5 Content Strategy Planners To Save Your Sanity With Multiple Clients
Co-Founder / CTO
If you’re a content creator, you’re probably a bit of a planning freak. Content strategy planners, in this case, are absolute lifesavers. They help you stay organized, meet deadlines, and keep your sanity intact when managing your content marketing efforts.
Now, I know what you're thinking. "There are so many planners out there! How do I choose?" Don't worry, I've got you covered. In this article, we'll dive into five content strategy planners that'll make your life easier.
Table of Contents
Disclaimer: At Yahini, we spend a ton of time testing, researching and using various tools to figure out which ones are worth recommending, evaluating them based on what they’re supposed to do and how well they meet our criteria. We do not accept payment for featuring a tool in our articles or linking to a site. Our recommendations are 100% authentic and unbiased, because we believe you deserve nothing less.
Do you need a content strategy planner?
If you’re like most content strategists, you’re juggling multiple clients and content projects. It’’s a lot to keep track of, and that’s where a content strategy planner can come in handy. A good planner acts as a source of truth for your entire content pipeline.
They help you meet deadlines, keep your content on-brand, and making sure you’re actually meeting your client’s business goals.
An overview of the 5 best content strategy planners
And here we go, a detailed review of each content strategy planner.
Yahini - Best planner for content strategy and content workbook creation
Yahini is a content strategy tool that builds a strategy, content workbook, and briefs from the ground up. Yahini brings the expertise of seasoned content strategists to your fingertips without the price tag of hiring a full-time pro or agency. It essentially helps you develop a comprehensive content strategy plan.
It digs into your niche, your competitors (perofming an automated competitive analysis in the background), and your target audience. With this info, it crafts personalized keyword clusters and organizes them into meaningful groups. Then you get a strategy that aligns perfectly with your target audience's needs at every stage of the marketing funnel. Yahini even balances your content mix, aiming for 50% bottom-funnel, 40% middle-funnel, and 10% top-funnel topics.
Using Yahini is easy. Just input your URL and a few business details, and it takes care of the rest.
You'll get a full content workbook with custom briefs for each keyword, all built using frameworks designed by experienced strategists. This workbook can serve as your primary content plan.
How does it help with content strategy planning?
The essence of Yahini is that it builds a content strategy for you from scratch using an in-house AI model trained by experienced content strategists. This is how it works:
- One-Click Content Workbook Generation – With just a few simple inputs, Yahini generates a full content workbook. This saves you hours of manual work and gives you a full content strategy at your fingertips.
- Advanced Keyword Clustering – Yahini uses in-house AI models to create personalized keyword clusters aligned with your target audience's needs. This helps you target the right content topics at each stage of the marketing funnel, improving your content's effectiveness.
- Balanced Funnel Allocation – The tool helps you maintain a balanced content strategy across different funnel stages. This ensures you're not neglecting any part of the customer journey, leading to a more effective overall content strategy.
- Strategist-Level Content Briefs – Each brief is customized for its specific keyword, funnel stage, and type of content. This level of detail helps writers create more targeted, effective content that aligns with your overall strategy.
- Competitor Analysis – Yahini analyzes your competitors' content to help you find unique angles. This feature helps you create content that stands out in your niche and provides more value to your audience.
- Priority Scoring System– Yahini assigns a priority score to each keyword, considering factors like importance, funnel stage, volume, and competition. This helps you focus on the most impactful content opportunities first.
- Funnel Stage Filtering – Unlike most keyword tools, Yahini allows you to filter keywords by funnel stage. This unique feature helps you easily target specific parts of the customer journey in your content strategy.
- Content Type Matching – Yahini matches each keyword to the most appropriate content type based on the funnel stage. This feature helps ensure you're using the most effective content format for each topic, improving engagement and conversion rates of potential customers.
- Customizable and Editable Briefs – Yahini provides an editor where you can customize your briefs. This flexibility allows you to add your own insights or adjust the strategy as needed.
