You’ve got a video series for your business, so you’re already way ahead of the curve. Episodic marketing is just beginning to make an impact and the earlier you start the better positioned you’ll be to benefit. But to be frank, if you’re not also repurposing your episodes into microcontent, you’re missing out on a ton of extra value your video series could be bringing to your business.

Fortunately, we’re here with a complete guide to exactly what you need to do. We’ll break down all the steps involved in repurposing video content and how they can let you do more for your business.

1. Consider your use case

Just like with anything you do for your business, you need to begin with a goal in mind. Episodic marketing and video repurposing can be used for:

• Building brand awareness
• Building brand loyalty
• Social selling
• Customer retention
• Customer education
• Talent acquisition

That’s only naming a few more common use cases. Consider what else an engaged audience enjoying your content could be used for.

Once you’ve got a clear idea of which use cases make the most sense for you, it’s time to think about creating content that’s ready to be repurposed.

2. Start with something substantial

The more substantial the content you start with, the more options you have for repurposing it. This is because each piece of microcontent that you create should be based around something interesting or engaging. If each episode of your video series covers a lot of ground and possibly includes a few different formats within it, you have plenty of options for creating smaller videos, images, articles, memes, etc. based on it.

Substantial also means it should have a decent length. 15 minutes of content isn’t going to give you many options. A business video series episode should ideally be more like 30-60 minutes to make it well-suited for repurposing.

3. Choose the right platforms and formats

Now that you know your use case and you’re creating substantial enough episodes for content repurposing, you need to choose your platforms and formats. The main rule for both is that more is better. 

The more platforms and formats you’re working with the faster you’re able to learn what works and derive crucial insights from your audience. That said, you also need to be realistic about what you can do with your resources.

Formats

You’ve got a lot of options for formats you can use to create microcontent:

• Blog posts
• Videos
• Audio clips
• An audio podcast version
• Images
• Charts

Beyond these formats, you’ll have variations of each based on the channel you’re using to promote them. For example, a video made for YouTube will be different than one made for Facebook. Choosing the format you want to work with will largely depend on the channels you want to focus on.

Channels

Again, you have a lot of options here. Some of the most popular channels for promoting repurposed content are:

• YouTube
• Facebook
• Instagram
• IGTV
• LinkedIn
• Pinterest
• Twitter

Think about where your audience is, but also don’t be afraid to try a less common channel. You may be surprised to see where you can build an audience if you tailor your microcontent well for each platform. For example, Pinterest isn’t as commonly used but if you can create compelling images that resonate with the largely female audience on that platform, you can get fantastic results.

Also remember that you can always add or remove channels as you go. The idea is to lean, iterate, and pivot. So, don’t worry about needing a complete strategy from day 1.

4. Create microcontent you think will resonate

Once you’ve chosen the formats and channels you want to create microcontent for, it’s time to create it. Start by going through the original episode and look for moments that you think will resonate with one or more of your audiences. 

Once you’ve found these moments, consider what type of content you can create around them. For example, a guest might have mentioned a fascinating statistic. This can be tuned into a chart, a picture of the guest with the statistic as a quote next to it, a short video of the moment, or even a blog post about it. Right there you can create 4 or more pieces of content based around that single moment.

Go through and find as many moments as you can, create the content, and distribute it on the channels you’ve chosen. Then, it’s time to learn.

5. Test that microcontent

Microcontent is about much more than promotion, it’s about learning. Frame each piece of microcontent like it’s an experiment complete with its own hypothesis. You’re testing whether something resonates with an audience. Start with objective criteria for defining success to avoid falling prey to your biases.

Asking for help from your audience

This testing shouldn’t be purely passive. GaryVee advocates asking your audience which moments resonated with them in the original video episode (and to please include the timestamp!). This sets you up for the next step.

6. Create a second round of microcontent

After you’ve put out your first batch of microcontent and gotten feedback from your audience, creating a second round allows you to further hone in on your learnings.

For example, let’s say a short video on YouTube about a story your guest told got some excellent engagement. Maybe the success of that content was about the story itself, or maybe it was about a specific audience. Now try uploading that video onto IGTV to see if it gets similar engagement. The differences will give you valuable insights into your audience.

7. Incorporate your learnings into your next video

Now that you’ve got all of these learnings, it’s time to use them. Besides finding uses in your business’ wide marketing efforts, you need to incorporate them into your future episodes. Use some kind of a document to keep track of everything you’re learning and consider how these lessons can make your next episode better.

Then, once you’ve put out that episode, ask yourself whether your initial hypothesis was correct. You can also test that with your next batch of microcontent.

Get expert advice

This whole process has a lot of art and plenty of science in it. That’s why experience helps so much in knowing what moments should be repurposed and how to test them. If you’d like some help in doing that or even in getting your show off the ground, let’s talk.