Template 01 - Calendar
Free Social Media Content Calendar Template
RecurPost’s social media content calendar template plans one month across every network a brand publishes to. It carries ten fields, and seven of them map into a bulk import file so an approved month uploads once instead of being retyped. This page shows every field, one filled week across LinkedIn and Instagram, and exactly which columns survive the trip into scheduling.
1. THE ARTIFACT
What the Calendar Plans, and Which Views It Supplies
A network-neutral calendar earns its keep at the moment two networks disagree about timing. A LinkedIn post at 8am on Tuesday and an Instagram post at 6pm the same day are one row apart in this sheet and two apps apart everywhere else, and the person who has to notice the clash is looking at one screen rather than two. The rest of RecurPost’s social media templates cover the narrower jobs that sit beside it.
ONE BRAND, ONE MONTH
The calendar covers one brand, several networks and one month at a time. It is the artifact this page previews in full: ten fields, one filled week across two networks, and the columns that carry into a bulk import.
USE THIS ONE
2+ NETWORKS
Use this calendar when the same month covers more than one network. It is network-neutral, which is what lets a LinkedIn row and an Instagram row sit side by side in the order they publish rather than in two separate tools.
USE INSTEAD
Use the Instagram-only option in RecurPost’s social media templates library instead when Instagram is the only account being planned, because that sheet carries format, hashtags and grid order that a network-neutral calendar has no reason to hold.
2. THE FIELDS
The Ten Fields in the Calendar
The calendar carries ten fields, and three of them exist for the people rather than for the posts. Owner, approval status and result notes are the three that describe the team rather than the post. That distinction matters more than it looks, because those are exactly the three fields that stay behind when the month goes into a bulk upload.
Platform and account are separate fields for a reason too. One brand can hold two accounts on the same network, and a calendar that collapses them cannot tell a regional page from a head-office page when the upload runs.
TOPIC IS NOT THE CAPTION
Topic holds a short line saying what a post is about. Caption or asset link holds the text that actually publishes. Keeping them in separate fields is what lets you scan a month for repetition without reading every caption in it.
BUILT FOR
A brand or an agency planning one month across two or more networks, where the same idea gets reshaped for each one.
SKIP IF
Instagram is the only account being planned and the feed’s grid order matters as much as the dates.
FIELD
WHAT IT DECIDES
WHAT GOES IN IT
01 Date and time
When the post goes out
A date and a clock time
02 Platform
Which network it belongs to
The network name
03 Account
Which account on that network
The handle or page name
04 Format
What kind of post it is
Text, image, carousel, video, document, link
05 Topic
What it is about
A short line, not the caption
06 Caption or asset link
What actually publishes
The caption text, or a link to the asset
07 Owner
Who is answerable for the row
One named person
08 Approval status
Whether it is cleared
Draft, in review, or approved
09 Campaign
Which push it belongs to, if any
A campaign label, or blank
10 Result notes
What happened after
A short note, added later
3. WORKED EXAMPLE
One Filled Week Across Instagram and LinkedIn
A filled week for a two-person B2B consultancy runs seven posts across LinkedIn and Instagram. The consultant writes LinkedIn, the marketing assistant builds Instagram, and one idea appears three times in three formats.
ONE IDEA, THREE SHAPES
Monday’s text post, Tuesday’s carousel and Saturday’s Reel are one idea in three shapes. Seeing that in a single sheet is the whole argument for a network-neutral calendar: on two separate platform tools it looks like three unrelated pieces of work, and the repetition that makes it effective is invisible.
ONE SHEET, ONE BRAND
One sheet plans one brand, however many networks it publishes to. Two clients in one sheet makes the approval column mean two different things, and the first missed approval is the one that teaches you that.
DATE AND TIME
PLATFORM
FORMAT
TOPIC
OWNER
STATUS
Mon 08:00
Text
The workflow problem clients keep describing
Consultant
Approved
Tue 12:00
Document
Two-page checklist for fixing it
Consultant
Approved
Tue 18:00
Carousel
The same checklist, six slides
Assistant
Approved
Wed 12:00
Single image
The team mid-project
Assistant
Approved
Thu 08:00
Text
Answering a question from Monday’s comments
Consultant
In review
Fri 15:00
Link
New case study
Consultant
Approved
Sat 10:00
Reel
Ninety seconds on the same workflow problem
Assistant
Draft
4. APPROVAL
How a Row Moves From Draft to Approved
Two fields carry a row from an idea to something publishable: owner and approval status. Every row starts as a draft with an owner against it. Once the month is approved, RecurPost’s social media calendar is where it lives from day to day, showing the month in Month, Week or List view, and a post moves to a new time by dragging it, so a clash you missed in the sheet is fixable in the place the posts actually sit.
A REJECTED ROW
A rejected row goes back to draft with a line in result notes saying why, rather than being deleted. The row is evidence, and deleting it means the same idea comes back in six weeks with the same problem.
IN REVIEW
CAPTION FILLED
A row moves to in review only once the caption or asset link is filled. That rule is the one that keeps the calendar honest, because a sheet full of approved rows with empty caption cells is a month that looks planned and is not.
APPROVED
SECOND READER
A row moves to approved only once someone other than the owner has read it. A solo operator with no second reader can use draft and approved alone and leave the owner field empty.
5. THE MAPPING
Taking an Approved Month Into a Bulk Import
RecurPost’s bulk scheduling reads a CSV or Excel file, and seven of the calendar’s ten fields have somewhere to go in it. The other three stay behind.
THE THREE THAT STAY
The three that stay behind are the right three. Owner, approval status and result notes describe how the team made the post rather than what gets published, and an import file carrying internal workflow state into a publishing queue is a file that eventually publishes the word “draft”.