Pros and cons
As with any other tool, Yahini has some pros and cons, depending on what you’re looking for. Some pros include:
- AI trained by real content strategists, giving you expert-level insights
- Quick and easy to use - generate a full content workbook with just a few clicks
- Customized briefs for each keyword and funnel stage
- Balanced content strategy across different funnel stages
- Unique keyword clustering and prioritization system
- Competitor analysis to help you find unique angles
- Affordable alternative to hiring a full-time content strategist or agency
And some cons you might want to check out:
- As with any AI tool, it may not capture nuances specific to your brand voice
- Might not be super accurate if you operate in a novel industry or you don’t have a lot of competitors
- Might not adapt as quickly to sudden market changes or trends as a human strategist would
Best suited for…?
Yahini is used by marketing managers, freelance writers, SEO pros, SaaS owners and entire content teams. What they all have in common is a need for solid, data-driven content strategies that go beyond just ticking off keyword boxes. It's for those who need a strong content strategy from the outset.
Pricing
Right now, we're keeping things super simple with Yahini's pricing. Instead of going the typical subscription route, we're offering lifetime access with a one-time payment per project.
Each project credit unlocks a complete content strategy toolkit for one website - including a curated list of hundreds of business-specific keywords (automatically researched and sorted by funnel stage and priority), unlimited content brief generation, and the flexibility to build your content workbook with as many keywords as you need.
Every content brief is crafted using expert frameworks with specific writing instructions tailored to each keyword, funnel stage, and content type.
Running multiple websites? No problem - just grab an extra credit for each one.
Head over to our pricing page to check out the current early-access offer before we switch to a subscription model later on.
If you manage multiple projects and content strategies (e.g. you’re a huge agency), you can get a custom quote. Just reach out to us!
ClickUp’s Content Calendar - Best planner for beginner content creators
ClickUp is a project management platform for task management, collab, and project tracking, and it offers various useful features like time tracking, custom views, and integrations with other tools. Their content strategy template can be a good starting point.
Speaking of content strategy, one of its best features is its extensive library of templates for different project needs. Among these is their free Content Calendar template, a resource for beginner content creators looking to organize their content ideas. It is ready to use but can be easily customized to fit your needs, functioning as a basic editorial calendar.
How does it help with content strategy planning?
This template gives you a clear visual layout of your content schedule. You can easily plot out content ideas, track deadlines, and manage multiple clients in one place. It can help streamline the content planning process.
Pros and cons
Here are a few pros of using ClickUp’s content calendar template:
- User-friendly interface
- Great for beginners who don’t need extensive features
- Customizable
- Can integrate with other ClickUp features
And here are some cons:
- You have to do all the planning and just use their template to stay more organized;
- Can become cluttered if you manage a large volume of projects.
Best suited for…?
This template is perfect for beginner content creators who are just starting to formalize their content strategy.
Pricing
ClickUp’s content strategy planner template is free to use.
DivvyHQ - Best planner for huge enterprise teams and workflow optimization
DivvyHQ centralizes content planning, creation and collaboration, thus is perfect for teams that want to optimize their content operations. It supports complex content marketing planning.
At its core, the software offers a content calendar, workflow automation, and analytics tools. The platform also includes features like customizable request forms, an HTML editor for content creation, and performance-tracking capabilities, which helps in assessing content performance.
How does it help with content strategy planning?
It essentially provides a central hub for content planning and collaboration across various departments. It reduces overreliance on email and other communication tools – things that often keep teams busy instead of being focused on content strategy. This is crucial for a cohesive content marketing strategy.
Pros and cons
Here are some of the software’s pros:
- Perfect for centralizing strategies and keeping teams on track;
- Content calendar;
- Workflow automation;
- Built-in content creation and collaboration tools.
And here are some cons:
- May be overwhelming for small teams or individual content creators;
- No content strategy template options are available out of the box.
Best suited for…?
DivvyHQ is perfect for big marketing teams – especially those working across multiple departments or managing complex content strategies. It’s especially helpful for enterprises with dispersed teams or agencies handling multiple clients.
