As a runner, I can tell you that when you are first starting out as a beginner, things are difficult. Arms flail. Legs tend to wobble. Everything feels off balance. If you do it long enough though, your body starts to figure out ways to economize the motion. You run with deliberation, economizing every step and movement so that you can last longer.
Creating content is a lot like running. When you first start out, you think that each article should have a "home"; one place where someone can see it. As you begin to economize your motions, you start to realize that in order to work more deliberately, you can get much, much more mileage out of your work and as a result, have more chances to demonstrate the value of your brand.
In this article, I am going to give you 5 ways to take what you already have and make the most of it.
- Link to older, archived articles frequently- This is probably the easiest and most deliberate action you can take. For blogs, good articles can fall so far back that they are barely seen. By linking to the articles, you are giving your existing audience to see things on your website that could otherwise fall by the wayside. As a bonus point, it helps with SEO as well.
- Syndicate Full Articles- I used to worry about syndicating existing articles on my website to other websites. But then I started thinking. Isn't the article meant to be seen? By syndicating, you are giving the opportunity of others to recognize your work, building your name or business, and exposing your work to many who otherwise wouldn't know you exist. One caveat though- Wait until the article gets indexed by Google before you do this.
- If you can get permission, repost articles that you have written elsewhere- Likewise, if you are a regular guest poster, you can always ask for permission to repost your article (with a link) after a certain time frame. This is smart as well because your existing audience may not be aware of your articles and (as my philosophy goes) even if it's old, if you haven't seen it, it's new to you.
- Change the media form- Another no brainer here. If you write articles, turning them into podcasts (for people who like to listen rather than read), videos (for people who like to watch) or images (for people who want a summation) is a good alternative to creating something new. You can even build infographics for content that is robust or series based.
- Take what you have and turn it into a book or an app- You may not be aware of this but many webmasters who write books use their existing material to bulk up a book. Examples of this include Mark Sisson (recipes), Chuck Wendig (writing advice), and Brett and Kate McKay (a manual for men). The premise is the same; if you haven't seen it before, it is new to you. Likewise, you can also create an app, free or paid, of your website or some elements within your website. NomNomPaleo has one of the top selling Cooking apps at the Apple Store, much of which contains recipes that exist on her website.
What other things do you do to promote old content?