How to Re-use Content?

You have a series of blog posts sitting there, and you do not know what else you need to create more traction.

To start with that, it is always good to have searchable text content, because Google works perfectly with that and some people like to read content in the form of a guide or a way to visualize the steps.

Are there any difficulties with written texts? Yes, here are a few suggestions:

• People need time to read long articles and who has so much time these days?
• Readers may abandon the post if they are bored, before finishing the reading.
• They may bookmark it to read later if ever find the time; usually they do not. Have you ever bookmarked a list of articles only never to return reading them? I have done that repeatedly.
• It is challenging to create popularity and engage people if the text does not satisfy the professional writing requirements. A hasty written article may leave your readers with questions or content gaps, but it is always good to have something than nothing, right?
• You need to analyze how you are going to optimize the texts for conversions, how many Call-to-action (CTA) buttons you need, and monitor the performance to tweak further.

Writing does not fit the way some people like to produce content. Some people prefer to record first and write later. When they explain a concept to others through the mic, helps them clear their thoughts overwriting the article then.

If you have already prepared a podcast or a video following a script you can use bullet-points to create the article or blog post. You should be able to have it ready soon enough as you already talked about it in your other content forms.

Having ready audio or video content will enhance the quality of your article. Be sure to embed your podcast and video in it. You can use Wordpress to insert both content forms in your posts; it will provide the respective players automatically.

Embedding a video makes the readers spent more time on your page, while the podcast may convert them into subscribers.

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It is maybe easier to create a video than write an article. Some people can do both; others prefer speaking than writing. Either way, keep in mind that videos can target a separate audience who likes to watch instead of reading, plus videos are direct and create a special relationship with the viewers.

Viewers can meet the person behind the pen, see your personality, appreciate your sincerity and body language, know that you are a real person, all pointers that create engagement.

Videos appeal to emotions, and in this aspect, it is easier to resonate with watchers than to the article readers. Viewers notice the voice changes and the facial expressions that could work positively or negatively.

Videos are the best way to tell a story and businesses should work on creating stories instead of stiff adverts. Plus, videos are instrumental when you have a short story or breaking news.

You can take your blog post and make a video just by narration or presenting the content, then upload it to YouTube in a separate channel with your other videos treating a similar topic. When you have more videos around a theme, you can do an introductory video and follow up with in-depth pieces like content stacking below.

With some videos of the same topic ready, you may consider preparing a series as a course for sale and uploading them on Udemy.com.

For example, if you have a How-to blog post, you can turn it into a video showing the steps either live or via a presentation. If you have a podcast, you can play a video loop and let the podcast run in the background.

Note that you need to capture the viewers' attention within the first ten seconds or less else they will stop watching the video. The video should inform viewers right from the start what is the theme and how it will help them find a solution.

Videos that create engagement have specific requirements. I am preparing a separate article on Video content, but I could say briefly here that you need to figure out how a video can serve better your needs.

• For example, the length of the video, you need to analyze if you need a short or a longer video.
• What form of Call-to-action (CTA) serves better your goals.
• How to promote a video, so it ranks in the top search results of YouTube (Video SEO).
• How to organize the video content in topics (video channels).
• Are you going to embed the video in other external pages, i.e., social accounts or your site?
• Do you need to optimize for the Autoplay feature to grab attention quickly?
• You will need to upload subtitles so users can watch videos on mobile devices without the accompanying sound in specific environments, i.e., waiting rooms or for hearing-impaired people.
• Is it better to have narration, music or both?

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It is better to prepare a script, i.e., bullet points or sketches, and then create your video regardless if it has narration or just frames. When your video follows a script everything goes smooth, you are aware of the requirements, and it takes less time to create it. The video script will also take into account how much time you need to pause the talking, so the users appreciate a smooth speech flow like a radio show.

The options available lead to different results and have their ups and downs. If you use a digital SLR you record better quality video, as there are no camera movements, you have better light conditions, and you can set up a video recording studio at a permanent space with a pleasing backdrop always set up and ready to go. If you find the light is not enough, you may consider buying a softbox light. You can always plug a better microphone to the camera and capture great sound.

