Every piece of content you create is a way of connecting with your audience and can help your business flourish, which is why it’s such a fundamental part of what you do.
But whether you’re just starting or you’ve been in the business for years, we all reach a stage where we feel like we’ve got stuck in a content rut. Even if things are smooth sailing, it never hurts to experiment with new ways to boost your content strategy.
Boost Your Content Strategy Effortlessly
So why not give your boring content strategy an essential – and fun! – boost with these five tips? We’re sure they will provide you with the engagement and leads you want while helping you enjoy your content creation again.
1 | Give Your Old Blogs a Facelift
There are few things more motivating than trying to improve yourself. You know you’ve had some good ideas in the past, so why not revisit those old blog posts and give them a makeover? This is a fuss-free and effective way of boosting your content strategy. And who knows what inspiration you’ll find when you review some of your previous ideas?
There are lots of ways to give your old blogs a facelift. One of these borrows from a long-established practice in TV: spin-offs. Take an idea from an old post, then expand and develop it into fresh content. Alternatively, if you wrote something about a new enterprise, how about writing a follow-up to it reflecting on your progress? Both are great ways to create engagement and get traffic back to your blog.
Another fun idea is re-clothing an old blog, turning a text piece into a video, podcast, or photo story. Not everyone engages easily with written pieces, but if you transfer the ideas to a new medium, it will attract much more attention. It’s also interesting for you to develop your skills in a new area to boost your content strategy. If you’d like a simpler approach, why not reformat an old blog post with new images?
2 | Refresh Your Social Media Templates
Social media templates save you valuable time and effort; they help you organize your content and assess your current social media use. You might have been super-organized and created social media templates months in advance, but that was six months ago, so maybe it’s time to revisit them and inject some new ideas.
The first thing to do is to establish what you want to achieve with your social media content. This process alone is motivating, helping you take stock of your strategy. Look at your audit template to evaluate current trends in engagement; look back over your calendar templates to check whether you’ve got a range of content.
Then look forward. Add a topic column to your templates if you don’t already have one – this helps you narrow down your posts and saves you that panicky instant of trying to think of a new and exciting content idea on the spot. Color-code your posts by platform so you can see at a glance that you’ve got a good variety.
Don’t be afraid to change these as you go along, though – remember, social media templates help you organize your content strategy, but they’re not set in stone, and if you think of a new idea, you don’t need to wait to post it. Planning is important to boost your content strategy, but so is spontaneity.
3 | Collaborate with Industry pros
Sometimes two (or more) heads are better than one. That second head is ideally a professional who’s been working in the industry for years and can give you valuable insight and great new resources. Collaborating with an industry pro also instantly multiplies your potential audience; any completed work will be read by their readership and your own, making it a powerful tool for gaining shares and links.
So what form could this collaboration take? Some fun ways of working with others are interviews and podcasts. An interview with a pro shares their experience with your audience and encourages people to engage with your content further. A podcast offers a different slant, is more laid-back than formal interviews, and can be regularly released.
You could also partner with an industry pro or brand to write more in-depth case studies. This gets them – and you – more exposure with the opportunity to produce content that’s different from the norm. Collaboration generates fresh ideas and a different perspective, and it’s fun to bounce ideas off someone else!
4 | Snap Some New Branded Photography
One of the first things followers notice about your content is the aesthetics; they’re a way of creating a cohesive brand – so it’s always worth reviewing. If even you are getting tired of your content strategy, one way of adding some pep is to shoot some new branded photography.
Your branded photos are a big aspect of the visuals that represent your brand; they should reflect your values, your mission, your overall aesthetic, and of course, share your personality. Getting some new branded photography pushes you to think about your brand and re-determine your goals to boost your content strategy.
Before the shoot, take some time to make a list of your current objectives and think about what you’re doing at the moment that you’re excited about and want to share. Seek inspiration from brands that you admire: what’s their content like? How is their message communicated through their photography? Make a mood board for your shoot and find a photographer you trust. Then, enjoy it! It’s always fun to be creative and reaffirm why you do what you do!
5 | Livin’ Up Your Overall Approach
Remember, your audiences engage with content the creator has engaged with, so have fun with your content. Try new approaches; if you usually create blog posts, work on some vlogs; if you are into photo-based posts, think about collaborating on a podcast. If you liven up your overall attitude to content strategy rather than treat it as another box to be ticked, you’ll be amazed at the positive reception!
Now it’s your turn to go out and boost your content strategy today. It doesn’t have to be rocket science, but it does have to make sense of your overall marketing goals. Need more tips? Subscribe to our newsletter below for more!