A publishing checklist should prevent expensive mistakes without turning routine work into bureaucracy. It must be short enough to use, specific enough to verify, and connected to the exact content version and destination.
What the template covers
The checklist groups checks into identity, content, media, evidence, approval, schedule, delivery, and recovery. Each row records whether the check is required, who owns it, the result, evidence, and the time it was completed.
Do not mark every check required for every post. Define a policy by channel, format, and risk tier. A routine evergreen text post and a regulated customer video should not have identical review paths.
Preflight checks
Identity and destination
Confirm workspace, channel, account, visible author, audience, and campaign. A valid caption published to the wrong account is still a publishing failure.
Copy and links
Check platform length, opening lines, mentions, hashtags, dates, offer conditions, links, UTM parameters, and landing-page readiness. Preserve the final text rather than relying on a screenshot.
Media and accessibility
Validate media count, order, file type, size, dimensions, duration, crop, safe areas, audio, subtitles, alt text, thumbnail, and cover. Use the connected platform's current contract rather than a generic spreadsheet limit.
Rights, claims, and disclosures
Record sources and permission for music, footage, people, customer material, trademarks, statistics, quotes, promotions, AI-generated media, and commercial relationships.
Approval and schedule
Verify that the approved version matches the scheduled version. Confirm timezone, embargo, dependencies, inventory, landing pages, community coverage, and escalation ownership.
Delivery is a separate section
The checklist continues after the schedule is saved. Record provider acceptance, processing, verification, live URL, and final state. If the status is failed or unknown, record the incident owner and next safe action.
Do not retry simply because the public post is not immediately visible. First determine whether the provider is processing, rejected the request, lost authorization, or returned an ambiguous result.
Recommended workflow
- Create a checklist row set from the content's channel, format, and risk tier.
- Assign only the checks that require a human decision.
- Complete automatic platform validation before requesting approval.
- Bind approval to the exact version and scope.
- Run final preflight near the scheduled moment.
- Verify the public result and save the URL.
- Open a recovery record for failed or unknown delivery.
Connect the checklist to the content calendar template through content_id, and use the approval workflow template for decision evidence.
Minimum completion rule
A post is complete only when the intended destination and version are verified live, or when a deliberate alternative outcome is recorded. “Scheduled,” “sent,” and “provider accepted” are intermediate states.
Review platform-sensitive checks whenever provider contracts or policies change. The template was last reviewed on 2026-08-23.
