How to design Effective Content Calendars in Google Sheets

Choosing a content calendar program can be difficult because there are so many options. Some are overly complicated, some are too expensive, and some provide you with a toolkit you'll never use. You might even still be trying to decide which is your favorite and need a temporary fix, preferably one with no paywall or trial period. Using spreadsheet software, you can construct a circumstance that provides just what you need and nothing more. Learn how to create and utilize a content calendar in Google Sheets by reading on.

Table of Content:
Choose the Columns for Your Content Calendar Sheet
The content calendar sheet should have tabs for ideas and tracking
Guidelines for Managing Your Content Calendar Sheet

Choose the Columns for Your Content Calendar Sheet
Your content calendar's goal is to schedule your posts and keep everything organized in one location. By doing this, you can later locate everything easily. Additionally, it's a great area to work together with your employees. List out all columns to begin. This will assist you in outlining your posts later; think of it as prompts to help you remember and start thinking.
Consider the components that are similar to all of these pieces of material, such as text, photographs, and the date you intend to publish them. You'll also need a means of identifying the post, including a title or description, making notes, and indicating its status.
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Other suggestions for columns include:

• An account column where you can specify the destination of the post, such as Instagram, a blog, a website, etc.
• Including several copy columns for various accounts, such as copy for Facebook and Instagram, etc.
• A link column for the lengthy draughts of your material that you should create in Google Docs or another word processor before summarising them in your Spreadsheet.
• A "people" column that lists the contributors to the post.
• A column for priorities to convey urgency.

Write the columns you plan to utilize along the top of your Sheet once you have decided which ones to use. It won't be a problem if you start little; you can always add more later. You frequently come up with new ideas while working.

Your content calendar sheet should have a functional status button.
Data validation can be used in Sheets to construct a dropdown menu. Consistent communication is beneficial, particularly when working with others. When you wish to display a post's status, this is useful. It could also be used for a priority or people column.

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How to do it:

• Choose a cell from the Status column.
• Within the top menu, select Data.
• Data validation can be selected from the list.
• Use a list of objects as your criteria.
• Enter the words you want to be included in the field to the right, separating them with a comma.
• Click Save.

After saving, your list will once again be visible in the cell. Keep it selected then add Conditional formatting if you wish to colour-code your statuses.

How to do it:

• Within the top menu, select Format.
• From the options, select Conditional formatting.
• Click the dropdown menu next to "Format cells if" in the sidebar's "Format rules" section.
• Choose Text includes.
• In the field that appears below, enter the status.
• Under Formatting style, alter the background or text color.
• Click Done.
• With the other statuses, repeat these procedures.

Once it is prepared, copy the cell and use the column's letter at the top to pick it. Deselect the title cell by selecting it while holding CMD or CTRL before pasting. Later, you can view all fulfilled statuses & hide them by using the Sheets' sort function. You may also copy and paste them into such an archive tab.

The content calendar sheet should have tabs for ideas and tracking
Just use tabs at the bottom of your screen to make a distinct location for your draughts if you want to brainstorm in your Sheet while keeping it organized. You do not require many columns here, but you should have one for your post's title or summary, your idea, and any observations you have regarding the images. A new tab can be made to keep track of your results. The title or summary of the article, the date, and whatever KPIs you use to gauge achievement, interactions, views, conversions, etc.—will be the column headers in this case.

Guidelines for Managing Your Content Calendar Sheet
Here are some suggestions to aid in content planning:

• Schedule a time block and perform your task in batches. By doing this, you may prepare your posts in advance rather than composing them and looking for photographs as you go.
• Even if you don't utilize all of your ideas, put some in right away; you never know when you might need them.
• You can save time later on by using tracking to find out which posts perform the best on different platforms and to identify what doesn't.

And here are some formatting hints for your Sheet:

• Use option + enter or control + enter to start a new line.
• By clicking on your rows and choosing Resize row, you may change the height of each one; even if the wrapped text is making a row tall, resizing will hide it.
• Simply dragging and clicking the row, you may manually change the height as well.
• Your Sheet will stay organized if your Text wrapping setting is set to Wrap.
• If you would like the text to appear in the middle, top, or bottom of the cell, use the Vertical align option in the top menu.

To keep your content marketing well-organized and on course, a content calendar is crucial. With initial brainstorming, you can avoid terrible last-minute planning and increase the consistency of your content production.

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