How to plan content
A quarter of publishing: twelve pieces across a blog, a newsletter, social posts and video, each with its own publication day, and two milestones. Unlike a marketing campaign, which builds to one launch, a content plan is a steady stream of small chains. The three views below show the same plan and stay in step.
Timeline: what goes out when
One row per piece, grouped by channel and colored by production status. Each bar is the work on one piece, and the piece goes out on the bar's last day.
Most pieces reuse an earlier one: the tips and the first newsletter point to the how-to post, and the quote posts, the video and Newsletter: customer come from the Customer story. The Complete setup guide is the quarter's long piece, and three later pieces wait for it.
Drag Customer story a week later. The quote posts, the video and Newsletter: customer move five work days with it; the guide, the pieces that reuse it and Quarter review stay where they are. A slip moves the chain that reuses the piece, not the whole quarter.
Production board: where each piece stands
Channels as rows and statuses as columns, from Idea to Published.
Use it in the weekly content meeting: what is stuck in Editing, and what needs a writer. Moving a card to another status changes its color in the timeline, not its dates. When a piece goes out, move it to Published yourself: the plan records the work, it does not publish anything.
Publishing dates: the list for the week
Every piece with its publication day in the End column, its channel and its status.
Choose the End heading to sort by publication day and see what goes out next across every channel. Without sorting, the list follows the chains, so each piece sits under the one it reuses.
Make it yours
- Choose Open in Tidigar under any view to get your own copy, dated from this week. It is free, needs no account and stays on your device.
- Rename the channels to the ones you publish on, such as a podcast or a second social account, and remove the rest.
- Replace the pieces with your topics and drag each bar so it ends on the day you want it out.
- Make the posts that promote a piece wait for it, so they move together when it slips.
Follow production dates in your calendar
Save your copy in Tidigar Business (paid), select the saved Publishing dates view and choose Share → Screens…. Make a screen, open it and choose Calendar subscription → Copy calendar link. Writers can subscribe in their calendar app without a Tidigar account. The steps and limits are in Screen links and calendar feeds.
The feed contains each activity's whole production period as an all-day event, plus the plan's published milestones. It does not turn each row into a single event on its End date: Customer story spans its planned start through its publication day. A subscription does not publish the content or change a card's status.
This page gives you an independent local copy; publishing the feed is a separate Business step. Anyone with its address can read it. Updates are read-only and can take hours or longer to appear in the calendar app; keep last-minute publication decisions in the team's usual communication channel.
Frequently asked questions
How far ahead should a content plan go? A quarter is common: far enough to plan a long piece and what reuses it, close enough to change topics.
How is this different from a campaign plan? A campaign builds toward one launch date with reviews before it. A content plan has many publication dates, and each piece can move without moving the others.
Does Tidigar publish the posts? No. The plan holds dates and status; you publish in your own tools and move the card to Published.