As a marketing manager, you have a ton of work to do. Between projects, reports and more, trying to manage social media (which is a lot of work in and of itself) can put on a lot of stress. You have to check in on your campaigns, approve graphics, pull analytics, and the list goes on. Having a checklist in place can help you ensure that you’re getting all your work done promptly and you’re not missing any critical steps.

Why Are Checklists Important?

Checklists are essential for any manager. Actually, that’s true for almost any position, which is why they are so critical to today’s work environment. In fact, Atul Gawande, author of “The Checklist Manifesto” talks about how to the world is so busy and complicated that we need a checklist to keep up with everything. He’s literally a surgeon, too. If he needs checklists, marketers probably do as well. Checklists help by:

• Keeping you on track and organized.
• Ensuring that you don’t forget something in the process.
• Help you maintain consistency.
• Help delegate tasks to the rest of your social media team and ensure that they are also getting their work done.

And that’s just one day! Not to mention, that’s just social media. You’re probably balancing other things on top of your social media management. In summary, get yourself a checklist, there’s too much going on with your day-to-day work not to. Create Checklists In CoSchedule With Task Templates You can move all of your checklists into one place with Task Templates from CoSchedule. Getting them set up in your calendar is easy. Select the task template icon. Add in the tasks from your checklist and assign them to a person in your calendar with a due date. Title and save your template once it’s ready.

Finish Any Outstanding Tasks

The first part of any social media marketers day should be to finish any outstanding tasks from the day before.

Check That Posts That Are Publishing Today Are Ready To Go

This step in your daily checklist involves three parts:

1. Ensure that any accounts tagged in your posts are correct. The last thing you want to do is send out a post that links to the wrong account.

2. Make sure any links in your posts are working. Broken links are no good.

3. Double-check for spelling errors. Simple mistakes can leave a lasting (and unfortunately, negative) impression.

Review Any Meetings On Your Agenda For Today

Meeting to discuss an upcoming campaign? Do yourself a favor and review your notes and research before you head in.

Check The Status Of Upcoming Graphics and Videos

If upcoming posts still don’t have the images, graphics, or videos they need, check in with the teams responsible for creating them. This is especially important because if you and need to make edits, you don’t want to be adding visual content at the last minute.

Review Any Visual Media That Needs To Be Approved For Your Social Channels

If graphics or videos are waiting for approval, make your edit notes and get them back to their respective teams in a timely manner.

Edit Upcoming Content For Each Social Media Channel

If you have a writer crafting social copy, review every post before it’s published.

Approve Any Content That Is Ready For Publish

Once the graphics are uploaded, and the content is edited, you can approve your posts to publish to your channels. Ensure that your social media publishing tool has approval features to make sure everything that publishes is actually ready to go.

Engage With Thought Leaders

There are thought leaders in every industry. Set aside time each day to engage with them, and find new people to follow. Share advice, tactics, and more to help develop that relationship. You never know when they might call for a favor. Plus, engaging with thought leaders can help keep you on top of the latest trends in your industry and increase your authority.

Reshare Content From Partners and Influencers

If you are working with a partner or influencer, show their content a little love by sharing it to your channels. This can also help fill gaps in your social media schedule if you’re running out of content ideas.

Update Your Social Media Calendar

Your social media strategy lives and dies by your calendar. Which means that it should always be up to date. Check in every day to ensure projects, messages, reports, and meetings haven’t moved dates.