Creating a Content Plan: An Easy Step-by-Step Guide

If you want the content creation process to run smoothly and produce content that moves the needle, you need a content plan that aligns with your strategy. In this guide, you’ll learn how to create a content plan in six easy steps.

What is Content Planning?

Content planning is the process of deciding what you’ll publish and when. It’s essential for keeping everyone and everything on track and for prioritizing content in a way that makes sense for your content strategy.

For example, there are thousands of SEO-related topics we could write blog posts about. Just look at how many Search Engine Journal has published:

It would take years to publish this many posts, so we need to prioritize the ones that make the most sense for us. This is why we need a content plan.

How to Create a Content Plan

Content planning isn’t that hard and shouldn’t take long to put together. It’s really about finding and prioritizing topics that make sense for your strategy, then scheduling and assigning them.

Let’s go through the process.

1. Make Sure You Have a Clear Content Strategy

Have you ever tried to cook something new without a recipe? Then you’ll know that although it can be fun, results vary. The same happens if you try to create a content plan without a content strategy.

But what is a content strategy, anyway?

In simple terms, it’s a document explaining why you’re creating content, who it’s for, what type of content you’ll create, and where you’ll publish it.

Here’s an example:

• Why am I creating content? To influence our audience’s buying decisions by showcasing how our products and services help solve their problems.
• Who am I creating content for? People who want to drive more search traffic to their websites (business owners, affiliate marketers, e-commerce stores, etc.).
• Where will I publish content? The Big Picture Strategies Blog (because our audience uses Google to search for information).
• What type of content will I create? Blog posts.

If you haven’t created yours yet, avail our guide to creating a content marketing strategy.

2. Find Topic Ideas

Most people do this by looking at what’s popular on their chosen platform or channel. For example, if you’re creating videos for TikTok or YouTube, you may search for a topic there and look at what’s getting views.

The problem with this approach is that popular content might not have earned its views organically. They might have come from ads.

For that reason, we recommend doing Google keyword research instead—even if you’re creating content for TikTok or YouTube. This is because people tend to search for similar things across platforms, and keyword tools for Google have the most accurate data.

If you notice trends here, you can use them as “seed” keywords in a keyword research tool to find more similar topics.

3. Identify the Best Topics

The best topics are those with the highest traffic and business potential. If you’re creating content to rank in Google search, there are a couple of other metrics you’ll want to take into account too.

Traffic Potential: Traffic potential is how much traffic a topic can potentially attract for you. If you’re creating content for SEO, you can use the Traffic Potential (TP) metric in Keywords Explorer for this. It shows the top-ranking page’s estimated monthly organic traffic, which is usually a good proxy for a topic’s TP.

Search Intent: If you’re creating content for Google search, make sure searchers are actually looking for the kind of content you want to create. Use the current top-ranking results as a proxy for this.

Business Potential: Business potential is how easy it is to “sell” your product or service in the content. If it’s easy to pitch your business, the score is high. If it’s near-impossible to do so, the score is low. This depends on your business.

Keyword Difficulty: Keyword difficulty is a measure of how hard it would be to rank for a topic. The Keyword Difficulty (KD) score in Ahrefs is a good place to start. The higher this number, the more backlinks you’ll likely need to rank on the first page.

4. Prioritize Topics

Every good content plan needs prioritization because it’s impossible to write every piece of content at once. You need to pick your battles.

A simple color-coded spreadsheet can help you prioritize topics. Add topics that passed your search intent criteria, along with their Traffic Potential (TP), Keyword Difficulty (KD), and business potential (BP) scores. Then, color-code all the scores (greener = better).

5. Schedule Topics on Your Content Calendar

A content calendar is just a schedule of what you’ll publish and when. Building one is easy enough. Just pick some topics from your spreadsheet and add them to your project management software or a Google Calendar.

6. Assign Topics to Writers

It’s finally time to set your plan into action and assign content to creators. Assign the topics in your calendar, starting with those with the closest due dates. You should also give writers instructions for assigning related tasks to keep your content workflow moving.

Having a content plan that aligns with your strategy is crucial for smooth content creation and effective content marketing. By following these steps, you can ensure that your content plan is well-organized and aligned with your business goals.

Ready to start creating effective content? Explore more strategies and tips at Big Picture Strategies. Need Expert guidance to support your content creation? Check out our store for resources that can help you succeed.