How to repurpose social media content

Want to know how to repurpose social media content? Creating social medic content can be a time-consuming activity. You’ve got to think about what you want to create and then take photographs, record videos, make graphics, and write captions. The time it takes to create one social media post can quickly rack up. And then that post lives for anywhere between a day to a week depending on the social media platform you posted on.

 

That is why it is so important that you don’t spend all that time creating a post once and then it go to the social media graveyard. Instead, you need to learn how to repurpose social media content so you are able to maximise the life, and impact, of the content you create. Keep on reading to find out how to repurpose social media content.

 

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HOW TO REPURPOSE SOCIAL MEDIA CONTENT

Step 1: Identify the social media content you’d like to repurpose

The fact is you aren’t going to repurpose every single social media post that you create. You want to be repurposing the good content and the content that will make sense again in the future.

 

For example, you might have created some great content around a topic that was trending and therefore it won’t make sense to post that again in the future.

 

When identifying social media content to repurpose you’ll want to have two categories: evergreen and seasonal. Evergreen content is content that can be posted at any time of the year and will be relevant. For example, in my business, I have a blog with hundreds of blog posts and many are how-to in style. Whether a business owner reads that blog post this week, next month, or next year it is still relevant. Therefore, any social media content I create that links to a how-to blog post I can categorise as evergreen content for repurposing.

You can find out more about evergreen content in my beginner’s guide to evergreen content. 

 

In contrast, some content is seasonal and only makes sense at a certain time of the year. However, seasonal content can often be used again next year. For example, I work with financial coaches and service providers. In the UK the 6th April marks the beginning of a new tax year from a personal income perspective. Therefore any content that is created to make the beginning or end of the tax year can be reviewed, with possibly a few amends, the following year.

You can find out more about seasonal content in my beginner’s guide to seasonal content.

 

Taking the time to identify the two different types of posts is key as you’ll be building up two banks of content: one you can use whenever and one for content that can only be used at specific times throughout the year.

 

WANT TO GET A CONTENT STRATEGY CREATED SPECIFICALLY FOR YOUR BUSINESS?   Without a solid content strategy, it is easy to spend lots of time and money and see little results. As an award-winning content marketer, who does all of my own marketing, and a Chartered Marketer, with over a decade of professional marketing experience, I’m able to make content with a solid strategy to ensure sales, but in a modern way that will cut through today’s busy online world. And the best bit is it doesn’t have to take forever.  In fact, I run content strategy days (evergreen content and launch content) so you can get an overarching content strategy and then a launch or 3-month content plan in just one day. To find out more about my Strategy Days click here. Not sure what open is best for you? Book a free, non-obligation, introduction call here.

 

Step 2: Weave repurpose content into your social media content plan

 

The reason why I recommend having 2 clear banks of content (evergreen and seasonal) is so that it is easy when you are planning your content to see the opportunities to add in repurposed content rather than always creating something new.

 

I highly recommend that you are planning your content at least on a weekly basis and ideally a monthly basis. When you get to the point where you are planning content on a monthly basis you’ll be able to look at the month ahead, review any key dates (whether for your business or in the world) and then start putting a plan together.

 

Now if it is October and you are a financial educator that wants to do a big focus on preparing to not overspend for Christmas then by planning for the whole month you can look at your banks of content that can be repurposed, decide which ones to repurpose and then add in other content around that.

 

To be clear at this stage you aren’t making all of your content a month in advance. The aim is to plan for the month so you have an outline of what you are posting on what channel and what the focus is.

 

Planning in this way will not enable you to maximise the amount of content you repurpose, but will also enable you to then approach your content creation process in a more efficient way.

 

Not currently planning your content in advance? To make the most of repurposing your content you need to start content planning. Download a free copy of my content marketing plan workbook by putting your details in the form below.

Step 3: Repurpose your social media content

To repurpose social media content you need to consider two things: the platform the content will be posted on and the world now. It will be easier for me to explain this with an example.

 

It might be that you have created content on Instagram for years and you want to repurpose your content. Now due to the changes on Instagram it could be that over the years the format of your content has changed. For example, you might not want to post a static graphic with a quote from 2020 on your feed today. However, the caption might still totally work so you decide to create a reel with the quote and use the same caption. This is an example of repurposing your social media content based on the platform and the time of posting.

 

When it comes to repurposing your social media content there are a few fairly standard ways to repurpose.

 

Option 1: Reuse your content in its entirety

The first way to repurpose social media content is to post exactly the same thing. You can do this either on the same social media platform or on another platform. For example, if you have created a photograph and caption post that is easy enough to repurpose across Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn. And if you have created a short-form video that is easy enough to repurpose across Facebook, Instagram and TikTok. I talk more about the process of repurposing short-form video here.

 

Now the thought of reposting the exact same content may seem like cheating, but if it worked well once why make life harder than it needs to be? The reality is only a small percentage of your followers will have seen your content the first time around and if you post it at least a month later they’ll have probably forgotten then saw the post anymore. And even if they remember seeing it, it reinforces that this is what you are an expert in, what your business helps with etc.

 

Option 2: Reuse the visual asset but change the caption

The second way to repurpose social media content is to post exactly the same visual (photograph, graphic, video etc), but change the caption. It might be that you have a photograph that you love or you created a video that took a while to edit so you want to really get the most out of it. In that case, you can look at changing the caption. Now you have the option of tweaking the original caption or completing starting from fresh.

 

This is a great approach to use when you are moving content across platforms. For example, if you have a short-form video that you originally posted on Instagram, Facebook or TikTok you might now be deciding to repurpose the video as a Pinterest Pin. The original caption might be too long for Pinterest but by changing the caption you can ensure the video has another life (and on Pinterest that life is much longer than on a social media platform).

 

Option 3: Reuse the caption but create a different visual (or have no visual)

The third way to repurpose social media content is to post the exact same caption, but use a different visual or have no visual (if you are on LinkedIn for example). This approach is great if you are a wordsmith, or you paid for someone to write some content for you, and you want to get the most out of the words. The fact is due to the scrolling nature of social media most people are more likely to have remembered seeing a photograph or video than what you actually wrote in a post. By creating a new visual for an old caption the reality is most people will think it is an entirely new post, but you’ve had to do significantly less work!

 

This is a great approach if you are redoing a launch and you had posts that performed well previously. You can freshen up the assets, but not have to write new copy. This is also a great approach if you have paid for a copywriter or ghostwriter and want to make those words work as hard as possible.

 

 

That’s it. You now know how to repurpose social media content.

 

The reality is repurposing social media content isn’t hard. In fact, it is easier than creating new content, but many business owners are stuck on the treadmill of constantly creating new content that they never think to repurpose.

 

The key is to build a process for your content repurposing. Be sure to be creating those two banks of content that can be repurposed and then ensure you review those banks when you are looking to create content for the next week, fortnight, or month.

 

There really is no need to constantly be creating new content and hopefully, now you feel better prepared to start regularly repurposing social media content.

 

Let me know in the comments what your biggest aha moment has been.

 

WANT TO RUN A THRIVING ONLINE BUSINESS I’m a Business and Marketing Strategist that specialises in supporting coaches, consultants and online service providers who are small in size, but big in ambition. I help my clients to strategically grow thriving online businesses without selling their soul or working themselves into the ground. To find out more about how we can work together check out my services here.   And to discuss your precise needs book a free, no-obligation, introduction call to discuss your business here.