Repurposing content is a great way for marketers to take collateral they've already created and it and re-deploy it for more results.

Most brands realize they should be conducting content marketing, but they remain focused on volume. Some may feel they don’t have the resources or bandwidth to produce blog posts, news stories or other media frequently enough to support their objectives. Even worse, some might not even understand how investing in high-quality content can generate more results.

Brafton reported that only 39 percent of companies blog frequently, or at least six blog posts per month. However, businesses should certainly be writing more often, as there is a correlation between how often and consistently brands produce content and how many unique visits they accumulate. At the same time, the SEO landscape is shifting so that search engines expect high-quality content at scale. So what can web marketers do to fill the publication void they’ve created for themselves?

Doing more with less content

One of the most efficient methods is to repurpose content. When brands have put in the work of researching, writing and revising content, there’s no need to forget it once it’s been published. Instead, the same information, facts, figures and graphics can potentially be reused for further content marketing opportunities.

The Eloqua Community State of Content Marketing report recently discovered 63 percent of marketers want to repurpose content to make it more “snackable.” Snackability refers to the quick and easy consumption, which means businesses are taking lengthy whitepapers or detailed infographics and publishing quotes, stats or excerpts in smaller, forms that are easier to consume.

For example, infographics can be sliced and diced to highlight golden nuggets of information, which can be reappropriated for social media image posts. According to Twitter, Tweets including pictures generate 35 percent more Retweets, so it’s a good idea to re-use visual resources whenever possible.

Tweets including pictures generate 35 percent more Retweets, so it’s a good idea to re-use visual resources whenever possible.

Repurposing: Efficiency whenever possible

Repurposing might sound simple, but it actually requires marketers to be extremely strategic. They need to know what content types have enough material to support additional assets and how often to repurpose their media. Eloqua also found 59 percent repurpose content assets between two and five times. A good guideline to follow is that the more detailed content is, the more it can be repurposed. Therefore, a 2,000 word case study might yield blog posts, Tweets, video scripts and news stories, while a single blog post might only bear repurposing a couple of times.

Marketers can meet the challenge of creating great content consistently when they are smart about how the invest. It’s about a bigger picture and realizing how individual elements from each can be paired together for something that’s bigger than the individual parts. 

Alex Butzbach is a Marketing Writer at Brafton. He studied Communications at Boston College, and after a brief stint teaching English in Japan, he entered the world of content marketing. When he isn't writing and researching, he can be found on a bike somewhere in Metro Boston.