If you’ve ever struggled with continuing to create killer social media posts, then you’ll understand the value of repurposing content.
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Let’s be real … Agencies understand the struggle of content marketing better than anyone as they work day in and day out to generate engaging, high-converting ideas for multiple accounts for multiple clients.
Have you ever posted one of those amazing Facebook updates that had that indescribable quality that results in a surge of likes, comments, clicks, and shares, and then immediately wondered how to replicate that success with other content?
Or had a great idea and you don’t want to let it fade away after a single Tweet?
In this blog post, we’re going to dive deep into repurposing content on social media so that you can keep your calendars full, your excellent content cycling, and your audience engaged.
What Is “Repurposing Content”?
Repurposing content is the process of taking content you’ve already created and altering it so that you can reuse it again in another fashion.
Have an amazing Facebook post that got plenty of engagement—or that you were just really proud of?
Convert it into a long-form LinkedIn post, a YouTube video, or even an in-depth blog post.
Also, you can do a follow-up of that post with another Facebook post, turn it into a video for Facebook, or share more information relevant to the post.
Or you can repurpose content on the same platform, too.
A single great idea doesn’t have to end with a single post, and it shouldn’t. You can repurpose your social media content to keep your clients’ social calendars full, your audience engagement, and plenty of ideas on the drawing board.
Why Repurposing Content Is So Crucial for Agencies
For busy agencies and account managers, knowing how to repurpose content is a gamechanger.
This is particularly true when you’re reliant on a client to pass along information about brands, products, and services, and the flow of information or materials may be restricted.
If they give you a single group of photos, how can you repurpose them in enough ways to keep your calendar full without boring your audience?
Knowing how to do more with what you get can make a huge impact on the work you do (and your success rate).
Eight Strategies for Repurposing Content on Social Media
Seeing the appeal of rehashing existing content in addition to coming up with all the new stuff?
There are so many different options for how you can repurpose content. Let’s take a look at eight of them.
1. Adapt social content for cross-platform sharing
You can—and should—repurpose great content across multiple platforms.
Have a great blog post or video? Post it everywhere!
While you can post the same content on multiple platforms, you should customize it for each platform you’re repurposing content for.
Facebook posts should not have hashtags, for example. But tweets should have a few hashtags. Instagram posts should have a lot of hashtags.
You’ll also need to be more concise on Twitter, and have a more professional tone and probably longer content on LinkedIn.
Content going to Pinterest and Instagram should only utilize high-quality images.
An example of repurposing content on social
Here’s a great example from Stasher. First, we’ve got a Tweet about #WorldOceansDay. In the few characters, they have simply stated that a single bad prevents 260 single-use plastic bags from entering the ocean and waterways.
On Instagram, they used the same image to talk about World Oceans Day, but instead, they promoted a Live that they would be hosting on Instagram talking about the day with a science communicator and divemaster.
They took a single concept and image and repurposed it in several ways.
You can do the same.
2. Revamp high-performing posts
Repurposing social media content doesn’t mean copying and pasting great statuses into your scheduling tool (though, technically, you can do this).
Instead, update the content that worked so well when you share it again.
You’ll almost definitely get stronger results on your second campaign if you share a new version of the original content instead of an exact duplicate.
Examples of how you can do this include:
- Pull several different great single lines from blog posts, videos, or interviews that you’re sharing. Each time you share the content to social media, use a different quote as your tagline. A quote from a celebrity or influencer can be an outstanding soundbite that can help drive clicks across multiple posts even while you’re sharing a single resource.
- Compile user-generated content (UGC) or valuable resources shared on the platform into a single Twitter Moment that you then promote and send traffic to. By placing it in a new format and clustering it together, you can make it more powerful and impactful.
- Update older high-performing blog posts with new information, and announce the updates in your social media posts when you share them.
- Share your own Instagram posts in a Story to capture more attention and drive more engagement.
Here’s an example from A Future Without Breast Cancer. They compiled Tweets showcasing the success of their Run For the Cure event, including featuring pictures of participants.
Instead of having standalone tweets, they created a Moment to revamp the content and make it more impactful.
3. Reuse visuals in creative ways
There’s nothing wrong with repurposing images across platforms to get the most life out of them as possible.
However, you also can keep your feeds fresh without having to pester your clients for new visuals.
Let’s look at a simple example from Ben and Jerry’s. Below, they use the well-known picture of the brand’s founders overlaid onto a new background, and then they slap some graphics like birthday cakes and birthday hats onto the picture along with text overlay.
They’re using a familiar picture but using graphic design software (potentially like Snappa or Canva) to use and update an existing image. (Fun fact: Agorapulse has Canva integration!)
You can also take a collection of still video images and combine them into a comprehensive video with tools like Animoto to shake things up. You can use these videos in your Stories, in ads, or to promote testimonials, new products, or sales.
