The words “reduce, reuse, and recycle” apply as much to content creation as to saving the planet. In this article, we look at why repurposing content for social media is important and offer tips on how to approach content repurposing.
Why You Should Repurpose Content for Social Media
Creating gripping content for social media platforms takes time, energy, and resources that digital marketers may not always have. Content creation for social entails creating a variety of media and packaging it for consumption on different platforms.
Overexerting yourself as a creative or a social media marketer often leads to burn-outs and creative blocks. Below are some reasons why you should repurpose content.
- Efficiency: content is an asset, therefore, underutilizing your content is wastage. By repurposing content you reserve your time and energy towards other marketing efforts such as monitoring analytics.
Repurposing content for social allows you to continually gain value from previously created assets.
- Message reinforcement: All content is not equal, despite creatives’ best efforts, some pieces of content will outperform others. By repurposing the content that had an overwhelming response, you evoke the same positive emotions that your audience had when they viewed the original content.
Therefore, repurposing content promotes engagement and brand loyalty.
- Reach a brand new audience: Apart from reinforcing the brand message and brand values, when you repurpose content you can reach a brand new audience with the same message.
- Update dated information: We live in rather dynamic times whereby what was unfathomable today is the norm tomorrow. Marketers in all industries can attest to the changes.
You can repurpose old content by using it to highlight the changes in your brand or industry. Repurposing allows you to breathe life into old content.
- Boosting SEO: Search engines give priority to content that is above par. When repurposing content for social, you should consider the content pieces that performed outstandingly.
The same quality of content that attracts traffic and engagement on different social media platforms will help boost your SEO ranking.
Now that we know the advantages of repurposing content, let us look at some actionable ways in which you can repurpose content.
- Convert old blog posts into visuals
You can convey your message through pictures rather than words. A good example is repurposing an old blog post by summarizing the subtitles using images or visuals that echo the message.
Let us say you run a lifestyle blog. You previously wrote an article about 5 DIY projects that can transform a plain T-shirt into a fancy top. You can create a short video that shows the T-shirt before and after the DIY transformation and post it on Instagram, Facebook, or TikTok.
You can also summarize blog paragraphs into sentences and use those sentences to caption images in a carrousel post on Facebook or Instagram.
- Refresh old images
You can enhance old images that generated traffic and engagement by adding filters to them. There are plenty of tools, including Canva, which you can use to add pizzazz to old images. You can use these recreated images as background images.
You can also challenge your followers to caption the image and hence create a string of user-generated content (UGC).
- Post Throwbacks
Everybody loves a good throwback. Apart from recreating an old image, you can also repost it as is and stir engagement by creating a source of nostalgia.
The throwback images don’t have to be decades old, you can even use content that is a year old. Utilize throwbacks to illustrate brand or product growth between now and then to your users.
Throwbacks are also handy when launching an updated version of your product or a new service.
- Repurpose images for Pinterest boards
Pinterest is an underrated yet effective channel for generating quality traffic. Pinterest is a very niche-specific platform; therefore, you can create pinboards that promote brand lifestyle using old images from Facebook and Instagram.
Let us say you are in the fitness business. You can create boards for various workouts, pre-workout and post-workout diets, and motivation quotes.
- Repurpose poll post results
Many marketers have resorted to using poll posts to get a clear picture of what their followers and consumers are thinking. You can use the answers generated from these poll posts to generate content for social media platforms.
One easy way to use poll post results is to post interesting data trends that emerged from the poll. Throw the generated facts to your audience and spark a conversation.
For example, if you run a skincare shop, post the results from a previous poll about your followers’ nighttime skincare routines.
You can also attach a call to action when repurposing poll posts by asking your followers to subscribe to your email list for full poll results. Consequently, you spend less time creating content while simultaneously growing your email list.
- Summarize old blog posts into infographics
According to statistics, infographics are the 4th most used content type in marketing. Survey results also established that people respond better to directions with illustrations rather than just text. 323% of people following illustrations are successful in their quest.
Infographics are particularly invaluable for businesses in the software as a service (Saas) industry and B2B marketers. If you are in either of these two lines of business, you can turn old highly engaging blog posts into infographics and post them on either Facebook or Linkedin.
Fun illustrations can also make engaging Instagram posts.
- Turn old blogs into presentations
You can go a step further from infographics by turning long-read posts into a presentation. Presentations allow your followers to cover wide topics exhaustively in a limited amount of time. Apart from long reads, you can also convert interesting case studies and white papers into simple easy-to-read presentations.
Presentations are also useful for B2B marketers, Saas marketers, and digital marketing agencies. You can use platforms like Slideshare to make your presentation available to your audience.
Linkedin is also a good avenue for posting presentations.
- Share user-generated content
Your followers are a rich source of free content that could offer tremendous benefits for your brand. UGC helps with brand visibility and boosts SEO ranking. It also humanizes your brand and gives a sense of authenticity.
UGC ranges from reposts of branded hashtags, brand mentions to reviews and testimonials. Your users are a third party with nothing to gain from endorsing your brand. Therefore, UGC content attracts more attention and interest than branded content.
Sharing UGC also creates a domino effect of more UGC that you repurpose in the future.
- Livestreams and webinars
Livestreamed events and webinars give raw unfiltered content that your followers will benefit from. They are also quite simple to create with limited editing required.
You can repurpose Livestream and webinar video content by reposting it on YouTube or reels on Instagram. In so doing, you can reach a completely new target audience. Livestreams and webinars also have immense potential as podcasts on platforms like SoundCloud.
As stated above, live streams and webinars are often unfiltered. You can also scan for interesting cuts in such videos and create GIFs.
- Tweet threads
Tweet threads provide a quick and easy way to caption a series of events in one post. You can use tweet threads to caption your best work and build anticipation for future projects and campaigns.
You can also set up a tweet thread with backlinks to your best works on other online platforms such as blogs and videos. Tweet threads can attract fresh interest in your content and help you generate leads.
- Create an e-book
After years of blogging on a particular subject matter, you have generated enough content to create an e-book, so do it. Post a link to your newly-created e-book and attach a call to action like asking your followers to subscribe for a free copy.
Therefore, you can achieve two goals; creating content and lead generation.
Points to Note about Repurposing Content for Social Media
Below are some pointers to pay attention to when creating your content repurposing strategy.
- Note that not all content is worthy of repurposing; only repurpose the best performing content pieces. Turn to your analytics to establish the best-performing content pieces that you can leverage for social media.
- Second, have a goal for repurposing content. The four main goals of social media marketing always stand. Repurpose content for brand awareness, engagement, lead- generation, or sales. Having a clear goal in mind while repurposing empowers you to select appropriate content pieces.
- Focus on evergreen content or content that will remain relevant for a long time to come. Your followers will not respond positively to dated content since it is irrelevant.
- Repurposing content starts during the original content creation process. As you create content, always focus on the big picture by including evergreen angles you can utilize in the future.
Bottom Line:
Repurposing content allows you to share ideas freshly; it is also less demanding than constantly creating content from scratch. When it comes to strategic content creation, less is more.
Spend less time fighting creative blocks and experimenting and focus on giving your followers what is tried and true. Repurposing content is an easier way to achieve overarching marketing goals