Content Recycling: Why It’s Beneficial and How to Do It

Content, content, content. Everyone wants more and therefore every business and organization must produce more. Does it ever feel absolutely exhausting? Just when you think you have enough for a few days on social, your blog or for ads, you realize you’re already out of additional content to use. Creating content can feel like two steps forward, one step back.

It’s frustrating and time-consuming, and as a small business owner or entrepreneur, you just don’t have time for that! So, how can you continue to be effective with your content marketing efforts with less effort? Content recycling!

Now, the name might lead you to believe this is something else altogether, so let us explain. When we say content recycling, we are not talking about simply reposting content that you have already published in the past. An example would simply be linking an old blog post with a small caption and publishing it 6-12 months after its initial post. While there is nothing wrong with this method, and at times this can be quite helpful and effective, content recycling refers to something a bit different.

When we say content recycling what we mean is squeezing every last drop out of a single piece of content as well as repackaging and repositioning that same content over time, to be used again and again. There are two methods here – sitting down and creating an in-depth piece of content that can then be used in a variety of ways OR using an already existing piece of content and building on it. Here’s a simple example of the first method and what this could look like for your business or organization.

Let’s start with a piece of thought leadership, like a podcast, webinar or presentation.

From that one piece of content you can now subtract the following:

– 20 different social posts, including graphics and quick videos

– 4 blog posts

– 4 blog videos

– 1-2 eGuides

– 1 tip sheet

That’s over 30 different pieces of content created from just one presentation, giving you a month’s worth of potential content from simply sitting down to create one in-depth piece. Not only that, but you’ve now got tons of ways to point back to your original webinar, podcast or presentation to promote it and gain a larger audience. This same method could be done with any number of mediums or original pieces of content.

That’s method 1 in extracting the most from the content you create. Now, method 2 is recycling existing content and then building on top of it, rather than extracting out of it. What does this look like?

This time, let’s start with a blog post. Maybe it’s a post that did very well and your analytics show that it drove a lot of people to your site. Or maybe after it was initially posted, you received a lot of great feedback and questions. So, you know this piece of content is valuable, but it’s been sitting in a singular blog post for a long time. It needs to be built and expanded on. So now you can potentially turn this already created blog post into:

– 20 different social posts, including graphics and quick videos

– 2-3 spin off blog posts going into more depth on the subject

– 4 blog videos

– record a webinar / presentation / podcast all on the same subject – bonus: you already have your notes ready because you’re just spinning off the already created blog post

– 1-2 eGuides

– 1 tip sheet

Both of these methods – either sitting down and creating an in-depth piece that could be utilized in multiple ways OR using content that already exists in your library and building on it – are great ways to make the most of your content marketing efforts, with less effort and stress.

Still feel a little overwhelmed by #contentmarketing or content creation? We can help! When it comes to content recycling, we’re pros! We can take your already existing content and turn it into a content machine that will drive new leads and results for you organization. Learn more here or reach out to us anytime – we’d love to chat!

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