In today’s reality, in any reality, leaving money on the table is a poor business decision. As business owners, we have to be fiscally responsible in how we use our money (what we spend vs. what we keep, follow up procedures etc.) but we also need to be responsible for how we leverage our time and our skills and knowledge. This is where content repurposing comes into play.
Our expertise is a valuable commodity, that is why we are EXPERTS who Speak. Our expertise is as valuable, if not more valuable than our delivery.
When you get a great idea and decide to write a blog post or an article, or record a Facebook live, and it sits on your website or your timeline, and gets shared on social a couple times, you are not leveraging your expertise to the maximum benefit.
We need to start creating less and promoting more. Not to say we need to stop writing and sharing our expertise – but we need to focus on getting more eyes on what we already have.
So, if content repurposing is the goal, how do we know what content to choose?
Not everything should be repurposed. For instance, the multitude of articles we are all writing right now on ‘thriving in COVID environment’ will never be used after the next 6-18 months (we hope). Neither will my 2018 posts on the introduction of https and site security and explaining why you can no longer schedule content to your personal fb page. That is old news now.
Choose content to repurpose that is:
- high value
- has elicited responses (shares, likes, etc.)
- is not time or data or event-specific.
This is prime evergreen content.
Before you start to implement any of the ideas below, I strongly suggest you go through your existing blog posts, videos, lives, audios, workshops and take an inventory of what you have, then group your content by topic or audience.
For most of you I bet that you will come out of that exercise with more pieces than you ever dreamed you had.
Now that you know what to re purpose – let’s talk about the how and the cost.
Weigh Your Options when Content Repurposing
As you go through the ideas below, it is important to remember that this is an option list – not a ‘do everything’ list. After you have done your inventory, it is important that you choose 1 or 2 things that will work with what you already have and with your budget or skill set.
I have broken them down into three categories.
No Cost / Very Little Work
- Go back in your blog 2+ years and see what ideas resonated with your readers (or that you feel are still very relevant today and update or rewrite them with your current spin.
- Do the same with your videos or FB posts
- If you have great blogs, record them as a video and post them on your YouTube and LinkedIn accounts. Do a Facebook live where you review your top 3 performing posts and invite others to chime in.
- Record them as an audio file and create a podcast or audiobook.
- Re-read your newsletters – are there any tips in there that you could ‘recirculate’ and create a new blog series on your top tech tips, or recognition tips – or whatever is appropriate?
- Repurpose those great posts as LinkedIn articles.
- Turn a blog topic series into an email series.
- Pull out quotes from your blogs and create images or memes highlighting the quotes – link them back to your post
Skills and Resources
- https://www.canva.com/ *graphic design, quotes and memes
- https://analytics.google.com/analytics/web * to see how your posts are performing and to choose what content to repurpose
- YouTube ‘how-to’ videos *just ‘Google it’ – you will find what you need on content repurposing
- https://www.rev.com/ *transcription software
Low Cost /Some Work
- Again, go back to your blog and see if you have any ‘top 10 lists’ or steps etc. Expand on each idea in the list and create a blog or video about each.
- Reuse your post and create an infographic in Canva.
- Transcribe your podcasts and create an Expert Series e-book (or book for that matter)
- Set up a social scheduling platform. (free or paid versions) Hootsuite, Buffer, Social Bee, etc.
- Get in touch with your speaker colleagues or those who do something ‘similar but different’ and offer to write a guest blog on their website or record a video together and feature each other.
- Promote your content with multiple titles. For instance -you have a ‘top 5’ list. You could create 10 different twitter/FB images that promote one tip, hinting at several more.
Some Cost / More Work / Longer Term
- Do you have a blog series? 5 or 6 blogs on a specific topic? Hop on Zoom and create a video presentation. Now repurpose that video on your blog, YouTube channel, LinkedIn, and Facebook. If you have video editing software on your computer, you can even break down the video into 140 seconds sound bits and post it to twitter.
- Put together a quiz as a lead magnet
- Repurpose that blog series again and create an eBook or a full book.
- Create an online course
- Create a membership site
Online courses, membership sites and speaking portals are a long-term solution, that (when done right) are so much more than ‘simply’ content repositories. They can become revenue generation for years to come and they can see you through these upcoming rougher years.
PS – Watch in the next month or so as I unveil a new approach to speaking in the post-COVID environment. I have some ideas that my clients are currently implementing and they have the possibility to be revolutionary in our industry…
