The Ultimate Guide to Repurposing Content

Crafting stellar content is akin to laying down a killer solo track. But why settle for a one-hit wonder when you can create an entire album of chart-topping hits — all based on a single song?

Our guide to repurposing content can help you squeeze more juice out of the content you’ve already invested in, but with far less effort than it takes to whip up something fresh. That compelling blog post you wrote now doubles as an attention-grabbing video. The stats from a recent white paper you published find new life as a shareable infographic. A tutorial you invested tons of hours recording can be converted into an ebook your customers can turn to over and over again. See where we’re going with this?

All these iterations fall under content repurposing, which could be a key component of your content strategy. The benefits are simple and plenty:

• Save time on content creation
• Extend an asset’s shelf life
• Amplify the reach of high-performing content across channels
• Cater to the needs of different buyer personas
• Create, publish, and promote content consistently

Content repurposing isn’t as simple as copy-and-pasting your blog’s highlights to your social media. You don’t want your audience to feel like your content is repetitive across all channels, so you’ll need to get creative with your remixes and make sure you’re continuing to deliver value, regardless of the medium. Otherwise, it just feels like last night’s leftovers.

Here’s how to repurpose content in a way that feels fresh and engaging.

First, let’s start with when to repurpose content

Knowing when to repurpose content is as important as understanding ways to do so thoughtfully. Despite all the advantages to content repurposing, not every piece can be recycled and reused. It must serve a specific goal, channel, or audience — otherwise it just turns into digital clutter that detracts from your brand.

So, when should you try to drain every drop from your high-quality content?

1. Repurpose when your goals for the content have changed

Start by answering, “Why do I want to repurpose this content?” (Hint: “Because every marketing guru says so” is not always the right answer.)

Maybe you have a blog post written to bring in subscribers to your company’s newsletter. But you might be able to use the same content to nudge people to sign up for your online course. Repurposing content is the right choice here because your goals for the same piece of content have changed.

2. Repurpose content when the data says so

Review your analytics to see which posts are performing well. A few questions to consider asking:

• Does Google Analytics point to a handful of excellent blog posts driving maximum traffic to your site?
• Is there a YouTube video that garnered thousands of organic views?
• Did one of your white papers go viral or get backlinked by many notable websites?
• Which podcast episodes have the most downloads?

Think about how you can repackage these pieces to provide a fresh experience.

But there’s a caveat: You don’t want to target content that received many shares simply because the topic was trending at the time you created it. It may or may not be relevant today. However, if you have an old blog post focused on a topic that’s suddenly trending on TikTok, it might be prime time to repurpose that content into a short, punchy video that attracts a new audience. Timing is everything when it comes to using this strategy.

3. Repurpose content that’s evergreen

Focus on repurposing content that would be useful for months (if not years). For example, an educational video about how to interview your customers would be beneficial in the long term.

On the other hand, avoid repurposing content that has a short life. Anything too topical or newsy is unlikely to have the staying power to make it worth the effort of repurposing.

If you publish a blog post about a hot topic in the news, for instance, it will be old as early as tomorrow. It might get you many hits today, but repurposing it to an excellent LinkedIn post a week later might not get you the same results if you had posted about it in real-time. If you’re determined to repurpose content that’s newsy right now, do so as quickly as possible to capitalize on the interest before it dies down.

Note: A caveat to this is for short shelf-life content that you can make evergreen. Do you have content related to the pandemic that still has value and purpose today? If so, give it a quick edit to reframe the content. For example, a blog post you wrote about creative ways to spend time indoors during lockdown could be repurposed as an infographic about fun things to do inside on a rainy day, which could be useful forever.

On the other hand, if the content is an educational piece (like a how-to post), it’s a great candidate for repurposing. Think of a few different mediums and channels where every piece of long-form content could live and build that into your creation strategy before you begin execution.

How to repurpose blog content

Blog posts — whether 500 words or 5,000 words — can be repurposed into various formats.

