearly track what’s getting done and what deadlines are coming up. Give your stakeholders insight into every task’s individual due date, as well as the larger cadence of scheduled project work. Then, click into a task to view more information like the associated custom fields, dependencies, subtasks, and more.

2. Custom fields. Custom fields are the best way to tag, sort, and filter work. Create unique custom fields for any information you need to track—from priority and status to email or phone number. Use custom fields to sort and schedule your to-dos so you know what to work on first. Plus, share custom fields across tasks and projects to ensure consistency across your organization.

3. Subtasks. Sometimes a to-do is too big to capture in one task. If a task has more than one contributor, a broad due date, or stakeholders that need to review and approve before it can go live, subtasks can help. Subtasks are a powerful way to distribute work and split tasks into individual components—while keeping the small to-dos connected to the overarching context of the parent task. Break tasks into smaller components or capture the individual components of a multi-step process with subtasks.

4. Dependencies. Mark a task as waiting on another task with task dependencies. Know when your work is blocking someone else’s work, so you can prioritize accordingly. Teams with collaborative workflows can easily see what tasks they’re waiting on from others, and know when to get started on their portion of work. When the first task is completed, the assignee will be notified that they can get started on their dependent task. Or, if the task your work is dependent on is rescheduled, Asana will notify you—letting you know if you need to adjust your dependent due date as well.

Recommended apps

1. Adobe Creative Cloud. Creative teams do their best work when they can focus on designing. With the Asana for Adobe Creative Cloud integration, creative and design teams can easily access the information they need to kick off work, get feedback from reviewers and approvers, and deliver final assets without leaving Photoshop, Illustrator, or InDesign. See new tasks, share designs, embed XD share links, and incorporate feedback delivered in Asana—all in Adobe Creative Cloud.

2. Figma. Teams use Figma to create user flows, wireframes, UI mocks, prototypes, and more. Now, you can embed these designs in Asana, so your team can reference the latest design work in context with related project documents. And, unlike screenshots, live embeds update in real time to reflect changes made in a design file, eliminating the overhead that comes with finding the right files and updating images.

3. Canva. With the Canva for Asana integration, easily embed beautiful Canva designs to bring your Asana projects to life. From presentation decks, social media assets, wireframes, to videos, the Canva integration allows you to consolidate all your ideas and designs all in one place so you can seamlessly communicate and collaborate.

4. Hubspot. Create Asana tasks automatically using HubSpot Workflows. With HubSpot Workflows, you can use all the customer data in HubSpot CRM to create automated processes. This integration enables you to seamlessly hand off work between teams, for example, when deals or tickets close in HubSpot.

Social Media Calendar Template Checklist

Streamlining your digital marketing strategy begins with the effective use of a social media calendar template. This checklist will guide you through the essential steps to optimize your social media planning, ensuring you hit the right notes with your target audience on different platforms.

Performing an in-depth social media audit

The first step with your social media calendar template involves conducting a thorough audit of your existing social media presence.

• Step 1: Assess how your content has been performing across various platforms.

• Step 2: Identify what resonates with your audience and note any gaps in your strategy.

For both large and small businesses alike, a social media audit is essential because it provides valuable insights into what to do next in your social media planning process. Once you gather these insights, add them to your template’s project overview to ensure they’re always top of mind.

Example: For a bakery, a social media audit might reveal that Instagram posts showcasing behind-the-scenes baking processes receive more engagement than simple product photos. This insight can help you focus on creating more interactive and visually appealing content for Instagram.

Choosing the most impactful social networks for your audience

Not all social media platforms are created equal, especially when it comes to engaging your specific target audience. Focus your efforts on platforms where your audience is most active.

For a small business, this might mean prioritizing Facebook and Instagram, while a fashion brand might find more engagement on visually-driven platforms like Instagram and TikTok. In your Asana template, you can create custom fields—labels for each task—to visualize and sort posts for each platform.

Example: A tech startup might find LinkedIn more effective for B2B engagement compared to TikTok, which might be more suited for B2C audiences. Therefore, the startup would prioritize LinkedIn for professional content and industry insights.

Tailoring content types to your brand voice and goals

Your social media calendar template should reflect a diversity of content types, aligned with your brand voice and marketing goals. Whether it’s creating engaging video content for TikTok or thought-provoking articles for LinkedIn, ensure your content variety speaks to your brand ethos and meets your audience’s expectations.

Example: A travel agency could mix stunning destination photos on Instagram with informative travel tips on Facebook. For TikTok, short, engaging travel vlogs could be more appropriate to capture the platform's younger, more dynamic audience.

Developing ready-to-use content and hashtags

Streamline your content creation process by developing templates and predefined hashtag sets. This step not only saves time but also maintains consistency in your posts. Color-coding different content types in your social media calendar template with custom fields can also help your team stay organized and on track.

Example: A fashion brand could develop a set of hashtags like #FashionFridays or #StyleInspo, coupled with template designs for new arrivals or seasonal collections. This approach ensures quick, consistent posts across platforms.

Scheduling around notable dates and marketing campaigns

Integrate important dates, holidays, and marketing campaign schedules into your social media calendar template. This foresight helps in creating timely and relevant content that maximizes engagement and impact. In Asana, switch between project views to easily see your template as a calendar—then drag and drop tasks to easily align your content with these dates.

Example: A bookstore might align its marketing calendar with literary events, like World Book Day, by scheduling posts about book discounts or author features. This strategy ensures that posts are relevant and timely.

Setting up a regular and responsive posting timetable

Consistency is key in social media scheduling. Determine the optimal times to post on different platforms and set up a regular posting schedule. This regularity helps in building a loyal audience and ensures your brand stays top-of-mind for your followers. With your Asana template you can create tasks for each social media post—then assign due dates (down to the hour) to ensure posts go live on schedule.

Example: A small business may find that its audience is most active on weekdays, around lunchtime. Thus, scheduling posts for noon on weekdays can increase engagement and visibility.

Employing social media scheduling tools for consistency

Automate and schedule posts using various social media scheduling tools. These tools not only help in maintaining a consistent posting rhythm but also free up time for your social media team to engage with the audience and work on other aspects of your digital marketing strategy. When building out your template in Asana, look for integrations to help you seamlessly plan and post across different tools.

Example: A digital marketing agency could use tools like Buffer or Hootsuite to schedule a week's worth of posts across different platforms. This allows the team to focus on real-time engagement and content creation without worrying about daily posting.

Keeping track of engagement and analyzing data for insights

Finally, regularly monitor and analyze the performance of your posts. Understanding engagement metrics and audience behavior is crucial for refining your strategy. Use these insights to adjust your social media calendar template for improved performance, ensuring your content continually resonates with your audience.

Example: After launching a new product, a beauty brand tracks engagement metrics like shares, comments, and likes on posts related to the product. Analyzing this data helps them understand what aspects of the product resonate with their audience, guiding future marketing efforts.

This comprehensive approach to using a social media calendar template will help you manage your social media presence more effectively, allowing you to focus on creating content that truly engages and grows your audience.

FAQs