PLATFORM AND ACCOUNT
Platform and account do the same job together: they identify which connected profile a row belongs to. Neither one on its own is enough when a brand holds two accounts on the same network.
CALENDAR FIELD
WHERE IT GOES IN THE IMPORT FILE
Date and time
The scheduled time, combined with the sheet’s timezone
Platform
Identifies the connected profile, together with account
Account
Identifies the connected profile, together with platform
Format
Informs the post type where the network supports more than one
Topic
Not published. Keep it if it helps you sort the file, drop it otherwise
Caption or asset link
The post text and the media reference
Owner
Stays in the sheet
Approval status
Stays in the sheet
Campaign
The label you group the batch by
Result notes
Stays in the sheet
6. THE ARITHMETIC
What a Filled Week Adds Up To in a Month
Seven posts a week is twenty-eight posts a month across two accounts, which is one upload. Four LinkedIn posts and three Instagram posts make the seven, and four weeks of that cadence make the twenty-eight.
RecurPost sets no hard cap on how many posts a single import can carry and recommends keeping a batch to around 100 posts so it processes quickly, so a two-account month leaves plenty of room.
WHAT IT FITS
Bulk import fits a month where every row reads approved before the export runs. It does not fit a month with rows still in review, because a draft caption uploaded is a draft caption published.
COUNT BEFORE YOU EXPORT
The week’s row count turns into a month’s post count before any of it turns into an upload. Twenty-eight is the number you check the batch against, not an estimate you make afterwards.
PLATFORM
POSTS / WEEK
4
3
Every week
7
× 4 WEEKS
→
ONE MONTH
28
posts across two accounts
Twenty-eight is the number you plan against, and one upload carries all of it. Owner, approval status and result notes stay in the sheet.
7. THE FILE
What You Get, and What Happens When You Submit the Form
RecurPost gives the social media content calendar template away free. You take your own copy of the file and edit that copy, so nothing you plan reaches anyone else.
The form asks for six details and requires one. Business email address is the only required field, and full name, organization, employee count, country and company URL are optional.
RecurPost sends the calendar to the business email address you supply, and the confirmation on this page tells you it is on the way.
DELIVERY
It arrives by email, at the business email address you enter on this form.
ACCESS
You take your own copy, so the month you plan stays yours.
PRICE
Free, one required field, no card.
FREE TEMPLATE
Get Your Free Template
Business email address is the only required field.
Fill the ten fields once, get every row to approved, and set the whole month live from one screen.
8. FIT
When This Calendar Fits, and Which Calendar to Use Instead
Two calendars sit in this library, and the difference is how many networks you are planning.
THE LIBRARY
All three sit in RecurPost’s social media templates library alongside the audit, analytics and proposal documents.
WHAT YOU NEED TO DO
USE
WHY
Plan a month across two or more networks and export it as one upload
This social media content calendar template
It is network-neutral and it maps into an import file
Plan a month for one Instagram account, including how the feed will look
The Instagram content calendar template
It carries format, hashtags, media link and grid order
Plan one time-boxed push with its own objective and result
The social media campaign template
A campaign runs inside the month rather than instead of it
TRY RECURPOST
RecurPost’s Agency plan covers 20 social accounts and includes 3 team members. RecurPost prices an extra teammate at a flat $20 per month on any plan instead of multiplying the plan price by every seat. An approved month uploads once and lands across every connected account, so the number of networks in the sheet costs nothing extra until the account count moves.
RecurPost is the social media management software agencies run their client publishing on.
No credit card required
Frequently Asked Questions
What the calendar holds, how a row is approved, which columns reach an upload, and how the file reaches you.
What fields are in a social media content calendar?
A social media content calendar carries ten fields: date and time, platform, account, format, topic, caption or asset link, owner, approval status, campaign and result notes. Seven of them describe the post and three describe the team, and that split is what decides which columns end up in a bulk upload.
How does a post move from draft to approved in the calendar?
A row reaches in review once the caption or asset link is filled, and it reaches approved once someone other than the owner has read it. A rejected row goes back to draft with a line in result notes rather than being deleted, so the same idea does not return in six weeks carrying the same problem.
Which calendar columns go into a bulk upload?
Seven of the ten fields map into a bulk import file, and owner, approval status and result notes stay in the sheet. Date and time become the scheduled time, platform and account together identify the profile, caption or asset link becomes the post text and media, format informs the post type, and campaign becomes the label you group the batch by.
How do I get the template, and what do I receive?
RecurPost sends the social media content calendar template to the business email address you supply on this page. It is free, and you take your own copy and edit that. Business email address is the only required field on the form.
Discover your must-have Social Media Templates
The calendar holds the dated month. These are the documents that sit above it and beside it.
01
PLANNING
Social Media Strategy
Map a client’s goals, audience, and posting plan.
02
PLANNING
Strategy Presentation
Pitch the strategy to a client in slides.
03
PLANNING
Marketing Plan
Lay out channels, cadence, and owners for the quarter.
04
PLANNING
Social Media Audit
Assess a client’s current accounts before you start.
01
CALENDAR
Instagram Content Calendar
Plan an Instagram grid and feed in advance.
02
CALENDAR
Google Posts Calendar
Plan Google Business Profile posts ahead.
01
CAMPAIGN
Social Media Campaign
Build out a time-boxed campaign’s posts.
02
CAMPAIGN
Campaign Proposal
Pitch a campaign to a client for sign-off.
03
CAMPAIGN
Paid Social Media Ads
Plan paid ad sets, audiences, and budgets.
01
REPORTING
Social Media Analytics
Track post and account metrics in one sheet.
02
REPORTING
Social Media Reporting
Package monthly results for a client.