1. Repurposing blog posts into video content

Video content brings in the biggest return on investment among all content formats, according to the latest State of Marketing report from HubSpot. It’s one of the smartest mediums to try if you want to repurpose blog content, and there are almost endless ways to do it. You could:

• Turn a how-to post into Loom videos on your website that demonstrate your product in action
• Create a TikTok or YouTube video highlighting key takeaways from your blog post
• Condense the main points of your blog post into a script for an animated video
• Interview a team member on camera for more information on what you covered in a blog

Then, add your video to your social media feeds and share snippets in your newsletters to reach a broad audience.

2. Repurposing blog posts into social media content

Wrote an in-depth listicle or did a deep dive into a how-to post? Repurpose it into an interesting thread on X or Reddit, or as a LinkedIn post or Instagram carousel.

Highlight the main sections, add enough context, and redirect readers to your blog if they want to read more. If your blog post is thoroughly exhaustive, you can even make multiple social media posts covering each pointer in detail.

3. Repurposing blog posts into ebooks

As you compile a wealth of blog posts on a single subject, you could repurpose that content into an ebook. Each blog post could serve as a chapter for an “ultimate guide” ebook on the topic. You could do it with as few as three in-depth blog posts, although more content could make your ebook more comprehensive.

Again, don’t simply copy-paste your blog posts and send a pretty PDF to your customers.

You have to form a coherent structure for your ebook and edit it to flow smoothly from one chapter to the next. It’s also important to modify your design — ebooks present the opportunity to frame your blog content in a different way by highlighting stats, adding more images, and visual data. You can even add more research or expert interviews to your ebook and create gated content for lead generation.

4. Repurposing blog posts into guest content

If one of your long-form content pieces is gaining tremendous traction, double down by repurposing it for another website that correlates with your niche. You could repurpose a checklist from a blog post into an infographic and republish it on a site that accepts guest posts. Or, you could even repost it as-is if it’s adding enough value for the new audience in its current form.

You build valuable backlinks (improving SEO) along with getting more mileage out of your content. The best part? You can now share the new format of your old blog post on social media as well — thoroughly squeezing the juice out of a single post.

How to repurpose long-form content

Long-form content like white papers and ebooks are your company’s greatest marketing assets — made with labor, time, and a ton of effort. There are plenty of ways you can repurpose it, but here are the top four:

1. Repurposing research into blog posts

Similar to how you can combine similar blog posts into an ebook, you can highlight the main findings from your research report in a blog post.

Influencer Marketing Hub follows this method every year when they release their benchmark report.

Want to take it up a notch? Create a blog series on the main results — diving deep into each subtopic of the white paper or ebook.

2. Repurposing long-form content into social media posts

White papers and ebooks are full of data-driven or expert-backed insights that make for shareable social media posts.

See how HubSpot repurposes content from their research report in an Instagram post.

3. Repurposing long-form content into video content

Share the key results of your white paper or ebook in a video format. Discuss every data point in-depth or share snippets of experts you’ve interviewed.

For example, Biteable repurposed content from their survey findings into a YouTube video.

4. Using long-form content in email campaigns

Want to nurture your email list? Repurpose your long-form content into exclusive snippets for your email subscribers.

Oliver Burkeman shared an excerpt from his book, Four Thousand Weeks, to highlight the pre-order offer to his newsletter subscribers.

You can also repurpose content from your white papers into an email course or email series — forming drip campaigns that automatically deliver each chapter or insight over a set number of days.

How to repurpose audio content

Audio content has huge reach. According to a recent study by The Infinite Dial, an estimated 218 million people listen to online audio content every month. Plus, audio content gives your audience another way to engage with your brand at times when they might not be in front of a screen, such as while they’re driving or going for a jog.

It makes a lot of sense to deliver fresh audio content people can listen to — and then repurpose that content into other formats. You can turn a podcast or even the audio from a video interview into new content for your blog or social media channels.

1.  Repurposing audio content into blog posts

When you repurpose content from your podcasts into blog posts, you not only get SEO benefits but also provide additional value to sponsors through another conversion-link-tracking opportunity.

But simply transcribing your podcast or writing show notes won’t cut it. Highlight the key takeaways, organize the content into different sections, and erase anything irrelevant.

