If you’ve ever sat down to write your newsletter but didn’t know what to write about, you’ve just identified your need for an editorial calendar. This helpful tool can make completing an ezine or e-newsletter a much easier process.

What It Is

It’s a schedule of stories you plan to cover in the future. You can project as far as a month to more than a year in advance. Magazines use them religiously, particularly to help contributing writers know what topics they’ll be covering when.

Why It’s Important

For one thing, you’ll know what you’ll be writing about for any given issue, which virtually eliminates writer’s block. Also, you can begin gathering research for upcoming stories as you run across it so that when it’s time to write, it’ll already be handy.

If you use contributing writers, your editorial calendar tells them what stories to pitch, increasing the chances that you’ll get acceptable submissions. You can either publish your calendar on your website or send it out by request.

Another benefit is it’ll cement your deadlines. For example, if you publish on Tuesdays, then you may choose the Friday before as your completion deadline.

And, to build anticipation for future issues, you can highlight upcoming stories at the end of each current issue. Finally, it will give you a record of stories you’ve already covered to avoid duplication and breed consistency in your publication.

How To Create It

List your upcoming publication dates. For example, if you publish your e-newsletter every Tuesday, grab a calendar or make a list of all the Tuesday as far in advance as you desire.

Next, list the topics you intend to write about. Think about upcoming holidays, events you’d like to promote, product releases to review, anything that’s viable fodder for your publication.

Is your company launching a new product this spring? Note that for the applicable issue. Does the Sales Department usually run a huge fall sale? Is your non-profit group sponsoring its premier fundraiser at Christmas? A calendar helps you plan the necessary coverage.

Looking so far ahead also helps you come up with more creative angles to cover various topics, particularly notoriously dry ones such as product information or specifications.

Consider any regular sections you may run in each issue. For example, if you typically interview an industry expert for your ezine, go ahead and jot the names of people you’d like to feature.

Once you’ve completed your list, plug the stories into the corresponding dates.
Keep in mind that last minute changes might pre-empt a story idea so don’t consider the calendar to be cast in stone.

Having an editorial calendar is a sure way to know what you’ll be writing about for a given period of time. Try it. See if you like it. You may just find it was one of the best things you could have done for yourself as the editor and for your publication.