How to create a Notion social media dashboard

Welcome back to the Notion for Blogging series! This collection walks you through how to use the Notion app to manage your blog and brand. As the title suggests, today’s installment shows you how to create a detailed social media dashboard in Notion. Let’s dive in!

What is a social media dashboard and why do you need one?

A sneak peek of the Social Media Dashboard template, part of the Notion for Blogging Premium Template Pack!

Your social media dashboard is the command center for your social media content. This page links off to subpages for individual social media platforms. It also features a content calendar filtered to show only your social media content.

You might also choose to embed task lists, ad spend trackers, resources on social media algorithms and best post times — the possibilities are truly endless! Why do you need a Notion social media dashboard? What makes Notion superior to other content scheduling apps? Let’s take a look.

Plan all of your social media content (and everything else) in one place

Even the best social media schedulers and planners provide limited views of your content. You might get a calendar and a list, but that’s about it.

Social media schedulers also don’t allow you to plan all of your content — including your blog posts, email campaigns, podcast episodes, and YouTube videos. This limitation ultimately means your content will be scheduled across different apps, making it easy for things to fall through the cracks.

Notion solves all these problems and so many more for the low, low price of free!

Make templates to easily create new posts

How easy would it be to create a new post with just one click? That’s exactly what Notion allows you to do. Creating templates for posts makes it easier than ever to track tasks related to each post and see posts for different platforms at a glance on your calendar.

Track post-related tasks

Creating social media content involves so much more than just writing a witty caption and hitting “Publish”. Creating images and videos, researching SEO keywords and hashtags — these are just a few examples of social media content subtasks.

Within your Notion social media dashboard templates, you can track tasks to ensure you haven’t missed anything before posting.

How to set up a Notion social media dashboard

Note: Before you set up your social media dashboard, I highly recommend creating a Content Creation Hub first:

The Content Creation Hub is where all your content will live, including blog posts, email, podcast, and video. You can embed this database into your social media dashboard and subpages for the social media platforms for easy setup.

Here’s a step-by-step walkthrough of how to set up your Notion social media dashboard. (Video tutorial coming soon!)

Step 1: Create a new top-level page

Step 2: Embed your Content Creation Hub, or create a new database

To embed your Content Creation Hub, type “/” on your keyboard to open Notion commands. Then, type “linked” and choose “Create linked database”. Search for your Content Creation Hub and add it.

You can set whichever views you like. I personally prefer a calendar view, but you could also choose a table, gallery, or board.

If you’d prefer to set up a new database, I recommend doing so in a top-level page so you don’t have to create a new database for each social media platform. This allows you to keep all your social media content in the same database.

Step 3: Filter your Content Creation Hub or social media database to show only relevant content

To see only social media content, click the three dots in the top right-hand corner of the database. Select Filter, then Add a filter and Add a filter again.

Then, just apply the correct filter. If you’ve set up a Content Creation Hub similar to mine, your filter might be “Content Type” is “Social”.

Step 4: Format your page

You can format your page however you like. I prefer to split my social media dashboard into two columns.

The left-hand side could include a short task list, links to goal pages, or a place to jot down post ideas and best post times.

The right-hand side is wider to accommodate the social media calendar.

My social media dashboard template also includes an embedded view of the expense tracker to show ad spend for that platform. (We’ll cover using Notion for blog expense tracking in a future post!)

Step 5: Add your content

Now that your social media dashboard is all set up, start adding your content. If you’ve set up a Content Creation Hub similar to mine, you’ll be able to create new social media posts from templates.

If you haven’t set up templates yet, I’ll show you how to do that in Step 7.

Step 6: Create filtered views

Your social media dashboard will feature a social media calendar that shows all of your posts. But you might like to create new views that each show your Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, and LinkedIn posts.

To do that, hover next to the title of the embedded database and click Add view. Create your view and apply your filters as usual. (See Step 3.) Once you’re done, duplicate the view and adjust the filters to save yourself some time and clicks.

Step 7: Create templates

If you’re not using a Content Creation Hub and you’d like to add post templates, here’s a step-by-step walkthrough.

Step 1: In the upper right-hand corner of the database, click the three dots.

Step 2: Click Templates. Then click new template.

Step 3: Start editing your template. I recommend setting properties for the content type, adding icons, and adding tasks or notes in the main page for that platform.

Step 4: When you’d like to create a new post, click the dropdown arrow next to “New” in your embedded database. Select the template you’d like to use to create the post.

Step 5: To edit a template, click the three dots by the template and click Edit. Make any edits you need.

Tip: To save yourself some time, duplicate templates and tweak icons, properties, and page content as needed. This will save you quite a few clicks!

Ideas for your Notion social media dashboard

I’ve briefly covered some ideas for your social media dashboard. Here are a few more for inspo!

