Repurposing content: How to extend the life of your content assets

Content creation drives marketing success and requires significant investment.

You pour hours into crafting blog posts, videos, infographics and more, all designed to engage and convert.

However, with the rapid consumption of content, the lifespan of these assets can be alarmingly short. 

The solution? Repurposing content.

By reshaping and reusing existing content, you can extend its lifespan, reach broader audiences and create unique content for different personas, maximizing your return on investment. Here’s how expert marketers can effectively lead in repurposing content.

1. Assess your high-performing content

The first step in a successful repurposing strategy is identifying which pieces of content have performed the best. 

Look into social media metrics and other analytics tools you have access to to determine which blog posts have received the most views, which videos have the highest engagement and which infographics are most shared. 

High-performing content is a simple, low-hanging fruit to start your repurposing journey, as it has already proven its value to your audience.

2. Break it down or build it up

Turn comprehensive resources into smaller, easily digestible pieces. For instance, a detailed white paper can be broken down into a series of blog posts or infographics, making the information more accessible and extending the white paper’s reach. 

Conversely, you can aggregate several related blog posts into an ebook or a comprehensive guide, providing a deeper dive into a topic your audience cares about. Additionally, turning those longer pieces of content into gated, valuable content to accumulate leads. 

Dig deeper: SCAMPER your way to better SEO and content marketing ideas

3. Change the format

Transforming content into different formats can help reach different segments of your audience.

Convert a blog post into a video tutorial for visual learners or distill its key points into an infographic. Alternatively, adapt a webinar into a podcast episode for audiences who prefer audio content.

Individuals consume content differently, so it is important to make sure you have a wide type of marketing mix to engage your audience. 

HubSpot recently surveyed marketers about the most effective types of content. Here are the highlights:

• Short-form video content is the most popular medium overall, with 37% of respondents favoring this format.
• Images and infographics are also highly preferred by consumers, with 52% favoring visual content like this, especially Gen Z (53%) and Baby Boomers (58%).
• Live videos and live streams are the third most popular content type consumers want to see.
• Short videos, social media marketplaces, sponsored content and influencers are the preferred methods across age groups for product discovery and learning about products/services.

4. Update and relaunch

Industries evolve and new data emerges, so updating old content with fresh information and statistics can breathe new life into it.

Once updated, relaunch the content as a new post, complete with current examples and enriched data. This boosts the content’s relevance and its SEO value, drawing in traffic from organic search.

Additionally, if you have evergreen content on the site that needs a bit of a refresh, simply update that content on that page versus creating a new piece of content. That URL most likely has more authority and will keep its SEO value.

5. Target new audiences

Your personas or audiences can change or grow, but there is no need to recreate the content wheel. Consider tailoring existing content for new demographic or geographic markets if applicable. 

If you have a successful tutorial aimed at beginners, you could adapt it for an advanced audience by incorporating more complex concepts and case studies. Similarly, translating content into different languages can open up new markets and expand your reach internationally. 

For example, my organization currently focuses on payers or insurance carriers. We are refining our solutions and content libraries to target specific job titles and functions, making our content more focused and effective.

6. Leverage for social media

Social media thrives on micro-content.

Extract intriguing quotes, statistics or visuals from your content and turn them into posts for platforms like X, Instagram or LinkedIn. These snippets can drive traffic back to the full-length piece on your website, enhancing both your social media engagement and site traffic. 

Recently, I have been researching keywords for content marketing and have noticed that many of my findings are pointing toward articles published in LinkedIn’s CMS. I’ve recommended to my team and network that repurposing content and placing it on LinkedIn could be of huge value, not only for search but also for thought leadership.

Dig deeper: A guide to LinkedIn content marketing

7. Use in email campaigns

Integrate repurposed content into your email marketing campaigns. A series of blog posts can be turned into a weekly newsletter feature, or key insights from a case study can be used to nurture leads. Email campaigns can breathe new life into older content while providing value to your subscribers.

Improve your marketing reach and effectiveness with content repurposing

Repurposing content isn’t just about saving time and resources; it’s about enhancing the reach and effectiveness of your marketing efforts.

By transforming, updating and redistributing existing content, you can continually engage your audience without creating new content. 

As markets evolve and new trends emerge, your content should adapt to the changing digital landscape to maximize its potential long after its initial release.