Efficiency pressures in content marketing. How to increase your reach and reduce costs with content repurposing

The possibilities in content marketing are becoming more and more extensive through the use of new tools and especially through AI, especially in 2023. However, the cost pressure is increasing and marketers still have to keep an eye on the balancing act between expenses and ROI. Content repurposing offers them the opportunity to prepare content in a cost-saving way and to achieve more reach. This article explains what content repurposing actually means and what needs to be taken into account.

How do I reach a broad target group with my content while at the same time using my marketing budget as efficiently as possible? Many marketers are faced with this question. After all, according to HubSpot’s Marketing Strategy & Trends Report 2023, 70 percent of respondents see securing the necessary budget as the biggest challenge, while 69 percent focus on expanding their reach through email marketing measures and social media.

However, producing and playing out the necessary content is expensive, so 6 out of 10 marketers distribute the same content unchanged on multiple platforms to achieve the necessary reach. However, this means that they are not exploiting the full potential of their existing content. The magic word here is content repurposing.

What needs to be considered in content repurposing

But what is meant by content repurposing? It’s a tool that takes content that has already been served through certain channels and uses it to create new content in different formats and for different platforms. Marketers can reduce their spend while producing high-quality, effective content. This strategy thus goes beyond simply updating articles (content remastering) or republishing old content (content republishing).

When preparing content, however, one should always consider the weighting and content orientation in the respective channels. While the company blog, for example, is well suited for content from the areas of “thought leadership” and customer loyalty, content from the area of “branding” should rather be placed on the social media channels. You can find more information about this in this article.

To make content repurposing successful, there are some basic rules to follow:

✏️ Adjust

Marketers should thoroughly review their content that they want to use for content repurposing.
Are adjustments necessary, is there new information, or does something need to be removed?

✏️ Combine

Combining different pieces of content is a better way to reach relevant audiences.
Can different posts be combined, even if they are thematically different?

✏️ Expand

Some content can be expanded into more in-depth articles.
Which content is suitable for this?

Turn long into short

Before repurposing content, marketers must conduct an audit to determine what content is available. This is followed by an initial assessment of the resources needed to process the content. Finally, target groups and corresponding channels must be analyzed in order to be able to play out content as efficiently as possible.

Specifically, long contributions, whether as video, podcast or text, are particularly suitable for content repurposing. For example, a long video can be split into several short videos and finally published as a mini-series on social media, or used as micro content in the form of memes, GIFs or snippets. Even without the moving images, the pure audio recording is suitable as a podcast episode. Intelligent tools can also be used to convert both videos and podcasts into text posts without having to go to great lengths to do so. Texts can also be used as the basis for podcasts or videos.

In addition, an AI can also help to shorten or slightly rewrite the content for the individual channels. However, it is important that the content fits into the theme house logic of the individual channels.

Feedback as a basis for target group-oriented content

After publication, it is important to analyze content and channels on the basis of engagement in the form of likes and comments and to optimize them if necessary. This content, which has been specially adapted to the target group on the basis of direct feedback, can then be republished as a new post, thereby increasing the reach on the one hand and also raising awareness of the original content on the other.

Source title image: Adobe Stock / Rawpixel.com.