You Need A Content Calendar! (Why and How to Make One)

Even outside of the music niche, one of the hardest things to do when you first get into content marketing is knowing what to post and when. Sometimes it feels like you are always behind on the times, what’s being talked about, or you don’t have enough time to properly prepare for things that you want to do in a timely manner.

When I was in charge of marketing for a large-ish regional brewery, one thing that drove me crazy before I took over was we would always wait until the day of or the day before to figure out what we were doing for holidays/events etc that we knew were coming and came every year - even if we were just running the same discounts we’d normally run for holidays.

So step one for me was to make a content calendar that can be viewed as a one page document that has everything for the entire year on it. This sounds like a massive undertaking but let me explain

The Content Calendar

The content calendar does not need to have every post on it you ever plan to do, sometimes spontaneity is great and you truly can’t predict how content is going to perform until you try it so it’s hard to plan 3-4 months out when the series you spent a month developing is dead and not worth the time to continue moving forward with.

That said, where a content calendar becomes incredibly useful is for planning. If you are a horror composer, you know Halloween is in October and that people are in the horror/spooky mood. You also may know a great horror director is releasing a horror movie in June. Both of these are opportunities for you to make content that is relevant, timely, and can be part of the “cultural moment” that is happening around those times. Why wait until it’s a week before Halloween to figure out if you are going to do a spooky cover or release a Halloween EP and make all the content around it?

Starting a Content Calendar

So the way I like to do this is to make 12 sections - one for each month. In each section, I will have a list of the important dates and events that are going on that month. It could be holidays - like Halloween or Christmas, General “Season” stuff like opening day for baseball, or even industry events like the Oscars, a big film release, or a movie related holiday like “Star Wars Day”.

What you want to do though is be aware of all the big exciting stuff that is worth talking about for the whole year on one page. 1) This is an excellent way to plan and start brainstorming ideas a few months out to be a part of the conversation when the time comes and 2) you can reuse this every year if you just update the dates!

Picking and choosing what elements you include in this calendar is incredibly personal and I might do a post about organ music at a ballpark for opening day of the Yankees but you might have zero interest in baseball at all. You don’t need to limit yourself to just music/film, and actually finding ways to be “music adjacent” in distant niches (like my organ example above) is a great way to try and connect with new audiences.

How to Use a Content Calendar

Let’s take a look at March 2025. March this past year had a few areas that may be worth creating content around. The oscars were March Second. Mardi Gras started that same week. In my area, St. Patrick’s day is one of the largest holidays of the year (I’m in an Irish town, and we supposedly have the second biggest parade in NY just after Manhattan) so it’s on here, March Madness is a cultural phenomenon even outside of basketball, and of course there is the giant Game Developers Conference at the end of the month. Here’s what March looks like on my calendar:

March

Important Dates: Oscars 3/2-Sun, Mardis Gras 3/4-T, St. Patrick’s Day 3/17-M, March Madness (month), Game Developers Conference

So this is all great, but how do we generate content from this? Well, the oscars are a huge talking point. Making some reels or long form videos about the best scores of the year or history of a certain composer who is up for an oscar is one idea. Mardi Gras has a whole musical culture around it, perhaps arranging a popular song into that style is another. These are the obvious ideas, sure, but better to plan ahead than not.

Where this is “less obvious” are the topics on here that are more personal and less of a holiday/award show. March Madness for example - so many retailers and brands run a march madness tournament in their industry or niche. Why can’t composers take advantage of that idea and do their own movie or film score bracket? Or what about GDC? Yeah, you may not be going but what if you made content about how to get the most out of a conference or things to do while you’re out there?

Both of these ideas are “for march” but the content creation and release may even happen in February. Knowing what’s coming up and how to take advantage can save you a lot of time and stress than trying to do these last minute. If there is a movie release coming out you are excited for, especially if not many people are aware but you’re certain it’s going to be big, then that’s an amazing opportunity as well! Imagine you were making content about the songwriting in KPOP Demon Hunters the very day it was released because you knew it was coming and was going to be big - you could’ve been the first on the scene with amazing insight and possibly went viral!

So once I identify what I want to do, I make a checklist of everything I need for that idea in that month.

For example:

Later this week I am releasing a video where I rescore a silent film from 1896. It’s so much more than just writing music for a silent movie though, here’s what was on my checklist

Scoring a silent horror film for Halloween

• pick a movie

• research the movie

• research George Melies

• Write the script

• write the music and film yourself writing live

• Edit

• Create a title & 3 Thumbnails

• Publish on youtube

• Publish Session on Patreon (session)

• Add project to your email update for next month

As you can see, this can be a GREAT way of organizing your content and being aware of where the various irons are in the fire. Sometimes a post can be just a post, no planning, but other times it can be incredibly helpful to be relevant and timely and planned out far in advance - especially for events that happen yearly!

Other uses for a content Calendar

Another thing I like to add to my content calendar is an IDEAS section for each month, as well as a reminders. Ideas are things I see other people doing that I think would be fun to try next year - like hosting a “maker’s march” event or an Oscar FIlm Recap or Ranking video. Reminders are also important, like “reminder that this specific grant/application/mentorship opens in March every year”

These sort of things are INCREDIBLY useful (and even important) and can make a huge difference in your marketing efforts. I love google calendar, but having everything on a single page in a text document like this allows you to quickly scan/be reminded of what’s coming up outside of the current month and give you more of a “Bird’s eye view” of the entire year, in a way that is repeatable and expandable year after year.

One last note

If you are in a situation where you are working with people besides yourself, let's say fundraising for a kickstarter film you're a part of or in a larger company, this calendar can be incredibly helpful for coordinating the team and making sure everyone is on the same page. Knowing you need a graphic or video for XYZ holiday made that says "ABC" months in advance can save so many headaches when crunch time comes and people are trying to figure out what to do, when they could have done this months prior during a slower season or in the prep for your campaign. It's really indispensable and highly recommended!

ScoringTech.Net is operated by Joe Chris as a means of trying to give back to the composer community. Consider joining the monthly mailing list to have these articles sent to your inbox on the first of every month! Follow me on instagram @Joe_Chris_ , youtube, or Join our free discord community where we host bi-weekly composition challenges!