In business, social media is primarily used to connect with a target market. Providing them with engaging content and being engaged yourself (i.e. answering/asking questions and being involved in conversations) is the most effective way to build that connection. While social media automation can improve the process, it doesn’t help with the content creation and engaging components. But there is a simple system that you can use to create 30 days of engaging social media posts in a weekend and did we mention, it can be free? By being well organized, taking advantage of available resources and making your content go further, you can strategically develop a killer content strategy that works.

A Few Things to Remember

1. Reuse content– While most experts agree that the same social media post should not be used on various platforms because of size and algorithms, it is widely recommended to repurpose the content. For example, resize posts from Instagram for Facebook and change the written content to appeal more to community engagement. Also, don’t forget to remove the 15+ hashtags. While Instagram algorithms love them, Facebook algorithms do not.
2. Consistency Matters – Consistency in posting and style are key to effectively growing an audience. When creating bulk social media posts, step back and review to ensure your voice and images are on brand.

Creating 30 Days of Engaging Social Media Posts in a Weekend (without Spending a Dime)

Create a Strategy First

Before creating one graphic or writing one line of content, design a strategy to follow. Not only will this save you time, but help you create a cohesive and complete picture on social media. Here are a few tips to creating an effective strategy:

• Keep to similar themes daily, if not weekly or monthly. This communicates reliability and professionalism. For example, if you post on Monday about the need for selfcare on Facebook, but on LinkedIn, you post how entrepreneurs need to dig into their businesses, your message becomes muddled.
• Look for cues from popular topics on social media in your niche.
• Use blog post or podcast strategies to inform your social media strategy. For example, plan to take quotes as social media posts on the day the blog post is published and then a few days after to build in engagement.
• Plan for promotional posts, but only after 3 high-quality content posts.
• Take holidays and major planned events into account.
• Plan for Lives, behind the scenes content, and engagement.
• Plan for Hashtags, but review throughout the month to ensure effectiveness.

Write Your Written Content Before Graphics

Before developing graphics, set down and write your content. Use a platform such as Trello, Google Docs, or even an Excel Spreadsheet to save your content. We do not recommend putting this directly into a scheduling platform yet, because if something goes wrong with the platform, all of your work could be lost. Instead, saving it somewhere that you can easy copy it from is the best option.

When you write your content, think of each day of the week (i.e. Mondays), week (i.e. 1^st week of the month) or month as a blog post depending on your theme strategy. This will help you write a coherent message to your audience. If your posts in a specific theme seem out of place next to one another, then review them. A few other tips on writing 30 days of engaging social media posts include:

• Remember your brand voice.
• Include call to actions on each post.
• Quality matters, so write something that your audience will be helped, entertained, or provoked in some positive way by.
• Remember that different platforms perform better with Hashtags than others.

Take Advantage of Online Graphic Design Applications

Online platforms like Canva are perfect tools for developing bulk graphics. Whether you need Pinterest, Facebook, Instagram or LinkedIn, you can easily create a design by choosing from Canva’s countless free templates.

When you begin to create 30 days of engaging social media posts graphics, add 30 pages to the template when you begin. This will help with quickly designing graphics and also make it easier to download and sort later. Also, take advantage of the free templates on the platform. These can be quickly customized with branding colors, text, and applicable photos. Additionally, many include video elements which preform better on social media. Below is an example of a stylish template we customized in a matter of minutes.

If you use Canva, ensure that each page title is updated with the date and platform that you want to use the image for. This will make uploading to your posting platform faster. For example, name the image Facebook_01­_01_2021.

Wrap Up

Now that you have 30 days of engaging social media posts created, upload them to the scheduling platform of your choice and enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Whitsett Maxie Creative is here to support you and your business as you navigate the digital marketplace. Contact us today to set up a consultation to discover how our customizable services can meet your needs.