Any modern smartphone can create decent videos, and you have the advantage of mobility. Many marketers record videos on the road, i.e., the successful businessman Gary Vaynerchuk, in their car, etc. Of course, you should not expect the best quality of lighting, sound, and steadiness from such videos but they serve well their scope of mobility and originality. You may consider getting a selfie stick and an external mic to capture better sound.

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If you take the notes from the webinar you did in the past you can generate a series of articles, publish a shorter version on YouTube, or create a page (FAQ) where you answer common questions in bullet-points. Be sure to take a couple of webinar questions and send the answers to your email list subscribers to keep them engaged.

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With audio, the audience characteristics are different as you have mostly dedicated users that listen to your podcast while commuting or doing stuff in their house. That still means that you need to capture their attention, entertain, educate and even inspire them. Doing any of the above, you gain their trust and retain them for more extended periods of time.

You can take your video and transform it into a podcast. Again here, you need to consider pausing the speech like a radio show.

Podcasts could be twenty or more minutes long but keep in mind that you need to have a big topic to discuss if you take the time. When you have guests talking, it makes sense doing podcasts from half to an hour and a half.

If you have created some podcasts that belong in a common theme, you could create an audiobook and make it available as a free download on your site or elsewhere.

Recording quality sound is critical. You can buy a quality microphone and plug it to your PC or your digital camera if you are producing a video later.

You may use any content script that has bullet-points or can help in creating a short presentation in the form of Powerpoint or PDF. Wordpress supports embedding PDF, and in the case of the Powerpoint you may do it via a Wordpress plugin or just put the link for downloading the file.

When you create video content, you should have already prepared some slides and then imported them into your video processing suite. The next thing to do is export the slides into PDF and embed them into a blog post or in online document sites that host presentation PDF files, i.e., Slideshare.com.

If you have some blog posts that belong into a frequent topic, you could organize them into an ebook that you can upload in Ebook sites or sell it on Amazon.

Having prepared content in any of the above forms will leave you with some visual content that you can further exploit. A good example is uploading the visuals into your social media accounts together with a brief description, a CTA or a link to your landing page.

Some visuals work better than others, but generally, the scope here is to keep mentioning the brand. The second goal is traffic and conversions, but that depends on the interesting visual, the description and the optimized landing page.

Many marketers curate content instead of creating it for reasons of reducing costs or having no time so that they may use your visuals, may visit your page to read the material, and give you some attribution or offer a partnership.

Apart from the visuals, you can offer a few bullet-points from your article to generate some shares. Be sure to include a link to your post when you share them online.

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Infographics are a visual content form that benefits the branding. Blog posts, video scripts, image files all provide content to create an infographic.

You need to have some DTP (Digital Publishing) skills to create an infographic to make it look professional. There are online forums like Freelancer.com, Peopleperhour.com, Fiverr.com, where you can order an infographic, provide the general idea, maybe some visuals and the creator will hand you the ready files.

Be sure to include a description of your business at the bottom, together with the business address, and contact details. Also, you should have a footnote with the copyright attribution and a link pointing at your landing page for those who want to use the infographic on their sites.

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Another idea is to organize your data that support your article into tables and charts. Charts are the best way to visualize a concept when you can back it up with some data, i.e., user statistics, monthly or yearly growth, revenue, etc.

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Content stacking is when you have a content idea and create different types of it and group them under a common topic following a content plan and a script.

It might be a series of videos around a topic followed by a blog post and a podcast all uploaded in different online places.

When you stack content as above, you save time over creating the elements independently. When you create videos, you will appreciate that it is more comfortable as you have a script and you have already put your thoughts in writing.

Stacking content makes your content pieces better as you have refined one concept that only takes different forms. As soon as you get the grip of how to stack and optimize the content production, you can pass into creating subthemes or episodes and link them together. This way you can cover a big theme and create reader engagement, more subscribers, and conversions.

Do not forget to include conversion elements like CTAs (Click-to-Action buttons) in your content stacks.

Now that you have organized your stacked content ideas into a sort of marketing campaigns you can track the performance of your different engagement metrics. Content stacking is a great way to augment your fan base.

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Things change in all industries and niches, and fresh content brings growth. If you have old blog posts that sit without bringing any traffic you could tweak them with updated data. It is best to keep the old URL of the article and present a new version of it to your readers.

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