Staying Productive & Creating Content With Ease

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Content Creation & Budget Template

Staying on top of your social media accounts can be difficult at times, and it may be hard to find inspiration for your content. 

Together, we will go over some things to consider when planning and creating your content, which will help you stay on track with growing an engaged audience. 

What Is In This Guide

The Importance of Consistency

Having a thorough social media marketing strategy helps you avoid missed opportunities and helps you to prioritize better when it comes to content creation. 

This helps ensure that you stick to your plan or identify when adjustments are necessary. Regardless of how much engagement you’re currently seeing, you must keep creating amazing content. 

Consistently feeding your social platforms with great content will help you get more favorable treatment from popular social algorithms, keeping your existing audience engaged. 

Simply put – the more frequently you post high-quality content, the more likely your content will be seen by the people you’re trying to attract. 

If your goal is for one of your posts to go viral, the worst thing you can do is watch a piece of your content gain some traction and have nothing ready to follow it up with. 

Once one of your posts reaches new audiences, you have to capture their attention for as long as possible and attempt to build a strong relationship with your new supporters. 

Another thing to note is that although self-promotion is important, you should not come across as a salesperson. Make sure you find ways to include your fans and make it about them too. 

Relationships with your fans grow stronger when you create connections as opposed to just asking for them to listen to your music or buy your merch. Learn to strike a balance, and the rest will follow.

A Complete Overview: Planning and Releasing Your Content

Content comes in many forms, and what works for one artist might be a flop for another. Some content is easy to create, like spontaneously going live on Instagram, while other content may involve several moving parts to make your vision a reality.

To simplify the process, we created a thorough overview for you to use when planning your content creation and thinking about the process from start to finish. Use the template provided to answer the key questions mentioned below:

What is the goal or purpose of this piece of content?

When using social media for your music, there are typically three different types of content you’ll be making, each with a specific purpose for — AWARENESS, ENGAGEMENT, and CONVERSIONS. 

To reach your desired social media goals, you need a balanced combination of all three content types.

Awareness

Content created to build AWARENESS is any promotional content related to your personal brand and your music. Since this content is focused on attracting new fans, this is where you should invest in high-quality projects where the overall aim is to build broad brand awareness for your image and your music. 

A great example that comes to mind is Joyner Lucas’ viral and highly polarizing single “I’m Not Racist,” which has accumulated over 144 million views to date.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43gm3CJePn0

The single was released on November 28th of 2017, and before then, Lucas was starting to become more known for his artistry but still not considered mainstream. However, this single, especially the music video’s virality, seemed to take his notoriety to the next level.

Everything about Lucas’ content has a way of touching people, giving you an alternate point of view and making you change your perspective. 

It’s well thought out and meticulous. Lucas’ content grabs your attention and makes you want to learn more about the artist.

In an interview with Fader, he states, “I just started focusing on my visuals, which I felt were very important. Once I figured that out, I started writing the videos before I would even write the record. I started doing everything backwards, and it worked for me.”

Lucas certainly applied this approach to “I’m Not Racist,” which seemed to spread like wildfire and had everybody talking. 

This approach to your content helps create the awareness you need to draw people in and grow your audience. Once you get their attention, it’s time to focus on keeping it.

Engagement

From press interviews, Instagram story updates, vlogs, live streams, or even TikTok videos of what you eat in a day — ENGAGEMENT related content is any post that allows you to connect with new fans as well as your core audience. This content should be personal, raw, and genuine. 

Since this content is mainly for your loyal supporters, it allows you to build a relationship with them, helping them see the musician behind their favorite music. 

Joyner Lucus engages with his massive audience almost every day by expressing his views on social issues and going live with fans. Lucas even grew more popular and human in the eyes of his fanbase the day he was in the middle of an Instagram live and randomly gave one of his fans a ride home on Thanksgiving.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gP5ZPxAu8Os

Your content should conveniently open the door for engagement opportunities, and from there, you’d be surprised at how the simplest and most genuine acts can solidify a lengthy relationship with your fans.

Conversions

Once you have built an audience that knows who you are beyond the music, it’s time to turn your passion into a business. This can come in many different forms depending on the platform, but there should always be an underlying focus on driving CONVERSIONS. 

You can use this type of content to promote your merchandise, advertise any upcoming concerts, make special announcements, plug your other social media platforms, build your email list, or encourage people to listen to your music. 

When Ariana Grande came out with the chart-topping pop anthem ‘Rain On Me’ with Lady Gaga, they posted a mock-weather report on all of their social media platforms to promote the song.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZkOxrJHlTE&ab_channel=LadyGaga

Let Gaga and Ari be an example that just because some posts are focused on driving conversions does not mean they can’t be creatively executed. Conversion focused content should be eye-catching while blending in with your other posts — because who would want to follow you if you are just plugging your merch all day?

Do you have a concept or vision in mind for the content?

After understanding what type of content you need to create, the next step before executing the creation is coming up with a concept or a vision for your content that fits within your schedule and budget. 

In the example of Joyner Lucas above, it’s evident that he started with the end in mind. Before even writing a song, he typically plots out a concept or vision first. Now you don’t have to be this methodical, but it is evident that this type of planning goes a long way when it comes to engagement. 

Keep in mind that you also don’t need to spend a fortune to make amazing content. Sometimes keeping it simple and using a little imagination is more than enough to bring your vision to life.

