Audiences today devour content at an unusual rate.

In India, an average consumer spends 2.25 hours daily on social media.

In this time frame, they might scroll through approximately 8100 pieces of content or even 135 one-minute videos for that matter.

These numbers are huge considering the 31.2% annual growth in active social media users.

If the consumption rate for content is this high the efforts to engage the audience automatically go up.

Engaging with your audience with relevant content has become key to staying at the top of their minds.

However, the majority of companies fail to do so owing to the slow content production cycle that they get stuck with.

Top it up with issues of decreased attention span of viewers, which adds to the pressure of content creation.

From a Content Marketer’s Lens

Let me break it to you.

It is not the lack of attention span amongst audiences it’s the lack of consideration span.

Audiences today want to be hooked instantly. To do that you need to be present and interacting on all platforms first

Being found is the key to attracting an audience.

But being present everywhere and simultaneously producing content can be strenuous.

The process itself involves a multitude of steps.

Ideation > Research > Content creation and lastly > Distribution.

Ask a content marketer out there who struggles to put out quality content every day.

So how do we deal with this?

Ans – Repurposing content

What is Content Repurposing?

Repurposing content is an easy and simple way to recycle a macro piece of content and turn it into micro pieces which can be distributed across platforms.

The vice versa of this is also true. Many marketers condense multiple blog posts to create an ebook.

While Repurposing content, it is important to understand where your audience hangs out. Analyze the consumption pattern and the platform people are on to help you decide what to produce in a native format.

With Repurposing – a podcast can be turned into a blog, social media posts, and even small video snippets.

A blog can be repurposed as social media posts, gifs, videos, infographics, etc.

Internal data, reviews, etc can be turned into case studies.

It is not just limited to creating new micro pieces of content.

Refurbishing blogs or other content pieces to be relevant in the current situation is also a way of repurposing content.

The idea of repurposing can be applied to varied content pieces.

Why Repurpose content?

Most Marketers and companies alike have this misconception that if the content is ready, it will automatically be liked or consumed by the audiences.

However, this might not necessarily be true.

Sometimes audiences might not even land on your site to read a blog or check your podcast. Then how do you reach them?

Content repurposing can help here. Having content pieces at various touchpoints will surely increase your chances to be discovered.

The changing landscape of social media along with multiple channels has brought in new formats of content.

Each of these formats differs in terms of idea, size, and execution.

While a reel or story is good for Instagram, the same will not be effective for Linkedin and vice versa.

On LinkedIn, text-based content will be more effective.

With repurposing, the same content of reels can be expanded in a text form.

Here are a few other reasons why you should repurpose content.

7 Benefits of Repurposing Content

Save Time – It is an efficient way to create content. Let’s think about the process here: Ideation and Research part is already taken care of in the macro piece. All that is left to do is content creation and distribution. That’s a whole lot of time saved.
Higher Retention – If you are projecting a particular idea in various ways, the retention would be higher.
Appeal to all audiences – You never know what clicks with your audience. While some people like to read others are visual creatures. Some find it super interesting to read a 10-minute blog, while others would enjoy the same idea being shared in a carousel format.
Work Smart – Reuse what you already have, you don’t have to work hard to think of new ideas constantly and put extra pressure on the entire team.
Consistent Content – Repurposing is the easiest way to pump out content at scale and keep engaging with your audience.
Improved SEO – With minimal efforts, you get multiple content pieces to boost your organic traffic.
Repurposing content for social media – Repurposing can help you develop 5 to 6 good pieces of content out of a single blog or video. This can help you fill out your social calendar.

The more you publish, the more you know what sticks: Not all your ideas are going to be accepted by your audience.

However, over a period of time repurposing content helps generate data on the multiple formats of content you have posted.

This data can then be extremely helpful as a data-driven marketer to analyze engagement and understand the patterns.

Analyze this data every 15 days and build an optimization plan accordingly.

This will ensure at all times that your posting decisions are data-backed and not merely a gut feeling.

Since we now know the benefits of content repurposing, let’s find out if it is right for you.

Should you repurpose content?

Repurposing content could be a great addition to your content marketing strategy. However, having a clear idea of how to repurpose is important to start.

The first question to ask here is do you have a macro piece of content to begin with?

Every content piece cannot be repurposed.

The main content that you use needs to have a strong idea which then can be broken down into smaller ideas for micro pieces.

A great way to do this is a Content Audit.

The goal here is to sift out amazing macro content that you already have
Make an inventory of internal content for your firm ( blog posts, case studies, podcasts, videos, tutorials, etc ) – Get on the ground, do some research, and have an internal review.
Analyze which pieces work for your/ which pieces are really good and filled with ideas – Understand what is working best for your site which are the blogs that are pulling in people.
Shortlist macro pieces you want to repurpose – These are your gold mines and it’s out of this goldmine that we pick out pieces of gold to shine through and sprinkle it around in different shapes and forms.
Chalk out a plan on how to repurpose these pieces

Here is a free template that you can fill out to audit your content for repurposing.

Remember – Repurposing is not equal to Copying content.

Using the same content over and over again in different forms will just bore your audience.

Be smart about the content idea and recycle the thought in various ways.

Repurposing content example: Buffer

Buffer, a social media management platform, is all about repurposing content when it comes to their social feed.

In 2015 Buffer did a repurposing marathon and managed to increase the Linkedin and Quora followers by 500% with just a 4% dip in website traffic. They used a combination of tactics like reposting blogs on medium, quora, sharing courses as videos, using Slideshare, etc.

The repurposing efforts continue in varied forms today. Let’s have a look.