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Consistently delivering quality content is one of the best ways for content creators to grow their audience, and according to Statista, 77% publish at least one blog article per month, while 38% publish at least one article per week. This underscores the importance of content planning software to plan your content and grow your audience. This article will tell you about the best content planning software for your website or blog. 

Here’s the list of the best tools that I’ll cover in this article.

  1. monday – Content planning software with Gantt charts
  2. Adobe Express – Content planning software for creating cross-channel content
  3. Ceros – Content planning software for creating interactive content
  4. Motion – Content planning software with a task manager feature
  5. Hootsuite – Content planning software with an audience insights feature
  6. Later – Content planning software for sharing user-generated content
  7. Asana – Content planning software with team communication features
  8. Loomly – Content planning software with built-in analytics
  9. Seismic – Content planning software with capacity planning feature
  10. MarketMuse – Content planning software for optimizing content

Comparison Criteria

What do I look for when I select the best content planning solution? Here’s a summary of my evaluation criteria: 

  1. User Interface (UI): Content marketers and writers follow strict schedules, so I look for software with easy-to-find features to save time. 
  2. Usability: I look for software that’s easy to use and master so even new writers can master it quickly. 
  3. Integrations: Blog post writers use several tools to run their websites, so I look for software that will work well with other tools. 
  4. Value for $: Some blog post writers are just starting to build their brand, so I look for software with good features but reasonable pricing. 

Content Planning Tool Key Features  

  1. Editorial calendar: A publishing schedule to guide a content team with their daily, weekly, or monthly deliverables. 
  2. Analytics: Gauges the performance of your blog or website to help you identify areas for improvement. 
  3. Audience insights: Helps identify trending topics and keywords to guide you in writing an article that appeals to your audience. 
  4. Content optimization: Helps you optimize your content, so it ranks better than competitors in search engine results. 

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Overviews Of The 10 Best Content Planning Software Solutions 

Here’s a brief description of each content planning platform to showcase each tool’s best use case, some noteworthy features, and screenshots to give a snapshot of the user interface. 

1. monday.com – Content planning software with Gantt charts.

monday.com content planning software screenshot

monday.com is a project management software with informative dashboards for an overview of how your blog or website is performing. It has marketing planning software for planning, creating, managing, and optimizing marketing campaigns. monday.com has an automation feature for automating repetitive tasks to have more time to attend to other critical aspects of your content strategy.  

monday.com is the best content planning software with Gantt charts to assess your workload visually. Gantt charts help you quickly see the status of different articles to help struggling members or allocate more resources. It has a milestone feature to anticipate deadlines and make sure that content gets published on time. monday.com lets members add comments to tasks and projects to reinforce collaboration. 

monday.com integrates with other content planning tools like Google Calendar, Google Sheet, Asana, and Microsoft Teams. 

monday.com has a free forever plan with limited features for up to two users, while the pricing for paid plans starts at $8/user/month. 

2. Adobe Express – Content planning software for creating cross-channel content.

adobe express content planning software screenshot
Adobe Express has a content scheduler feature for planning your marketing campaign and publishing content on all social media accounts simultaneously.

Adobe Express is a web and mobile app technology for creating multimedia content. It has a digital asset management feature for media planning and creating interesting blogs and social media content. Adobe Express is a cloud-based content creation platform, so your content creation team members can access updated information anywhere. 

Adobe Express is the best content planning software for creating cross-channel content for your website and social media posts. This content planning tool can help you deliver consistent content that looks great with whatever medium your readers prefer. You can save time by reusing content from your website and posting it on your social media platform. 

Adobe Express has a free forever plan with limited features, while the pricing for paid plans starts at $9.99/month/account. Adobe Express offers a free 30-day trial of paid plans. 

3. Ceros – Content planning software for creating interactive content.

ceros content planning software screenshot
Ceros lets you create interactive content like quizzes and puzzles to make your website more engaging.

Ceros is a cloud-based design platform for creating content from a blank canvas or pre-built templates. This content software lets you organize files into different folders to make articles easier to find. This content marketing tool can grant different access levels to content team members to promote collaboration while giving your editorial team more control. 

Ceros is the best content planning software for creating interactive content to engage readers. This content planning tool lets you embed social games, puzzles, and quizzes to pique your customers’ interests and improve bounce and conversion rates. You can plan a progression of interactive content like quizzes that increase difficulty or puzzles that unlock a more complex puzzle. 

