In professional services marketing, we often hear how hard it is to stay on track with a content marketing program. Consistently producing fresh and relevant content is not easy. Between topic generation, production, and promotion, content creation can be a full-time job.
Unfortunately, the challenge of creating content is a common reason that marketers give up on content marketing before they have a chance to see results. (For more spot on reasons why content marketing often fails, check out this SlideShare by Rand Fishkin at Moz.)
Instead of throwing in the towel, try to learn the tricks of the trade.
How can you produce a regular stream of content without feeling like you’re starting from scratch every time? Remember the hidden B2B content marketing gem that makes the whole process easier: content repurposing.
Repurposing your content will save you time while also offering your readers options depending on their format preference. You can double, triple or quadruple the amount of content you offer without having to put in double, triple or quadruple the work.
Here are a few strategies you can use to lighten the load and widen your breadth of content.
3 Strategies for Repurposing Your Content
1. Use multiple formats. Your prospects and clients have different needs for their content consumption. Some of your more visually inclined learners might prefer an infographic to a whitepaper. Or they might prefer skimming a blog post in thirty seconds rather than watching a five-minute video.
Use what you have at your disposal to expand your content across multiple formats. Here are a few examples:
- Turn speeches or webinars into blog posts
- Compile multiple blogs of the same subject matter into a guide or ebook
- Turn an hour-long webinar presentation into a short video how-to’s
- Use webinar slides to create SlideShare presentations
Just be sure that with each new form your content takes, you’re also offering your audience something new. Rather than simply “reusing” your content, include additional information, a slightly different angle, or create a new experience to up the value. Which brings us to #2.
2. Take a new angle to an existing topic. Let’s say your firm specializes in IT security for retailers. Since you’re focused on educating the retailer audience about security challenges and solutions, you’ll most likely write about that topic more than once.
How can you use the same general topics multiple times? After all, you have 52 weeks of content to produce. Focus on these tips:
- Create a new title
- Address a slightly different challenge your audience faces
- Create case studies on the topic area
- Write an FAQ
- Break up blog posts into multiple posts and go more in depth in each one
- Change the intro and conclusion
- Include new images and graphics
Don’t be tempted to post the same piece twice
Remember, steer clear of reposting the same piece of content in multiple places online. For example, you might write an in-depth post for your blog, but you also have an opportunity to guest blog on that same topic. It can be temping to use the original article on the guest blog. Instead, repurpose the same topic using the tips above.
Why? Search engines like original, unique content in order to know what results to show searchers. While you’ll most likely not suffer from a manual or algorithmic penalty from having a small amount of duplicate content online, it’s better to be safe than sorry.
3. Breathe new life back into older pieces of content. Certain pieces of older content can get another day in the sun when their issues become relevant again. Again, while it’s not a best practice to directly republish older content that may have been archived, you can easily update it to reflect the most recent issues.
Let’s say you published an article before your annual conference designed to help attendees navigate various events, speakers, and panels. Take the same concept, keep the information that is still pertinent and then update last year’s news with the updated information from this year’s conference. You’ll save your readers the time it would take to navigate your archives and second-guess what might have changed from one year to the next.
Repurposing your content can often feel like cheating the system. However, with the right tweaks and updates, you can offer a greater variety of content that reaches a wider audience without extending the same level of effort it took to create the original piece.
Offering more content options makes it easier for prospects to engage with your firm on their own terms. And by establishing your firm as an expert, you’re also establishing your firm as a solution to the challenges they face.
Staying on track with content marketing shoudn’t be an uphill battle. Check out our Content Marketing Guide for Professional Services below for more tips.
This article was syndicated from Business 2 Community: 3 Steps to Repurpose Your Content in B2B Content Marketing
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