4 Steps and 11 Ideas to Re-purpose Content for Inbound Marketing Success

I love Disney. My bet is just the name ‘Disney’ conjures up a positive image for you. Maybe it’s the Little Mermaid or Beauty and the Beast…or maybe you’re of the Pixar Toy Story / Finding Nemo generation. Perhaps the Disney name triggers a fond memory of family trip to one of their theme parks, Broadway shows, or touring Disney on Ice presentations.

What I admire most about Disney is their marketing savvy and their ability to consistently re-purpose their content properties. Say what you will, they know how to get the most out of a successful idea.

When a new ‘product’ becomes popular they do their best to make it ubiquitous throughout all their media channels.

Think of any successful Disney movie in the past 60+ years that wasn’t followed up with a toy, amusement park ride, home video, and plushy logo merchandise for you to take home as your very own. You see advertising for it on ABC, The Disney Channel, ABC Family, and Disney Radio.

As far back as the 1930s their ability to resell a strong property is what’s known as the ’Mickey Multiplier’ and it extremely positive effects for both their business and the economy at large.

My point?
When it comes to content and inbound marketing of any kind, we should all take a page out the Disney playbook and find ways to exploit our content across every available media channel.

Here are 4 steps and 11 ideas to re-purpose your content and increase the effectiveness of your inbound digital marketing campaign:

Step 1: Identify what content merits re-purposing

You’re looking for content that ‘has legs.’ Something that resonates with your visitors and with your product or service. Sometimes this may be a hot trend or spike in traffic attributable to a specific post. Other times, it may mean picking out an oldy but goody that continues to rank high among your most popular posts.

As always, Google Analytics can be a big help with identifying content opportunities. What posts yield the greatest total visits with a relatively low bounce rate and you’ve got some candidates for re-purpose-able content.

Step 2: Identify all of your media channels

Inbound marketing is about creating great content and then using that content to convert visitors into customers. How might potential customers come in contact with your message? Here are some ideas to extend your content marketing strategy beyond your blog.

1. Video Blog and summarize the content YouTube, Vimeo, Viddler , etc.
2. Create a screencast Tutorial using Camtasia
3. Create a Podcast of an interview with a subject matter expert and then distill it to a thorough blog post
4. Compile to common themed content into a downloadable e-Book
5. Distribute the e-Book through the Apple or Kindle Stores
6. Create a print version of the book using a self publishing service like Lulu or Amazon owned CreateSpace that your sales team can have as ‘leave behinds’.
7. Print versions also make great takeaways for retail locations that you can hand out at your check out counter
8. Create a press release announcing the launch of a print or e-Book.
9. Create an ‘infographic’ summarizing the key points of your previous material
10. Combine all the multimedia content together into an App distributable through iPhones, iPads, and Android compatible devices.
11. Create a webinar to share the material and invite interaction with live participants (and round and round you go).

And of course cross link this through all of your social media outlets using a tool like HootSuite. Your YouTube video should not only appear on YouTube but also on your FaceBook page. And your Twitter link should go reference back to the video , etc., etc., ad nauseum.

Step 3: Exploit the benefits of each channel for it’s unique value

Each media has its own unique strengths. Blog posts allow for thoughtful exploration of an idea. You can draw out a concept, provide links to support materials, and provide ample opportunities for the reader to delve as deep into a subject for as long as you can hold their interest. While audio and video allow you to be a bit more expressive and create an emotional connection to the material. Hearing the tone, the emphasis on key phrases in a presentation have a completely different effect than print on paper. Further, screencast tools allow you to show and tell your story.

Simply ‘porting’ a one-to-one version of the content does little to engender credibility or establish your company as a thought leader. The idea is to extend and expand on the topic and the unique perspective of the medium for all it’s worth.

The more you incorporate value into each channel the better shot you’ll have at getting users to cross over from passive reader to customer — this is what makes inbound marketing work.

Step 4: Ready your organization receive the inbound leads from each of the available channels

In developing your content marketing strategy, we start with the end in mind. And that means understanding how you plan to convert visitors into qualified sales leads. As you work to ‘extend and expand’ your content, don’t forget to have clear calls-to-action and references to your other media to keep the conversation going.

Encourage your sales and support staff to distribute your content. Have them hand out business cards with links to download the content, pass out free books, incorporate links within email signatures, use QR Codes at your retail locations to entice people for free downloads…anything which let’s people know you have information and are willing to share.

In the end, content marketing is about leveraging the brainpower of your organization. By applying a little creativity and forethought you can broaden the reach of that content and increase the return on investment for your inbound marketing efforts.