Ceros integrates with other content planning tools, including Snapchat, Adobe, Getty Images, and Pinterest. 

Ceros provides pricing information and a demo upon request. 

4. Motion – Content planning software with a task manager feature.

motion content planning software screenshot
Motion automatically assigns project tasks to members according to their skills and availability.

Motion is a content planning software with a content calendar feature for scheduling content. This content planner has a notification feature to remind you when tasks are due or if you are about to miss a deadline. Motion has a project management feature that automatically assigns tasks according to the skills and schedule of content team members. 

Motion is the best content planning software with a task manager feature for organizing and managing tasks. You can use this content management tool to create recurring tasks like sending deadline reminders or content briefs to your content team members. Motion has a prioritization feature to reschedule tasks like when an urgent meeting pops up or if an article needs critical revisions. 

Motion pricing starts at $12/user/month and offers a 7-day free trial. 

5. Hootsuite – Content planning software with an audience insights feature.

hootsuite content planning software screenshot
Hootsuite has a content calendar of all published and scheduled posts.

Hootsuite is a social media management tool for scheduling and publishing social media posts. It has a content calendar feature for visibility of all scheduled and published content to help you make sure that your social media content adheres to your content marketing strategy. This social media management tool has an analytics feature to identify the best days and times to publish content to improve visibility and gain more readers.  

Hootsuite is the best content calendar software with an audience insight feature to help you create popular content. You can use this content management tool to identify popular keywords and topics to help you develop trending content ideas. Hootsuite also lets you filter keywords and topics by demographics, location, or date, allowing you to target a specific group for your blog post. This feature can help you understand how customers and readers perceive your brand to identify areas of opportunities. 

Hootsuite integrates with other content planning tools like Facebook, Airtable, Klarity Analytics, and Cloudview. You can connect Hootsuite to a paid Zapier account to access more premium apps. 

Hootsuite has a free plan with limited features for one user and up to five scheduled posts. The pricing for paid plans starts at $49/month/one user and offers a 30-free trial. 

6. Later – Content planning software for sharing user-generated content.

later content planning software screenshot
You can use Later to search for posts that use a specific hashtag.

Later is a social media marketing platform for planning, analyzing, and publishing content to your website, blog, and social network. You can use Later to plan and schedule Instagram Reels to auto-publish on a set day and time. It has an analytics feature to know which posts generate traffic to guide you in future posts. 

Later is the best content planning software for sharing user-generated content to diversify your website content. You can gather content and re-share them by browsing for posts with hashtags that matter to your readers. Later also lets you browse for Instagram posts that tagged or mentioned you or your blog and add them to your content library for reposting. This social media management tool automatically adds creator attribution to imported posts to give proper credit to the original authors.  

Later has a free plan with limited features, while the pricing for paid plans starts at $18/month/user. Later offers a free 14-day trial of their paid plans. 

7. Asana – Content planning software with team communication features.

asana content planning software screenshot
Asana lets you comment on tasks to give instructions that everyone can immediately see.

Asana is a project management platform for organizing and assigning tasks. It has an automation feature for automating repetitive tasks to help you save time. It has built-in forms for use in submitting work requests like the allocation of more resources or requests for approval of draft articles.  

Asana is the best content planning software with team communication features to improve coordination in publishing content. It is a centralized dashboard where content team members can see their pending tasks and publishing schedule. Users can add comments to tasks and provide feedback that other members can immediately see. Asana has a meeting template for crafting detailed agendas and taking meeting notes you can share with other team members. 

Asana integrates with other content creation and planning tools like Google Calendar, Google Drive, Microsoft Teams, and OneDrive. 

Asana has a free forever plan with limited features, while the pricing for paid plans starts at $10.99/user/month. 

8. Loomly – Content planning software with built-in analytics.

loomly content planning software screenshot
Loomly has an analytics feature for measuring the success of your website or blog.

Loomly is a content creation software for planning, publishing, and measuring content. You can use it to browse trending topics to get new content ideas. It has a content library for managing all your content, videos, images, and files in one database. Loomly has an automated publishing feature for social media scheduling. It has a workflow approval feature to make sure that all approvals receive immediate attention. 

