Are You Using All the Leftovers of Your Content Feast?

This week, millions of American families will come together to enjoy a traditional Thanksgiving dinner — a holiday feast full of turkey and myriad supporting dishes. After gorging on the lavish banquet, we’ll store container upon container of leftovers in our refrigerators that will be eaten the rest of the week. Right?

Well, not exactly. Dana Gunders, Staff Scientist at the National Resources Defense Council, estimates that on Thanksgiving alone, Americans waste about 204 million pounds of turkey — that’s roughly $277 million worth of food thrown right in the garbage.* Talk about food for thought!

Of course, as a passionate content strategist, I can’t help but draw a parallel between these unsettling statistics and the 60% to 70% of content created by B2B marketing teams that is never used — a gross waste of content that translates into “tens of millions of dollars a year,” according to Marisa Kopec, VP and Group Director at SiriusDecisions.

Is all of this waste — be it food or content — inevitable? Of course not! Just as the Internet is full of recipes for leftover turkey, every piece of content in your library can be repurposed to serve up fresh content that satisfies buyers’ growing appetites.

Here are some holiday-themed ideas to help you maximize the value of your content investments:

  • Spice up your leftovers! By refreshing previously served content with current research, tips and best practices, you can infuse aging assets with new flavor and breathe fresh life into assets that would otherwise go unused. 
    • Chew on this! Consider which analysts, influencers and media outlets your buyers visit to gather information. Doing so will help you develop a hefty source list to find relevant research and information to update your content. You also can refresh assets with ease by finding updates to the studies featured in the original asset or adding more current statistics. As you update your content, remember to include links to relevant branded content that aligns with key topics or may interest your buyers.
  • Enjoy a week’s worth of turkey-inspired meals! Just as you might use leftover turkey in sandwiches, soups or salads for a week’s worth of meals, you can repurpose existing content in a variety of new formats.
    • Chew on this! One foundational piece of content, such as a white paper, can often generate at least 10 other types of content. For example, you can easily use information and insight from a single white paper to create videos illustrating key points, a blog post series featuring internal thought leaders, a “tips and tricks” email campaign, social media campaigns, a full-sized infographic, several “mini infographics” focusing on key data points, Brainshark presentations, webinars, online assessments and quizzes based on business challenges, and shorter text-based assets, such as checklists.
  • Invite friends over for made-to-order turkey sandwiches! In terms of content, odds are your business has a variety of buyers with different needs. Swap out statistics, headlines, calls-to-action and other elements to address individual industries or personas to reversion existing content (with or without cranberry sauce!) and make it more relevant to specific audiences. 
    • Chew on this! Similar messages delivered across multiple formats and channels can help you reinforce key buyer-focused themes without defaulting to monotonous and repetitive content.

No one likes to see things go to waste. By turning existing content into a variety of new formats and across delivery channels, your business can serve high-quality, buyer-focused content at a lower cost. What’s more, by refreshing, repurposing and reversioning your existing assets, you can satisfy buyers’ appetites, cater to their individual tastes and turn existing content into a bountiful harvest all year long.

*If you’re getting into the recycling spirit, visit Dana Gunders’ web site to learn more about how to reduce food waste this holiday season and throughout the year.


As VP of Client Strategy, Dana Harder helps B2B marketers turn their marketing organizations into demand-gen rock stars! That means helping Content4Demand clients build and refine their content strategy, all corresponding content and even their demand-gen efforts. And when content assets and campaigns don’t go as planned, she helps clients go back to the drawing board, identify what went wrong and how to get back on track. While she’s not helping her clients build a consistent and scalable content strategy, she’s doing yoga, meditating, dying her hair an awesome shade of pink or cheering her son on at the hockey rink. You can follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

 

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