The Freelance Writing Coach podcast creators turn each of their episodes into digestible blog posts. For example, they recorded an episode about building email lists and sending newsletters, and then they repurposed content from the recording into a post about whether or not freelance writers should create newsletters.

Not only can Contently help you create the podcast in the first place, we can help you convert that podcast into a blog post or blog series.

2. Reusing audio content in social media clips

Creating an animated video clip from your podcast is one of the easiest ways to repurpose podcast content for social media.

Terry O’Reilly, host of the Under The Influence podcast, regularly shares snippets of his podcasts on his X handle.

The best part? You can create these shareable clips in minutes using Audiogram.

One podcast episode can be a goldmine of social media content creation when done right. Justin Simon, a content marketing consultant, got three weeks of content out of one podcast episode in a few hours.

How to repurpose video content

Long-form video content is yet another goldmine that can keep your content engine from drying out. If your brand hosts webinars, publishes YouTube videos, or produces any other form of video content, here’s how you can repurpose it.

1. Repurposing video content into blog posts

I turned a webinar by Dennis Shiao into a blog post by organizing the content into different sub-sections, adding more context where relevant, and highlighting the key nuggets.

Whether it’s an expert interview, a video podcast, or a social media live Q&A — you can repurpose content from a video into a blog post.

2. Using video content for snackable social media clips

Short videos have boomed since TikTok. Seventy-three percent of consumers say they’d prefer to watch a short video to learn about a product or service, according to a study by Wyzowl.

And giving the customers the type of video content they want can pay off. HubSpot’s 2024 report found that short-form videos generated more return on investment than any other marketing trend, including influencer marketing and selling on social media apps.

What’s the easiest way to repurpose content from long videos into something more digestible? Trim your long-form videos down to snackable clips.

For example, Deian Isac, customer success manager at Service Provider Pro, repurposed his YouTube video into short LinkedIn snippets.

Use services like Milk Video to create these video snippets in the blink of an eye.

Repurposing content doesn’t mean reinventing the wheel

Creating a single piece of high-quality content requires a ton of effort and sometimes a lot of money. But repurposing content allows you to work smarter and not harder by making use of a single investment — wisely, of course. You always want to make sure the repurposed content adds just as much (if not more!) value than the piece that inspired it, so that may require a little finessing but much less work than creating something from scratch.

By making use of the repurposing methods highlighted in this guide to repurposing content, you can reach new audiences and grow your online presence without creating anything new. The best part? You also save on the time and money required to create a fresh piece. Win-win.

Ask a Content Strategist: FAQs about repurposing content

Q: Are there any potential drawbacks or risks associated with repurposing content?

While repurposing content offers a lot of benefits, there are drawbacks to consider. These may include the risk of content appearing repetitive if not properly adapted for different channels, diluting the original message or brand identity, and the challenge of maintaining quality across multiple iterations.

Q: How can I ensure that repurposed content remains relevant and valuable to my audience?

To ensure that repurposed content maintains its relevance and value, you have to understand your audience’s preferences and needs on each platform, tailor the content accordingly, and incorporate fresh insights or updates when possible. Regularly monitoring engagement metrics and soliciting feedback can also help gauge audience response and make necessary adjustments.

Q: Is there a risk of cannibalizing traffic or engagement by repurposing content across multiple channels?

While there is a potential risk if content is too similar across platforms, strategic repurposing can actually enhance overall engagement by reaching different segments of your audience and catering to their preferred formats or channels. The key is to offer complementary experiences rather than duplicative content.

Q: How can I repurpose content while maintaining consistency with my brand voice and messaging?

Establish clear guidelines for tone, style, and messaging across all channels. Ensure that repurposed content aligns with your brand values and key messaging points while also adapting to the nuances of each platform or format.

Q: Are there any legal or copyright considerations to keep in mind when repurposing content?

Yes, it’s essential to respect copyright laws and intellectual property rights when repurposing content. Make sure you have the necessary permissions to use any third-party material, such as images, quotes, or excerpts from other sources. Additionally, be aware of any licensing agreements or terms of use associated with the original content and ensure compliance when repurposing it.