Blogging 101 – If You Want to Succeed, You Need CoSchedule

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Here’s how it works.

When I began blogging in 2013, I actually used a spreadsheet to organize my monthly posts and social media sharing. Each month I printed my paper spreadsheet out and for each blog post I wrote, I entered the information by hand to plan when I was going to share my posts online and to which social media platform(s). It was a very tedious and time consuming process.

I first learned about CoSchedule in 2014. I signed up for their 14-day free trial and I fell in love with the ease with which I could plan and schedule my social media shares for my blog posts. After my trial ran out, I signed up for their monthly Blogger plan and I have remained with CoSchedule ever since.

So, what is CoSchedule?

“CoSchedule is an easy drag-and-drop content marketing calendar that allows you to plan, create, and promote your content all in one place. It saves you time and helps you grow your audience through smart marketing plans and efficient team collaboration.”

CoSchedule from Garrett Moon on Vimeo.

Since 2014 there have been a number of new features added to CoSchedule and a number of new plan options have become available. Depending on what you are using CoSchedule for, you can select a different monthly (or annual) plan. There are 5 plans currently available, but for blogging I think you will be most interested in the Solo Standard and the Solo Marketing Plans. The main differences between these two Solo Plans is the integrations you can access (Basic vs. Premium) and the number of social profiles you can use for scheduling purposes. The Solo Marketing Plan also allows you to add ReQueue.

CoSchedule Plan Options:

Sign Up for The Free Trial Option Here (no credit card required!)

SOLO STANDARD    SOLO MARKETING    TEAM MARKETING    TEAM PRO    MULTI-CALENDAR

With every blog post I write I schedule my social media shares, for the day I publish, 1 day later, 1 week later, 1 month later and 1 other date within the next year. You can publish even further ahead too if you want – you have the ability to select custom dates. I schedule all of this before the post is even published. This is perfect for me because I can write my post and schedule everything and then just walk away. It is all done and I do not need to remember to go back and share anything!

Here’s an example:

I entered a ‘fake’ date in 2020 to the post because I wanted to show you how this works. You can click the + sign beside any of the options and select which social media accounts and boards you want to share to. If you are an Admin in a Facebook Group you can even schedule shares to the Group. I currently have my plan set-up to share to Facebook, Pinterest, Google+ and Facebook Groups.

The available Social Accounts you can connect are:

Instagram, Google+ Pages, LinkedIn, Pinterest (each board), Facebook (Page, Group and Profile), Tumblr and Twitter

When you click the + it opens up some options for you to choose from. First you need to select where you are sharing (see the little white flag in the blue square in the image below? I chose my Facebook Page). 

If you wanted to, you could select more than one Social Profile to share to, just remember if you do, each one will share using the same wording and options you choose for this time spot. Once you select your Social Media Profiles to share to, you need to decide if you will share as Text, Image, Video or a Link. Everyone prefers sharing things in different formats but for me I always share as an Image. If you don’t like the image suggested in the post, you can hover over it (to the right of the star in the red square) and it will give you an option to delete it. Then the option opens up for you to choose an alternate image from the post (for the Image Sharing Option).

TIP: if you haven’t saved your post since you added a new image up top, it won’t show up down here. So save your draft first before scheduling.

Once you choose the way you are going to share your post you can decide (if you are sharing as an Image) if you want to share the title and link only or if you want to add more text to the description box. Some social media sites limit the number of characters (like Twitter) so I recommend sharing Twitter separately if you’d like to modify the text you share when sharing as an Image.

If you open the option box beside “same day as publish” it will provide other publish dates to choose from. Including 3 days, 1 week, 1 month, _ days and a custom date option. You can select any 1 of those options for the post and then you can also specify the Time you want the post to be shared.

The time you choose to share can be automatically determined by CoSchedule based on the interaction your past posts have received, or you can select a different option if you want it shared at a specific time.

I personally write my posts right on WordPress and then at the bottom, because I added the CoSchedule App, it displays the options for scheduling. Then you can visit the Calendar right in WordPress or choose to go to the Web App online to make changes, drag-and-drop your posts into different dates, or even just drag-and-drop social media messages to different spots in the calendar.

You can even go into an old blog post and add social media shares, after-the-fact, at ANY time. You are not limited to posts created after you signed up with CoSchedule.

Another Feature I use all the time is the Social Curation Chrome Extension. I use this to schedule shares of other people’s posts to my social media accounts. It is quick and easy to do and saves me a lot of time because I can simply click the extension button on my browser when I am viewing their post and it populates all the information I want to share. I just need to decide where and when I want to share the post. Once I schedule these shares, I can even access my Calendar and drag-and-drop them to a different date and time.

Here’s a look at what the online calendar shows when I view it on WordPress. I used my Filters to show you just my scheduled Facebook Page Shares and my blog post drafts / scheduled posts:

The times displayed are the times CoSchedule has selected as my “Best Time” to share. Each of these entries can be dragged-and-dropped to a different spot in the calendar.

One final feature I’d like to share with you that I love is the Top Content Report.  It analyzes everything you’ve ever shared using CoSchedule and tracks the social media interaction it received. This allows you to monitor which posts do well and it allows you to schedule more shares on them easily.

CoSchedule makes social media marketing easy – it saves you time and allows you to track and share posts across multiple social media channels with just a few clicks of the mouse. CoSchedule has made me a better and more efficient blogger and it has helped me grow my online business quickly. If you want to succeed at blogging, you need to promote your posts on social media and CoSchedule makes this easy to do. Sign up for your free trial today and find out for yourself! 

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