Create a content repurposing plan
Create a content repurposing plan
1. Define the scope of your repurposing plan to match your larger content marketing strategy.
This helps to keep everyone involved in the planning and execution of content repurposing on task, and ensures that the plan helps to accomplish broader marketing goals. Example factors to define your scope include: The audience segment you want to reach. The industry on which you want to focus. The channels you want to use. The product, service, or solution you want to promote.
2. Review the primary content channels for your top 3-5 content competitors to discover how they have successfully repurposed content.
Content competitors are competitors who typically publish the same type of content as you to the same general target audience. Reviewing their efforts provides context to and inspire ideas for your own repurposing plan. Use the same KPIs you use in your own content marketing to define successful content. For example, if you find that a content competitors’ research whitepaper has performed especially well as a short explainer video on YouTube, you might find success turning your own whitepaper into a similar type of video.
3. Identify up to 5 pieces of existing content that are still relevant, have met or exceeded content marketing KPIs, and can be repurposed within your scope.
Draw from a regular content audit, or perform an informal audit with repurposing in mind. Focusing on high performing content maximizes the chances that it will perform well on different channels, as well. Types of content that typically lend themselves to repurposing include: Gated content, like ebooks and whitepapers. Presentations and takeaways from marketing events. Video and audio content like podcasts. Customer case studies and long-form testimonials.
4. Set goals for each piece of content you intend to repurpose, focusing on the specific impact each piece can make in your overall content marketing plan.
The goals can carry over from the original content you look to repurpose, or expand into a new goal within your defined scope. For example, the goal of your whitepaper might have been lead generation. Any repurposed content can still link to the whitepaper for lead generation, or take some of the nuggets from within it for a higher-level engagement and brand awareness strategy. Repurposed content can also work to reach a new audience segment through channel diversification. For example, you might be able to reach ground level B2B buyers through a podcast, but high level decision makers when repurposing bits from the podcast for LinkedIn content.
5. Choose new content formats for each piece that will be repurposed based on the goals, scope, and audience you have set.
For example, a whitepaper can be reformatted into: An email series for newly generated leads. An infographic for your website’s blog. Short video snippets or graphics for social media. Long-form video for YouTube.
6. Create a short content brief for each repurposed piece of content you plan to publish based on your goals, intended audience, and format.
This brief will provide valuable context for content creators. Components should include: A link to the original content. A short outline of what pieces of the content to highlight. The purpose or goals of the new content. The channel where the new content will be published. The audience persona to target. Any CTA that relates to your repurposed content goal. In most cases, the brief can be as short as a few bullet points. For more complex repurposing projects, like turning a whitepaper into a long form video, you might need a full page brief.
7. Use your content calendar to schedule your repurposed content alongside original content for an internally consistent publication schedule.
While original content should remain the focus of your content marketing strategy, repurposed content is ideal to fill in the gaps on channels like social media, email, and your blog. Plan for your original content first, then add in your repurposing opportunities to approach ideal posting frequencies for social media and other channels.
8. Monitor the success of your repurposed content using your content marketing KPIs within your regular content audits.
Audit your content at least every six months. Mark any repurposed content to evaluate its performance according to the goals you’ve set and make potential adjustments. Over time, these insights can help you adjust the goals, scope, and execution of your content repurposing plan.