Loomly is the best content planning software with built-in analytics for gauging your website’s or blog’s performance. You can use this feature to analyze all your posts and social media content to see which ones attracted more readers to include similar posts in your content planning session. You can also use Loomly to make a period comparison to analyze your readership and identify factors that may have affected the growth or decline of your audience. 

Loomly pricing starts at $15/month/up to 2 users and offers a 15-day free trial. 

9. Seismic – Content planning software with capacity planning feature.

seismic content planning software screenshot
Seismic has project templates to help you guide content team members.

Seismic is a content planning software for planning, creating, and publishing on your website or blog. It has a content automation feature for repurposing or reposting social media posts. Seismic has embedded insights for creating content that appeals to your audience. Seismic has project templates to help you guide your content team with clear content briefs. 

Seismic is the best content planning software with a capacity planning feature to make sure that you have enough resources to meet deadlines. It has burndown charts to visually assess how quickly your content team delivers new articles. You can use Seismic to triage new requests to determine if you have enough resources or need to reschedule an article for a later date. 

Seismic integrates with other content planning tools like Bynder, Dropbox, Marketo, and WordPress. 

Seismic provides pricing information and a demo upon request.

10. MarketMuse – Content planning software for optimizing content.

marketmuse content planning software screenshot
MarketMuse allows you to compare your article with top-ranking pages to publish a better-performing article.

MarketMuse is a content marketing platform that utilizes artificial intelligence for generating content briefs. This content management software has a text editor that gives real-time feedback on how your content stacks up against top competitors. MarketMuse has external linking suggestions to connect your article to authoritative but non-competitive sources to boost the credibility of your content marketing strategy. 

MarketMuse is the best content planning software with an optimization feature for improving your article by comparing it to similar top-ranking articles. This content marketing tool gives you a list of topics and keywords for use as content ideas to improve your content strategy. MarketMuse’s optimization feature guides you on how often you need to use a topic or keyword to optimize your blog post without oversaturated. 

MarketMuse has a free plan with limited features for one user, while the pricing for paid plans starts at $7,200/year/account. 

Other Content Planning Options

Here are a few more that didn’t make the top list. 

  1. Wrike - Project management software with a calendar feature for content planning. 
  2. Trello - Web-based list-making application for assigning tasks and meeting deadlines. 
  3. DYNO Mapper - Website discovery software with content planning features. 
  4. Google Calendar - A free calendar feature for scheduling meetings with your editorial team. 
  5. Content Snare - Software for collecting and curating images, articles, and other files. 
  6. Concured - AI-powered software for personalizing content.
  7. GatherContent - Content operations platform with collaborative tools for delivering content on time.  
  8. TextOptimizer - Text optimization tool for creating content that ranks high in search engine results. 
  9. Notion - Software for creating a roadmap your content team can follow when creating articles.  
  10. Wistia - Software for optimizing videos to help drive traffic to your website. 
  11. Kapost - Software for planning, producing, and analyzing your marketing content. 
  12. Airtable - Project management platform with content operations feature for assigning and monitoring content deliverables. 
  13. CoSchedule - Content marketing platform with a Headline Studio feature for writing better headlines with smart suggestions.  

What Are The Types Of Content Planning Software?

  1. Backlog management: Tool for managing the list of articles you need to write. 
  2. Content calendars: A publishing schedule detailing your content deliverables. 
  3. Briefing tools: Tool with content briefs to guide your content team members on their writing assignments. 
  4. Idea generators: Tool for generating blog post ideas that cater to your audience’s needs. 
  5. Social media scheduling: Tool for automatically publishing social media posts during optimum times. 
  6. Proofing & approval systems: Software for automating the proofing and approval process to make sure that all published articles are up to standards. 
  7. Marketing orchestration: Marketing automation tool for optimizing cross-channel interactions to improve customer experience.   

What Do You Think About This List?

Blog writers and publishers face stiff competition in cornering an audience share that generates revenue, and they need all the tools there are to get them ahead of their competitors. Content planning software is one such tool and can help them consistently deliver excellent blog posts to grow their readership. With the help of content planning software, bloggers can create informative content that ranks high in search engine results to reach a wider audience. If you want to learn more about the best content planning software and other tools to help you maximize your blog, subscribe to the Indie Media Club today. 

By Nuala Turner

Nuala is passionate about indie media, and is excited about the possibilities that the future holds for the field.