Effective content repurposing strategies and frameworks

What happens to a webinar after it’s over? Or an e-book after it’s published? Does the content you create just sit there, unused? 

No! You take it and transform it into something new.  That’s content repurposing: transforming existing content into different formats, adapting it for various platforms or reusing it in new ways to reach a broader audience.

Rather than creating new content from scratch, repurposing existing pieces uses what you already have and makes it relevant in other contexts. This practice is a key strategy in modern-day digital marketing, as it helps maximize the value of content, extend its lifespan, and reach diverse audiences — often at a lower cost than creating entirely new assets.

But where do you start with content repurposing? Which approaches are likely to achieve the best results? Here’s everything you need to know about developing an effective content repurposing strategy, including bringing together a comprehensive framework that will help you squeeze every last drop of value from your work. 

Understanding content repurposing

Content repurposing saves time, conserves resources, and increases the content’s lifespan, so it’s a win-win for everybody involved, including your target audience.

Why content repurposing is essential

A well-thought-out content repurposing strategy will:

Increase the value and longevity of your content

Content repurposing extends the lifespan of your content by giving it multiple opportunities to be discovered and engaged with over time. This ongoing relevance helps engage audiences and attracts new readers and followers long after publishing the original content.

Enhance your company’s reach and visibility

We all consume information differently, and some audiences prefer different content formats and platforms. For example, while some users prefer reading blog posts, others might be more tempted to stop what they’re doing and listen to videos or podcasts. By repurposing content, you can reach people where they are and increase their appetite for, and engagement with, your best work. 

Reinforce your key messages and keep your brand front of mind

Rather than leaving old content out to pasture, repurposing ensures that your core messages and brand values are consistently communicated across different platforms and formats. Repetition reinforces brand identity. 

Enable you to adapt to audience preferences and trends

The way we interact with the web is constantly evolving. Repurposing content enables you to keep up with trends and consumption habits and make sure what you’re putting out there is still relevant. 

Boost your online presence

Repurposed content can improve search engine optimization (SEO) by getting your content to rank for various keywords that are important to your business and increasing the number of entry points to your website. For example, turning a blog post into a video with optimized titles and descriptions can enhance your visibility on both search engines like Google and video-specific platforms like YouTube.

Effective content repurposing strategies

Your content repurposing strategy needs to be diverse and dynamic. But if you’re working with a large volume of archived content — or you’re not sure how to use what you’ve already produced to reach new audiences – it’s best to follow a few simple best practices. 

Transforming long-form content

E-books and whitepapers provide an easy starting point for content repurposing. You can take the basic approach and extract snippets of your key messages for use across your social media channels or incorporate charts into infographics. 

A more sophisticated approach would integrate your content’s key messages into different content formats. For example, you can transform your e-books content into video snippets, a webinar, slides for sales and more. 

Start by thoroughly reviewing your longform pieces to identify the main themes, key points, statistics and sections that can stand alone as individual statements. Then, create an outline for your repurposed content by breaking down the content into an outline of topics and subtopics. This will help you map out which sections are best for each format. 

Utilizing visual content

Transforming text-based content into engaging visual formats, such as infographics, videos and slides, can make your message more digestible and shareable. 

The content in your word-heavy assets will need to be stripped back and adjusted to suit a faster-paced format that lets the visuals do all the talking. For example, you’ll need to create condensed, easy-to-follow scripts for videos that have a clear beginning, middle and end for maximum impact. And decks will need to be designed to focus on the main points, so the presenter has scope to expand on the core content with their own stories and anecdotes if they want to. 

Audio and video content repurposing

By strategically converting rich media formats like webinars, podcasts and videos into blog posts, social media snippets and infographics, you can bring your ideas to people without time to sit through an entire episode. Here are a few ideas:

Highlight reels are ideal for use on social media. These clips should be no longer than 30-60 seconds and contain at least one memorable quote that distinguishes them from the rest of the series.

Q&A round-ups take all the important points from an ask-the-speaker session and collect the key takeaways and insights in one useful blog piece. Including a short profile of the contributor helps to add credibility.

Episode recaps are a great way to summarize the content of a podcast in written format. You could even provide a full or partial transcription of the blog post, making the content more accessible to people who prefer reading and could also help boost your organic search engine rankings.

Building a content repurposing framework

By now, you probably have a good grasp of what it takes to repurpose content. The most successful marketers, however, take a systematic approach to content repurposing.

Let’s take a closer look at how to develop a custom content repurposing framework that can be understood and followed by everyone in your organization.  

Framework components

Leverage your content to its fullest potential by making sure your content repurposing framework contains the following elements:

A comprehensive content audit

Inventory your existing content and catalog it by type and topic. We recommend using a content management system (CMS) to do this, rather than a simple spreadsheet. Then, once you know what you’ve got and where it lives, identify your evergreen pieces — i.e., the assets that will remain relevant over time — and dive into its performance online by analyzing metrics like traffic, engagement, conversions and social shares. High-performing content is likely to do well a second time around, so this should be your priority. 

A carefully considered content map

Map content types to specific formats. For example, a data-rich blog post might be well-suited for an infographic, while a 5,000-word whitepaper could be broken down into a series of blog posts, social media updates and videos. 

At this stage, you’ll also need to consider what type of content is likely to be well-received by your target audience, and which platform it should be shared on for the most engagement. It takes a while to create a content map that works, but it’s well worth the effort! 

Clear goals and timelines

Keep your content repurposing strategy on track by creating a schedule that outlines what needs to be done and when. Make sure it’s clear which member of staff or contractor is responsible for each part of the process and give them deadlines so production runs smoothly.  

You should also set key performance indicators (KPIs) for each piece, so you know which data needs to be tracked for an accurate picture of how hard that content is working for your business. Perhaps generating higher volumes of website traffic is important to you, or you’re more interested in getting likes and shares on Instagram or LinkedIn. Either way, make a note of the information that needs to be tracked post-launch. 

Establishing specific, measurable goals for your content can encourage everyone to work towards a wider objective, too. For example, you might want to increase traffic to your blog by 20% within 3 months or generate 10 conversions via your website’s content that can be directly attributed to your content repurposing plan within a timeframe of 6 months.

By following these actionable steps and getting creative with what’s gone before, you can start seeing tangible results from your content repurposing strategy in a matter of weeks – all while making efficient use of your content creation resources!