In October, prior to Halloween, I was thinking about the first quarter of the year and the blogs I needed to write. A content Calendar is not a sexy marketing technique, but it is one of the most important tools to a successful media effort.

Those nice Holiday ads you see in December are usually shot and edited in the summer. That means your product mix, your offer and your theme need to be ready to go in late spring. That kind of work-ahead requires a content calendar, just based on the logistics of accomplishing tasks and following a process.

Yet even on a small scale, you should be setting a content calendar to make sure you are optimizing all of your content creation, media efforts, messaging and budget. It is estimated that more than 60% of businesses don’t have a documented strategy.

A content calendar provides a 360-degree view of your messaging across all platforms. It also can help you see gaps in your message stream. A content calendar also can help you plan and organize around key events and milestones in your organization. A content calendar leads to high quality because of the strategic planning.

To me the most important part of a content calendar is that it provides a cadence or rhythm to your marketing efforts. As I studied my data for my blog and my past calendar, I found that readership steeply drops the week of a holiday and the week leading up to a holiday. I’ve been able to realign my efforts accordingly — no need to produce fresh content with few readers.

Creating content is a relentless beast. One way to tame it is with a content calendar. So today, as you read this, I should be planning June blogs and thinking about summer.

Mark Mathis III is chief creative & strategy officer, partner and cofounder of AMPERAGE Marketing & Fundraising.