A content plan is important for your business but only if you stick to it. If you’re an online business, you can reach thousands and thousands of potential clients and customers using social media. I know you’ve seen plenty of online entrepreneurs and social media managers tell you that planning is key. While this is true, planning is only effective if you follow up and actually create the posts. I’ve spent over a year posting pretty much every day on my Instagram, and slowly brought this number down to 4-5 posts a week. Here’s how I keep up with it and how you can do it too.

What content do you want to post?

It’s important to think about your audience and what type of content they would like to see. Posting 7 random posts a week just for the sake of posting every day might bring quick results, but once this slows down you could be stuck with no clients. Consider what the goal is. Do you want potential clients to head to your website? Maybe you want people to follow you. Whatever the goal is, think about how you can get people to do this through entertaining content. Content they actually want to see.

Start building a rough content plan

The number one thing that keeps me in line with my content is having a plan that isn’t too strict. I choose one simple rule. Post 5 engaging, purposeful pieces of content weekly. I’m not strict on whether these are Instagram posts, Carousels or Reels. Just as long as the content is entertaining and has a purpose, the rest comes later.

I dump all of my ideas into one place. My content calendar in Notion. This allows me to just dump out any quick ideas that I have into a Notion Page. I can then use the inside of the page to write a rough script, make notes about some things I’d like to add to this post or even get my captions and hashtags ready. Then I can drag and drop the ideas around the calendar so I know when I want to post them.

PS: If you wanna grab my content planner template, or even just take a look into what it can do and whether it’s right for you, you can do so here.

Remember, put no pressure on yourself. Having everything perfectly planned and ready to go can feel good, but for me, the planning process takes longer and is more tiring than the actual content creation. This leaves me not wanting to spend more time on content by the time the plan is finished. I focus on dumping out my ideas and spreading them across the calendar, allowing my content plan to be flexible. this content calendar is drag and drop for a reason.

Recycle ideas from your content plan

I like to spend one day planning and 10 minutes per day for the rest of the week creating the posts. I like to plan 5-10 posts. This usually sets me up for 2 weeks. Remember how I said I didn’t love the planning and creation process being together? The best way I found to avoid burnout with content is to spread it out into manageable chunks like this. And here’s the thing. The one day I spend planning doesn’t have to be this revolutionary list of incredible, new ideas. Sometimes I’ll pick 1-2 topics that my niche focuses on and just think of as many small ideas as I can for these topics.

It’s okay to recycle your ideas.

Get rid of your mindset blocks

Stop worrying about boring your audience with the same ideas. Just focus on where you put the content instead. For example, you could make 2 pieces of content talking about the exact same thing, except one is a Instagram Carousel and the other is a Reel. Both of these things have the opportunity to show up in different places and reach different people. Your carousel might draw in a client who finds you on the explore page. Your reel might attract someone scrolling in their reels feed. Do you know how many times someone has to see your content before they even consider buying from you? It’s about 7 times btw! Stop being afraid to repeat ideas, especially if you’re doing it in different ways.

The most important thing about planning content you’ll actually stick to is…

Not putting too much pressure on yourself and finding what works for you. So many influencers will tell you that you need to be posting every single day, but if this is too much pressure for you, then that’s okay. Your audience would prefer fewer posts, all of which are meaningful rather than post after post that do nothing…

Don’t forget to grab my flexible content planner here and start planning your own way.