This could be in the form of a quick video shoot for TikTok, a behind-the-scenes look at your latest music video for YouTube, or a photoshoot for Instagram. Creating and sticking to an overarching theme across all of your social platforms helps strengthen your brand and sets out a cohesive narrative for your career.

When do you plan to release this content?

Just because an album, single, or video is completed doesn’t mean it’s the right time for it to come out. You may find it useful to reference your calendar when creating a content schedule, so you can align your social posts with your upcoming releases or announcements. 

Having release dates in mind gives you something to work towards. It helps you plan for not only the creation of your content but also the promotion afterward. Not only that, you must plan multiple steps ahead so that you can keep the momentum going long after your release with new music and more content. Having a stockpile of content or new music is never a bad situation to find yourself in.

Who will be a part of the content?

Most often, you will be the only person that is featured in your social media content. However, sometimes you might want to collaborate with other artists, companies, or influencers. Or maybe you need people to help you shoot and edit your music video, bringing your vision to life. 

For example, if you plan to shoot an acoustic cover of your latest song, will you be playing all of the instruments yourself, or will you need to hire a musician for the day? Do you need to find a videographer? Some of your video content may require additional talent from actors, dancers, choreographers, set designers, and other creatives. 

After your content is shot, will you be editing it all by yourself, or will you be handing off your content to an editor? Do not spend months trying to edit a video or photo that could take someone a couple of days to do! If you choose to edit this content yourself or hand it off to outsourced talent, make sure the footage is shot and edited in a way that aligns with your creative vision. 

After you know if you need outsourced talent to be involved, make sure you work all of those expenses into your budget. Some of these services can come with an associated cost, and you may not have the budget to spend on everything you need. If your budget is holding you back, consider your options. For example, you could hire a talented student building their portfolio and willing to work for a more affordable rate. 

Planning for the development of the content

The development of your content can be just as time-consuming as creating your music, so you need to make sure your time is being spent wisely. You are creating content for a reason — to build an audience for your music — so make sure to keep the end goal in mind at all times. 

When developing the structure, intention, and tone for your content, think of how your content can be used for promotional purposes down the road. 

Many artists share a behind-the-scenes look at their creative process, music videos, events, and photoshoots, so don’t miss the opportunity to share these valuable and authentic moments with your supporters. 

When putting together your budget, as mentioned above, you need to know who the key players will be when creating your content.

For larger projects, you may have to buy and rent additional equipment and props. You also need to consider how long you need the space you are shooting in, if there are filming permits involved, and if that will also be an additional expense. 

If you are working with a videographer, the hope is that they will handle most of this for you and have their own equipment or include the rental equipment’s cost in their rate — but that’s not a given and is up to you to confirm all of this, weeks if not months ahead of the planned shoot date.

Creating your content

Whether this is a multi-day shoot for a high-budget music video or a self-filmed vlog out of your home, the same rules apply to you to effectively create your content. 

Always come prepared with all of the information and resources you need for the content you are creating. 

This could range from things you need to perform at your best or additional people to help production go smoothly. While some things are bound to change on the fly, try your best to stick to the strategy and the plan you set out before creating your content.

You can never have too much footage, so make sure your production team captures the b-roll shots or outtakes for your promotional content if you planned for it in your marketing strategy. 

This footage is a cost-effective way to shoot promotional clips and behind the scenes footage to build hype around your upcoming projects and releases. 

Below is an example of how artist KYLE and his team repurpose content from their tour.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WilEosjwI-A

Editing and Post-Production

After you have handed all of your content to an editor for post-production, you need to make sure that things are organized. Follow-up with whoever is working on your content while they are editing, and keep in close contact with them to limit mistakes or avoid miscommunication. 

It is on you to stay on schedule with your releases to ensure everything gets completed on-time. Don’t shy away from following-up with your editor if your content is taking longer than anticipated and giving them edits to complete if the final product does not align with your vision.

Promotion

After your content is out in the world, don’t leave it up to your supporters to promote your content. It is vital that you follow through with whatever promotional plan you have set for yourself and track which methods were the most effective for organic growth. 

Most social media platforms have analytics integrated into their platforms. Identify the kind of content that’s working and think of ways to replicate your success with similar content in the future.

Always take time for reflection

After posting any piece of content, you should reflect on all of the things that went well and the things you could do differently. 

What didn’t go so well? Did you stick to the plan you created? Did you build any strong relationships with the cast, crew, or companies that you worked with? Was there anyone who you will avoid working with again in the future? 

Asking yourself these questions and dedicating time to reflecting on the content you spent hours planning and creating will ensure you save money and time on your next project and avoid making similar mistakes again.

After posting any piece of content, you should reflect on all of the things that went well and the things you could do differently. 

What didn’t go so well? Did you stick to the plan you created? Did you build any strong relationships with the cast, crew, or companies that you worked with? Was there anyone who you will avoid working with again in the future? 

Asking yourself these questions and dedicating time to reflecting on the content you spent hours planning and creating will ensure you save money and time on your next project and avoid making similar mistakes again.

Key Take Aways

All habits, good and bad, form and strengthen over time. In the beginning, you may find it challenging to find time to create content on top of everything else going on with your music career and in your personal life. 

However, you will find a steady workflow over time and some dedicated people to collaborate with that align with your vision, budget, and schedule.