Embed a task list

My Editorial Task database is a lifesaver. As a busy blogger, I have a ton of tasks to track. Embedding a task list onto your social media page that shows all your related tasks is a handy way to see what you need to do at a glance. (We’ll cover the Editorial Task database in a future post.)

Add an expense tracker

If you run social media ads, you might like to add an expense tracker at the bottom of the page. Because you have other expenses you’ll want to track, I recommend setting up a separate page and embedding it into the social media pages. Then, just add your filters to show ad spend for only those platforms. Again, we’ll cover the Expense Tracker in a future post.

Keep a list of resources

Social media algorithms are constantly changing. Lists of hashtags and best post times for each platform will come in handy for planning and drafting posts. I recommend setting up a digital library where you can save all those resources and embedding it on your social media pages.

Check out my post on how to set up a content repository in Notion. Don’t have time? No prob. I already made a template for you!

Best post times

Although there are some benchmarks for the best times to post on social media, you might like to review your own analytics to discover what times and days your posts perform best. Keep a list on your social media pages for easy reference.

Add goals

Because different social media platforms have different metrics, you’ll have different goals for each app. Notion is a great way to track your goals, review your progress, and hold yourself accountable. You might choose to create a new page or database for goal tracking, or you could simply jot down a short checklist of goals in your sidebar. If you do want to make a goal tracking database, stay tuned — I’ll also cover that in a future post!

Track analytics

Although I don’t necessarily recommend tracking all of your analytics in Notion, it’s a great place to track your most important metrics. I’ve included analytics tracking in the Goals & Progress database, part of the Notion for Blogging Template Pack!

How to create subpages for individual social media platforms

What’s a Notion social media dashboard without pages for individual platforms? Here are a few ideas for setting up your own subpages in Notion.

Tip: Once you’ve figured out a design for your first platform page, duplicate that page and tweak embedded databases accordingly. This saves you tons of time setting up new pages and ensures each page features the same layout.

Using Notion to plan Facebook content

If you’re using Facebook to promote your blog, you have a lot of plates spinning. Groups, pages, ads — it’s a lot to track. Here are some ideas for managing your Facebook content plan with Notion.

Tips for using Notion to plan Facebook content:

• Track group content and engagement.
• Set analytics and sales goals.
• Keep a list of post ideas.

Using Notion to plan Instagram content

Notion is the perfect way to plan Instagram content. I recommend adding a gallery view to your embedded content database to see a visual layout of your upcoming posts. It’s especially handy if you don’t use an Instagram scheduling or feed preview app.

Tips for using Notion to plan Instagram content:

• In your Instagram post template, add a short task list for your Instagram posts.
• Add a Canva Link to your content database to easily see your designs.
• Keep a list of hashtags handy.

Using Notion to plan Twitter content

Let’s be honest — it’s easy to lose quality posts in Twitter’s home feed, especially if you follow a lot of people. Creating lists is a great way to curate your feed and engage with relevant content. Here are some ideas for planning your Twitter content in Notion.

Tips for using Notion to plan Twitter content:

• Curate Twitter lists.
• Set reminders to engage.
• Create a list of hashtags and topics.

Using Notion to plan Pinterest content

Notion is especially useful for planning Pinterest content. In addition to planning your pins, you can also create pages for Tailwind and SEO keywords.

Tips for using Notion to plan Pinterest content:

• Create a page for tracking Tailwind tribe engagement and analytics.
• Track group boards you’d like to join and how often you’d like to contribute.
• Set up a SEO keywords page to simplify optimization.

Using Notion to plan LinkedIn content

I love using Notion to plan my LinkedIn content. It’s so easy to just create a new post and type away!

Tips for using Notion to plan LinkedIn content:

• Add post creation tasks in your LinkedIn post template, like creating slide decks or videos.
• Jot down a list of weekly themes. (LinkedIn influencer Jason Vana discusses the importance of using weekly themes in this useful post.)
• Track connections and groups.

How to create a Notion social media dashboard: wrapping up

The social media dashboard makes it easier than ever to manage all your social media content, tasks, hashtags, keywords, and so much more.

If you’re anything like me, you use a dozen apps to create, plan, and schedule your social media content. Notion can reduce that number significantly.

Admittedly, I still use the free version of Later app, an Instagram scheduler. But apart from the actual social media apps, that’s the only app I use for social media planning.

If you’re looking for a minimalist yet robust approach to content planning, Notion is the ultimate solution. But migrating your entire content plan into a new app can be daunting.

That’s exactly why I created the Notion for Blogging Premium Template Pack for busy bloggers like you. Complete with 75+ pages and templates already created for you. All you have to do is plug in your content and go!

Unlock your exclusive discount

For a limited time, use the discount code LAUNCH2021 to receive $5 off the discounted launch price!

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