Planning enough content for your church for one entire year… sound impossible yet?

Planning your content ahead is essential for creating better content that your community loves and actually getting some rest on the weekends.

I want you to create a content schedule that doesn’t just last for a couple weeks and fade, but one that you actually stick to.

When you get a hold of a solid routine to plan in advance, you actually aren’t doing more work, you are just shifting your approach so that when you are in content creation mode, you aren’t stressed or rushed - which doesn’t serve you or your community.

When you are in the middle of a big event promotion or a busier time in your church, imagine knowing that your marketing content is prepared and ready to go so you can focus on what matters most in those seasons.

Heavenly, right?

In this post, I’m going to take you through the keys to planning your church's marketing content for an entire year. 

Table of Contents

1. What is Content
2. Determine What Content Your Church Will Create Each Week
3. Repurpose Your Content Through Multiple Channels 
4. Take a Look at Your Year as a Whole
5. Map Out Your Content for the Year 

Church Content Plan Key #1: What is “Content”

You are most likely creating content for your church in many forms and you may not have thought of it as “content”. For example, a church’s biggest piece of “content” each week is the Sunday message!

Content includes: any words, copy or posts you are writing for your church to serve your audience in some way. You can serve through education, inspiration, or simply letting people into the “behind the scenes” of your church life.

You can place your content on different platforms including: Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Youtube, Blog Posts, Twitter, email, and Podcasts. 

Content is everything you are putting out into the world from your church to communicate your message to your community. 

Creating content is central to any business and especially churches, to clearly communicate to the world and move your mission forward. 

Now that you know what content is, it’s time to put a system in place to make sure you are being as effective as possible. 

Church Content Plan Key #2: Determine What Content Your Church Will Create Each Week

The most important thing about creating content is consistency. When you create consistent content and people learn to know when and where to expect your content, you start to be seen as a reliable source. 

This builds relationships and trust online. When you create a consistent content schedule, your community will create habits of consuming your content overtime. 

Inconsistency can create doubt in your communities subconscious and make them feel that your church is not a dependable source. 

Next determine what content will best serve your community and how many times per week you want to show up and communicate to them. The key is to choose an amount you can stick to.

Ask yourself: How much time do you have each week? How can you block off time and stick to it? What can you do in advance to set yourself up for success? How many social media posts, videos, emails, podcasts or blogs will you create per week?

Church Content Plan Key #3: Repurpose Your Content Through Multiple Channels

The first step is to know that you can’t do it all. You can’t have an online presence everywhere and do it well and that is ok. 

You need to prioritize what type of content you’ll create and which platforms you’ll be communicating through. 

Make sure to pick places where your community is already hanging out and the places that you love so that you’ll be more likely to be consistent.

To start, pick two main social platforms where you will devote your time so that you can get good at those two places, instead of being mediocre at all of them.

If you aren’t sure, my recommendation is Facebook and Instagram because they are the largest social media platforms and most people are on them. 

Next, pick one place to publish larger pieces of content at least once a week. The main places to publish a large piece of weekly content is a blog, a Youtube video or a podcast. 

Then you will repurpose this one piece of content onto multiple platforms in multiple ways. Yes, you can take ONE piece of content and share it as many ways as possible. 

Does that sound efficient or what?!

Let’s go over an example. 

Let’s say each week you take your Sunday message and want to repurpose that message content in as many ways as possible. Here are 10 ways to repurpose your Sunday message throughout the week.

1. Post the video of the message on your Youtube with a detailed description from the message 
2. Take a clip of the video and post it on your Instagram and Facebook
3. Use the content from the message to write 7 social media captions 
4. Take the audio and place it on your podcast and add a detailed description and an introductory audio message 
5. Transcribe the video and reformat it to become a blog post on your website 
6. Record your Pastor sharing for 1 minute about the message and post it to your Instagram Stories 
7. Create a Reel on Instagram based on one point of the message
8. Send out an email to your community highlighting one point of the message and the Pastors heart behind it and link to your website where they can re-listen
9. Pull a quote from the message and post it on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter  
10. Create a quote graphic from the message and post it on Instagram and Facebook, then pin it to a board on Pinterest 
    

See how you can take one large piece of content and repurpose the heck out of it to squeeze out every last drop?! 

Think of every piece of content you create at your church as a living piece of content. It will live on after it's put out into the world for someone to find at some point on the internet. It will continue to impact lives, even after it’s over. 

Every piece of content will live on, instead of being over on Sunday after the message is shared. 

How powerful is that?! 

Church Content Plan Key #4: Take a Look at Your Year as a Whole

Next up, take a look at your year as a whole. What is the big picture your church is working on each week, month or quarter? Map this out so you can be ready to build up to different events or key seasons in your church.

By knowing these dates you can create content in advance so that when you hit a busy season, your content is ready to go and you are freed up to focus on what matters most in the moment instead of worrying about your social media or other content. 

Also, when you take a step back you can create content strategically versus randomly. You can create with purpose, instead of creating just to get something up because you have to. 

Each piece of content you create should serve a purpose and be aligned with your overall church goals. Make sure to connect with your leadership team and Pastors so you can make this a reality! 

Church Content Plan Key #5: Map Out Your Content for the Year 

Finally, map out your content! Put it on paper, or digital paper! Create a master content calendar so you can see your plans right in front of you and share it with your entire staff and team. 

A simple google spreadsheet works wonders where you can track each week's social posts, emails, podcasts, and videos. You can outline your focus for each month so everyone stays aligned and on target.

This way, you know what is coming up, who is doing what and there is no confusion or creating content on the fly. Everyone can be freed up to be creative and put out their best work because there is a solid plan in place. 

You can also take a look at each person’s workload and make sure they have enough time to get things done without stressing. 

If you need something to start with, click here to download The Ultimate Social Media Calendar Every Church Needs.

Conclusion 

Now you know the keys to planning your church social media content for an entire year! 

You learned:

1. What is Social Media Content
2. Determine What Content Your Church Will Create Each Week
3. Repurpose Your Content Through Multiple Channels 
4. Take a Look at Your Year as a Whole
5. Map Out Your Content for the Year