Picture it: you’ve spent a whole month on a piece of epic content (and nearly died – twice – for the sake of it). But it only took a minute to publish, 10 minutes for people to read … and 48 hours before it seemed to run out of gas.
And now it’s time to start all over again with another new piece of content.
However, you’re not so sure that the ROI was worth the effort. And you’re less than sure you want to summon yet another epic piece of content from your creative depths for such – not terrible but definitely underwhelming – results.
One thing you do know is that people have different preferences for when it comes to consuming content. And so now that you’ve decided to see what this repurposing game is all about. You want to reach a new audience with a fresh take on old content.
One snag, though: How in the heck do you repurpose content so that it still looks fresh and appealing?
Moreover, how do you make sure that, in the process of extracting more juice from one piece of content, the core message is still as powerful, readable and share-worthy?
We’ve got a few answers for you. Let’s take a look at a few interesting ideas on how to repurpose your old content so that it dazzles new people.
How To Pick the Right Content
Before you do anything else, you need to make sure that the content you recycle is worth the effort. If a piece of content was badly received the first time around, it’s a good idea to let that one go. Focus instead on content that was well received the first time around.
There are 2 key ways to pick content that deserves a bit of repurposing:
- Check your analytics. Dive into Google Analytics and see what blogs and videos people enjoyed the most. Where are the engagement and conversions at? High performing posts are your best shot at successful repurposing
- Ask “is this evergreen?” Any content that you decide to repurpose must have legs. Why? Because the longer the lifespan and relevancy, the more it’s going to be worth your time and effort to repurpose
Once you’ve got an idea of what content should be recycled, here are a few ideas for what you can do with it:
1. What to do With a Webinar
Webinars are a pretty useful way of demonstrating your expertise to a live audience and answering questions on the fly. But here are the cold, hard facts:
Research has shown that your audience will make time for just one webinar per week. If it’s not yours, it will be someone else’s. Which means you miss out.
But, hey, you don’t need to fret just yet. How about converting your webinar gig into a video and uploading it to YouTube? Then, send an email to your subscribers that points all those who missed out on the original webinar in the direction of your “recap” video.
2. What to do With Data
Is data content?
Not exactly – but it can become a key part of your content marketing strategy.
We’ve all read case studies – you know, where experts say to us “okay, so we ran a few tests on our website to see what was affecting our conversion rate. What we found was pretty amazing. We found a way to boost our conversion rate from 0.9% to 2.3% literally overnight. And we’re going to share it with you today.”
That sounds so damned juicy. Who wouldn’t want to read that?! I want to read it and yet it’s totally made up!
So, the next time you run tests and crunch data, don’t let it all go to waste. Repurpose it and turn it into a case study that you know your audience will be interested in.
3. What to do With Interviews
Interviews are pretty cool. But you know what? As popular as video marketing is, not everyone wants to watch videos. Some still prefer to read.
Let’s say you’ve shot, edited and uploaded a 2-hour video of an interview with an expert in your niche. To the studious marketer who digests info best when it’s in text form, 2 hours is going to look pretty long. Too long!
So why not take that interview and turn it into an eBook? Then, you could market this as expert advice. And even use it as a lead magnet to attract new customers.
Moreover, you can ask the interviewee to share it on their social platforms, too.
4. What to do With Statistics
The more raw facts and figures you’ve got for people, the more they will trust you.
So, let’s imagine you’ve written a big statistics post. There are numbers flying around everywhere. People love it – 45% of them have shared it.
So why not recycle it by posting each stat one by one to Twitter?
Twitter is ideal for sharing stats because you can squeeze an image, a stat, some text, AND a compelling CTA all into one bite-sized post.
And you can do it again and again with all your stats.
This works because busy people don’t have the time to read a lengthy blog post. When you break your statistics posts into tweets, people can consume them on the go while engaging with your brand.
5. What to do With Old Blog Posts
There are a few things you can do with old blog posts. One thing that’s worth mentioning before anything else is that sometimes you can simply go back and make a few adjustments in order to get an old blog post ranking better on Google.
For example, let’s say I wrote an article about car tax in 2016. It’s a really good article and people loved it!
Thing is, it was a hassle writing it but now that we’re in 2018, I have to write a brand new one as the 2016 one is out of date!
… Or do I?
As it turns out, I don’t. Instead, I can just update the old blog post with 2018 facts and figures. A lot of the text can stay the same, but prices and CO2 numbers etc. will need to be updated. As might some of the tools in my original post. My audience will love this, and so will Google.
There are other ways you can repurpose old blog posts. Videos are so popular – 55% of us watch videos online every day. So why not turn a popular blog post into a fun video? This will allow you to reach a new audience with the same message but in a different format.
Before you panic, you don’t need to hire a professional actor just yet. The easiest way to repurpose blog posts into videos is to turn your blog into a slideshow. The slides should each be short, concise and they should contain relevant information only. All your videos should be short, too. Don’t forget to add eye-catching images for better engagement.
These are a few ideas on how to get more juice out of a piece of content. The odds are in your favor: As long as the original piece of content was awesome, there’s no limit to how many times – and how many ways – you can reframe it for new audiences.
Over to you
How do you repurpose your content? What benefits have you found from doing so? Please share with your fellow readers. Thanks!
Andrew is the CEO of Next Level Web, a trusted marketing agency based in San Diego, California. He has three lovely daughters and the most patient wife of all time. They specialize in Web Design, Search Engine Optimization, PPC Advertising, and Email Marketing (The Agency – not the daughters… yet).
You can connect with Andrew on Facebook here, or LinkedIn here, or follow him on Twitter @NxtLvlWeb
You may also want to read: Content Repurposing: Why You Need to Get On Board
Quick SEO Win: How to Refresh Your Old Content
7 Practical Ideas to Revitalize Your Content and Improve Blog Performance
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