2013 Editorial Calendar is here!
Three years ago, we released our first editorial calendar with the hopes that our fellow nonprofit communicators would be inspired to think of new and interesting ways to get their message out, essentially acting as their own publisher.
Since then, this practical tool has received great feedback and praise from our colleagues:
Beth Kanter, author of Beth’s Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media and co-author of “The Networked Nonprofit” says “It’s not every day that you come across high quality content shared freely with the community – it helps lift all the boats.”
Nelson Layag, Training Director of CompassPoint Nonprofit Services says “Having an editorial calendar has anchored a team-based approach to communications. It’s given structure to what was a wild wild west approach to reaching out to our community.” (Nelson offers more insights on CompassPoint’s experience here on Kivi Leroux Miller’s excellent blog nonprofitmarketinggiude.com.)
If you are new to the concept of an editorial calendar, it is a user-friendly tool for mapping relevant, compelling content to your media channels. Since the Calendar is presented as a Google spreadsheet, you can tailor it to keep your team informed and aligned about communications opportunities. Our colleagues and clients who use the tool also find that it sparks new ideas from staff, especially when customized with your team’s work plan. For example, our colleagues at VolunteerMatch used the tool as an inspiration to create their 2012 volunteer engagement calendar.
This year, we’ve further refined this handy tool, and tested it with a number of our clients. So now the 2013 version has twice the hooks to inspire nonprofit communications. Download a copy now and add your own calendar hooks, program dates, events and other important dates that your organization can leverage for successful communications. Read last year’s blog post for more details.
Let us know what dates you think we should have on the 2013 radar. And we look forward to hearing your tips on how you customized your 2013 editorial calendar.
P.S.: We’ll update the Editorial Calendar mid-year, and will share other tips and tools for content strategy, so sign up for inbox delivery to stay up to date.
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Photo courtesy of The New Sales Coach.
Holly Minch is LightBox’s founder and hopes the 2013 Editorial Calendar helps you achieve greater communications impact during the coming year.