Hey, everyone.
Megan here from meganminns.com.
Today I'm going to show you how to create and manage your content calendar using Asana.
By following these simple steps you'll have a content calendar that makes it so easy for
you to create content consistently for your business.
The first step is to create a new project in Asana for your content calendar.
You could just name it content calendar, or if you want to get more specific feel free.
Since I do YouTube videos every Thursday, mine is called YouTube Videos.
I have a podcast one and that's called Podcasts.
Could say Blog Posts or you can just leave it at Content Calendar.
Whatever works for you, just go ahead and and make that project and name it.
Then Asana will ask you to choose between a board or a list.
Now this is a new feature at the time I'm recording this.
Asana just rolled out the boards feature where you can either have your projects as lists,
which is what Asana used to only offer, or now you can have boards, which are more visual
columns.
It's really great for those processes where a visual element is helpful.
Make sure you choose board instead of list, because that's what I'm going to be showing
you through this process.
Now that you have your project created, I'm going to guide you through creating five columns
within this board.
The first one should say "to write," or it could say "to record" if this is a video or
a podcast.
The second column should say "to edit."
The third column should say "to schedule/publish."
Column four should say "to promote."
Column five should say "published."
Step number two is to create a new task, and it will be your template.
We're going to build out a template for every piece of content.
For me, I do YouTube videos, so I have a process that I go through for every single video I
create.
If you have a blog or you do a podcast, I'm sure you have your own process as well.
We're going to go ahead and build that out.
Create a new task, call it Template, and make sure you put this new task in the first column
on your board.
You're going to use this over and over again so you want to make sure it stands out and
it's right at the beginning of your process.
Now go in and flush out all of the steps that go into your process.
I like doing this in the subtasks of this template.
Go ahead and really flush this out.
Copy and paste if you already have this document in somewhere else.
Don't forget to fill out the description and anything else that you need to help make this
process as easy as possible.
In case you aren't sure how to get started with a content process, maybe you don't have
anything documented or you don't have a process down, don't worry.
I've got you covered.
I actually have a free content process checklist, template, in the link below this video so
you can download it and start with this, and then customize it for you, your business,
your team, and your content.
Now you have your template task created, we're going to use this as a template for every
piece of content you want to create.
Just go ahead and open up that template task.
Click the three dots in the right corner, and then select make a copy.
This is how you're going to use something as a template over and over again.
Now name the new task the name of your content.
Maybe it's the title of your blog post or the name of your video, or the podcast episode,
whatever it is helpful, even just a topic if that is all you know so far.
Then go ahead and make the due date the date this piece of content gets published.
This is just a really great reference point so at a glance you can see when it really
needs to be done by.
Then go ahead and assign it to yourself or assign it to your content manager.
I am my business's content manager so it's totally fine if this is all just you.
You don't have to assign it to other people, but by still assigning these things to you,
it's going to be really top of mind.
It's going to be in your task list every day, so definitely go through the step of assigning
it to you or whoever is managing your content process.
Don't forget to give the subtasks due dates and assignees as well based on your process.
I know for my team I have a video editor and I have a virtual assistant, so most of the
tasks are on me to write the script, record, upload, schedule the blog post, all that good
stuff.
But I do have a team that is helping me along the way.
Make sure you're assigning content and tasks to whoever is supposed to do them on your
team.
Now you have your content calendar built out in Asana.
Way to go, you.
I do have a few pro tips to help make this process even easier and seamless.
Make sure you keep it up to date, especially if you are the only person on your team or
you are your content manager.
If you let these tasks go out of date and you're not updating them or marking them complete,
this process will fall apart.
That goes with any project management system in any process, but specifically for this
we want this process to work for you, so make sure you're checking in every day, marking
tasks complete as you've done them, changing due dates if you need to give yourself a little
extension.
All that's totally fine, but just make the effort to go in and keep it updated.
Another tip is to get detailed.
Write out all of the information that you and your team need within these tasks.
I think mine always has the actual ... in the description it will have the time things
are getting published.
I will put the full title.
I'll put what the content upgrade is.
Any important information I put that into the description.
I'm always attaching files.
Part of my process is updating a spreadsheet with certain links, whether it's the YouTube
link or the blog post link or the content upgrade landing page.
I actually attach that Google Drive spreadsheet into the relevant task.
Then it's just really easy for us to do it.
You can just click it right from within Asana.
You don't have to open up Google drive separately.
Get detailed.
It's okay if this process evolves as you're doing it.
That's great.
That's really actually ideal.
This will evolve with you and your process.
But go ahead and get as specific as you can right now.
You also want to make sure that you and your team are communicating within Asana.
Now if you have a system like Slack set up, I understand it's sometimes easier to communicate
in there.
That's okay.
But for task-related questions, we have a really good policy about communicating in
the task.
It's just a great reference point.
We can always go back and see what that conversation was.
It's stored in a more permanent way than slack, where unless you're paying, which I always
do the free version, some of those messages will go away.
I think you have 10,000 messages in slack.
You get the point.
Keeping it in Asana is just a great way to always have a reference point of what the
answer was and to update the process, and just keep it all within Asana.
We want to avoid using emails for internal communication as much as possible.
The last tip I have for you is to designate a content manager.
I kind of touched on this earlier, but even if it's just you, making that official designation
that you are the content manager or your virtual assistant is your content manager, or you
have hired a content manager, whoever it is, designate it.
Because that person is the one who's going to move the task throughout this workflow.
We made those original columns, and someone needs to be making sure that they're moving
to record, to edit, to publish.
Someone needs to move through that process.
That's the person who the task has probably been assigned to.
Then also, just making sure things are getting done, holding your team accountable for due
dates, holding you accountable for your due dates.
I totally get how easy it is to forget about them sometimes.
But designating a content manager, even if it's just you, will give you new authority
and new ownership over your content process.
Now you know how to create and manage a content calendar using Asana.
If you don't have a process set up right now for creating content, you're starting from
zero.
That's why I'm sharing my exact content creation process with you as a worksheet.
Don't forget to download the content creation process below this video so you can start
creating content consistently right away.
Now I want to hear from you.
How do you manage your content calendar process right now?
Leave your tips in the comments below this video.
If you thought this video was helpful, be sure to subscribe, share it with your friends,
and hit the like button below so I know to make more videos like this.
I'll see you in the next one.