Friday Deep Dives (Creating a Content Distribution Engine: The Power of Reshare, Repost, and Remix)

Welcome to Friday Deep Dives by Efikó,?a newsletter by Dozie Anyaegbunam, where an industry expert or I go all in on one question on content marketing from you all. I'm glad you're here.

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Hey folks, Ross Simmonds of Foundation Inc here. Thanks for having me on here, Dozie.

Create once. Distribute forever.

That’s the motto that every creator, brand, and marketer should embrace when it comes to their content but have unfortunately ignored.

If you have created a good piece of content over the last two months, two years even, you should share that content every other month to drive traffic & results.

Especially if that piece of content drove results in the past.

But most brands don’t think this way.

Let’s dive into what you need to understand before switching your strategy from a state of constant creation to one that embraces distribution.

Starting with Distribution

The first step on this journey is understanding why you should distribute content and where. You need to understand the channels your audience will be spending time on and ensure that these channels are right for you.?

There are a few things to consider:

Firstly, the engagement quality on each channel should be assessed- a simple 'like' on an Instagram post is far different from someone clicking 'buy now' on a guest post.

Secondly, an analysis should be carried out of the level of competition for each channel; if you can become an early adopter and gain a first-mover advantage, you have a much better chance of success.

It is also necessary to consider how much of an audience reach each channel offers; some will simply have more potential than others due to their size.

The barriers associated with using each channel must also be considered - what are the benefits and barriers of posting on LinkedIn vs. Twitter?

You have to figure this out for your industry and your niche. Then make a decision based on that.

Finally, the cost per result should not be forgotten; understand your acquisition costs per distribution channel and adjust accordingly.

To make sure you get accurate answers to these items…

Try leveraging social data tools like SparkToro or Audiense, search data from tools like STAT by Moz or Semrush, third-party research, and direct conversations with your customers.

Now, once you have done the research and understand where your audience is spending time, what they do on these channels, and what content is likely to resonate…

The next step is thinking about how you can use your existing content assets (and future) to win on these channels. Most people often think exclusively about creating new content.

This is a mistake!

To kickstart this process, you need to focus on three key concepts regarding content distribution – reshare, repost, or remix. This is what I call the 3 Rs.

The Key To Content Distribution Success

Essentially, once you press publish on a piece of content, there are three things you can do with it to drive optimal results:

1. Reshare the link
2. Repost elsewhere
3. And remix into something new.

Let’s look at each of these techniques.

Resharing is sharing the link to the piece of content on social channels & other owned channels that reach your audience – think Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or even including a link inside a question on Quora.

Reposting is when you take the asset in its entirety and post it on other channels – think a LinkedIn Article, Medium article, guest blog post, or Quora Article.

Remixing is when you take the asset you originally created and start turning it into assets that can live in new formats, new channels, and with new content – think turning a blog post into a YouTube video, a YouTube video into a podcast, or a podcast into an infographic.

By leveraging these three key concepts of resharing, reposting, and remixing, your content reaches more people and is shared more often.

This helps to ensure your content reaches the widest possible audience and has maximum impact.

Content distribution is an ongoing process.

And it involves understanding both the people you’re reaching out to and the channels they inhabit.

Investing in resharing, reposting, and remixing helps to create a content distribution engine where your content reaches more and more people with each passing day.

The key to effective content distribution lies in:

Finding the right balance between creating quality content & leveraging existing channels to share it — think social media, owned media & other influencer networks.

It’s also important to be mindful of how many times you’re actively promoting each piece of content — too much promotion can become annoying for your audience or seem spammy & may result in them tuning out your message altogether.

And that’s it, folks.

Please feel free to connect and ask Ross any questions you have on LinkedIn.

If you found it helpful, let me know in the comments or by email. If you have a question you would like me to explain in-depth, send it in. And even if I don’t have the answer, I’ll find someone who can answer it properly.

Thanks for reading to the end. You all make writing this newsletter worth the trouble.

Be good out there. If you can't be good, be careful.

Dozie.

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