We talk a lot about earned media over here, but owned media – content and media platforms that you create and control – is an equally important component of a well-rounded communications strategy.
The thought of having to add ‘consistent content generation’ to your list of to do’s, however, can be overwhelming. But it doesn’t have to be! You can generate a surprising amount of owned media by just by repurposing your existing content.
Read on for eight (relatively) simple ways to maximize the impact of each piece of content you generate, by repurposing it in different ways.
1. Generate content for your social media platforms.
Not only can – and should – you share your owned content across all social media platforms, but you can pull excerpts or quotes or ideas from a primary piece of content and turn those shorter tidbits into compelling social media posts.
For example, read through your latest blog post and look for bite-sized bits of wisdom that you can pull out of the blog post and turn into Tweets.
2. Use your existing content on a different medium.
Let’s say you’ve written a blog post about a particular topic. Take the information you share in that post to create a video on the same topic. If you podcast, develop a podcast episode around the subject, too. Send out an e-newsletter that teases your blog post and invites recipients to read more on your website. You get the idea.
The hard part of developing owned media is often thinking of a topic and putting together the relevant information in a cohesive manner. Once you’ve done that one time – in a blog post, for example – you can pull the information and tweak it as necessary to fit a range of different owned mediums.
3. Consider a media pitch.
Depending on the topic and substance of your content, consider whether or not it could be compelling to select media reporters. If so, use your existing content to draft up a media pitch for a targeted list of reporters.
4. Repurpose your existing content into a guest post
Countless online outlets and blogs are open to receiving guest posts by authoritative experts. With this knowledge, take a piece of your existing content and rewrite it. Or, if your content is a video or a podcast, turn it into a written piece. When you have a new piece based on your existing content, submit it as a guest post to a relevant outlet.
5. Design an e-book
Expand your existing content by turning it into an e-book. This takes a bit more effort than some of the other suggestions on this list, but it’s often worth the effort to take an existing article or video, break it up into sections (or chapters), fill out the information where necessary, add some images, and call it an e-book.
6. Update old, popular content.
Everything needs a refresher from time to time – including your owned media. Take a look at some of your more popular, evergreen content and think about which pieces could be updated in some way.
For example, let’s say you published a popular blog post last year on how to use social media for an e-commerce business. Now, think about where any of the lessons you learned about selling online during the COVID-19 pandemic could be incorporated to update the piece and make it more current, more informative, and more useful to your readership.
7. Create new content by developing round-ups of related content.
Look back through your existing content and group together pieces that address the same (or a similar) topic. Then, use those groupings to create new content in the form of round-ups, a longer-form guide, or even a full e-book.
8. Develop themed e-newsletters.
Similarly to the suggestion above, create a series of themed e-newsletters. Pull pieces of owned content that address the same or a similar topic, and use them to create an informative newsletter on that particular subject.
A great thing about owned media content is that you own it. Once you’ve worked hard to generate a piece of content, get creative about how to use or repurpose it. Each piece of content you create can be used in endless ways to reach different audiences on different mediums. The sky’s the limit!