While the battle for the Iron Throne rages on in the world of Game of Thrones, there is no contest for King of the Internet. Content is king, hands down.
Marketers at all types of companies have one thing on their to-do list every day, and that thing is content-related. You are tasked with: creating new digital content; reporting on existing digital content; publishing digital content; defending digital content that flopped; fighting against overplaying digital content that was successful. It’s all about content, all the time.
The good news is that there are a few circumstances that warrant recycling existing digital content to optimize the success of your online efforts. This tactic will save you some time, but it will still require some work. Here are the two most important factors that you should consider when you are trying to find digital content to recycle for your blog, social media, videos and podcasts:
Two Things That Qualify Content for Recycling
#1: High Traffic, Low Conversion
In the scenario where you can identify which of your posts have had high traffic, but low conversion, you have an opportunity to investigate and pivot to bump up your lead count.
This type of content already has a lot going for it: you know your audience is interested. What you need to figure out is why conversion was low: was your call to action (CTA) clear; was your CTA too far below the fold; was your CTA not prominent enough; was your CTA verbiage weak?
You also want to check the order of your content. Cleary with high traffic you’re doing something right in the headline, but your audience might not be making it to the content that drives home your CTA and converts them into a lead.
You might also want to check the length of your content. There is no one-size-fits all for this, you just need to research what your audience prefers.
#2: Low Traffic, High Conversion
On the other side of the coin is your content that had high conversion rates, but low traffic. The structure of the content was on point, but how can you get more people to see it, so they can convert too? Check your meta data to make sure you are using the right keywords.
You can also find other content that you’ve published that is similar in topic, and connect the two via a link. If the other content has better traffic, that link can help drive more traffic to your high-conversion content.
You have a few options when recycling your digital content, including editing the content that exists and republishing the editing content as a new piece.
If you are just editing existing content, you can share it as an “in case you missed it” (ICYMI) or “throwback” post to give context to the repost.
When looking for digital content to repurpose, expand your research to content from a year or more back, don’t limit yourself to the most recent content.