An example of what this might look like
4. Straight up repost at staggered posting times
The biggest reason to repurpose content is to get even more results on your best posts.
To fully maximize the visibility of your content, you should share repurposed posts at a different time of the day than their original posting times.
Know the best times to post on social
If you shared your original post on Facebook on a Monday afternoon, for example, reshare it on a Thursday at 6 A.M.
Agorapulse’s publishing tools will make this much easier.
You can schedule posts ahead of time with just a few clicks (including multiple postings of a single post). If necessary, you can check on the publication time of the original post.
This allows you to optimize your repurposed content for maximum visibility and engagement, helping you reach an audience that potentially hasn’t seen it yet.
You can even create custom messages for each social platform on one screen, and schedule it all at once.
5. Turn static posts into dynamic experiences
I know that you might be tired of hearing the words “dynamic” or “interactive” right now in the marketing world, but they are important.
To get your clients’ results (and results on your own accounts!), you need to determine what you can do to create community-based, interactive experiences that stop users from scrolling and get them talking to you.
Which would you remember more as a user? A post on Instagram that you maybe stop to read the caption of or a Live that you click after seeing a notification where the CEO of a small company answers a question you ask right then and there?
Remember that #WorldOceansDay in example one? They converted it into a Live video, which they then shared to IGTV.
Take posts that users seem interested in, and convert them into topics for Live videos, Watch Parties on Facebook, or Twitter Chats. These are interactive and often value-based. They can help you create a stronger community around your brand while you repurpose content.
6. Convert great concepts into social videos
Videos can be high-engaging and are outstanding on social media, particularly when they’re value-based resources.
The reality is that videos can also take time, money, and effort to create. So starting with a solid idea that has already performed well in a static post is a great way to generate ideas that can be repurposed into social media videos.
You know there’s a good chance they’ll do well!
StitchFix had an Instagram post that got plenty of engagement showcasing fall-inspired outfits and color combos to stock your closet with.
They also have a video titled “10 Fall Essentials to Stock Up On,” which has some topic overlap with the post above.
Taking an idea and running with it, adapting it to offer more value, information, or actionability is a great tactic when repurposing content in exciting ways.
7. Reshare or revamp great content with a timely spin
The first year, it may feel easy to come up with exciting content for a brand… and then you start to feel the writer’s block kick in.
The good news is that there are almost always timely, relevant events that can somehow impact your industry… Those give you new ways to repurpose content that has done well in the past in an interesting way.
We’ve all seen the “what are you doing over the summer” posts that most brands put out, for example.
Misfits Market, however, applied a twist to the standard format by bringing up the fact that the COVID-19 vaccines are rolling out, the world is opening up, and they want to know about summer and travel plans for their customers.
It was a smart way to ask about something customers are excited about (summer!) and to gain valuable information for their brand while adapting a standard post topic into something unique.
8. Create a series of posts from a single idea
You can theoretically repurpose content that you haven’t even published yet if you choose!
You can, for example, create a series of posts from a single idea, concept, topic, or resource. Those are almost more like intentional campaigns than standalone posts.
They can help get more eyes on a resource or topic you want to promote.
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The Predictive Index ran a report about remote work, and then shared key findings with graphics over a series of posts day after day on different platforms. This allowed each finding to get its own highlighted moment, but it also likely increased reach and overall interest since it was spread out over time.
There are plenty of ways to do this.
You can share one post a day featuring top submissions from an Instagram contest you ran, or run a campaign showing each of your new products when the new inventory arrives.
Get creative.
How to be creative when you don’t feel creative at all
What Content Should I Repurpose?
When you’re deciding what content you should repurpose, the low-hanging fruit is to repurpose your highest-performing posts.
You can find out which content has the best results on each platform through Agorapulse.
Through its reports section, you can see which posts got the most engagement and what types of engagement
You can use this information to find your strongest content for repurposing.
There are some exceptions to this. Timely content should not be repurposed.
For example, whether your Instagram post announced breaking news for your business or shared holiday discounts, it won’t be nearly as relevant the second time.
Focusing on useful, valuable evergreen content is the smart move when you want to repurpose social content. Examples include links to educational blog posts or video tutorials.
Final Thoughts
Repurposing your best social media content ensures that more people will see and interact with it. This can give your Pages and profiles a boost in any algorithms that factor in engagement.
By using Agorapulse to find, tweak, and schedule your highest-performing content, you’ll guarantee that your posts live up to their full potential.
Remember that with a little creativity and some time spent looking through your analytics, you can start repurposing content with great success no matter who your clients are.
Take control of your social media! Check out our free trial of Agorapulse to help you schedule, track, and measure all your social media efforts.