Pricing
DivvyHQ has two plans – a Starter plan at $39 per month, billed annually, and a Pro plan at $79 per month, billed annually. If you’re an enterprise customer, you need to contact them for pricing.
Contently - Best planner for content marketing campaigns
Contently is a platform offering a suite of tools, like an intuitive content calendar, campaign management features, and a content library. Its content marketing template options can streamline your campaign setup.
Its Content Planning Suite eliminates “content chaos” and improves team alignment. Some key features include a drag-and-drop calendar for visibility across the entire organization, enterprise campaign tools to manage content and events, and some great workflow and brief templates you can work with. This can also help in planning different types of content.
How does it help with content strategy planning?
Contently gives your team a way to build and execute thorough content marketing campaigns. You can use its intuitive calendar and campaign tools to plan content campaigns ahead of time. At the same time, you also have access to their library of templates which can help reduce your team’s workload and production times. This allows for better management of content pieces across various content channels.
Pros and cons
Here are some pros:
- Intuitive drag-and-drop calendar for content scheduling;
- Enterprise campaign tools;
- Customizable templates.
And some cons:
- Some tools are only useful for enterprise;
- Pricing may be a barrier for smaller startups.
Best suited for…?
Contently is ideal for medium to large enterprises with complex content marketing needs.
Pricing
You’ll need to contact them for a full quote.
GatherContent - Best planner for content operations
GatherContent is a specialized platform designed for content operations, meaning the content creation,r eview, approval, and governance processes. A good content audit can identify areas where this tool can be most effective.
Key features include a customizable content hub, workflow tools for every stage of content production, real-time collaboration capabilities, and standardized content templates. The platform also offers granular user permissions and integrations with various content management systems and other tools via API and Zapier. This aids the editorial team in managing various types of content.
How does it help with content strategy planning?
GatherContent helps your team overcome common challenges in content creation and management by offering a structured and organized environment for collaboration. It can function as a central content plan repository.
It has various workflow tools, customizable templates, and real-time editing features which will help achieve your content marketing goals.
Pros and cons
Here are some of GatherContent’s pros:
- Customizable workflows to match specific content processes;
- Real-time collaboration capabilities;
- Standardized templates for consistent content production.
And here are a few cons:
- Users often complain about customer service;
- Set up workflow might not be as easy.
Best suited for…?
GatherContent is suited for medium to large organizations with complex content needs and those with multiple stakeholders involved in the content creation process.
It can help teams manage a high volume of social media posts and other content for social media platforms.
Pricing
You’ll need to request a demo with GatherContent to get a pricing quote.
Some best practices for using content strategy planners
Content strategy planners are awesome, but they’re here to help, not to do the job for you.
First things first: Don't get too caught up in the tool itself. It's easy to spend more time fiddling with your planner than actually creating content. Use it to guide your work, not dictate every move. Your primary focus should always be on achieving your content goals.
Choose a planner that fits your style. If you're spending hours trying to figure out how to use it, you're missing the point. The right tool should feel intuitive and save you time, not create more work. An effective content strategy template should adapt to you, not the other way around.
Here are some other quick tips you should keep in mind:
- Don’t try to use every feature at once;
- Get everyone on your team on board to make the most of the tool;
- Don’t forget the human touch, as tools are great but your creativity and instincts matter too.
How to choose the perfect content strategy planner for you
Now you’ve got some options!
Start by thinking about what you really need. Try out a few options, as most content strategy planners offer free trials. Consider how well they support your specific marketing efforts and help you reach your target audience.
Keep in mind that the best planner is the one you’ll actually use, so pick something that helps you get the job done. Whether it's a simple editorial calendar or a complex content marketing planning suite, it must fit your workflow.
Yahini offers you the strategic advice you need to create a content strategy from the ground up. Its AI has been trained by seasoned content strategists, providing you with expert-level content briefs right at your fingertips.
Ditch the generic outlines! Sign up now.